Commanding General’s Spiritual Fitness Concerts. They have been going on for years at Fort Eustis and Fort Lee, but these disturbing misuses of government funds and abuses of soldiers’ rights have only recently been brought to our attention.

These concerts, and the stories of soldiers who were punished for choosing not to attend, were reported in a recent article by Chris Rodda, Senior Research Director for the Military Religious Freedom Foundation.

Rodda reports that Maj. Gen. James E. Chambers has started these religious conversion oriented concerts at both bases where he has been the commanding officer, and that they have continued at For Lee even after his departure, at an appalling cost to taxpayers.

The costs may be small compared to the enormous military budget, but any money spent on promotion of a religion by government agencies is unacceptable, and “Spiritual Fitness” programs in the military cost uncounted millions of dollars per year. Millions of dollars taken from citizens who for the most part are not Evangelical Christians and who would not willingly pay to promote that religion, or to coerce anyone into sitting through repeated and extended attempts to convert them.

The fact that military officers are wasting up to $100,000 per act at each concert with the clear intent of promoting Evangelical Christianity is disturbing enough, but punishing soldiers who choose not to attend these “Spiritual Fitness” events where their commanders support these blatant attempts to convert them to Evangelical Christianity is an unmitigated abuse of the rights granted to every citizen by the constitution of the United States of America.

Lest there be any confusion as to the purpose of these bands and the officials who hired them, an article in the Fort Eustis Wheel quotes one member of the BarlowGirl trio who headlined this particular concert as stating that their group is “on a mission to bring the armor of God to servicemembers”, and they are doing it with your money and with the support of your military commanders.

Remember California Proposition 8? Aka California Marriage Protection Act, aka The Mormon Proposition: a measure that added a new provision to the California Constitution that provides that “only marriage between a man and a woman is valid and recognized in California.” Well, it was just ruled deeply unconstitutional by a federal judge today, August 4, 2010.

"Proposition 8 fails to advance any rational basis in singling out gay men and lesbians for denial of a marriage license. Indeed, the evidence shows Proposition 8 does nothing more than enshrine in the California Constitution the notion that opposite-sex couples are superior to same-sex couples," Walker, who was appointed to the federal bench by former President Ronald Reagan, wrote in his opinion.

"Race restrictions on marital partners were once common in most states but are now seen as archaic, shameful or even bizarre," he added. "Gender no longer forms an essential part of marriage; marriage under law is a union of equals."

The written opinion and decision happen to be filled with numerous responses and reasoning why the Prop 8 supporters have failed to make their legal burden. It seems unlikely that an appeal will save them, unless they’ve actually been holding their best arguments in reserve for no reason.

Other sources with much more insight into the opinion have already begun to chime in. I will be compiling them as they fill in over the next few days.

And: “With a stroke of his pen, Judge Walker has overruled the votes and values of 7 million Californians who voted for marriage as one man and one woman.” If that offensive argument is the best that we can expect on appeal, then Prop 8 is certainly not long for this world. In the United States of America you don’t get to vote away basic human rights for a minority because you’re the majority.

Link, via CNN.