Polls undercount support for marriage

SF Gate has an interesting article which estimates that poll results regarding support for marriage protection amendments are lower than actual opinion.

The article says that pre-election polling in several states that have already passed marriage protection amendments low balled estimates by as much as 19 percentage points. Why?

While the article cites a factor that I wholeheartedly agree with--a big factor is how the question is asked (how it's worded, what sort of tone and inflection the pollster uses, etc.)--I don't think that's the only reason, not by a long shot.

Gay rights supporters blame people's unwillingness to express an anti-gay opinion to a pollster for the discrepancy between polls and the ballot box, and McClusky agrees. But public opinion experts who study the phenomenon of "social desirability," which leads people to lie to pollsters on issues like church attendance or whether they would vote for an African American candidate, think other factors may be more significant.

Or as I more simply put it, "people know what 'the right answer' is." In other words, many people are social animals to the point that they feel compelled to follow the herd. They don't want to be perceived as out of step with the crowd. And since our "objective media" does such a good job of telling people what the politically correct opinion is, and how if you're not in agreement with it you're a Bible-thumping, provincial, uneducated, bigoted rube, then people are somewhat naturally going to give "the right answer" when a member of this same intelligentsia calls them and asks them if they support what is implied to be "equal rights for the peace-loving and oppressed gay community that is just seeking to get along and be recognized as 'just as good as everybody else'", or if they're one of those "uneducated, hate-mongering religious zealots who oppose fair treatment of gays?"

Of course, you probably won't see the question put that way in the pollster's call, but the "objective media" has already laid the groundwork for that implication with their incessant, nonstop statements to that effect in the daily newspapers and newscasts.

So, as I often say when many people are polled, "They know the right answer, and that's what they tell the pollster. But when they go into the privacy of the voting booth (where that elitist voice which ridicules them for their values isn't so strong), more often than not, they vote their conscience."

We'll see just how right I am in a little over a week...

Study shows abortion triples risk of depression

From the British Evening Standard:

Women who have abortions are three times as likely to suffer depression and other mental illness, it emerged yesterday.

Senior doctors claim new evidence shows a clear link between abortion and mental health problems in women who previously had no history of such illness.

This is part of what VoteYesForLife.com is talking about when they say women need to be protected from this kind of unnecessary risk.

Former Abortionist Calls for End to Abortion

VoteYesForLife.com has a new commercial, and it's an attention-getter.

It features features South Dakota certified OB-GYN Dr. Patti Giebink, who used to perform abortions at the Planned Parenthood clinic in Sioux Falls. She now has a private practice where she cares for mothers and their babies, rather than killing their babies.

She says it's time to ban abortion on demand in South Dakota.

"I don't think it's necessary," Dr. Giebink says.

Watch the video here.

Anti-Amendment C Position "Absurd"

Below is an article comment on an Argus Leader article on Amendment C. It puts the bogus claims of homosexual activists and their apologists in the proper light, along with good context for the whole issue:

I moved from South Dakota to Michigan when I finished college and started my first job. Soon after, I became responsible for taking care of my sister, who has a disability. I was denied health insurance for her solely because she was my sister, rather than my lesbian partner. Consequently, I have followed Michigan's marriage amendment very closely, and would like to challenge the accuracy of Jon Hoadley's claim that the Michigan's marriage amendment had the unintended effect of removing health care for unmarried couples.

Michigan passed a marriage amendment. The Attorney General, Michael Cox, issued a non-binding ruling that the marriage amendment meant that public entities (eg state universities, etc) could not base benefits on the recognition of civil unions.

There's an important point here. Cox did not rule that state entities could not provide insurance to unmarried couples. Rather, Cox ruled that these entities could not provide insurance to unmarried couples while denying insurance to individuals too closely related to be legally married.

Cox's opinion was overturned by a later ruling. It is current policy for state universities to offer health insurance to gay and lesbian couples, while denying single mothers health care for family members that take care of their children.

This position...the position that Hoadley supports...is absurd. It insists that there is nothing uniquely special about the capability of a woman and a man to bear a child, while simultaneously insisting that there is something special about sexual relationships in general.

Posted by:sj

Seeing the Light

Looks like Mr. Blanchard at South Dakota Politics has changed his mind on Amendment C and now supports it, due to the latest display of judicial activism in New Jersey.

Hopefully more folks will wake up to the fact that homosexual activists and their "useful idiots" in the judiciary are serious about gutting marriage.

While we must always use caution when making changes to a constitution, we need Amendment C in South Dakota, and the inclusion of the marriage protection amendment isn't done lightly.

Need Marriage Protection, Now More than Ever

The New Jersey Supreme Court just gave the ole middle finger to marriage today. From the New York Times:

The State Supreme Court in New Jersey said today that same-sex couples are entitled to “the same rights and benefits enjoyed by opposite-sex couples under the civil marriage statutes.”

Is there now any chance that some who believe we don't need Amendment C (South Dakota's marriage protection amendment) will pull their head out of the sand and face the reality that judges are bent on making marriage mean nothing at all?

One of the most galling things in the decision was this:

The court gave the legislature a six-month deadline to enact the necessary legislation to provide for same-sex unions.

The court gave the legislature a deadline? I guess we know who's in charge now--the judiciary. A bunch of arrogant, unelected tyrants in black robes run things now, not the people.

If I was in the NJ legislature, I'd tell the NJ court they can "enact the necessary legislation" their own darn selves, since they seem to think they have the power to make law.

The Holy Sacrament of Abortion

I and others have long said that abortion is a sacrament in the religion of secular liberalism. Now we have an admission from the Left to that effect--and not just a "secularist." From the Rapid City Journal:

Rev. Stoebner was among the ministers who donned clerical robes, stoles and collars to declare that Referred Law 6 restricts religious freedom.

Making abortion illegal would prohibit faithful people from living according to their religious laws, traditions and understandings, without the threat of criminal indictment, they said.

So if people can't practice the sacrament of abortion, their religious freedom is violated?

I guess I would agree that religious liberty was being violated if a Christian was forbidden to be baptized, or a Christian was forbidden to take communion, or a Christian was forbidden to express his faith in public (like we have been in recent years), but I guess I never thought of abortion as a sacrament to be sought after and practiced as a religious liberty.

Guess you learn something every day...

Doctors who Value Life

From the Rapid City Journal letters page today. Some more of those "crazy" doctors who seem to value life so much:

All life important
In our medical practice, we care for patients of all ages. Some are healthy, some are very sick. Some are young, some very old. Some have serious mental and physical handicaps.

Some of our patients have handicaps that are so severe that they cannot survive without substantial help from others. These people, of course, deserve the same respect and caring as any of our healthier patients.

Based on current medical knowledge, we believe life begins when a sperm and egg unite and conception takes place. Other than conception, there is no other reliable method to distinguish when a new human being actually exists during fetal development.

When we look at pictures of fetuses in early development, it's impossible to believe that what we see is only "tissue" and not a human.

Since we do believe that life begins at conception, we desire that those tiniest of humans, like our sickest patients, be regarded with respect and caring. We believe that all human life is important and deserves to be protected.

It is for this reason that we support Referred Law 6.

DAVID A. JOHNSON, M.D., DANIEL FRANZ, M.D. & SAM HUOT, M.D.
Rapid City