Broken Vow

GOP Congressional Candidate Wants Opponents To Pledge To Discriminate Against Gays

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We don’t expect much from politicians in Alabama, but every time they reach a new subterranean standard, they grab a shovel and go even lower. This time it’s Dean Young, one of nine Republicans running in a special election in one of the state’s Congressional districts. Young, a businessman who unsuccessfully ran for the seat in 2012, believes that  it’s “time for men and women of faith to stand for the founding Christian values and morals that made our nation great, to defend our families and the sacred holiness of marriage.”

Therefore, Young has taken it upon himself to come up with a six-point pledge that he supports and that he is calling on his opponents to sign. As might be imagined, the pledge is a combination of knuckle-dragging homophobia and spelling errors:

1. I believe that the only marriage is between one man and one woman.

2. I believe the Biblical condemnation of homosexuality and thereby gay marriage.

3. The tenants [sic] of my church oppose gay marriage.

4. I oppose gay marriage.

5. As a member of Congress, I shall take active steps to oppose gay marriage.

6. I support the by-law change to expel any member of the Republican Executive Committee who opposes the party position by supporting gay marriage.

That last bit is aimed at the state party, which is trying to expel the head of the College Republicans Federation of Alabama, for being okay with marriage equality.

Seeking to differentiate himself from a crowded field, Young is now pressing is eight opponents to take the pledge and violate not only the rights of LGBT Alabamans but also the doctrine of church-state separation. Anyone who supports “homosexuals pretending like they’re married,” says Young, should be a Democrat anyway.

Young has been a fixture on the religious right for a while. He was formerly head of the Christian Family Association, in which capacity he advocated posting the Ten Commandments in public schoolrooms.Young once called a rabbi “a leader of the forces of darkness” for opposing an attempt to place a marble statue of the Ten Commandments in front of a Wisconsin courthouse. He’s also a perennial also-ran, having tried for the same Congressional seat last year and state Secretary of State ten years before that. Let’s hope he keeps his perfect record.

Photo credit: Dean Young for Congress