Political moderates are interesting creatures. They like to stake out a position between the extremes so that they appear reasonable. It bugs me because in this day, when our freedoms are under serious assault, we need people of conviction and courage, not moderates like Senator Worsley, whom I’m embarrassed to say is my state senator.
So Senator Worsley started out as a co-sponsor of SB1062. I read the bill. It’s a very reasonable bill, if you believe in religious liberty. It states that, in Arizona, a person can use his religious convictions as a defense in a lawsuit.
Enter the gay rights activists, who seem intent on pressing a relentless assault on religion. To them, my religious liberty makes them feel uncomfortable, because that means I believe in traditional marriage, a belief which they want to wipe out (see my earlier comments on their “wipe out homophobia” battle cry). They charge that this law could be used as justification for some people refusing service to people because they are gay. This argument begins to be picked up by the establishment media, to the point where some of them are calling it the “refusal of service to gays” bill.
So Senator Worsley, rather than stand up and accurately say, “No, this bill does not say that,” heads for the tall grass, turning on his colleague, Senator Steve Yarbrough, the bill’s sponsor. I would have more respect for him if he simply disagreed with the bill. But to agree with it to the point of being a co-sponsor and then fold under pressure, that’s poor. And it’s not just Senator Yarbrough that he has left hanging out to dry – he has left our religious liberty in Arizona now in a very precarious situation. It is now officially legal in Arizona for the government or another private party to force you to act contrary to your religious beliefs. And this assault on religion in the name of gay rights will only get more intense with the passage of time. Be advised, people – it’s going to get very uncomfortable to be a committed, practicing Christian in the United States in coming years.
And while I don’t agree with Governor Brewer vetoing the bill, I understand why she felt she had to, especially after the desertions by Senator Worsley and other moderate Republicans. And it’s no surprise, after seeing what she did in pushing Medicaid expansion over the objections of most of the Republicans in the legislature (my dear Senator Worsley excepted).
It was nice to see that most of the Republican senators who voted for the bill held firm in the face of public outcry. But I’ve come to expect this lack of principle from Senator Worsley. I’m encountering the same thing in his failure to stand up for the Article V Convention bill, which is calling for a convention of the states to amend the US Constitution to try to rein in the federal government. While both of my representatives, Justin Pierce and Justin Olson, are working for the passage of this bill, I have yet to receive a response from Senator Worsley, even after e-mailing him four times. He has responded to two of the e-mails, but has ignored my question about whether or not he supports the bill.
Links: Wikipedia article explaining the contents of SB1062.
Article from the Christian Post explaining that SB1062 does not give businesses license to discriminate against gays.
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