Southern Preposterous Lie Center hoisted upon its own petard.

Back in the spring of 2005, the Southern Preposterous Lie Center attacked the Family Research Council as one of "A Dozen Major Groups Help Drive the Religious Right’s Anti-Gay Crusade." It labeled the FRC as a "hate group."

Now that diseased chicken has come home to roost. "Family Research Council accuses Southern Poverty Law Center of sparking shooter’s hatred."

The head of the Family Research Council on Thursday (Aug. 16) accused the Southern Poverty Law Center of sparking hatred that led accused gunman Floyd Lee Corkins II to shoot a security guard at the conservative Christian lobbying group’s headquarters.

FRC president Tony Perkins called the Wednesday shooting “an act of domestic terrorism.”

“Corkins was given a license to shoot an unarmed man by organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center that have been reckless in labeling organizations as hate groups because they disagree with them on public policy,” Perkins said.

The SPLC tracks domestic extremists and lists the FRC as an “anti-gay” hate group. On Thursday, Perkins called “an end to the reckless rhetoric that I believe led to yesterday’s incident that took place right here.”

The SPLC’s Mark Potok called Perkins’ accusations “outrageous,” and said his group is committed to offering “legitimate and fact-based criticism.”

“The FRC routinely pushes out demonizing claims that gay people are child molesters and worse — claims that are provably false,” Potok wrote on the SPLC’s blog. “It should stop the demonization and affirm the dignity of all people.”

Corkins, 28, of Herndon, Va., had volunteered at The DC Center, a gay advocacy group in Washington, D.C.

He has not been charged with a hate crime, but was found to be carrying symbols of a recent flare-up in the culture wars. Corkins was found to be carrying 15 Chick-fil-A sandwiches when he was arrested, along with a 9 mm pistol and 50 rounds of ammunition. . .

The American Family Association issued amplified the FRC’s condemnation of the Southern Poverty Law Center.

“They have repeatedly and without cause demonized FRC, and have spent years stirring up anger in the homosexual community and directing that anger toward an organization whose only crime is to promote and defend the classic American values of faith, family and freedom,” the group read.

“Thus according to SPLC’s own standards, it is the SPLC that is to blame for yesterday’s shooting.”

The Montgomery castrato, Mark Potok, immediately fired back: "SPLC: Family Research Council license-to-kill claim ‘outrageous’"

The FRC and its allies on the religious right are saying, in effect, that offering legitimate and fact-based criticism in a democratic society is tantamount to suggesting that the objects of criticism should be the targets of criminal violence.

Riiiight. Which is exactly what the SPLC has been doing for years. Maybe FRC can sue the bejeezus out of SPLC and get that multi-million headquarters that "poverty" built.