Gov. Daugaard On the Opposite Side of Religious Freedom

South Dakota Governor Dennis Daugaard

The libs at the Argus Leader are peeing their pants over the recent victory for religious freedom in the Hobby Lobby case, and quickly turning it to fear-monger support for the homosexual agenda.

From the Argus Leader:

But the Hobby Lobby decision bolstered the right of businesses to refuse laws that violate their owners’ religious convictions. Legislators such as state Sen. Phil Jensen say that strengthens the case for “religious freedom” laws.

“(Hobby Lobby) just reinforces the Constitution’s concepts of the right to free association and free speech,” said Jensen, a Rapid City Republican who sponsored one of this year’s anti-gay-rights bills. “People are getting all hung up on political correctness when the Constitution is, I think, pretty clear. If you don’t want to go to a business, then you don’t have to go to a business.”

Notice how the Leftists in the “mainstream” media turn a religious freedom bill into an “anti-gay-rights” bill.  (Why are conservatives so pathetic at noticing this and turning the language back to what it is really about?)

You might recall that the Rapid City Journal did a hit job on Senator Jensen earlier this year–at hit which was eagerly enjoined by South Dakota RINOs such as Governor Dennis Daugaard who found protecting religious freedom (indeed, freedom in general) “to be completely out of line with South Dakota values.”

Maybe religious freedom and the free market are “out of line” with liberal RINO values, but they are not out of line with South Dakota values.

As the Argus Leader article recounts:

Two committees and the full House of Representatives voted last year against passing a slate of similar bills, and both Gov. Dennis Daugaard and Lt. Gov. Matt Michels came out against them. Next year’s Legislature will have many new members as a result of this year’s elections, however.

The proposals were sparked by cases in Colorado and Oregon, where wedding vendors got in trouble for refusing to provide cakes or photography for same-sex weddings they felt violated their religious beliefs. But those cases stemmed from existing state laws making it illegal to discriminate based on sexual orientation. South Dakota doesn’t have such a law, making it legal right now to refuse service to gay couples.

Notice that it said “…making it legal RIGHT NOW…” That is, until homosexual activists find a “useful idiot” lawyer and a “useful idiot” judge to manufacture a “right” for them to force a Christian business owner to facilitate and participate in their immoral activities.

Only a complete idiot sits around in a war zone doing nothing to protect themselves until the enemy is in their face. Sadly, our culture is in the middle of a war zone today, with the Left Hell-bent on forcing everyone to accept and even applaud its immoral agenda.

What’s more, shortly after the “Republican” supermajority legislature killed these religious freedom bills, two homosexual activists launched a fresh and direct attack on South Dakota’s marriage protection amendment. With the way the federal court system has been attacking marriage lately, unless Republicans are willing to grow some anatomy and threaten to impeach any judge who tries to play judicial activist with the South Dakota Constitution, it’s only a matter of time before marriage and religious freedom are exposed to unprotected assault here in our state, too.

It’s worth remembering, too, that Dennis Daugaard and Mike Rounds worked together as governor and lieutenant governor for eight years. When one considers the long list of Rounds’ betrayals that we have on record, can we really imagine that the “Daugaard” apple has fallen very far from the “Rounds” tree?

As I have pointed out many times before, there can be no “middle ground” between the agenda of the Left and traditional American values. Two diametrically opposed value systems cannot coexist in the same culture. One will necessarily dominate. If our traditional values are not aggressively defended against this deliberate and determined attack, the dark agenda of the Left will dominate.

So, South Dakota Republicans: how does it feel knowing that your governor and what appears to be a majority of your legislators are enemies of religious freedom, and sit squarely on the side of homosexual activists? You Republicans who call yourselves Christians and conservatives: what do you think about that?

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Bob Ellis has been the owner of media company Dakota Voice, LLC since 2005. He is a 10-year U.S. Air Force veteran, a political reporter and commentator for the past decade, and has been involved in numerous election and public policy campaigns for over 20 years. He was a founding member and board member of the Tea Party groups Citizens for Liberty and the South Dakota Tea Party Alliance. He lives in Rapid City, South Dakota with his wife and two children.

Bob Ellis

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