I think the late Republican Arizona Senator and conservative standard-bearer Barry Boldwater is probably beating his head against his casket. Senator Goldwater’s wife was a founding member of Planned Parenthood of Arizona, and Senator Goldwater himself was a champion for individual privacy and for birth control.

However, Arizona’s Republican legislature and Governor Jan Brewer have completed their abandonment of those principles by adding a third party into the patient-doctor relationship: the patient’s employer. And employees who choose to use birth control, even if they pay for it themselves, just may find themselves out of a job.

For ten years, Arizona had a very common-sense contraception law. Arizona employers that offered a health care plan to their employees needed to provide coverage for contraception. Religious employers, however, had always been exempt from this law in order to comply to their religious beliefs. Regardless of employer, people who used birth control in the comfort of their own homes and in accordance to their own religious beliefs could not be fired for doing so.

But common sense just was not good enough. Now, under legislation passed by the legislature and signed into law by the governor, Arizona businesses that designate themselves to be a “religiously affiliated employer” will no longer have to include contraceptives in the insurance coverage they provide for their workers. Women seeking reimbursement for birth control from their health insurance provider will have to prove that they are not using the medication as contraception if they work for a religiously affiliated employer that has opted out of providing insurance coverage for contraception.

And all a company will need to do is change a few words in the company’s articles of incorporation to claim that their religious beliefs are central to how they operate their business; that language is so broad that even the Republican author of the legislation admitted companies could simply lie to fit the definition and escape the contraception mandate.

And for an added kicker, the new law gets rid of the protection that people who choose to use birth control will not be fired from their jobs for making health care decisions their bosses disapprove of, even if the employee pays for her birth control out of pocket.

This is not the first time Arizona Republicans have sought to enshrine discrimination into state law, but it is alarming how completely they've apparently committed themselves to that destructive path.

There is a fine line between persuasion and manipulation, but holding someone's job over their head just because they want to make their own decisions about when and if they want to use contraception crosses that line.

Excuse them Senator Goldwater; they have forsaken you.

After nearly two years of right-wing conspiracy theories like birtherism, deatherism, and gold currency frenzy, it was probably inevitable that GOP state legislators would return to one of their party’s modern classics: anti-United Nations hysteria.

UN-related conspiracy theories are most famously associated with 1990s-era Republican claims of “black helicopters” landing on farmers’ land in the middle of the night. Now similar fears are back, with a vengeance, in five GOP-controlled legislatures considering bills like this one in Arizona:

The bill’s sponsor, Arizona State Senator Judy Burges, says her goal is to wipe out any environmental program administered or funded by the government to prevent “social engineering … including where we live, what we eat.”

Burges’ bill, Senate Bill 1507, is based upon an unfounded conspiracy theory about “Agenda 21,” a non-binding international plan for environmentally-sustainable development crafted by the United Nations. The plan was adopted in 1992 by 178 countries, including the United States under the George H.W. Bush administration.

Burges and other members of the Tea Party believe that clean energy programs in Arizona are a plot by the United Nations to create a single world government in order to control people’s lives.

SB 1507 actually passed in the Arizona Senate, though the state House recently declined to vote on it.

But how high do Republicans believe this conspiracy goes? To the very top, according to GOP legislators in Kansas, one of whom invoked the JFK assassination to advocate his state’s version of the legislation:

Rep. Bill Otto (R-LeRoy) said during the debate that he believed the EPA is making laws and that the federal government should follow the Constitution instead. He also invoked a conspiracy theory surrounding President John F. Kennedy's assassination. Lee Harvey Oswald could not have been the only shooter, he said, because it would have been impossible for him to have gotten off multiple shots in such a short amount of time. He suggested that JFK's assassination and Agenda 21 are connected because people don't believe there were multiple shooters and that they don't believe that Agenda 21 is powerful.

Legislation condemning (or, like Arizona’s, outlawing implementation of) the 27 principles of the Rio Declaration is also pending in Louisiana and Alabama. It actually passed in Tennessee, though even that state’s GOP Governor found it too wacky to touch.

So what’s in the non-binding Rio Declaration – a.k.a. Agenda 21 – that has GOP legislators searching the skies for those black helicopters? And is there anything in the document that Republicans may one day regret rushing to condemn? As it turns out, there’s plenty:

Principle 1: Human beings are at the centre of concerns for sustainable development. They are entitled to a healthy and productive life...

Principle 2: States have, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and the principles of international law, the sovereign right to exploit their own resources pursuant to their own environmental and developmental policies…

Principle 18: States shall immediately notify other States of any natural disasters or other emergencies that are likely to produce sudden harmful effects on the environment of those States…

In other words, dozens of Republican legislators are now on record saying people do not, in fact, have a right to life; the United States and its citizens do not have the right to exploit our own natural resources according to our own laws; and that Americans should not be warned about floods, disease outbreaks, and other emergencies originating overseas that could effect them.

In the hands of Republican primary challengers or mischievous Democrats, the consequences of a vote like that could be… interesting.

Will these latest GOP conspiracy theories come back to haunt the Republican legislators who peddle them? We won’t know for sure until Election Day, but adding yet another layer of looniness to the GOP agenda can’t possibly help Republicans shake their reputation for being out of touch, unfocused, and more concerned about black helicopters than they are about jobs, the economy, and education.

“As people who promote personal responsibility, family values, commitment and stability, and emphasize freedom and limited government we have to recognize that freedom means freedom for everyone.  This includes the freedom to decide how you live and to enter into relationships of your choosing, the freedom to live without excessive interference of the regulatory force of government.

But the memo has not made its way to Republican controlled state legislatures. Last week the Republicans in Colorado’s legislature "went nuclear" to kill a proposal to establish civil unions in the state and took another 40 bills down with it . Last year the Republican controlled legislature in Indiana approved a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between one man and one woman. If the legislature approves it again next year it will go on a future ballot, and later this year Minnesota voters will vote on a marriage initiative that the newly elected Republican legislature voted to place before the voters even though the majority of Minnesota voters do not support amending their constitution to narrowly define marriage.

Why is Mr. van Lohuizen sounding the warning signal after using this issue so successfully not long ago? It is simple: he reads polls. According to a survey from Gallup 51% of Americans support President Obama's decision to come out and support marriage equality. But it is the future America that has him truly fearful that homophobia will drive Republicans over the cliff.

According to the Pew Research Center in 2004, when Mr. van Lohuizen was leading President Bush’s re-election, Americans under 30 tilted slightly against same-sex marriage. Today, this same group favors it 65 percent to 30 percent.

The anti-gay Republican train has gained speed since Mr. van Lohuizen launched it, and it has become a top priority for Republican controlled legislatures across the country. Meanwhile, statehouse Democrats across have long been advocating for equal rights not because it was the popular thing to do, but because it was the right thing to do. In 2009 Democratic Iowa State Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal blocked attempts by Republicans to amend the Iowa constitution to narrowly define marriage after that state's supreme court established marriage equality; earlier this year Democrats in New Jersey passed legislation  that Republican Governor Chris Christie vetoed that would have granted equal marriage rights to gay and lesbian couples.

Earlier today Colorado's Democratic Governor  John Hickenlooper called the legislature back into session in order to address legislation allowing civil unions for same-sex couples in Colorado. Will Colorado's Republican leadership listen to the leaders of their party, or bow to their homophobic habits?  We wait and see. But in the meantime America's next generation of voters is watching, and they are not impressed.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 5, 2012

Contact: Nathan Thomas
nthomas@dlcc.org

DLCC On the Air in Wisconsin Senate Recalls

30-Second Spot Exposes Terry Moulton’s attacks on Education

Washington, DC - Today the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee’s Wisconsin PAC launched its first recall television ad of 2012, marking national Democrats’ first on-air strike in one of the four Wisconsin Senate recall campaigns. The spot shines a harsh light on 23rd District Republican state Senator Terry Moulton’s votes to gut education while giving tax breaks to the rich and to big corporations.

“Parents in the 23rd Senate District deserve to know that Terry Moulton is the reason their children have bigger class sizes and their schools have fewer quality teachers,” said DLCC Executive Director Michael Sargeant. “Moulton voted for the biggest education cuts in Wisconsin history, and then he used the money to give away billions of dollars in tax breaks to the rich and to out-of-state corporations. Those are not Wisconsin values.”

Recent polls released by the DLCC Wisconsin PAC show an extremely competitive campaign in this race. “Voters will go to the polls knowing all about Terry Moulton’s lock-step support for Scott Walker’s extreme attacks on schools, and they – the voters – will demand an answer for that,” Sargeant added.

The DLCC Wisconsin PAC’s 30-second spot, “Big,” is running in Sen. Moulton’s 23rd Senate District. Watch the ad here. Full script below.

"Big"
30-Second TV

Terry Moulton has a BIG problem.

You see, Senator Moulton spends a lot of his time helping the BIG guys. Big corporations. BIG donors. Moulton gives them BIG tax breaks…

While giving Wisconsin families the big brush off. Moulton took away $1.6 billion from our kids’ schools. So our kids get BIGGER class sizes and fewer quality teachers…

While Moulton’s buddies get billions in BIG tax breaks.

On June 5th, it’s time to give Terry Moulton the big heave ho.

###

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 1, 2012

Contact:
Nathan Thomas - nthomas@dlcc.org
Stu Trevelyan - stu@ngpvan.com

DLCC and NGP VAN Form Technology Partnership

“DLCC Go” to Provide Integrated Web Site Solution and Other Tools to Help Democratic State Legislative Candidates Win

Washington, D.C. (May 1, 2012) — The Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC) and NGP VAN have partnered to bring state legislative candidates across the country DLCC Go, a unique suite of integrated and affordable new media, fundraising, and field campaign tools that will give Democratic campaigns of all sizes a competitive technology edge.

State legislative campaigns can take advantage of DLCC Go [www.DLCCGo.com] to easily publish a professional web site, send broadcast emails, manage fundraising online and off, and integrate their web site with the VAN field tool most Democratic campaigns use. From Maine to California, DLCC Go lets any state legislative campaign — big or small — take advantage of the best integrated campaign technology available to Democrats. The DLCC has made DLCC Go affordable by negotiating an economy of scale price with NGP VAN, a Democratic campaign technology company.

“Since our inception, the DLCC has worked to make the most sophisticated campaign tools affordable and accessible for Democratic state legislative candidates across the country,” said DLCC Executive Director Michael Sargeant. “Through DLCC Go, candidates now have affordable access to NGP VAN’s advanced online toolkit, including a web site platform that is fully integrated with their fundraising and field tools. These same tools are already used by countless congressional candidates across the country, and with DLCC Go, all state legislative campaigns can now afford them as well.”

“Several years ago, we started an initiative to build out our state legislative program after we realized that there were hundreds of Democratic state legislative campaigns who could greatly benefit from our web site platform and core toolset if we simply made it more affordable and accessible. We’ve had hundreds of campaigns and every active Democratic caucus sign on to our tools in some fashion.” says Stu Trevelyan, CEO of NGP VAN. “This partnership and DLCC Go is an important step forward to helping even more Democratic state legislative candidates get a technology edge.”

For more information, please visit www.dlccgo.com

###

About the DLCC. The Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC) is the national Democratic organization responsible for winning state legislative elections. The DLCC is the only political committee in the country whose principal mission is to put Democrats in control of as many state legislatures as possible. We do this by helping to build winning, state-of-the-art campaign committees across the country through partnerships with legislative leaders, professional staff, and grassroots advocates. We provide candidates with access to tools like polling, research, and online activism platforms, as well as other data, field, and communications resources that have become indispensable for modern campaigns.

About NGP VAN. NGP VAN is also the preferred new media provider to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, EMILY’s List, America Votes, and State Voices. NGP VAN counts thousands of campaigns and organizations among our clients, including Obama for America, all the national Democratic committees, thousands of Democratic campaigns, and hundreds of labor unions, progressive and non-partisan PACs, and other organizations. We are proud to provide a uniquely integrated platform that combines the best new media, fundraising, and field products.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 26, 2012

Contact: Nathan Thomas
nthomas@dlcc.org

DLCC Polls Show Democrats Leading Wisconsin Senate Recalls

Democrats Favored to Win Majority on June 5th

Washington, DC - Today the DLCC Wisconsin PAC released polling results for the Wisconsin recall special elections in Senate Districts 21, 23, and 29. The surveys show Democrat John Lehman leading by 4% in District 21, and Democrats Kristen Dexter and Donna Seidel are both within the margin of error in Districts 23 and 29.

“Wisconsin voters are tired of the failed Republican policies that have made their state last in the nation in job growth, and these polls reflect that frustration,” said DLCC Executive Director Michael Sargeant. “Van Wanggaard, Terry Moulton, and Jerry Petrowski betrayed the working families of Wisconsin by voting in lock-step with Scott Walker’s extreme anti-worker agenda, and now all Wisconsinites are suffering the consequences. Voters are demanding a change.”

Democratic victory in just one Senate recall guarantees a Democratic majority in the Wisconsin Senate. No Democrats face recall elections. These polls clearly put the odds on Democrats taking back the Wisconsin Senate in June.

The complete polling memo, including full results for all three races, is available here.

METHODOLOGY

All three polls were conducted by Myers Research and Strategic Services and surveyed 400 likely voters in each district. SD 23 calling took place from March 20-22, SD 21 calling took place April 3-5, and SD 29 calling took place April 17-19. The surveys have a margin of error of ±4.9% within a 95% confidence interval.

###

Tennessee is on the brink of becoming a state where teachers can go to prison simply for telling a distraught student "there's nothing wrong with you."

If that student happens to be gay, that could happen under the terms of HB 229 – Tennessee’s infamous “Don’t Say Gay” bill that could be headed for final passage in the GOP-controlled legislature:

Tennessee’s elementary and middle school teachers could face more pressure not to talk about homosexuality with their students next year after the so-called Don’t Say Gay bill cleared a House education committee Tuesday. (…)

Schools caught in violation of the state’s sex education policies can have state money withheld, and teachers face a $50 fine and up to 30 days in jail, according to state law. The bill passed the Senate last year.

At least one local school board has gone down a similar road before, and the consequences were as tragic as they were brutally predictable: students who were relentlessly harassed and physically assaulted for being gay often turned to their teachers for help. But in that particular district, the threat of firing or other disciplinary action hung over any teacher who responded to the bullied students with a message of compassion and acceptance.

Instead, the silence and “neutrality” mandated by local officials sent a different message: that the bullies are right, and that there is something wrong with their victims.

Under HB 229 in Tennessee, not only would that message resonate across every public school in the state, but it would be backed by the threat of jail time for teachers who go against it – yet another devastating consequence of Tennessee’s GOP-controlled legislature.

Military personnel could become collateral damage in the latest GOP attack on voting rights – a Republican-sponsored bill in Missouri that could effectively end many military voters’ ability to vote by mail.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch condemned the bill, sponsored by GOP state Rep. Shane Schoeller, in a sharply-worded editorial last week:

Schoeller not only wants to ask voters to weaken the state constitution and then disenfranchise any state voters who lack a specific form of government-issued photo identification, now he also wants to take away the right of absentee voters — including members of the armed services — to mail in their ballots.

House Bill 2109 is horrendous for a variety of reasons. (…) The bill, for instance, gives local election boards the right to determine if your birth certificate is adequate. (Note to Hawaiians: Cancel that move to Missouri). Similarly, if you have a drivers license from a state that your local election authority doesn't think protects citizenship enough, you might not be able to register to vote.

The worst provision in Mr. Schoeller's bill would take away the long-held right of Missourians who request absentee ballots to vote by mail. These folks already are registered to vote. Some of them are disabled and can't get to the polls. Others are members of the military, stationed far from home, perhaps even overseas protecting the very right to vote that Mr. Schoeller seeks to diminish.

In practical terms, the veterans’ advocacy group VoteVets.org has noted that HB 2109 would “demand that members of the military find someone in Missouri to hand deliver their absentee ballot.” If ultimately approved, this legislation would go into effect after the 2012 election.

11,000 Missouri military personnel voted by mail in 2008, as did 270,000 total Missourians. All would potentially be impacted by this extreme legislation.

Missouri Republicans have apparently decided that nothing – not even the rights of 11,000 military personnel who risk their lives to protect our freedom – will get in the way of the GOP drive to manipulate future elections by disenfranchising voters.

Arizona Republicans are truly taking their state through the looking glass, so to speak. Up is down, down is up, pregnancy begins two weeks before conception, and now a GOP bill that supposedly protects “religious freedom” actually enshrines discrimination in state law – including discrimination based on religion.

SB 1365 says state government contracts cannot be withheld from an organization because of its “religious beliefs or exercise of religion,” and professional or occupational licenses likewise cannot be suspended because of refusal “to provide or participate in providing any service that violates the person's sincerely held religious beliefs.” But what this bill really does is make some Arizonans’ rights dependant upon the “religious beliefs” of others.

Democratic state House Leader Chad Campbell immediately noted the problems with such broad provisions:

Campbell, D-Phoenix, says the bill is crafted to be far too broad. It could pose problems for organizations that take public funding and provide professional services, he says, and Campbell cautions that it could have unforeseen consequences.

“There’s a lot of things that are problematic with allowing people to exercise their sincerely-held religious beliefs, because that term means a lot of different things to a lot of people. There are religions out there that believe we come from UFOs, there are religions out there that believe one race is superior to another," Campbell said.

So, for instance, could the state deny a charter school contract to any of the supposedly “religious” organizations that appear on the Southern Poverty Law Center’s list of active hate groups in Arizona? That’s unclear.

Could the owner of an adoption agency, a hospital, or a contractor providing job training courses decide one day that they have a religious objection to serving gays, Latinos, Jews, or (conceivably) Republicans? That’s possible too.

A different, even more extreme version of this bill was vetoed last year, and rightly so. But as with so many other terrible ideas they’ve latched onto in recent years (like their “birther bill”), Arizona Republicans continue to push this issue – and they show no sign of coming to their senses any time soon.

It recently came to the attention of New Hampshire legislators that because of a quirk in state law, some rape victims have had to endure debate in court (and in local media) over whether or not they are “mentally defective” – because the term appears in the state’s definition of aggravated sexual assault.

A bill changing the language to something a little more descriptive and a lot less insulting sailed through the state Senate with the support of numerous criminal justice and victims’ advocacy groups, and many expected it to draw little controversy in the state House.

But anyone who’s followed other recent news stories from the New Hampshire House can probably predict what happened next. Two House Republicans not only rose to say they had no problem calling mentally disabled rape victims “defective,” but they then angrily declared that the real insult was asking the legislature to do something about it:

According to several sources, some conservative Republicans on the House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee were insulted that the change was offered.

Rep. Jason Antosz referred to it as ''PC nonsense'' and that words such as ''defective'' and ''retarded'' were ''just words.''

''I'm sick of always having to change my language in order to be politically correct,'' Antosz said during the executive session on the bill.

Rep. Ken Kreis noted that the victim in the McDonald case was 29 years old and ''had her entire life to get used to being called defective.'' [emphasis added]

House Democratic Leader Terie Norelli was quick to condemn the Republicans’ remarks, noting:

These were outrageously insensitive insults – to rape victims and to people with disabilities. I don’t believe they represent New Hampshire values. But unfortunately, these words and actions epitomize what we have seen from this Republican majority — insults and attacks for anyone who disagrees with them, and disregard for the needs and rights of women, as well as people with disabilities.

Another New Hampshire Republican resigned last year after suggesting that people with developmental disabilities should be shipped to Siberia, but he apparently wasn’t alone in his disdain for disabled constituents. Voters will have a chance to show some disdain of their own this November - but we don't think they'll direct it at their fellow citizens.