NCGA: Religious Freedom cojones-check time. (McCrory? Nope. Forest? Yep. Moore? No. Berger? Um, May-be.) | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's note: Brant Clifton uses the words of others, in part, to keep a close inspection of the NC General Assembly in his "bare knuckles" Conservative online publication known as The Daily Haymaker.

    The drive-by media are becoming quite proficient at fake news. They've created crises out of thin air in Ferguson, Missouri; the George Zimmerman-Trayvon Martin case in Florida; the so-called loose cigarettes chokehold case in Staten Island, NY; the police van death recently in Baltimore; the Duke University "noose" case and - let's not forget - the lacrosse "rape" case; and in Indiana and Arkansas over religious freedom legislation passed by each state's legislature.

    North Carolina has a religious freedom protection bill in the legislative hopper. Apparently, our political "leaders" have been watching the fake news being generated from Indiana and have decided they want none of it. Gov. Pat McCrory says he doesn't see a need for protecting religigrow a pairous freedom. House Speaker Tim Moore echoed that sentiment, and went as far as trumpeting the fact that the bill will not even get discussed during the current session. Senate President Phil Berger put out a squishy statement suggesting that he wants something watered-down and right-down-the-middle, and didn't even know if the Senate would even talk about it.

    Now, we get to Lt. Governor Dan Forest. Forest has been way too quiet for our tastes for the last couple of years. But he has now stepped out - with 27 religious leaders - issuing a letter calling for passage of a Religious Freedom Restoration Act in North Carolina. Here is the text of the letter:

    We respectfully write to request your support for the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). RFRA is about preserving freedom, fairness, equality, tolerance, and diversity in our great State. As a bedrock principle, enshrined in the Constitution of the United States, religious freedom is of paramount importance.

    However, current discussions about protecting religious freedom have become regrettably clouded. Accusatory language, claiming that protecting religious freedom somehow promotes intolerance, ironically seeks to impose on people of good faith practices which are anything but tolerant. We call all people of goodwill to promote consistently the inherent dignity of every human person.

    We support assurances that the birthright of every person to religious freedom be available to each North Carolinian, as our State is in the minority in our country where people of religious faith are not given fundamental legal protection. Twenty eight other states have RFRA legislation, or RFRA-like protections provided by court decisions, which have helped:

    A church from being discriminated against by the government when it was denied equal access to public school facilities for services and charitable efforts.

    A Native American kindergartner who was told to cut his hair to comply with a school grooming policy.

    A ministry from being prohibited by the city from distributing free food to the homeless in the same park that the city permitted the outdoor sale of food.

    Some have claimed that RFRA allows business owners to deny service based solely on an identifying characteristic, such as sexual orientation. If this were true, we would not support this legislation. In the 22 years that RFRA laws have existed in our country, there has not been a single case where RFRA has been used successfully to defend such an action.

    What RFRA in fact provides is a legal framework to address disputes that arise, thus ensuring that religious organizations and individuals can have equal rights and protections. As such, RFRA may protect people from speaking certain messages or participating in events if doing so would violate their religious convictions or conscience. RFRA simply provides the necessary legal test so that both sides of any given dispute can be properly considered-giving everyone a fair day in court. We ask that you support RFRA because it best serves the people of our State by extending the tolerance and legal protections that reflect the rights and freedom on which our great State and nation were founded. [...]

    Let's not forget the florist in Washington State who is being hounded out of business by bureaucrats and The Gaystapo for refusing to supply flowers for a gay wedding. (Could they truly NOT find a gay florist in that entire state?)

    Let's also not forget the bakery in Oregon hit with a $135,000 judgement for refusing to supply a cake to a gay wedding.

    There is no angry mob out there waiting to yank their businesses from North Carolina or vote everyone out of office for backing RFRA. The leaders of these large corporations are speaking up due to their vulnerability. (The gaystapo has a lot of friends among the regulators in the Obama administration.) Many of these corporate leaders spouting the gay rights line have NO PROBLEM doing business in foreign countries that routinely harrass, oppress, torture, and execute gays.

    It's time to call on our "leaders" in Raleigh to take a break from shaking down lobbyists and actually DO SOMETHING meaningful and important.