It seems that the AFA and other like-minded anti-GLBT groups are at it again and they've made up their mind to
boycott Ford. Some good quotes from the article:
Randy Sharp, AFA's director of special projects, said Monday that Ford's chairman "refused to acknowledge, much less reply, to our concerns."
While it is certainly their right to boycott Ford that doesn't mean the rest of us can't snicker and laugh. Aside from the obvious thing summed up very well by HRC.org there is plenty to laugh about. Here is what HRC said:
Gay rights organizations criticized the boycott. Brad Luna, spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest gay rights organization, said "clear trends towards fairness, nondiscrimination, inclusion and acceptance of gays in corporate America are unstoppable."
"Any attempts to turn back the clock such as this one are out of step with the values of the majority of Americans," Luna said.
He is of course right and you won't find any respectible employer rolling back benefits for the GLBT community if they expect to be competitive in attracting employees.
The more ridiculous thing here is that AFA and their ilk are stamping their feet, huffing and puffing and attacking their own by doing this.
HRC.org puts together a scorecard for each session of congress and posts it on their website. You can find the scorecard for the 108th Congress here.
Ford contributes heavily to the Republican party each election cycle. In the 2003-2004 election cycle they contributed $544,450 according to our research with 77% of that going to the GOP. This election cycle their PAC has contributed $149,800 so far with 78% of that going to the GOP.
I just took a quick look at the scorecard on HRC's site and added up only the amount that went to Senate candidates from 2003 to 2006 that scored a 0 on their scale. A 0 basically means that they voted for the anti-GLBT agenda in every case. These are people like Sam Brownback, Jon Kyl, Orrin Hatch, Trent Lott, Rick Santorum, etc.
Looking only at that exclusive crowd Ford's PAC has contributed almost $60,000 over the course of the past two election cycles to these guys. The number would be a whole lot higher if I included the 0's from the House or went with everyone that favored the federal marriage amendment for example. This doesn't even consider the personal donations made by Ford's executives which in a lot of cases are to these same people and they are a lot larger.
The long and the short of it is that Ford is doing their part to keep the guys in office that are the worst GLBT offenders out there. Yet somehow the AFA can't find a better target for their "message" than Ford.
So boycott away guys, you are only hurting your own agenda in the process.