OUT OF STATE ANTI-GAY GROUP ROBOCALLING IN VERMONT

From GREEN MOUNTAIN DAILY

The Princeton New Jersey based "National Organization for Marriage" - a national religious right group that works against LGBT rights across the country - is currently running robocalls in the state on the marriage equality bill.

While there is a compelling case out there that this organization is either a Mormon Church front group, or is at least largely supported by the LDS Church, they got started in California (where they were very active in the California Prop 8 fight) with money from the Catholic Knights of Columbus. In any event, it is - once again - a group with a religious agenda that they feel everyone should be legally bound to, no matter what state they live in.
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Footnote: Shay Totten/Blurt received one of the calls:

I didn't record the call because I answered the phone and just listened to the recording. I'm surprised for a couple of reasons. First, my state rep was one of the original sponsors of the legislation (Democratic Rep. Mark Larson), and second I'm a journalist. Thirdly, it not only had my rep's name, but his number, too.

This leads me to believe that the call list was probably not a political list, but one that contains most, if not all, households. And this has to be expensive.

Not sure that having an out-of-state group lobbying for their cause is going to help the in-state opponents of same-sex marriage. They are also behind an e-mail campaign to Vermont lawmakers. I've placed calls and emails to the organization to get more details about their efforts in Vermont and will post any responses I receive. They claim to have an ad running as part of their Northeast Action Plan to stamp out same-sex marriage efforts in New England. I haven't heard one yet in Vermont.

Several readers who alerted me to the calls they received had this same question: The ad specifically mentions that lawmakers should support Gov. Douglas. Did he give his blessing to this group to use his name? Probably not. His name also appeared on a rather hate-filled rant that landed on people's fax machines this week from a Utah-based group America Forever. This group also robo-faxed Vermont businesses before a public hearing on same-sex marriage last month.