Author and educator Peter S. Drucker wrote, "When a subject becomes totally obsolete, we make it a required course." Congress takes the inanity a step further. When a subject becomes totally obsolete, they make a law.
The U.S. Senate is preparing to vote any day on S. 909, a "hate crimes" bill that would grant special preferred government status to a select few citizens based on the behaviorally driven, fluid and undefined concepts of "sexual orientation" and "gender identity," while expressly excluding other citizens.
When the House version of the bill, H.R. 1913, was being considered, Rep. Louie Gohmert, Texas Republican, and Rep. Steve King, Iowa Republican, attempted to curtail its inherently discriminatory nature and make it more inclusive by offering an amendment to add other identifiable groups such as veterans, the elderly and the homeless. The bill's sponsors inexplicably shot them down without explanation.
This underscores the fact that all hate-crimes laws, both state and federal, inarguably advance "unequal" protection of the laws. This flies in the face of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle - in Washington and around the country - should not only reject S. 909, but should also begin working toward repeal of all state and federal hate-crimes laws.
All violent crimes are "hate crimes." Ever known anyone cracked upside the head in love? There may have been a time when hate-crimes laws were temporarily necessary, but that time has come and gone. When the 1968 federal hate-crimes bill passed, there were multiple and verifiable cases of local prosecutors refusing to indict whites for violent crimes committed against blacks. This was the justification for the law at the time.
We've moved well beyond those days, and FBI statistics bear out that reality. In today's America, every citizen, without fail, is both guaranteed and granted equal protection of the law regardless of race, religion, gender, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, dominant hand, favorite color or "American Idol" pick. This renders all extraneous hate-crimes laws woefully obsolete and fatally discriminatory.
Consider that according to the latest FBI statistics, out of 1.4 million violent crimes in 2007; there were a mere 247 cases of aggravated assault (including five deaths) reportedly motivated by the victim's sexual orientation or gender identity. There is zero evidence to suggest that, where appropriate, perpetrators were not prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law in every instance.
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