Bush to Veto Hate Crime Bill
 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-w...03/hate-crimes


WASHINGTON — The House voted Thursday to expand federal hate crime categories to include violent attacks against gays and people targeted because of gender, acting just hours after the White House threatened a veto.
The legislation, passed 237-180, also would make it easier for federal law enforcement to take part in or assist local prosecutions involving bias-motivated attacks. Similar legislation is also moving through the Senate, setting the stage for a possible veto showdown with President Bush.

"This is an important vote of conscience, of a statement of what America is, a society that understands that we accept differences," said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md.

Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., the only openly gay man in the House, presided over the chamber as the final vote was taken.

The vote came after fierce lobbying from opposite sides by civil rights groups, who have been pushing for years for added protections against hate crimes, and social conservatives, who say the bill threatens the right to express moral opposition to homosexuality and singles out groups of citizens for special protection.

The White House said state and local criminal laws already cover the new crimes defined under the bill and there was "no persuasive demonstration of any need to federalize such a potentially large range of violent crime enforcement."

It also noted that the bill leaves other classes, such as the elderly, the military and police officers, without similar special status.

"Our criminal justice system has been built on the ideal of equal justice for all," said Rep. Lamar Smith of Texas, top Republican on the Judiciary Committee. "Under this bill justice will no longer be equal, but depend on the race, sex, sexual orientation, disability or status of the victim."

Republicans, in a parliamentary move that would have effectively killed the bill, tried to add seniors and the military to those qualifying for hate crimes protection. It was defeated on a mainly party-line vote.

Hate crimes under current federal law apply to acts of violence against individuals on the basis of race, religion, color, or national origin. Federal prosecutors have jurisdiction only if the victim is engaged in a specific federally protected activity such as voting.

The House bill would extend the hate crimes category to include sexual orientation, gender, gender identity or disability and give federal authorities greater leeway to participate in hate crime investigations. It would approve $10 million over the next two years to help local law enforcement officials cover the cost of hate crime prosecutions.

Federal investigators could step in if local authorities were unwilling or unable to act. The Human Rights Campaign, the country's largest gay rights group, said this federal intervention could have made a difference in the case of Brandon Teena, the young Nebraska transsexual depicted in the movie "Boys Don't Cry" who was raped after two friends discovered that he was biologically female and then murdered after local police did not arrest those responsible.

But Dr. James C. Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family, warned that the true intent of the bill was "to muzzle people of faith who dare to express their moral and biblical concerns about homosexuality." If you read the Bible in a certain way, he told his broadcast listeners, "you may be guilty of committing a 'thought crime.'"

"It does not impinge on public speech or writing in any way," countered Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., pointing out that the bill reaffirms First Amendment and free speech rights.

Conyers said in a statement that state and local authorities will continue to prosecute the overwhelming majority of such cases and the bill requires the attorney general or another high-ranking Justice Department official to approve any federal prosecutions.

The legislation restates already-enacted penalties. Those using guns to commit crimes defined under the bill face prison terms of up to 10 years. Crimes involving kidnapping or sexual assault or resulting in death can bring life terms.

The Senate bill, sponsored by Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., is named for Matthew Shepard, the gay college student who died after he was beaten and tied to a fence in Wyoming in 1998. His mother Judy, who heads a foundation in her son's name and has been a leading advocate of the legislation, addressed House Democrats before the vote to ask for their backing.

The Judiciary Committee cited FBI figures that there have been more than 113,000 hate crimes since 1991, including 7,163 in 1995. It said that racially motivated bias accounted for 55 percent of those incidents, religious bias for 17 percent, sexual orientation bias for 14 percent and ethnicity bias for 14 percent.

im starting to think im standing on the wrong side of the fence

No your not, just some issues your side has on some views.

i knew that you'd one day discover that deep inside you really are gay :p :D

I hope he doesn't veto Love Crimes next.

he can do anything, he's the commander guy

That is funny, commander guy.

Five bucks says the next one is "boss dude."

I would say, he will say "I am Jesus, and Jehovah has sent me here to purify the world." And I am pretty sure a lot will believe him. I think he is still high on all that crack he snorted.

I am starting to think gays need to come out more, so people can see there are way more gays. We need to come out, and say we do exist, we are everywhere, and we are your next door neighbor, your brother, your sister, your cousin, your husband, your wife. I think the more that come out, the more we will be accepted outside the cities. Because I think people are thinking that they are only in cities, and we are not. We are everywhere. I should come out I have been thinking of this lately, to come out to my family. Because that way I will help people gain more acceptance of this issue.

While I buy that he did snort coke in his day, and that he might have been dumb enough to try to snort rocks instead of powder, I don't think he could have gotten crack without getting seriously mugged. And if he had, he would have been very dissapointed that it wouldn't fit up his nose.

Can you come up with a good slogan?

That's absolutely untrue.


Every day is straight pride day, at least if you live on earth with all the rest of us. Stop whining.

I don't think middle America or suburbs in more liberal states, think there are gays in their community.

I live in San Francisco.

Gay rights goes without saying and we never have a shortage of gay pride marches.

I'm not sure I agree with the concept of hate crimes. To me, violent crime is wrong and must be punished severely, whether or not it's motivated by hate. And as disgusting as hate is, this is a free country, where people have the right to hate. When the government enters the business of trying to determine who hates whom, then where do we go next?

Gay marriage, on the other hand, should be legal, for basically the same reasons. The government should not be deciding what kinds of adults should have the right to enter into a legal union.

In other words, violence is wrong, and marriage is beautiful, regardless of who's involved.

I love you

That would explain his raver get-up.

he still does
http://tomflocco.com/fs/SecretServIntelSay.htm

You can't snort crushed crack rock because it makes you violently ill. Dealers will sometimes try to swallow large amounts of rock when they get arrested and some end up in the emergency room or dead as a result.
Haha, very funny, but of course, in reality, Bush has access to unlimited crack and cocaine, let's get real...

A lot of this is very wrong, laughable if you will, and I don't even know where to begin responding to it.