Login Here
George W. Bush has nominated a Surgeon General who promotes healing gays by praying away their lifestyle. Yup, you read that right: Bush's nominee for Surgeon General believes that gays should just pray harder to be cured of their choice. Except, of course, he doesn't want gays to minister or become church members:
Dr. James Holsinger appears to be a heavily "faith-based" religio-political activist, and isn't likely to serve the health interests of the full and diverse community of tax-paying Americans. His record as a member and current president of the United Methodist Judicial Council, the highest church court for the Methodist Church in the US, includes votes against allowing a lesbian associate pastor, and also supporting the denial of church membership to a gay man. The latter decision was overturned by the church's Bishops.
Hope Springs Community Church, founded by Dr. Holsinger and his wife when they were asked to leave their previous United Methodist church in Lexington, Kentucky, is, um, "recovery-oriented." Recovery from gayitude is one of the recoveries he preaches:
Hope Springs also ministers to people who no longer wish to be gay or lesbian, [minister David] Calhoun said. "We see that as an issue not of orientation but of lifestyle," he said. "We have people who seek to walk out of that lifestyle."
Sportin' Life, who blogs at Pam's House Blend (which I recommend for daily visits), sums up what we need to do about this new anti-science, anti-gay atrocity from BushCo:
This appointment needs approval from the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, which is composed of the following members: Democrats Chairman Edward Kennedy (MA) Christopher Dodd (CT) Tom Harkin (IA) Barbara A. Mikulski (MD) Jeff Bingaman (NM) Patty Murray (WA) Jack Reed (RI) Hillary Rodham Clinton(NY) Barack Obama (IL) Bernard Sanders (I) (VT) Sherrod Brown (OH) Republicans Michael B. Enzi (WY) Judd Gregg (NH) Lamar Alexander (TN) Richard Burr (NC) Johnny Isakson (GA) Lisa Murkowski (AK) Orrin G. Hatch (UT) Pat Roberts (KS) Wayne Allard (CO) Tom Coburn (OK)
You can get their staffers on the phone by calling the Capitol switchboard at 202 224 3121. You can submit email comments to the HELP Committee at help_comments@help.senate.gov. You can find contact information for individual Senators here..
I was very happy to see the email for the committee in Sportin' Life's post, so I'll repeat it: help_comments@help.senate.gov.
Please reject the nomination of James Holsinger to be Surgeon General of the United States. It is shameful that President Bush nominated a man who believes the gay can be prayed away. Please reject this nomination and insist the President appoint a modern, science-believing physican who will not lie to the American people and who will not let his religious beliefs color his medical advice. In the 21st century, we need more than medievalism and know-nothingness in our Surgeon General. Thank you.
Share This 
Spotlight
Zed?
Teddy.
Is there a Surgeon General who can cure people of being war criminals?
I’d like to pray the shrub away.
I wonder if the presstitutes will report this one, or stick with the baggage handler that was going to kill JFK again?
This one really sent my outrage meter to ELEVEN.
Hi Teddy!
Helloooo, LooHoo & lolo
Can’t we all just impeach?
How ’bout we get someone that can pray away the stupidity?
Christ. How ludicrous. And ludicrously predictable.
At least this administration is consistent. If it’s teh stupid, you know they’ll either do it, nominate it, appoint it or sign it into law.
Hmmm . . . Dodd, Clinton, and Obama all will get first crack at this nomination.
That will be interesting to watch.
OK maybe for witchdoctor general- not OK for surgeon general.
Science? You want a Surgeon General to consider science? Where have you been, TSF?
Just when we think teh stupid can’t get any stupider — Shrub foists this guy on us!
Why doesn’t the asshole do somethin useful- like pray away cancer?
ifthethunderdontgetya @ 4
Amen, brothers and sisters.
Can we nominate Kirk Murphy for surgeon general?
LoudounLib @ 18
2nd.
Just when you thought you have seen everything. My God, he has to be kidding. Is this the most ridiculous thing he has done yet?
Is he going to try recommending that we pray AIDS away? (There ought to be competent potential nominees out there. Somewhere.)
Just what exactly are his qualifications for being Surgeon General, other than being yet another faith-based turkey (no disrespect to turkeys intended)?
Who was the surgeon general before? Did someone pray him away?
Diggin’ in the Dirt:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zc1uLytiAc4
The only surgeon general I can remember lately is Jocelyn Elders, and that’s been a while. Or did she even pass confirmation?
ifthethunderdontgetya @ 4
That would be an Awesome Act of God!!!
Of course, if true opposition mounts to this nomination, we can expect Bill Orally to cast it as the secular humanists’ anti-Xtianist agenda. “Why are people of faith discriminated against in our culture?”
Here is 3rd for kirk Murphy. I love that guy!
LoudounLib @ 24
She didn’t pass masturbation.
It keeps the craziness coming so we can’t possibly catch all they are doing. (wearily… yet another shiny object)
lolo @ 20
Such a target-rich environment but, yes — this one does seem quite the nadir.
Elders? HMM- Yeah- got it- she was the one who caught hell with the wing nuts for advocating self abuse rather than sex?
lolo @ 27
Fourth??? :-)
I’m praying for the day we once again have a hero like Joycelyn Elders as our SG.
TeddySanFran @ 30
Like shooting fish in a barrel…!!! ;)
Hi lolo, long time!
Why doesn’t Clusterfuck put a preacher man in charge of the Pentagon- he can pray the insurgency away- why not work on prayin away poverty while he’s at it- but maybe that’ll take yet another Prayer Meister.
This is another dirty trick and brite shiny object to wave to the wingnuts since they are all bent out of shape about teh immigration fiasco.
CTuttle @ 34
Honestly, there must be some major sadism going on somewhere with these people. They just get off on torturing everyone in the world.
Does this have implications in so far as more praying in the future by Mr. and Mrs. Cheney and their daughter? I’m so sick of the Bush and Cheney hypocrisy.
LS @ 28
LOL!!!
Couldn’t the whole fuckin govt. be done away with if we found a good enough prayer person?
Loo Hoo. @ 40
hee, hee…I thought I might get banned or something :>
Loo Hoo. @ 35
Long time no see… No zeds recently!!! How’s your Health been??? :( *g*
Loo Hoo. @ 35
Hi didn’t feel so good the last few days I have just been lurking. Thanks for the shoutout LooHoo!
lolo @ 37
I had not thought of that linkage, but absolutely — when the secular humanist rage bubbles over next week, the televangelists can take it to their sheeple as proof that Shrub still shares their values, despite going steady with Teddy Kennedy. Good catch.
Prayed away a good case of piles just this morning?
rwcole @ 36
Think Airforce.
LS @ 38
S&M’ers, the whole Neocon Lot of ‘em!!! *g*
lolo @ 37
We have a winner!
Oklahoma kiddo @ 39
It’s all okay if you’re a Cheney.
rwcole @ 41
THAT IS IT!!! We need the “bigger” and “better” and “faster” to the source mega prayer person. One that gets “results” before “their” prayers get “there”. Hmmmmm….
God? Allah? Thor? Mother Nature…yeah, that’s the ticket!
Email sent to the committee immediately upon reading far enough in the post to get the addie.
Saw this news Friday and sent to coworker who broke out in peals of (gallows) laughter.
Now back to read the rest of the post and the comments.
This thread reminds me of the commercial “I’m gonna wash that gray right out of my hair”
I suppose I could call my senator, Tom Coburn, but if he doesn’t think teh gayness can be prayed away, he surely thinks it can be cured. His vote won’t help get the nominee out of committee, though, if the Democrats stand together.
TeddySanFran @ 45
I read about it this morning and it was the first thing that popped into my head. The wingnuts are foaming at the mouth over teh immigration and what better than this to calm them down or at least change the subject.
Thanks again to Sportin’ Life for the great material, and especially for the email address for the committee. That one’s a keeper — we’ve wondered hereabouts whether committees have email addresses, and now we know!
rwcole @ 41
Sorry. I don’t think the power of prayer is strong enough to will away the fetid swamp that has become our government,
How about some super duper sized Round-Up?
Completely OT here, but thought y’all might enjoy a good laugh. Some of the participants were from my old “radical and rebel homeschoolers” group. (What, did you think we were ALL Bible thumpers? *grins*)
What a great way of dealing with idiots!
http://asheville.indymedia.org/article/107
rwcole @ 31
Hell, C Everett Koop caught sh*t from the fundies after deciding that AIDS prevention was more important than following the basic fundie beliefs that teh gays didn’t deserve protection.
If I were these guys I think I’d be a little more concerned about praying for my own soul. In light of the death and destruction throughout the world they have wrought.
RevDeb @ 57
Man, that would need a Superdome of shaman, po’okela and priestesses with major mojo mana juju.
RevDeb @ 57
I believe that FDL’s nominee to be surgeon general had some less-than-flattering things to say about Round-Up in his post last weekend.
California scores two points today.
1. Iraq war may be on primary ballot
2. Gay and lesbian inmates get conjugal visits
Perhaps the GOP can run on a plank in 2008 of ‘a Republican under every bed’. These characters seem way too curious about the sexual lives of others.
So, let me get this straight. If I am a supporter of Bush, I support:
Torture
Indefinite Detention of anybody he personally decides is an enemy combatant.
Perpetual War in the name of the God of the Global War on Terror, whenever he (the God of the GWOT = Bush) decides to attack any aspect of an evil axis that he determines exists.
Death to women who need surgery to preserve their lives if their pregnancy is going to kill them.
Total control of the 3 branches of government by himself, if he so deems such an emergency to exist.
And, now, maybe he will personally deem who is gay????
Ummmmm….I’m sure there is another name for such a character..!!
“2. Gay and lesbian inmates get conjugal visits”
There goes the neighborhood.
Loo Hoo. @ 63
Just like medical marijuana?
i would like to defend the methodist church
no methodist i know-and i was raised methodist, would ever condone anti-gay anything. i would like to point out that he was overruled by the church in his views…………
and teddy- no amount of prayin’ on his part will ever bring support to his way of thinking……….life still goes on, and more people every day are looking at gays as fulfilled human beings, as we speak it is happening, and that is the powerful thing that will continue to create change, not the backward thinking, gay stifling thinking that the bush administration tries to teach to it’s ‘peepholes’ (peoples-but they like peepholes, perverts)……..
i wish to remind people how it was in the 70’s-my dad had gay friends, we went to dinner at their house regularly, was normal to me…but out in public then?????? no way……they never went out…….my step-brother and sister are both gay, with the same partners since the early 80’s and two of my best friends in high school were gay and lesbian, BEFORE it was ok….times were VERY HARD FOR THEM back then……..times have changed in a large way since then, and are still changing, don’t let this surgeon general thing make you think anything else…….people are evolving toward the good in a person by person movement, let that make you feel comforted. once you know someone who is gay it is the same as having a relative, and you defend them……that is happening all over america…….defending gay rights…….i remember the marches where noone showed up………now you can say you are gay at a party……never would have happened back then………women’s rights took a long time, too………rambling, sorry, just don’t want you to discount how equal you finally are, thanks to people that i have known who stood up way before it was popular. continue their efforts by being happy and meeting people and letting them see what a wonderful thinking compassionate human being you are, that’s what makes people change.
“Asked to leave” their church? Any info on why?? Sounds like some potential good oppo here.
Jeebus. Freakin’. Christmas! Where do they find these whack jobs? And in what universe do they feel it is both appropriate and effective to nominate them for positions of trust and responsibility. Obviously Dubya is playing to the base on this one, but I am also beginning to believe those conspiracy theorists who have suggested that the Repugs are deliberately trying to destroy the government.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 64
Hope you saw “Help! Mom! There’s a Liberal Under My Bed.”
http://www.crooksandliars.com/
I saw that Kirk Murphy had posted recently downstairs, so I alerted him to his nomination . . .
Peterr @ 68
kirk murphy @ 70
707!
I would like to remind the “religious right” that supported Bush via Abramoff, that they were described as “wackos” while they were being ripped off.
dmac, I appreciate your defense of the methodist church, but my post requires no one to defend the church. In fact, I point out that Dr. Holsinger and his wife were asked to leave their UMC congregation in order to launch their new church, with its odd views.
And yes, you are correct: we stand on the shoulders of giants. As I say to the young gays in my life about this world they will inherit: so sorry, and you’re welcome.
Mikulski’s on the committee? That should be fun.
And what the heck is the gay “lifestyle” anyway? Maybe if gay teens were allowed to openly date and go through the same social maturation rituals as straight kids, and get married later on, a lot of emotional pain could be avoided. Does it occur to Holsinger et al. that being persecuted and ostracized doesn’t facilitate becoming a happy member of society?
Thou shalt be str8.
So why did Gannon visit the WH so many times?
This doctor soon to be surgeon general can be a homophobe on his own time but for him to come out and seriously claim that homosexuality can be prayed away is ridiculous. How can he expect anyone to take him seriously. He has mental problems!
OMG.. where does shrub find these people? Can’t he do anything at all that I find remotely tolerable? How could he be wrong in every respect?
FWIW, I wrote both my senators and my house critter today asking them yet again to do whatever they can to get rid of that other General in the army of the rethug gods: Abu.
I’m going to have a dream tonight. That some gay group bought Cindy Sheehan’s land in Crawford.
lolo @ 78
I think they sit around and plan this stuff just to make us react. That’s what Devil’s Advocats do.
‘You’ll wonder where the homos went
When you pray just like the President’
;>)
Homework assignment:
Who would you suggest that the committee bring in as a witness to . . . ahem . . . challenge the good doctor’s less-than-science-based views for the committee?
Preferably, IMHO, it would be someone both scientifically credentialed and also theologically literate. You could make mincemeat of this guy on both counts. Bonus points of the prospective witness has a great sense of snark — with Hatch and Coburn on the committee, that could really come in handy.
Committee staffers are eagerly waiting for your nominations for witnesses.
It is a distraction. When I want to distract my dogs, because I want to go somewhere I don’t want them to follow me, I throw them a “treat” upon which they immediately descend…while I make my exit to do that which I intend to do. They happily devour it and, alas, I am gone..they have missed it.
darkblack @ 82
707
Peterr @ 83
Kirk Murphy, member?
more:
and more:
It’s a wedge issue. The base is pissed at Bush over immigration. Hence this appointment (Holsinger). God, these guys are clever. Rove, Rove, Rove.
What kind of fuckery is this?
darkblack @ 82
Do they still make Pepsodent?
Peterr @ 83
DING! How about John from Americablog?
teddy at 74
And yes, you are correct: we stand on the shoulders of giants. As I say to the young gays in my life about this world they will inherit: so sorry, and you’re welcome.
no, teddy, nothing you said made me want to defend, just didn’t want people reading the word methodist and thinking that was how methodists think–is quite the opposite………bush claiming to be a methodist and this guy claiming to be methodist is beyond appalling……methodists are the original rebels and defenders of social justice…..they aren’t methodists….it .wasn’t what you posted, it was these people claiming a history they don’t represent……..
Peterr @ 83
Einstein or Dr. Dean.
James Holsinger’s gotta be fighting off some strong gay tendencies.
The decreasingly unpopular although recently re-nominated Governor of Kentucky, Ernie Fletcher, has endorsed the nominee:
One wonders if this endorsement will help.
Loo Hoo. @ 95
He does have a Koop-like beard, however.
AND THE LORD SAID “LET THERE BE GAY”
I don”t have the link anymore but from the new york times;
.
The article goes further, documenting anal sex with ejaculation, lesbionism and mutual masterbation.
Pretty obvious, sex is not for procreation exclusively, unless of course you want to believe God got it wrong
But it took him anyway
LS @ 94
Peterr!
Maybe the Dems should just get it over with and offer KKKarl a deal he can’t refuse. He’s a political whore, and would take the money if he could survive “intact” (catch my drift).
perris @ 98
The article goes further, documenting anal sex with ejaculation, lesbionism and mutual masterbation.
Pretty obvious, sex is not for procreation exclusively, unless of course you want to believe God got it wrong
Hurray for flamingos!
Wonder how the Log Cabin Republicans feel about the good doctor? Will he be seeking their endorsement. And more importantly perhaps, will they give it to him?
Everything Bush does is a slap in the face to most Americans. Just like sending Bolton to the U.N., Bush choses the most reprehensible person he can find then watches that person destroy the department he now heads.
Apparently, Great Britain has had two gay Prime Ministers. Edward Heath, Conservative, in the 1970s, and Pitt the Younger.
http://johannhari.com/archive/article.php?id=1129
Oklahoma kiddo @ 103
What’s up with the log cabin anyway?
Capital J @ 75
You know, I live in Ohio. Sort of a semi-rural area. Big fundie area. BUT:
My 16-year-old son got invited to the prom by an older girl, and while we were getting his tux rented (last minute, of course) he told me about his friend who was also getting a tux. His friend Kathy. Her girlfriend, her date for the prom, was going and they both didn’t want to wear gowns. So this is very out in the open, they go and are announced as they enter the prom, they have photos taken and everything. I was really happy about this.
Boy have things changed since I was in high school circa 1970.
I must say though, that if this were at a high school only a few miles from here, it would be very different, from what I’ve heard. Class, race and income levels are low in this town, this is the town high school, and the ones a bit further out are more upscale. And more fundie, racist, classist, etc.
LS @ 105
Search me.
What is Grover Norquist up to? Much too silent. Busy drowning the government as we know it? He stays under the radar too much for my comfort.
Since he’s from Kentucky, Holsinger might be introduced to the HELP Committee by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. I wonder if the good doctor’s tried The Cure on Mitch?
Elaine might say a little prayer with them before the hearing, do you think?
Oklahoma kiddo @ 108
Doctor.
Every action Bush takes makes me believe that something will happen that will make him feel forced to declare martial law. This action is a declaration of war against science and reason.
TeddySanFran @ 96
Doubtful. Even Rasmussen is showing Beshear with a 16 point lead in the polls. And I’m betting that a lot of Beshear’s ads against Fletcher was start, “As former Representative Anne Northup pointed out during the Republican primary, Fletcher…”
Unfortunately, there are a number of wing-nutters supreme who have infiltrated my home state even more than when I was growing up there. And even some that will surprise like the soon to be ex-AG Stumbo who set off the investigation into Fletcher’s hiring practices. He issued an official AG opinion this week that stated that UK and UL offering domestic partner benefits was unconstitutional as KY based a marriage amendment last year or a couple of years ago…But by running as Lunsford’s Lt Gov candidate, Stumbo has pretty much assured his irrelevancy in the future. And a lot of good lawyers are contesting his assertion of the unconstitutional nature of the benefits.
LS @ 106
Must be a reference to Lincoln, who was a liberal compared to the present sorry bunch of Repugs.
Oklahoma kiddo @ 103
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L.....an#History
LS @ 105
They were forced back into their ‘Closet’!!! :-(
peterr at 83
how about the methodist bishops who refused to vote out gays at their convention a few years ago???????
before anyone else comitted, they did, and loudly……all are welcome, all are vibrant human beings with things to offer to the world i believe were their words. and they took shit for it, and didn’t care.
I like to call them The Log Cabana Boys.