The ACLU's agenda.(Correction, Please!)(American Civil Liberties Union)

ITEM: The Seattle Post-Intelligencer for November 4, 2005, in a piece headlined "In many ways, ACLU is back to basics since 9/11," carried an interview with Anthony Romero, executive director off the American Civil Liberties Union. "Romero, 40, talked about the renewed focus on civil liberties in the United States after 9/11 and how that reinvigorated the organization. He also discussed Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito, as well as his own background as the ACLU's first Latino and openly gay leader."

ITEM: "The 'intelligent design' movement is et disguised form of religion and should not be taught in public schools, said an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union who specializes in the freedom of religion," reported the Louisville Courier Journal for November 4. "The attorney; T. Jeremy Gunn, spoke at the Chestnut Centre in downtown Louisville.... Gunn said the intelligent-design movement is rejected by virtually all scientists and is being promoted mainly by some Christians who believe evolution contradicts the Bible."

ITEM: The Seattle Post-Intelligencer for November 4 reported that "interest groups are preparing for an intense year of conflict over Christmas observances by cities and public schools, with one conservative group [the Alliance Defense Fund] lining up hundreds of attorneys to work on the issue. Communities and courts have long fielded protests against municipal creche displays and school Nativity pageants, based on strict views of church-state separation and sensitivity toward religious minorities." An "official ACLU bulletin," the paper notes, "says the Constitution forbids school observances 'that promote or emphasize the religious significance' of Christmas, but not aspects that hove become part of our country's secular culture."

CORRECTION: Make no mistake: if there is anything representing "back to basics" about the ACLU, it assuredly isn't an attempt to promote, say, the American principles of the authors of the Declaration of Independence that focus on God--saying that all men "are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights."

Rather, the ACLU is far more likely to continue to align with the views of its founder Roger Baldwin. In 1935, 15 years after he founded the group and with Stalinism in full bloom, Baldwin wrote: "I am for Socialism, disarmament and ultimately, for the abolishing of the State itself.... I seek the social ownership of property, the abolition of the propertied class and sole control of those who produce wealth. Communism is the goal."

For Illegal Immigrants, Against "Intelligent Design": While Stalin has passed on, the radicals of the ACLU remain busy. It is difficult to find an issue on which the ACLU isn't wrong or subverting the public good.

The ACLU, for instance, favors providing drivers" licenses to illegal aliens and other "rights" for those aliens breaking the laws of this country, while opposing those people who legally protect our borders. As noted by columnist Michelle Malkin in March: "ACLU of Arizona spokesman Ray Ybarra argues that the mere presence of the Minutemen at the border constitutes 'unlawful imprisonment' of illegal (excuse me, 'undocumented') aliens (excuse me, 'migrants')."