Cobb’s Rep. Bobby Franklin Represents Radicalism at its Worst

Cobb County is home to a lot of renowned politicians, both past, present, and possibly future. While our county may forever be remembered as Newt’s stomping ground, I would like to dedicate this article to the work of a lesser known Republican in the area - 43rd District State Rep. Bobby Franklin.

Rep. Franklin was elected to the Georgia House in 1996. During last year’s elections, he ran unopposed, garnering more than 14,000 votes in the process.

Rep. Franklin is what I would call a “visionary.” You see, he has a lot of ideas about the way this county should be, and I really want to share some of his grander visions with you today.

Not only does Franklin want to revert back to the gold and silver standard, he wants to outlaw paper currency and fiat credit outright. In 2009, Franklin sponsored House Bill 430, “The Constitutional Tender Act,” which would make the state economy wholly dependent on gold eagles and “pre-1965” silver coins.

Franklin wants to severely cut “wasteful” DHS services in Georgia. In fact, he wants to cut all of them. In January 2011, Franklin sponsored House Bill 17, which would abolish the state’s Department of Human Services.

Franklin believes that driver’s licenses should be repealed, and in a CBS Atlanta interview, said that 12-year-old children should have the right to drive on Georgia’s highways. He proposed House Bill 7, “The Right to Travel Act,” in early 2011, citing the signing of the Magna Carta as a precedent for the proposal.

Not only does Franklin consider abortion murder, he wants to make the procedure a capital offense. Under House Bill 1, proposed by Franklin earlier this year, all forms of fetal death will be subject to full criminal investigations, including miscarriages.

Apparently, Franklin thinks it’s about time we started billing rape victims. He sponsored 2011’s House Bill 14, which would change court terminology so that “accusers” would end up paying for their own medical investigations.

Franklin is vocal about a lot of issues, no doubt about that. Among other proposals, he’s fought against mandatory vaccinations (House Bill 11, January 2011), for less food safety requirements (House Bill 12, January 2011), not to mention campaigned for Georgians’ rights to erect 40-foot-tall walls around their houses (2011’s inexplicably titled “Children’s Protection Act”). Heck, Franklin has even taken it upon himself to deal with Georgia’s metaphysical issues, as his proposed “Freedom of Choice and Security Act” seeks to legally define the nature of evil (Section 2.4 of House Bill 5, January 2011) within the state. And then, Franklin decided to haul off and make the following statement in a Marietta Daily Journal interview in February:

"You want someone with unrepentant criminal behavior? And it's not just that, neither should adulterers, neither should thieves, neither should a lot of things. The church is full of sinners, but we're told in 1st Corinthians it rattled off the homosexual, the adulterer, the thief, the liar, and such were some of you, but you've been washed, you've been justified and so forth. It's not what you were. You're not punishing a thought. But do you want an unrepentant drug dealer in the military? Same thing."

Of course, Franklin is referring to the idea of homosexuals serving in the military. In the same article, he said that homosexuality was a capital offense under biblical law. And you know what? Franklin seems to think the Law of Leviticus ought to have precedence over the law of the land.

 “Do our civil rulers seek the Lord as David and Jehoshaphat did, or do they praise the gods of pagan religions, like President George W. Bush does? Is their heart courageous in the ways of the Lord, or do they fear the voters? Do they work to tear down the idolatrous temples or do they approve changes to local zoning ordinances to allow more pagan temples to be built? We will not see revival until we insist that our civil magistrates follow Jehoshaphat’s example… Until we, as Christians, repent of our own sins, I am much more concerned about God’s coming wrath on America than I am about Osama bin Laden — whether he is over there or over here.”

That little morsel of asininity came from Rep. Franklin’s Georgia Journal, in a June 2008 post entitled “The Greatest Threat Facing America.”

Well, Franklin is entitled to his opinion, but at the same time, so am I. You know what I think is the greatest threat to Cobb County?

That fundamentalist wacko running the state’s 43rd.