Wednesday, September 10, 2008

ABC News: "Pastor, I am Gay" book challenge


ABC News featured the first statements by Mary Ellen Baker (married name), the Alaskan librarian caught in the Palin book challenge controversy today. The lead, by Brian Ross, Rhonda Schwartz and Anna Schecter says:

"The librarian at the center of a 1996 controversy with then-Wasilla mayor Sarah Palin says she can't recall any effort by Palin to ban specific books from the town library."

But the article goes on to explain there was a push to remove a book from a bookstore when Palin posed the censorship question "rhetorically." Twice.

"Palin's church...had been pushing for the removal a book called 'Pastor I Am Gay' from local bookstores, according to the book's author Pastor Howard Bess, of the Church of the Covenant in nearby Palmer, Alaska.

"'And she was one of them,' said Bess, 'this whole thing of controlling information, censorship, that's part of the scene,' said Bess. "

A local reporter remembers it a little differently, according to ABC.

The local newspaper reporter who covered the controversy, Paul Stuart, claims he was later told by the librarian that Palin wanted three specific books removed from the library.

In her statement to ABC News, the librarian said, "I am unable to dispute or substantiate the information Paul Stuart provided to you."

Stuart said he was confident of his memory. "She may have said that but that's not how it was."

Read the whole article for an objective look at what actually happened.
http://www.abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=5766173&page=1

For more about "Pastor, I am Gay," follow this URL:
http://www.spiritrestoration.org/Church/Homosexuality%20and%20the%20Church/Pastor%20I%20am%20Gay%20%20%20%20%20Book%20Review.htm

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