McCain Snuggles Deeper into Falwell's Pockes

John McCain continues to cozy up to the Fundamentalist Far Right, hoping that this group can make him president just like they did George W. Bush.

McCain will give the Commencement Message at Liberty University in May, where he will share top billing with Gary Bauer, founder of the Campaign for Working Families (CWF) a political action committee (PAC) “dedicated to electing pro-family, pro-life and pro-free enterprise candidates to federal and state offices.” CWF (www.cwfpac.com) has become on the largest PACs in Washington D.C., and Bauer has been waging a war on what he calls the “Tyranny of the Courts”, meaning that courts who uphold women’s rights, or privacy rights of homosexuals, or that “forbid the execution of convicted killers who were under the age of eighteen” are somehow “stripping power from the states,” and that the “only solution is a major change in who sits on the courts.”

While McCain may not share Bauer’s political or religious views or the views of Liberty University Chancellor Jerry Falwell, he certainly is attracted by the millions of dollars raised by CWF and other organizations, like the Family Research Council, associated with the university.

Even the Liberty University Public Relations Office admits that McCain has not always gotten along with the Fundamentalists:
“While Sen. McCain and Liberty University Chancellor Jerry Falwell have had their share of political differences through the years, the two men share a common respect for each other and have become good friends in their efforts to preserve what they see as common values. This will mark his first ever appearance at Liberty University.”

Instead of pandering to Fundamentalist extremists who what to legislate away the Human Rights guaranteed all of us in the Constitution, John McCain should be fighting to protect those Human Rights. Jerry Falwell and Gary Bauer have the right as individuals to believe whatever they wish, but they do not have the right to force their beliefs onto others.

With Hillary Clinton making issues like flag burning a large part of her campaign, and John McCain blatantly courting the religious right, the 2008 Presidential Campaign shows unsettling signs of being a race for the votes of a vocal minority on the far right.

Here is a naïve idea: why don’t we find some candidates who actually care about the Constitution and Human Rights and want to defend them from bigots and extremists?