For those not familiar with the story, a crackpot minister named Steve Anderson (Faithful Word Baptist Church in Tempe, Arizona) gave a hellfire and damnation sermon in which he prayed for Obama’s violent death. He took a detour however to focus on Barney Frank, of whom he said:
The proudly uneducated Anderson later said in an interview with Alan Colmes that he was wrong about Frank- that he had him confused with another faggot Democrat representative from Massachusetts, Gerry Studds, who had a sexual relationship with a 17 year old male page.* All gays are, however, pedophiles who enlist by rape.
So my question: I know that the rules are different for public figures when it comes to allegations of slander/libel/defamation, etc., but would Barney Frank have a valid case if he wished to pursue legal action against Anderson?
Relevant facts:
It would be impossible for Frank to prove loss of earnings or anything like since he’s an elected official from Massachusetts and Anderson is in Arizona and this isn’t an election year anyway.
Anderson did revoke and correct the comment in a later.
However, Anderson did make the comment in a public forum even though it was completely false and in that sermon he openly stated his wish for the death of Obama, and he vocally approved of a congregation member who carried a firearm to Obama’s appearance, therefore potential endangerment could be argued.
While I seriously doubt that Frank (who’s been called a fag by no less than the Republican House majority leader before) will pursue recourse, if he did so would he stand any chance of collecting damages?
*The fact that a presumably consensual relationship between a middle aged man and a 17 year old is not pedophilia but- at worst- statuatory rape (and of course a political career killer and kind of icky) is a point that nobody has yet addressed. There have in fact been many politicians and public figures who married women younger than 17 (albeit not in recent decades).
PS- Anyone care to wager on whether Steve Anderson will ultimately be found in a tryst with a 20 year old male hustler and a labradoodle or a Girl Scout troop and a komodo dragon? (His ilk never gets caught just having an affair- it’s usually some REALLY warped shite.)
The way that the First Amendment has been interpreted makes it very difficult for public figures to sue for libel successfully in the US. This is all to the good, because it means that we can speculate about the likelihood of the Reverend Anderson being found in bed with a dead 14-year-old male hooker (and his pet poodle), and not be sued ourselves for libel.
I will never understand the justification for King James only, a translation of a translation of a translation of a translation of a translation by 17th century scholarship overseen by a king who was not a biblical scholar and who told the translators what he specifically wanted accentuated and who presided over a church of which most KJ Only people are not a part (do they believe Baptists=Anglicans?). The same people have probably never been to a Shakespearean play in their lives and if they did they probably didn’t understand it, and some of those were written after the KJV. I presume there is a justification one somewhere, but that even Kirk Cameron would barely be able to hold onto the ‘logic’.
How about Michelangelo Signorile? Signorile recently interviewed Anderson, and during the interview Anderson asserted that Signorile is a child molester:
[QUOTE=Sampiro;11513287I presume there is a justification one somewhere, but that even Kirk Cameron would barely be able to hold onto the ‘logic’.[/QUOTE]
It’s a reaction to the Revised Standard Version and the NIV, which made changes that the fundamentalists didn’t like, and which they feel weaken the Christian message.
For instance, there’s a line in the book of Matthew talking about the birth of Jesus and how it fit older prophecy, that says, basically, “As the book of Issiah says, 'a virgin is with child and will bear a son, and you shall call him Emmanuel…”
Now, if you look at the book of Issiah, the King James version translates the line in Issiah, “a virgin is with child and will bear a son, and you shall call him Emmanuel…”
The thing is, that’s not really the best translation of the line in the book of Issiah. The translators of the Revised Standard Version and the NIV realized that, and they translated the book of Issiah, “a young woman is with child and will bear a son, and you shall call him Emmanuel…”
The King James Only people say that that translation weakens the idea that Jesus was born of a virgin and also contradicts the line in Matthew, which says that the line in Issiah uses the word “virgin”.
IANAL and all that, but it doesn’t look like there’s much of a case. He retracted the main false statement, and all the rest is opinion. I would like to however object to the assertion that “our country is run by faggots.” By my count, there are two out members of congress and one highly suspected. That means that only the legislative branch is only 0.56% faggot. That’s only one branch of three, and hardly a large part of the government. Even if we assume that there are potential Mark Foley reduxes out there, “faggot sodomites” are a very small voting block. They haven’t taken over our government yet, and have to rely on their traditional recruiting methods, like the Teletubbies and gym class.
