Tag Archives: Chicago Tribune

Pew Research Reveals Stark Differences On Abortion Among Religious Groups

Posted on July 17, 2018 by David E Smith

A majority of Americans including many mainline Christians support legal abortion, but many religious conservatives say abortion should be illegal in all or most cases, according to the Pew Research Center.

Those religious conservatives are now hoping that Roe v. Wade will be overturned in light of President Trump’s nomination of Brett Kavanaugh, a practicing Catholic, to the U.S. Supreme Court. They’re optimistic that having a fifth conservative on the bench could lead to a reversal of the 1973 landmark case that made abortion a constitutional right. Kavanaugh gave a speech last year in which he praised former …

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PODCAST: District U-46 Board Member’s Dishonest FB Post About Rep. Ives

Posted on August 8, 2017 by David E Smith

Traci O’Neal Ellis, the school board member in Illinois School District U-46, which was embroiled in a controversy last spring over the superintendent’s secret decision to sexually integrate restrooms and locker rooms, has joined the fracas over the Chicago Tribune’s biased reporting about State Representative Jeanne Ives. This is the twisted comment Ellis has offered on her school board member Facebook page, accompanied by a link to the dishonest Trib article…

Read more……

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Illinois: Safe Haven for Abortionists, Killing Zone for the Unborn

Posted on July 27, 2017 by David E Smith
On Friday, July 14, the Chicago Tribune published an article by Angie Leventis Lourgos titled, “‘My last resort’ — thousands come to Illinois to have abortions.” Never have I read a more stunning example of Isaiah 5:20. The stories told in the article, coupled with the story told in the accompanying video, are wholly, viscerally repugnant.
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Chicago Tribune Reports on Illinois Lottery Corruption

Posted on December 12, 2016 by David E Smith

The Chicago Tribune reported this last Friday on the dubious goings on at the Illinois Lottery:

A Tribune investigation found the Illinois Lottery collected hundreds of millions of dollars from selling tickets to instant games in which it did not hand out all of the life-changing grand prizes — sometimes awarding no grand prizes before ending a game.

Are you shocked, shocked that corruption is going on at the Illinois Lottery? Well, you shouldn’t be. Corruption, inefficiency, and lack of oversight affect virtually every government agency in Illinois.

Poor management of tax dollars have left Illinoisans with billions in unpaid

…
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PODCAST: The Shaming of Wheaton College by Shameful Organizations

Posted on September 1, 2016 by David E Smith

I just read with interest a “news” story on Wheaton College that reported that Wheaton College has been listed as the “worst” college on the Princeton Review’s list of “LGBTQ-Unfriendly” schools and included on the “Shame List” by Campus Pride, an organization committed to normalizing homoeroticism. The unbiased news reporter Leonor Vivanco neutrally reports that the “Shame List” is composed of campuses that have “applied or received a Title IX exemption to allow institutions to discriminate against LGBTQ persons, or that have a demonstrated history of anti-LGBT actions [emphasis added].” These are reporter Vivanco’s “unbiased” words—not Campus Pride’s.…

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Anti-Marriage Deceivers and Fools

Posted on July 7, 2015 by David E Smith

If I had a nickel for every time a liberal said it’s a slippery slope fallacy to claim that the legalization of homoerotic marriage would necessarily result in the legal recognition of plural unions, I would be a very rich woman.

The juxtaposition of two recent Chicago Tribune editorials provides an almost-comical illustration of both “progressive” deceit and ignorance about marriage.

Eric Zorn inveighed against conservative claims about the inevitability of legalized polygamy, describing such claims as “desperate” and “sophomoric,” and then a few days later, Steve Chapman made the sophomoric claim that legalized polygamy is “not so scary.”

I …

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Tribune Op/Ed Misleads on Healthcare Right of Conscience

Posted on April 20, 2015 by David E Smith
Sunday’s Chicago Tribune article, “State bill seeks to mandate disclosure,” is terribly misleading. It implies SB 1564 merely requires a healthcare provider to disclose that she has a conscientious objection, that the bill is simply about not having patients be “blind-sided” that a Catholic hospital/provider doesn’t perform abortions, elective sterilizations, etc. The bill does not require mere transparency about objections, but creates new obligations for healthcare providers, including pregnancy resource centers that offer women alternatives to abortion, to promote and participate in conscience-violating activities.
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The Mainstream Media and Its Ignorance on Marriage

Posted on June 2, 2014 by David E Smith

How do we know that Chicago Tribune columnist Eric Zorn is foolish? Well, let’s take a look at Sunday’s column and count the ways:

1.) He believes that the same-sex marriage debate will “fade into history.” 

2.) He believes that “ten years from now, when a betrothed or married couple is same-sex, it will be just as matter of fact as to a couple today being interfaith or interracial.” 

3.) He apparently thinks the elimination of sexual complementarity from the legal definition of marriage can change non-marriages into real marriages as opposed to merely unions recognized as marriages. 

4.) He …

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Ridicule Replaces Reason in Religious Liberty Debates

Posted on March 6, 2014 by David E Smith

“Swallowing half an hour before closing time that second dose of soma had raised
a quite impenetrable wall between the actual universe and their minds”
(Aldous Huxley, Brave New World).

I’ll give it a go once more for the intellectually lazy and socially insulated “progressives” out there who, when discussing issues related to homosexuality, refuse to address questions regarding basic presuppositions and logical consequences. For example, Chicago Tribune columnist Rex Huppke just wrote a silly and condescending column in the Chicago Tribune about the serious issue of religious liberty in which he revealed his own ignorance of the topic.…

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Postscript on Marriage Question From Tribune Columnist

Posted on November 21, 2013 by David E Smith

Yesterday I wrote about the question Chicago Tribune columnist Eric Zorn posed to me regarding the potential effects of legally recognizing same-sex unions as marriages. He asked for specific research on which to base “gloomy” predictions and asked what “animated” groups like ours to oppose same-sex “marriage.” It’s important to note that his question was premised on the implicit assumption that predictions about the effects of changing the legal definition of marriage should only be justified by sociological or objectively-measured research. But such an assumption must itself be justified. There are other warrants or justifications for predictions, including both those …

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Chicago Tribune Hosts Revealing Marriage Forum

Posted on October 3, 2013 by David E Smith

In a stunning public admission during a debate on the future of marriage in Illinois, the chief sponsor of SB 10, the proposed bill to legalize same-sex “marriage,” homosexual State Representative Greg Harris (D-Chicago) acknowledged that the bill does not provide religious liberty or conscience protections for individual Christian business owners. Further, it was clear that both he and homosexual Chicago Alderman Deb Mell (a former state representative and co-sponsor of of SB 10) oppose any such protections.

In the unfortunately titled “Marriage Equality” debate, sponsored by the Chicago Tribune, moderator Bruce Dold asked Harris about the absence …

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Concerns About Common Core (Part 2)

Posted on August 27, 2013 by David E Smith

Yesterday in the Chicago Tribune, Bob Secter writing ostensibly in support of Common Core Standards (CCS) engaged in the very kind of hyperbolic mischaracterization of critics of CCS for which he condescendingly mocks them. He spends the first quarter of his opinion piece comparing CCS critics to Joseph McCarthy, and then he spends the rest of his time mocking CCS critics based on one flawed story on FOX News. He wraps up his piece of demagoguery—as opposed to reasoned analysis—by returning to his dishonest and paranoid McCarthy analogy. This was not a sound analysis of CCS. It was …

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Chicago Tribune Celebrates Genderless “Marriage”

Posted on November 12, 2012 by David E Smith

I had other plans for today until I read the Chicago Tribune editorial that ebulliently celebrates the rejection in four states of the central defining feature of marriage—sexual complementarity.

In a display of astonishing hubris, the Trib editorial board has prognosticated—without evidence, I might add—that “letting same-sex couples marry does no harm to the civil institution of marriage, but promotes family stability, rewards loving commitment, and safeguards the interest of children” (Apparently in the Trib’s view, the interests of children don’t include having a mother and a father).

Further, the Trib asserts that the “public understands” all this. The Tribune…

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More on the Recent “Gay Pride” Parade Controversy

Posted on January 5, 2012 by David E Smith

I’m reluctant to beat a dead horse, but in light of a comment made by the pastor of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church and an editorial in the liberal National Catholic Reporter (NCR), a bit more needs to be said about the “gay pride” parade brouhaha.

1.   In addition to the cowardice of conservatives, it is the failures of religious leaders that have helped create the cultural mess we’re in right now. NCR recently wrote favorably about this portion of a statement issued by Our Lady of Mount Carmel’s pastor, Fr. Thomas Srenn:

The annual Pride Parade is

…
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Chicago Tribune Op Ed on Banned Books Week

Posted on October 5, 2011 by David E Smith

On Tuesday, John Keilman wrote a lighthearted editorial on last week’s annual dishonest campaign by the American Library Association (ALA) laughably named “Banned Books Week.”

His personal story was revelatory. Keilman shared that when he was young, pulp novels with “absolutely no redeeming value” beckoned with an irresistible force. He describes what so powerfully attracted him: their “lurid” titles and the cover art which depicted the hero with “his arm around a busty woman, blasting a hole through some underworld stooge.”

But then after explicitly stating the sexual and violent language and imagery that served as “catnip to a preteen” …

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