In vicious new smear, Rove falsely claims Jennings advocated for NAMBLA
After Sean Hannity introduced his Fox News show by asking, "Does Kevin Jennings support the group NAMBLA?" Karl Rove falsely claimed that Jennings, a Department of Education official, had engaged in "high-profile, in-your-face advocacy of things like NAMBLA and gay rights and queering elementary school curricula." Neither Rove nor Hannity provided any evidence that Jennings has ever "support[ed]" -- let alone engaged in "high-profile, in-your-face advocacy" of -- NAMBLA, and Rove's suggestion that support for "gay rights" is somehow related to support for NAMBLA is a smear.
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Rove falsely claims Jennings engaged in "high-profile, in-your-face advocacy" of NAMBLA
Rove, Hannity provided no evidence in support of false claim that Jennings advocated for NAMBLA. Hannity attempted to link Jennings to NAMBLA during the first two segments of his show, but neither he nor Rove provided any evidence in support of the false claim that Jennings supported or advocated for NAMBLA. Moreover, Rove's effort to link "things like NAMBLA and gay rights" is a smear.
From the October 7 edition of Fox News' Hannity:
HANNITY: Tonight -- shocking new allegations about President Obama's safe schools czar. Does Kevin Jennings support the group NAMBLA? The FBI agent who infiltrated that organization is here.
[...]
HANNITY: What do you make of what we talked about in our last segment? Here we have the safe schools czar, this guy by the name of Kevin Jennings. We talked about his praise of this guy Harry Hay, who is, you know, a guy that supports the group NAMBLA. He praised the guy, looked up to the guy. This guy admitted in his own words that he had counseled a 15-year-old that was having sex with an adult. He didn't report it; he asked the kid if he used a condom.
He said other controversial things. This Queering of Elementary Education book that he writes the foreword to. How does somebody like that, with that background, get appointed by a president of the United States?
ROVE: Well, one of two things happened on this. Either they decided that they deliberately wanted to put a very provocative, very controversial person in a job that -- where his views and his public statements and his actions were likely to unsettle a large amount -- number of Americans, or, once again, that vaunted Obama White House vetting system broke down.
I can't imagine that President Obama lacked the sensitivity to think that somebody who had said the things that Mr. Jennings had said, had done the things that Mr. Jennings had done, had taken the sort of high-profile, in-your-face advocacy of things like NAMBLA and gay rights and queering elementary school curricula -- that the president of the United States would think this was a person that he ought to put in charge of safe schools, and yet he did.
Jennings' praise of gay rights pioneer Hay had nothing to do with NAMBLA
Jennings reportedly said he was inspired by Harry Hay, "who started the first ongoing gay rights groups in America ... the Mattachine Society." Peter LaBarbera, president of a group that seeks to "expos[e] and counter the homosexual activist agenda," published a transcript of Jennings' 1997 remarks at the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network's mid-Atlantic conference that LaBarbera said was reprinted from The Lambda Report. In that speech, Jennings reportedly said, "One of the people that's always inspired me is Harry Hay, who started the first ongoing gay rights groups in America. In 1948, he tried to get people to join the Mattachine Society." Jennings' remarks include no mentions of NAMBLA.
Hay broadly recognized as gay rights pioneer. Upon Hay's death in October 2002, numerous obituaries (retrieved from Nexis) noted that Hay was a pioneer of the American gay rights movement -- just as Jennings noted in his 1997 speech. The New York Times noted that Hay "founded a secret organization six decades ago that proved to be the catalyst for the American gay rights movement." The Associated Press called Hay "a pioneering activist in the gay rights movement" who founded "the Mattachine Society." The San Francisco Chronicle stated that Hay was "considered by many to be the founder of the modern American gay rights movement." None of the obituaries mentioned NAMBLA.
Hannity's and Rove's efforts to link book foreword written by Jennings to NAMBLA are a smear
Jennings' book foreword decried anti-gay violence, had nothing to do with statutory rape. Jennings wrote the foreword to the 1999 book Queering Elementary Education: Advancing the Dialogue about Sexualities and Schooling. In the foreword -- which, contrary to Rove's and Hannity's suggestions, had nothing to do with statutory rape -- Jennings called for valuing "every human being as a precious gift" and looked forward to the day when people could "walk down our streets without fear."
Hannity's claim that former student was 15 is false
Former student was 16 -- the MA age of consent -- at the time of his conversation with Jennings. Hannity's assertion that Jennings "didn't report" that a 15-year-old student told him of his involvement with an older man is false. The student was 16, the legal age of consent in Massachusetts, when the conversation occurred 21 years ago.
These conservative punks are some real American vermin.
They will stop at nothing to destroy Obama and destroy anyone who they think can help them destroy Obama.
Rove and Hannity are 2 of the biggest cowards and pathetic bags of hate we've seen in a long time. Our corporate media in action. Got the license, got the microphone, got the smear, got the lie, let's go for it.
I think the govt. needs to be quicker to take back the grant of privilege we call "incorporation". If these people want to work together, they are certainly free to do so -- as partners in an ordinary partnership, with full personal liability. If they want the privileges and immunities of incorporation, let them serve the public interest.
That ONE FACT ALONE makes him unfit to serve as an education consultant - in any form. What does it benefit any child to be indoctrinated re: homosexuality. It would outrage me if the opposite were true: "Heterosexualizing Elementary Education" - this is not the school's business AT ALL; and this is not the place to bring up sexuality to small children. This is outrageous. Have you people forgotten how to even blush?
You probably think Catcher In the Rye is about baseball too...
This is simply a matter of opinion and you immediately react with a typical knee jerk response because of the person conveying the message.
May what ever higher power you believe in. give us all. the strength too make it through these difficult days and not be afraid to help our neighbor along the way...
Change is Inevitable...Growth is Optional
The facts that you - and anyone else defending this pervert - call FOX bad names instead of being grateful for the information that this individual is outrageous; and that you are NOT outraged at NAMBLA, the [u][b]FACT[b][u] that this sick piece of filth is writing a forward for the "Queering of Elementary Education" lets me know you're not sane. Surely you don't have any little kids in the public school. You think it is alright for grown men to have o*al sex with 18 month old boys? That is exactly one of the tenets of that diabolical group, according to an undercover police officer who infiltrated their group: The sick bunch of pedophiles.
What does sexuality have anything to do with elementary school kids, anyway? This is outrageous!!!! I have a grandson in kindergarten, and it disturbing to think that they are grown men - perverts - that see him as anything other than an innocent little boy.
Why aren't you outraged at the pervert who wants to "Queer" elementary school kids instead of calling Hannity & Rove cowards? The perverts who would molest your children are the real cowards. What is wrong with you people?
Those of us in the middle are not thrilled with him either.
The path of destruction BO has embarked on is going to split this country in two.
I would prefer a more moderate democrat like Clinton.
"One of the people that’s always inspired me is Harry Hay, who started the first ongoing gay rights groups in America,"
"He was, at times, a serious political embarrassment, as when he consistently advocated the inclusion of the North American Man/Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) in gay-pride parades."
http://www.nambla.org/sosconference1994.htm
Jennings is "always inspired" by Hays. Hays sees nothing wrong wtih adults having sex with children, to the point that Hays continually lobbied for NAMBLA to be included in gay rights parades and spoke to them publicly four times from 1984 to 1994, all available for viewing on NAMBLA's own website:
http://www.nambla.org/hay2002.htm
I hope that we could agree that marching with and advocating for NAMBLA is a little more than a "political embarassment."
Just because Sean Hannity and Karl Rove are a**holes, doesn't mean someone who admits to being inspired by pedophile lobbyists should be in charge of keeping our schools safe.
And was Jennings a pedophile lobbyist?
"Always inspired" and "is always inspired" have different meanings don't they?
Your attempt to use his words against him are as shameless as the other a**holes.
Reading is fundamental but means nothing without comprehension.
In the early 1980s, Hay joined other early gay rights activists protesting the exclusion of the North American Man Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) from participation in LGBT social movements, most noticeably pride parades–arguably the most visible signs of LGBT culture–on the grounds that such exclusions constituted a betrayal by the gay community.[33] In 1983, at a New York University forum, sponsored by an on-campus gay organization, he remarked "[I]f the parents and friends of gays are truly friends of gays, they would know from their gay kids that the relationship with an older man is precisely what thirteen-, fourteen-, and fifteen-year-old kids need more than anything else in the world."http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Hay
Jennings made the comment about being "inspired" by Hays in 1997 for his pioneering of homosexual rights back in 1948. All true. What you and MediaMatters would have us believe is that Jennings had no idea of these statements, sentiments issued and aggressive activism made and acted out by Hays only a few years prior? Those statements are of no small matter neither was Hays history throughout the gay community.
Putting aside the 15-16 year old kid for a minute...when the man who is hired to make policy with regards to the nation's schools is "inspired" by an individual who (along with his pioneering of gays rights) has ALSO made those kinds of statements and acted on behalf of an organization of active pedophiles, parents have every right to be alarmed. Their kid comes first. And the media should, for the sake of transparency and public information, report it.
With regards to the kid, a more responsible response would have been to warn the kid of the dangers of being picked up in bus stop bathrooms don't you think?
Jennings didn't have to say a word about supporting/being sympathetic to NAMBLA, the person he chose as his "inspiration" did it for him. Fox wins this one.
I can be inspired by Hitler's dedication to his country while still abhorring the things he did. Think it all the way through, I know, hard for some to do. I am inspired by his commitment to bettering his country and often ponder if that admirable quality had been coupled with a different point of view regarding what a 'better country' meant how strong and powerful would Germany be today?
So, yes, I can understand Jennings comments completely - he was inspired by Hay's willingness to put himself out there for the cause while still disapproving of some of what Hay said and believed.
Actually, barabbas70, you illustrate perfectly one of the biggest problems in politics today - the idea that it is all or nothing.
Murder over 6 million Jews and millions of others as dedication to your country? I find this logic hard to understand. Is dedication not comprised of the things you are willing to do as any means to an end. Atrocities, that still affect us all...even to this very day.
Not picking on you...just a really bad analogy.
Change is Inevitable....Growth is Optional
But my praise of that behavior wouldn't mean that I supported everything that Bush did.
The fact that you, and others, think that it means that Jennings supported Hay's NAMBLA association just shows how bereft of common sense and intelligence you guys are.
I've never heard of Hay's before, but from what I can tell he was roundly criticized for his NAMBLA advocacy. There's no reason to believe that Jennings has supported NAMBLA in any way shape or form.
Watch out. Attack Rove on his smear - not on beeing a closet-guy... .
Remember Harvey Milk?
Change is Inevitable...Growth is Optional
http://mediamatters.org/research/200910070044
http://mediamatters.org/research/200910070044
You cannot show any hint that Jennings supports NAMBLA. If you want to use your connective reasoning then Karl Rove approves of homosexual prostitution because of his involvement with Jeff Gannon. Don't you agree?
Change is Inevitable...Growth is Optional
It's a shame they used that title, because an instructional guide for teachers that offers advice on how to avoid stereotyping children at an early age could be very valuable.
I think their desire to come up with a provocative title has defeated the main purpose of writing the book.
That said, this article is yet another demonstration of Rove's complete lack of morals or decency.
He needs to continue to attack the Obama Administration to buffer the charges which could be filed against him in the future. If he thinks that by attacking Obama that he is scaring Obama, KKKarl is wrong.
KKKarl you'll enjoy prison..it'll be like old home week let's say like when Jeff Gannon had special nights at the White House...Has anyone ever explained all of those visits..
It is possible that Karl Rove's homosexual father molested Rove when he was a child, and this is why Karl is filled with so much animosity...
The conservative's lumping of homosexuality with groups like NAMBLA are just putting a negative spin on homosexuality. How come we have not heard Dick Cheney come out of the Republican closet on this "scandal"? Is it because his daughter may get upset at him?
----------------------------
The Midnight Review
Mum Is The Word
He also endorsed their beliefs, which you can prove by reading his many pro-NAMBLA speeeches he gave to.....NAMBLA. You can find these on the NAMBLA website. They miss him dearly.
http://www.nambla.org/hay2002.htm
Maybe I'm reactionary, but once someone endorses pedophilia to the point of carrying a sign that says "NAMBLA walks with me" (google it) I am unable to be inspired by them in any way, and would hope our Education Czar would feel the same. I believe the only way to view such a person is with pity and contempt.
If you think advocating pedophilia is most accurately described as a "serious political embarassment" then you are entitled to your beliefs. I don't think they represent the bliefs of most of the people who voted for Obama, myself included.
Jenning's praise of a NAMBLA supporter, even when mixed with slight criticism, is disgraceful and further polarizes people who think advocating the statutory rape of children is far worse than a "serious political embarassment".
If WPE Bush died and I commented that I admired some of his initiatives to fight AIDS in Africa, that doesn't take mean that I don't thoroughly condemn the policies of his that have done great harm to this country and the world. It would be stupid to assert that my one favorable comment indicated any kind of broad support. It is possible to recognize a favorable aspect of a person's life and have it confined to that aspect. The situation is the same with Jennings and Hay.
Your try to make the leap that Jennings through his praise of Hay accepts everything that Hay does.
This is like saying that a Catholic who respects a priest for all the good he has done and finds the priest turns out to be a pedophil that the Catholic should deny the good that the priest has ever done. If not they would be unfit to serve even as a teacher because of their praise of the priest.
In making the giant leap that Jennings is pro-NAMBLA because a man he respected for his dedication to a his life-long cause allowed NAMBLA to join his group. The giant leap doesn't stretch enough to cross the gap. There must be more writing between the lines to attack Jennings than such a trivial arguement.
Do you feel that Jennings lacks judgement because he saw some a positive trait in a person..
Change is Inevitable...Growth is Optional
If I found out a Catholic priest in my parish was advocating for NAMBLA, I wouldn't waste my time trying to praise the good things he did. And I doubt I'd find myself saying "you know that whole NAMBLA thing is seriously politically embarassing, but man that priest can really give a good mass. He's still pretty inspiring."
If George Bush said in his autobiography "One of the people that's always inspired me is David Duke, sure his whole "KKK-Nazi thing could be seriously politically embarassing, but his dedication and focus to family values were really admirable", would your ability to see context and nuance remain so clear?
Aside from Duke's belief that Jews, Blacks, etc are inferior and should be deported, David Duke believes in a lot of good, wholesome All-American stuff too, Just as Hay believed in very reasonable goals. And legalising child molestation.
Call me crazy or an absolutist, but once you're a Nazi, your permanently off the admiration list, same with pedophiliac sympathisers. Jennings sees things differently and apparently so do too many people on this board.
We're more advanced than you are. That's not something we should be ashamed about. It is something that should shame you, though, but we know it won't.
If Bush said that he admired Duke family values, but not his racism, that would be understandable. Not everything is black and white. Just because you admire the good that someone has done doesn't mean you admire everything about that person.
Lots of practice...
Seems to me Karl just might be a closeted gay man himself. Only they would be so over the top with their gay bashing. Must-Pretend-To-Be-Straight!
Seems anything goes on fox, truth be damned . .
Harry Hay advocated man/boy pedophilia over and over. Is that a position you want our Safe Schools Czar to take? He spoke at their conferences and forums 4 or 5 time. He formed the Radical Faeries, and he was a communist. In Hay's own words, he honored the older men he was involved with at the age of 13 and 14.
Jennings did engage in the "queering" of elementary schools, and he wrote the forward for the book. In Jennings' own book, Always My Child, he says that a child with any confusion about his/her own sexual identity must be categorized as "gay."
You are saying that Hannity and Rove provided no evidence of their claims, but really, Hannity has been quoting Jennings for days now.
It's the quotes that are telling the story. Where are your Kevin Jennings quotes from his work?
If you really want to know what Jennings has said and done then here are two articles with the details and confirming links.
By the way, it was Kevin Jennings who said, in public, over and over, the boy, Brewster, was 15 years old. It stayed that way until his appointment became an issue. Now he has changed his story.
If you want to be relevant, try giving some details rather than just objecting and denying - with no evidence. A discussion is needed about this, no matter your political persuasion. Everyone's children goes to school.
Barabbas gets it right.
http://maggiesnotebook.blogspot.com/2009/09/kevin-jennings-safe-school-czar-kevin.html
http://maggiesnotebook.blogspot.com/2009/10/hannity-nambla-jennings-kevin-jennings.html
And Jennings didn't say what you claim he said about all children who are questioning their sexuality have to be classified as gay.
It's amazing to me that people who are so uneducated on this topic continue to think that they can educate us on it!
The next time I need you as a resource for anything, I will be sure to let you know, but if I were you, I wouldn't hold my breath.
I wish he had also said that he knew the kid was 16 the day they had the conversation.
Kevin Jennings said he was "inspired" by Harry Hay.
Jennings was very specific in that it was Hay's early efforts that inspired him. Only an idiot reads that as a blanket admiration for everything Hay has ever said or done.
Jennings did engage in the "queering" of elementary schools, and he wrote the forward for the book.
Context is important. The book has nothing to do with influencing sexual natures. Nothing. It's simply (and complexly) about avoiding presumptions and assignments of particular sexual natures. Nothing wrong with that.
It's the quotes that are telling the story. Where are your Kevin Jennings quotes from his work?
I'd need to be convinced that there was something in Jennings' work that should arouse suspicion. So far, everything I've seen presented by Hannity, Rove or anyone else has been shown to be pulled out of context to dishonestly misrepresent his meaning.
By the way, it was Kevin Jennings who said, in public, over and over, the boy, Brewster, was 15 years old.
Nope, not over and over. Once in a speech and in context he might not actually have been referring to Brewster. And whether he was 15 or 16 wouldn't have mattered anyway because there was no sexual contact mentioned in their conversation. Jennings has never said there was.
If you want to be relevant, try giving some details rather than just objecting and denying - with no evidence.
I'm seeing plenty of evidence presented, but it's not coming from your side.
Barabbas got it wrong.
Glenn Beck's a Mormon, therefore Glenn Beck is a racist. I'm just using your logic.
Funny that Republicans were (and still are) totally capable of seeing past the fact that the Bush family were intimately connected to the Bin-Laden family for over thirty years.
Republicans are just A-OK with the fact that Prescott Bush had his financial institution closed and it's assets siezed under the "trading with the enemy act" back in the 1930's for laundering money for the Nazi's. I could go on.
Where was your righteous revulsion then?
Your hypocrisy is showing, and it is ugly.
BTW, ETRW, I read your posts often and find your eloquent beatdowns of our troale populace most satisfying.
That being said, if you are looking to justify pedophilia (and incest at the same time even), just look up some passages in your Bible, or Talmud, or Koran, or whatever holy book you worship...there's plenty of support from those lofty tomes.
Really? Even murder? Or mass murder? Or genocide?
However, point taken re; holy books.
And like all good Republicans I voted for Obama as I clearly explained in a previous post where I also referred to Rove and Hannity as a**holes.
I also never voted for Bush, and was very revolted by his family's associations, current and past as well as the damage he did to our country.
I'm no big fan of organised religion. Glenn Beck, and many Mormons are racist if they adhere strictly to the words of Brigham Young, I thought it was disgraceful that no one asked Romney such a question.
However if you absolutely never see black and white you have no moral compass. The world is indeed complex, but NAMBLA is not and most people who aren't locked into rigid party support react to NABLA and their supporters with one emotion: revulsion. There is no "gray" area on child molestation, which NAMBLA believes should be legal.
"And the ACLU advocated for the Klan to march in Skokie, Illinois. That doesn't make the ACLU supporters of Nazis. Freedom of speech means supporting legal speech even if you abhor its content."
Agreed, but Hay was a NAMBLA supporter, not just someone who supported their right to march. I support their right to march. According to the speeches he gave to NAMBLA audiences Hay thought consentual sex with children was fine and should be legalised. There are numerous other legitimate gay figures who also abhor NAMBLA that Jennings could have chosen to single out for admiration.
For someone who decries the "hate spewing right" its worth noting that on this thread I've been called an "idiot, ignorant, self-righteous, etc" while I've insulted no one here in a similar manner. But apparently thats OK because I don't share the majority opinion and am not as "advanced" as the people on this board, who assume I'm a moronic right-winger since I don't toe the party line on one issue.
Billy Carter was a "serious political embarassment", NAMBLA is a disgusting, immoral, destructive haven for very sick people and its supporters are equally warped.
If you are so "advanced" that you see the "gray" in the NAMBLA dynamic, have fun with that. Maybe one day a NAMBLA member will move next door to you and you can show the world how advanced and tolerant you are when you let him babysit your kids.
This whole discussion is a clear example of people seeing politics as a team sport. Admitting fault is surrender to the point where one finds themselves getting angry at facts, downplaying NAMBLA support and invoking Hitler's admirable qualities to prove their point.
Trent Lott got fired for a few poorly chosen words expressing admiration for Strom Thurmond, and I think his dismissal was appropriate. Were the majority of you defending Lott at that time and mentioning how one could admire Strom Thurmond while still not approving of segregation?
Or that Jennings is not supportive of such people as Hay?
Only wingnuts try that bogus scam.
enjoy the minority.
Well, I believe in evolution and I don't think Saddam Hussein bombed us on 911.
I enjoy the minority very much. I chalk that up to my triple digit IQ.
And I'm so absolutist that I think all scams are bogus.
He certainly seems like a person who is comfortable in front of a microphone, and an audience, and capable of defending himself.
He could go a long toward defusing the smears, and silencing his detractors, by simply explaining his motivations, and presenting his credentials.