Finally, Some Common Sense Legislation: Ohio Republicans Banned from Adoption

Good for Sen. Hagan.

Ohio lawmaker to propose ban on GOP adoption
OhioToday.com
BY CARL CHANCELLOR
Knight Ridder Newspapers

AKRON, Ohio - If an Ohio lawmaker's proposal becomes state law, Republicans would be barred from being adoptive parents.

State Sen. Robert Hagan sent out e-mails to fellow lawmakers late Wednesday night, stating that he intends to "introduce legislation in the near future that would ban households with one or more Republican voters from adopting children or acting as foster parents." The e-mail ended with a request for co-sponsorship.

On Thursday, the Youngstown Democrat said he had not yet found a co-sponsor.

Hagan said his "tongue was planted firmly in cheek" when he drafted the proposed legislation. However, Hagan said that the point he is trying to make is nonetheless very serious.

Hagan said his legislation was written in response to a bill introduced in the Ohio House this month by state Rep. Ron Hood, R-Ashville, that is aimed at prohibiting gay adoption.

"We need to see what we are doing," said Hagan, who called Hood's proposed bill blatantly discriminatory and extremely divisive. Hagan called Hood and the eight other conservative House Republicans who backed the anti-gay adoption bill "homophobic."

Hood's bill, which does not have support of House leadership, seeks to ban children from being placed for adoption or foster care in homes where the prospective parent or a roommate is homosexual, bisexual or transgender.

To further lampoon Hood's bill, Hagan wrote in his mock proposal that "credible research" shows that adopted children raised in Republican households are more at risk for developing "emotional problems, social stigmas, inflated egos, and alarming lack of tolerance for others they deem different than themselves and an air of overconfidence to mask their insecurities."

However, Hagan admitted that he has no scientific evidence to support the above claims. Just as "Hood had no scientific evidence" to back his assertion that having gay parents was detrimental to children, Hagan said.

"It flies in the face of reason when we need to reform our education system, address health care and environmental issues that we put energy and wasted time (into) legislation (Hood's) like this," continued Hagan, who has been in the Ohio Senate nine years. Before the Senate, he served 19 years in the Ohio House.

I highly commend this serious piece of legislation and hope it finds the co-sponsors it deserves. Every time the GOP wastes our time with more of their bogus feel-bad legislation as a defelction to their failures and the important work that needs to be done, they should expect to have to debate mockeries of their efforts on the floor as well.

The GOP showed America the way with their cynical proposal to "immediately withdraw" from Iraq in response to Rep. Mutha's thoughtful request for a mission plan. So they can just suck up the fruits of their abuse of government.

I realize Republicans are too busy trying to put Osama Bin Laden in charge of our Homeland Security to worry about education or health care reform, but if they can find the time bash gays, then they can find the time to defend putting our most vulnerable orphans in the hands of hate-mongering homophobes.

I hope it does get co-sponsorship and brought up on the floor - and I hope it does waste valuable time. Not because I believe that bill should be passed, I just want someone to complain about the time "wasted" on this "nonsense", and then have it thrown back in their faces that they've been wasting time on mean-spirited, bigoted, homophobic laws for years, and if they can't take it, then they shouldn't have dished it out in the first place.

I'm gay, and I'm a good person - Now, I do realize that there are some gay people that are bad apples, just like there are some republicans that aren't the good, honest, Christian little-angels they'd like you to believe.

The idea behind this bill will hopefully help put the shoe on the other foot and make some people realize that just because someone is different, or identifies with a certain “unpopular” segment of the population, that does not automatically make them a bad person, or unfit to be a parent.

I know this is just fantasy talk, but could you imagine if this bill actually got to a point where it was taken seriously? All those republicans that have/want adopted children would be squirming in their pants, afraid they'd have their family taken away from them or of never being able to start one in the first place.

But they'd have it easy . . . All they'd have to do is "choose" to become a democrat. Then, BAM! – instant adoption approval.

After all, since I "chose" to be gay, they can just flip that little switch on the back of their heads from "Rep" to "Dem" just as easily as they turn off the bedroom light before they have that "sinful" Republican s..e..x.

That is pretty sad that a democrat has to make a fake bill to get a point across. Although it won't work, remember when the Dems threatened to filibuster some judge so a Justice Sunday was made, headed by KKK Grand Wizards and other "good" republicans. Then a week later the republicans filibustering something they didn't like and got offended when the Dems called them on it.

Although it isn't a fake bill, it's a real bill, that if passed into law would affect people legally. Darn, move up to Ohio just to write to my congress person to vote for it.

Although Ohio isn't the greatest, just some swing state. I bet if this was done down here or in Texas no fuss would be made because we are dominately red, therefor no bill like that would even be read to know what it was about, like the Patriot Act Bill.

They should just ban all non-married people from adopting.
A single parent has to work and puts the kid in daycare meanwhile.

Gay married couples should be able to adopt and straight married couples shoud be allowed to adopt.
Should a divorce happen the the child will be cut in half and each half given to a parent