John Edwards' old campaign manager, Josh Stein, is the current North Carolina Senator in District 16. He's also among the most extreme and dangerous politicians in the state. Among the reasons he is dangerous are a) his assertion that killing unborn children is a fundamental constitutional right and b) his suggestion that Senate Republicans are more dangerous than Islamic extremists.
It is bad enough that this former disciple of John Edwards is serving in our state senate. To make matters worse, he also wants to be the next attorney general of the Tar Heel State. If you aren't concerned about that then take the time to familiarize yourself with what Stein had to say about anti-Sharia and anti-abortion legislation that was previously proposed in the North Carolina legislature.
According to a far left website, ForwardProgressives.com, which reports favorably on Stein, he said in part, “We had this anti-Sharia bill on the calendar this morning. It was a one or two page bill. Then that meeting gets canceled. Alright, fine. Then we get notice immediately before, that bill’s coming back up. We’ve seen that bill before, we’re ready to go in there and debate it. We go in there and (now) it has five or six new provisions on abortion. What is the relationship between Sharia law and abortion?"
Before Senator Stein answers that question for us, let us make sure that we understand what he is implying. With a straight face, Stein is suggesting that those who would ban Sharia law and then try to restrict abortion are hypocrites. Why? It's simple, at least in the mind of Josh Stein: Muslim extremists support Sharia and support banning abortion. So, again, in the mind of Josh Stein, when Republicans try to ban Sharia law they undo their actions by also restricting abortions. Why? Because restricting abortion is really the same thing as imposing Sharia law.
This is the reasoning of John Stein, and this is the man who wants to be North Carolina's attorney general. Let us continue with Stein's own words:
"The irony is, if you look at the anti-Sharia law provision, what it says is, 'The general assembly hereby declares it to be the public policy of this state to protect its citizens from the application of law that would result in the violation of the fundamental Constitutional rights of a natural person.' That’s rich… The reason I am opposing this legislation is because its intent is to eliminate a woman’s Constitutional right to have access to healthcare procedures for her pregnancy.”
It is important to note that, "healthcare procedures for her pregnancy" is a reference to only one procedure: dismembering an unborn child in the womb. The so-called right of a mother to dismember her child is the only "fundamental Constitution right of a natural person" to which he refers.
If you disagree with Stein and assert the fundamental right of the unborn to be free from dismemberment then you're simply trying to impose Sharia law. Trying to reason with Stein and trying to point out his smug hypocrisy will only earn you an adolescent comeback like "that's rich."
Of course, in reality, there is nothing rich about Josh Stein's moral reasoning. It is sheer moral bankruptcy. This bankruptcy is most evident when he tries to compare Republican Senators to Islamic extremists. Here are his own words:
“We don’t have anything to fear from the Sharia types, what we have to fear is from the North Carolina General Assembly Republican Senate impinging on people’s fundamental Constitutional rights.”
The people of North Carolina need to be concerned about the fact that far left publications consider Josh Stein to be a political hero. But they should be far more concerned that Stein takes far left publications into senate meetings and uses these extreme news sources in his questioning of fellow senators and committee members.
Just last week, Josh Stein entered a senate commerce committee meeting armed with an article published in the far left Indy Weekly. The bizarre article makes a series of accusations against Charlton Allen who was recently appointed to the North Carolina Industrial Commission.
One of the truly paranoid and bizarre claims in the Indy Weekly article involves accusations of anti-Semitism. Specifically, Allen is accused of anti-Semitism for running an article almost twenty years ago in a college newspaper in which he criticized a student government association (SGA) presidential candidate, Aaron Nelson. Allen was critical of Nelson for opposing funding for Christian and Muslim groups at UNC. Part of Allen's criticism of Nelson's candidacy included publishing a caricature of him with a pitchfork and sporting devil horns.
Anyone who ever attended UNC understands the pitchfork and horns as a reference to the much-hated Duke Blue Devils. But the radical Leftists at the Indy Weekly attributed the caricature to anti-Semitism – simply because Nelson happens to be Jewish. And everyone should know Nelson is Jewish. The name is a dead give-away, isn’t it?
The Indy Weekly article also claimed that swastikas were later found in books in the UNC library. Unbelievably, the article concluded that Allen was responsible for a breakout of campus anti-Semitism - simply for making Aaron Nelson look like a Duke Blue Devil fan.
Anyone who reads the Indy Weekly knows that it is utter garbage. It reads like a bad tabloid written by radical Leftists experiencing a bad acid trip. No member of decent, educated society takes it seriously, except for Josh Stein. In fact, Josh Stein uses the Indy Weekly to prepare for senate committee hearings.
Last week, when Josh Stein took the Indy Weekly into the Senate Commerce Committee meeting (for the purpose of confronting Charlton Allen) a series of truly bizarre questions ensued. For example, Stein asked Allen whether he had read the article and whether it was accurate in reporting that Allen had once dressed "in Muslim garb" and thrown water balloons at Operation Desert Storm protestors back in 1991 (This was when Allen was an undergraduate). Allen responded appropriately by requesting clarification of the definition of "Muslim garb."
When Stein's questioning over alleged insensitivity to Muslims went nowhere, he then questioned Allen about published accusations of promoting insensitive speech towards homosexuals - also using the radical Indy Weekly article as his sole source of information.
Stein's purpose in raising these issues was to question Allen's fitness to serve on the North Carolina Industrial Commission. Of course, none of this was relevant to Allen's fitness to serve on the commission. But the exchange did speak volumes about Stein's fitness to serve as North Carolina Attorney General.
Consider the following: Josh Stein considers it to be hypocrisy if someone opposes Sharia Law and also opposes abortion on demand. But he sees no hypocrisy in opposing anti-Sharia legislation while simultaneously fighting for the rights of homosexuals to be free from offensive speech. To top it off, while he's fighting anti-Semitism, Josh Stein is fighting anti-Sharia legislation, too!
Josh Stein's indifference to the unborn reveals that he is morally bankrupt – just like his mentor, John Edwards. Yet his smug hypocrisy is "richer" than any Senate Republican.
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