Franken grills anti-gay rights leader at marriage hearing

[Playinghardball]

Source: RawReplay
By David Edwards

At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Wednesday, Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) dismantled Focus on the Family senior vice president Tim Minnery’s claim that children are better off with married straight parents.

Minnery had tried to use a 2010 Department of Health and Human Services study to back up his assertion.

“I checked the study out,” Franken told the anti-gay rights crusader. “It doesn’t actually say what you said it says. It says ‘nuclear families’ not ‘opposite-sex couples.’”

“Isn’t it true, Mr. Minnery, that a same sex couples would fall under the definition of nuclear family?”

“I would assume it would mean a family with husband and wife,” Minnery replied.

“It doesn’t,” Franken explained. “I frankly don’t know how we can trust the rest of your testimony if you are reading studies this way.”

Watch this video from the Senate Judiciary Committee, broadcast July 20, 2011

http://www.rawstory.com/rawreplay/2011/07/franken-grills-anti-gay-rights-leader-at-marriage-hearing/

[11 Bravo]

1. I loves me some Senator Franken!

[arcane1]

2. It's people like Al that are the reason I still have some degree of optimism left n/t

[hifiguy]

3. My Senator is one of the few elected officials

that will openly and loudly call bullshit when he hears it. :loveya: Al!!

[gratuitous]

5. I suspect more folks would call bullshit

But that would require them to do what Franken did: Prepare for the hearing ahead of time, read the likely studies the bigots want to cite, and be ready to call them out when they're fudging. And far too many of our elected officials are just too damn lazy or timid to do that.

[ohheckyeah]

4. Franken is one of the few who will

call people out and call bullshit when he hears bullshit. I love Al Franken!

[RKP5637]

7. Yep, he's one of the best!!! n/t

[Arugula Latte]

6. Al is one of the few politicians who lives up to his promise.

Love him!

[Ikonoklast]

8. 'Nuclear Family' = Two Parents, plus kids.

Pretty simple concept, at least to me.

Two loving adults in a committed relationship, creating a nurturing environment for their children.