Wanted In Florida, Foster Parents For HIV Children; Gays Need Not Apply

I’m including the following opinion article from the March 6, 2006, South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board because it makes my blood boil and I believe it is time for us to take back our governments and end this tyranny and bigotry that has been foisted on us, by the Republican majority.

The article details the hateful atmosphere that exists in Florida today and I’m sure these travesties are being repeated across this great nation. So read this for yourself and then decide if you need to start taking some action, because Republicans have legislated away our right to marry and now adoption and soon who knows what. If you think I am professing doom and gloom, you are right, because most Republicans loathe both gay people and needy people seeking medical services, because they believe that both are just leeches on society and it’s only going to get worse.

If we don’t start rebelling against an uncaring government, no matter at what level, can legislation be far behind that will limit our rights simply because we have HIV? You can bet on it. Republicans claim to be compassionate conservatives when in fact many of them are nothing more than liars and bigots, because they seek our destruction, whether it is through legislating us into oblivion or under-funding those programs that we need to survive. If they can do this to children, supposedly the ones society is obligated to protect, what chance does a bunch of gays and positive people have to ensure our own survival?

GOP gives up kids’ lives to scare up votes
By William Butte

“I love my dads and they love me back, and that is one thing that Florida can never take away from me.”

Ironically, it was Valentine’s Day when 18-year-old Franke Alexandre found himself in Tallahassee before the five-member Florida Senate Committee on Children and Families, defiantly declaring his never-ending love for his foster parents, Steven Lofton and Roger Croteau.

Franke wants his dads to adopt him. But because Florida law bans gays from adopting, the state would rather rip the family apart.

His brave appearance before the committee, as with other-witnesses, was an attempt to persuade the three Republican members to vote for a bill sponsored by Sen. Nan Rich, D-Weston, and supported by Sen. Walter “Skip” Campbell, D-Fort Lauderdale, which would allow gays to legally adopt foster children if a judge finds, by “clear and convincing” evidence, it is in the child’s best interest.

Franke told the committee about his short life with its eyebrow-raising details – details he shared on the op-ed page of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel the same day: Born HIV-positive; mother died of AIDS soon after; uninvolved biological father.

It certainly explains his passion for a love that can never be taken away.

Lofton and Croteau, pediatric nurses specializing in AIDS at the hospital where Franke was born, took him and three other HIV-positive infants into their home. Their exemplary care of these special needs children earned them the first “Outstanding Forster Parenting Award” from Florida’s Children’ Home Society. Later, the family moved to Oregon to live near Lofton’s elderly parents and expanded with two more HIV-positive children.

Franke has thrived under Lofton and Croteau’s superior medical and parenting skills and today he is ready for college. But before he turned 18, the state of Florida demanded him to return or lose his much-needed financial support.

Unfortunately for Franke, neither his powerful story and love for his foster days nor their extraordinary parenting skills swayed Republicans Mike Fasano of New Port Richey, Evelyn Lynn of Ormond Beach and Durell Peaden of Crestview. So Rich, fighting an adoption ban she said was “born out of bigotry and prejudice,” had to table her bill.

One reason for Franke’s failure is bad timing.

With 2006 midterm elections approaching, Republicans, eager to deflect attention from questions over ethics and Iraq, reportedly are gearing up in at least 16 states to pass laws or secure November ballot initiatives to prevent gays from adopting. As they did in 2004 with antigay marriage amendments in 11 states, their plan is to draw out millions of socially conservative voters, like an Ohio pastor who said gays adopting gives the opportunity for “experimenting on children.”

And with our decades-old appeals-court–upheld anti-gay adoption lay as the blueprint for other states to follow, there isn’t a snowball’s chance in the Keys of Florida Republicans watering it down.

That’s the same chance Franke has this election year in his fervent desire to legally be part of the only family he’s every known. He’s up against the Republican’s fetid desire to retain and expand their political power at whatever cost, even if it’s playing the homophobia card at the expense of our society’s neediest children.

The Children’s Bureau, U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services statistics show that of more than 532,000 children in the foster care system – virtually all survivors of dysfunctional heterosexual households – approximately 120,000 are available for adoption. Yet less than half (about 50,000) find permanent homes each year.

So although some will argue kids like Franke need homes with a mother and father, there just aren’t enough June and Ward Cleaver types out there willing to fill the need.

Even more tragically, many adoptable foster children don’t fit the profile of the ideal child many couples want. They’re older (at least 20,000 “age out” of the system annually), of a minority background or have a serious enough illness to be labeled a special needs child.

Who will adopt these children?

Many times the answer has been gay men and lesbians. UCLA demographer Gary Gates analyzed 2000 Census figures and estimates 12,500 adopted children live in households headed by a gay adult.

In Franke’s published letter he called Lofton and Croteau “my dads” or “my parents” a dozen times. He wants to be adopted into the only family he’s ever known. You’d think the members of a political party that espouses “traditional family values” could understand that.

Yet his plea fell on deaf Republican ears, because this election year they are more than willing to turn kids like Franke into political pawns in the culture war for the sake of votes and power.

BOTTOM LINE: Ignorance and prejudice are the real winners in this bill's defeat.

Copyright (c) 2006, South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Having read it for yourself, how do you feel about what our “compassionate conservatives” are doing? Are these the people you want in power? I can’t imagine a worse future, so maybe we can mount an offensive to get them out of office, before they succeed in legislating us out of existence.