I am writing today to announce the closure of the Michigan Messenger. After four years of operation in Michigan, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news into a single site, The American Independent at Americanindependent.com. This is part of a shift in strategy, towards new forms [...]
An abstinence-only presentation provided to numerous school districts in Calhoun and Eaton Counties in October of this year provided false and misleading information to students about HIV, experts allege.
Two county registers of deeds filed a class action lawsuit Monday on behalf of Michigan’s 83 counties alleging that the Mortgage Electronic Registration Services owes millions of dollars in property title transfer taxes.
Despite evidence of the impact of mercury on children and public health, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette last month joined with 24 other state attorneys general in filing a lawsuit to scuttle new EPA regulations that would reduce mercury emissions from power plants.
U.S. Rep. Thaddeus McCotter (R-Livonia) has signed a letter, along with Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio), demanding that President Barack Obama fire Harry Knox.
The Congressmen along with leading Catholics sent the letter to Obama because Knox stood by a March 2009 comment by Knox in which he said the Pope was “hurting people in the name of Jesus.”
That comment was made following Pope Benedict XVI March 2009 statement that condoms are part of the problem with HIV in Africa. During flight to Africa, the Pope told reporters:
“I would say that this problem of AIDS cannot be overcome merely with money, necessary though it is,” he said. “If there is no human dimension, if Africans do not help [by responsible behavior], the problem cannot be overcome by the distribution of prophylactics: on the contrary, they increase it.”
Boehner, in acknowledging he would sign the letter with McCotter on Thursday, called Knox an “anti-Catholic bigot.”
Knox reaffirmed his condemnation of the Pope’s view earlier this week. The controversy is being stoked by the Cybercast News Service, a Christian news outlet.
The fact is, according to the CDC, correct and consistent use of condoms does reduce the risk of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections, and Knox is standing behind that.
Knox, who serves as director of Human Rights Campaign’s religion and faith program, is also a member of Obama’s faith-based advisory council. Human Rights Campaign is national political organization for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered Americans.
The letter to Obama concludes:
Now that Mr. Knox has again offended millions of Catholic Americans – standing behind his brazen assertion that the Pope “is hurting people in the name of Jesus” – we can only interpret your continued silence and complicity with his grave offense as wholehearted support for this bigot and his words of hatred.
We are now forced to demand the firing of Harry Knox. It is the only remaining action you can take to dissuade faithful Catholics that your Council is not a sham and that your “commitment to diversity” is an absolute mockery.
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