Lesbian Activist Who Urged Cupich to Take "Swift Action" Against Fr. Paul Kalchik Elected Mayor of Chicago

Yesterday, Lori Lightfoot won the Chicago mayoral race runoff against rival Toni Preckwinkle by the landslide margin of approximately 74% to 26%.

My headline calls Lightfoot a "lesbian activist". By that I mean she is a lesbian and an activist for liberal and democrat causes. She is "married" to another woman with whom she raises an adopted daughter and she was endorsed by many LGBT groups. But I have no particular reason to believe she is or will be necessarily anymore pro-LGBT (which itself could have multiple meanings) than Preckwinkle or many other Democrats.

Lightfoot had begun the race as a political newcomer, at least to electoral politics, and had initially only been a relative unknown in a crowded field. But she steadily gained support to narrowly come in first with 17.54% in the first-round of voting. Preckwinkle, a veteran Illinois pol, came in second with 16.04%.

Both were African-American women, prompting predictable gushing stories in the national media about Chicago getting its "first black female" mayor.

Here's an interesting fact that you probably didn't see reported:

Both black female candidates had or had had white "spouses" (the Preckwinkles divorced in 2013 after a 44-year marriage), which I suppose is another sort of first.

Though since both were in interracial relationships, presumably neither of them lost any of the Chicago black female vote because of it.

Lightfoot was arguably initially the underdog, but by the day of the runoff the prediction markets had her winning comfortably.

For the record, on the level of practical politics I don't give a damn whether Lightfoot is a lesbian or not. And, in general, that goes for most candidates.

I'd vote for Anne Marie Waters in a second. Unfortunately, I don't imagine Waters will be running for mayor of Chicago anytime soon. You can follow that lesbian activist on Twitter.

Or, rather, you can't. She was banned for Islamophobia.

But I'd sooner get thrown off a building than cast a ballot for Miss Lightfoot.

In September, she wrote a letter to Cardinal Cupich urging him to take "swift action" against Fr. Paul Kalchik, who had recently presided over the "burning" of a rainbow flag at his Avondale parish.

I write to urge your swift action against Rev. Paul Kalchik of Resurrection parish for his hateful act and speech. As you know, apparently in defiance of your direct order, Rev. Kalchik, along with some parishioners, led a burning of a rainbow flag that had previously hung in the parish. He claimed to be banishing evil. 

Rev. Kalchik has gone further and described homosexuality [sic] as an act against God and stated that homosexuals are to blame for the clergy sex abuse scandal. Rev. Kalchik's ignorant and hateful speech and actions must be addressed swiftly. 

...No person of true faith can stand as a leader of a parish, church, synagogue or mosque and express the kind of hate as that Rev. Kalchik has shown. I have followed very closely both the teachings of the Holy Father and your words, and it is clear that Rev. Kalchik's views are wildly inconsistent with both. He should not have the ability to continue subverting the minds of any other parishioners, and especially not children. 

Please take swift action to stamp out this hate.

As many of you know, the flag was no ordinary rainbow flag but the actual flag - a rainbow with a cross superimposed - that a previous pastor, Fr. Daniel Montalbano, had hung over the altar to make it a "gay friendly" worship space. Montalbano was known for hosting homosexual parties in the rectory. Church staff would later find him dead in his bedroom, having apparently suffered cardiac arrest while being hooked up to a masturbation device. Supplies of sex toys and pornography were carted away and burned. But at the time they missed the flag.

A few days after Lightfoot's letter, Kalchik was removed by Cupich. Various archdiocese emissaries, most or all of whom were suspected homosexuals, had been sent to threaten him. It was recommended that Kalchik submit to "counseling" at a psychiatric center. Instead, he left his parish on only a few minutes notice and for the last six months has been more or less in hiding.

Kalchik is a Catholic priest. Lightfoot is not a Catholic, as far as I know. But she still thought it was very much her business to petition her ideological ally Cupich to fire him.

Not only does she want to administer the government of my city. She also wants to control who is and isn't a Catholic pastor in my neighborhood.

This is why on Twitter I called Lightfoot a "lesbian fascist".

Stamp out this hate.

Or maybe she's just a nice lady who saw an opportunity for political publicity. For all I know the letter helped her surge into the runoff.

And she hasn't gone full-fascist against half of the black churches in the city - who take the conventional Old Testament line against homosexual acts - to say nothing of writing letters demanding "swift action" against most of the imams in the Chicago mosques, who preach against gays and Jews, or Chicago-based Nation of Islam head Louis Farrakhan, who preaches against everyone.

It wouldn't have helped her in the runoff.

Then again, Lightfoot's mother once said in an interview:

She is the shortest of my children … but she has never allowed height to cause her not to go up against whatever she feels is not right.

Without being uncharitable, the vertically challenged Lightfoot, with the big forehead and masculine uniform, does seem to have a whiff of the Mussolini about her.