On Maine Public Radio this evening, Susan Sharon takes a little less than four minutes to explain the latest ad from the people leading the people's veto, and explain the links of those involved to the Prop 8 campaign in California and their fundamentalist Christian ideology. Critics question Yes on 1 claims is really a mini-tour de force:
The Wirthlins are Mormon. Robb Wirthlin's father Joseph was an apostle in the Mormon church. Wirthlin is also related to GOP pollster Dick Wirthlin, who was active in California's anti-gay marriage campaign.
"We feel it's important that people see what the real-life ramifications of a change in law can have in other aspects of society that ostensibly originally had nothing to do with that first law that was changed," he says.
Also featured in Yes On One's latest ad is high school English teacher Charla Bansley of Ellsworth. "Vote Yes on Question 1 to prevent homosexual marriage from being taught in Maine schools," she implores in the ad.
Bansley is the state director of Concerned Women for America, a group that promotes biblical values. Bansley herself has opposed diversity training and tolerance classes in Maine schools. During the news conference Bansley acknowledged that Maine's same-sex marriage law does not specifically include requirements for same-sex marriage and family issues to be taught in public schools. But she thinks that could easily happen in Maine if the law is upheld.
Bansley declined to say where she teaches. "I would really like to keep my students out of this. I just left a freshman class and I would really like them not to get hounded by all of this."
In fact, Bansley does not teach at a public school, but at Calvary Chapel Christian School in Orrington, outside of Bangor. As a private school, Calvary would not be bound by anything adopted by the local school district.
It is a great piece, and I urge you to send it around to everyone that you know.
In a fundraising email that accompanied the release of the new ad from Stand for Marriage Maine (S4MM), the group leading the people's veto, Marc Mutty points to this video in which the Wirthlin's expand on their views:
This video was also used by opponents of equal marriage in California.
In it, Robin Wirthlin says:
Lexington Public Schools has come out with a new curriculum where they will teach about homosexuality and gay marriage in every topic: in math, in reading, in social studies, in spelling. There will be terms and concepts of homosexuality promoted in every subject, at every level - from Kindergarten on up.
Parents will have no right to object, and schools will roll this forth whether they like it or not.
I contacted the Maine Department of Education for a comment regarding this, and Communications Director David Connerty-Marin, sent this reply:
I cannot comment on Massachusetts education law or decisions made by local school districts in Massachusetts. Here in Maine, our Learning Results standards and education regulations make no reference to the teaching of marriage in any way. So a change in Maine's laws or definition of marriage places no requirements on local districts regarding whether or how they teach about marriage. Such curriculum decisions are strictly local. Before or after passage of the gay marriage law a district could choose to teach about marriage or not, and to teach about it in any way it deemed appropriate. It simply is not governed by state education law.
Connerty-Marin goes on to add, "The ad is entirely misleading."
DIRIGO BLUE is available as an