We're all here at the Greater Exodus Baptist Church in Philadelphia, preparing for the start of Justice Sunday III. The bloggers are all here on hand, the church has completed its security sweep, and our wireless looks terrific. I'm joining La Shawn Barber, Right Wing Sparkle, and Stacy Harp (as well as the First Mate) discussing the earlier church service. We're prepping for the press conference and having a blast.

I even ran into a little protest while putting my car permit on the dashboard. I ran into Joey Steel from World Can't Wait, which wants to warn the world of the impending theocracy that George Bush wants to impose on the US. Mr. Steel seemed particularly incensed that the Family Research Council has selected a primarily African-American church to stage JSIII -- as if the church itself didn't choose to support this cause themselves. He seemed non-psychotic, so I spent a minute with him and took a couple of his flyers into the church to show the other bloggers. He wants to warn the world of the coming fascist upheaval in the US.

It seems that something about people of Christian background getting together to exercise their right to political speech that frightens the people of World Can't Wait. So who are these people that get frightened by one televised rally? A look at their advisory board shows a few names of interest:

Lynne Stewart, attorney
Rosemary Candelario, pro-choice activist
Boots Riley , hip hop performer
Gore Vidal, writer
Warren Hern MD, Physician and pro-choice activist
Sunsara Taylor, writer
Mark Crispin Miller, professor & writer
Thomas Olmos, attorney
Mark Leno, CA State Assembly

Lynne Stewart, people will recall, got convicted of assisting Sheik Omar Abdul Rahman in getting messages to his followers that resulted in several deaths from terrorist attacks in Egypt. Sunsara Taylor is also known as Revolutionary Worker #1265. Mark Crispin Miller wrote the blockbuster you never read, Fooled Again: How the Right Stole the 2004 Election and Why They'll Steal the Next One Too (Unless We Stop Them). In other words, this isn't really even the mainstream Left we're seeing outside right now. I assured Joey I'd mention his concerns on my blog, and CQ readers can decide for themselves what they want to believe -- whether free speech belongs only to the atheists, or if Christians can be allowed to speak on their political beliefs.

We're going to get the presser going in a moment, and I'll be live-blogging it.

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