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A round-up of recent religion and media stories in the news. Continue Reading →
Tag: iowa
I'm Not Religious, I Just Love Meditation
Amy Levin: While the image of Oprah endorsing transcendental meditation is about as banal as a priest offering the sacrament, the Queen of the New-Age spiritual marketplace has sold spirituality to those in her pews again. Oprah’s bricolage-like church offered this week’s sermon via her show Next Chapter on the OWN network: transcendental meditation is awesome, readily available for consumption, and so culturally adaptable that even a city in the middle of corn country is bursting with enlightenment.
I’m Not Religious, I Just Love Meditation
Amy Levin: While the image of Oprah endorsing transcendental meditation is about as banal as a priest offering the sacrament, the Queen of the New-Age spiritual marketplace has sold spirituality to those in her pews again. Oprah’s bricolage-like church offered this week’s sermon via her show Next Chapter on the OWN network: transcendental meditation is awesome, readily available for consumption, and so culturally adaptable that even a city in the middle of corn country is bursting with enlightenment.
Searching Herman Cain's Soul. In Iowa.
By Andy Kopsa
Standing before a crowd of reporters at the Friar’s Club in New York, Sharon Bialek told her story. With her lawyer Gloria Allred at her side, Bialek painted a picture of an unwanted sexual encounter in a parked car in Washington DC: what she was wearing – pleated skirt, suit jacket; a pleasurable dinner and cocktails; and to her surprise, an upgrade to a suite at her hotel, courtesy of her host for the evening, Herman Cain.
Bialek shockingly revealed that Cain “reached for my genitals” and then pulled her head toward his crotch. She resisted and asked, “What are you doing you know I have a boyfriend?” Cain’s reply was simply, ‘You want a job, right?’
For a man who has likened himself to Moses, claims God* told him to run for presidency and is a registered minister at Antioch Church in Atlanta, these charges should be troubling. Instead Cain’s personal response has been indignant, his campaign’s ham-handed and somewhat juvenile. Cain’s lawyer recently cautioned that women considering going public with claims of harassment by Cain should “think twice,” a threat like that of a playground bully.
What Bialek has described is sexual assault. While sexual harassment is serious, sexual assault is, criminally speaking, a whole other level. In Washington DC, where the alleged Bialek – Cain incident occurred, a misdemeanor sexual abuse charge carries a $1000 fine plus up to 180 days in jail. If a case reaches into 3rd or 4th degree assault territory fines can reach $100,000 and jail time soars to 10 years in prison. Continue Reading →
Searching Herman Cain’s Soul. In Iowa.
By Andy Kopsa
Standing before a crowd of reporters at the Friar’s Club in New York, Sharon Bialek told her story. With her lawyer Gloria Allred at her side, Bialek painted a picture of an unwanted sexual encounter in a parked car in Washington DC: what she was wearing – pleated skirt, suit jacket; a pleasurable dinner and cocktails; and to her surprise, an upgrade to a suite at her hotel, courtesy of her host for the evening, Herman Cain.
Bialek shockingly revealed that Cain “reached for my genitals” and then pulled her head toward his crotch. She resisted and asked, “What are you doing you know I have a boyfriend?” Cain’s reply was simply, ‘You want a job, right?’
For a man who has likened himself to Moses, claims God* told him to run for presidency and is a registered minister at Antioch Church in Atlanta, these charges should be troubling. Instead Cain’s personal response has been indignant, his campaign’s ham-handed and somewhat juvenile. Cain’s lawyer recently cautioned that women considering going public with claims of harassment by Cain should “think twice,” a threat like that of a playground bully.
What Bialek has described is sexual assault. While sexual harassment is serious, sexual assault is, criminally speaking, a whole other level. In Washington DC, where the alleged Bialek – Cain incident occurred, a misdemeanor sexual abuse charge carries a $1000 fine plus up to 180 days in jail. If a case reaches into 3rd or 4th degree assault territory fines can reach $100,000 and jail time soars to 10 years in prison. Continue Reading →
As Goes Iowa:The Family Leader, Religious Politics and 2012
by Andy Kopsa
America’s culture wars are at full throttle: defunding Planned Parenthood, chipping away at a woman’s right to an abortion – and if possible taking away that right altogether, preventing or ending gay marriage (because it could lead to Sharia law), enacting Religious Freedom Restoration Acts to “restore religious liberty” that was never lost. State after state after state serves as a front on which the Christian Right and their willing Republican legislators wage these wars. Iowa is a perfect microcosm, an example of the powerful Christian Political Action Committees (PACs) leading the effort. Iowa’s powerful and successful The Family Leader is a model to which all others can be held.
The Iowa Family Policy Center (IFPC), which recently changed its name to The Family Leader*, is the most vocal and political anti-gay organization in Iowa. As a federally funded chapter of the Family Research Council (FRC), IFPC railed against gay marriage leading up to the 2009 Iowa Supreme Court decision granting marriage equality for same sex couples. They started the “LUV Iowa” (Let Us Vote) Campaign to bring a Proposition 8-like ballot initiative to the state. They sent lobbyists to the state capital and held ‘pro-family’ rallies. Continue Reading →
A "Kook, Weirdo, Nutjob, Whacko" Gets His Gun
A Sioux City, Iowa man was denied a gun license by Sheriff Douglas Weber because, said the sheriff, Paul Dorr’s gun ownership was a “concern for the public. Don’t trust him.” Dorr and his son Alexander have been long known in their community for frequent political activities including distribution of leaflets, protesting, and letter writing to the local newspaper editor. Local residents have reported the two Dorrs as a nuisance. Dorr took his case to court and last week Judge Mark Bennett, considered an outspoken critic of conservative judicial activism, ordered Weber to issue the license to Dorr and to attend classes on the constitution. Continue Reading →
A “Kook, Weirdo, Nutjob, Whacko” Gets His Gun
A Sioux City, Iowa man was denied a gun license by Sheriff Douglas Weber because, said the sheriff, Paul Dorr’s gun ownership was a “concern for the public. Don’t trust him.” Dorr and his son Alexander have been long known in their community for frequent political activities including distribution of leaflets, protesting, and letter writing to the local newspaper editor. Local residents have reported the two Dorrs as a nuisance. Dorr took his case to court and last week Judge Mark Bennett, considered an outspoken critic of conservative judicial activism, ordered Weber to issue the license to Dorr and to attend classes on the constitution. Continue Reading →
Gays Get One Tent
Mary Valle:
O. Kay Henderson at Radio Iowa reports that a gay-marriage opposing state senator Merlin Bartz wants to stop more-inclusive “spouse” language in the Department of Natural Resources‘ rules. Family and non-family rates are the same, but families are allowed to set up more than one tent on the same site. Senator Bartz, if you really are opposed to same-sex parents, wouldn’t you want them in another tent for all the unBiblical homosexing I’m sure you imagine they’d be doing in front of the kids? Or, what if they’re just platonic homosexual liberals who allow their teenager to bring along their same-sex/other sex “friend?” Maybe different tents would be a good idea? Cramming all the members of a family into one tent, no matter what their orientation, seems like the far pervier option.