Daily Archives: December 11, 2009

LifeSiteNews: “At least eight Russo-German families in Salzkotten, Germany, have suffered heavy fines and now their fathers have been sentenced to prison, because they have refused to send their elementary school-age children to mandatory sexual education classes.”

Ross Douthout writes at the NY Times (Dec. 6th): “If the more perfect union promised by the Lisbon Treaty is the European elite’s greatest triumph, the failure to successfully integrate millions of Muslim immigrants represents its greatest failure . . . Better if they had let their voters choose . . . Instead, Europe’s leaders ended up creating a clash of civilizations inside their own frontiers.”

AFP: “Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi said the Swiss referendum banning the building of new minarets was an invitation for Al-Qaeda to launch attacks in Europe, the official news agency JANA reported on Sunday.”

Telegraph: “Swiss shoe-shop owner has built a mock minaret on the top of his warehouse in defiance of a ban on the Muslim architecture.”

Luke Goodrich of the Becket Fund writes at the Wall Street Journal: “The common theme in these cases is that the Court [European Court of Human Rights] views religious expression as a threat to a free, democratic society . . . A serious commitment to human rights requires governments to respect the religious impulse—even if much of society thinks religious beliefs are wrong, silly, or even harmful. If the European Court of Human Rights cannot get past its fear of religion, its jurisprudence will only become more incoherent, and all human rights more fragile.”

Bostone Globe (AP): “The demonstrations marked the first response by Iran’s clerical leadership and its supporters to the taboo-shattering actions of their opponents on Monday, when tens of thousands of students protested at universities around Iran.”

ADF attorney Joe Infranco appeared on Point of View Radio with Kerby Anderson to discuss recent oral arguments at the 9th Circuit in the Mt. Soledad Cross case.

The MP3 runs over 8 minutes.

Related ADF Media Information Page

Veterans Memorials Project: ADF, Liberty Legal Institute, American Legion

SaveOurMemorials.com

Liberty Legal Institute

Detroit Free Press: “Upset and frustrated, about 300 metro Detroiters with roots in Iraq, most of them Chaldeans, gathered Thursday night in a banquet hall in Warren where Michael Corbin, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, spoke to the crowd. Corbin, a diplomat who was appointed to oversee Iraq’s minority communities, was grilled by an audience that criticized the U.S. for failing to protect Iraq’s Christians.”

Boston Globe (AP): “Asheville City Councilman Cecil Bothwell believes in ending the death penalty, conserving water and reforming government — but he doesn’t believe in God. His political opponents say that’s a sin that makes him unworthy of serving in office, and they’ve got the North Carolina Constitution on their side.”

Legal Blog Watch reports: “On its blog, the CMLP [Citizens Media Law Project] announced yesterday that it has created and will now be maintaining a guide to live-blogging and tweeting from court.”

Christian Science Monitor: “It’s impossible to understand European history without reference to religion. But it’s less and less difficult to understand contemporary European society in purely secular terms. Two recent controversial political and legal decisions about the Christian cross and the Muslim minaret in Europe illustrate an increasing disconnect between religion and culture.”

‘Chai Feldblum is absolutely dedicated to granting rights for engaging in non-heterosexual, non-monogamous sex that would be superior to religious freedom,’ Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America (CWA) told CNA.”

The Slovak Spectator: “A ruling of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) regarding the placing of Christian crosses in Italian schools is in conflict with Europe’s cultural heritage and its Christian history, according to a declaration published by the Slovak Parliament on December 10, the TASR newswire reported.”

USA Today: “The number of federal workers earning six-figure salaries has exploded during the recession, according to a USA TODAY analysis of federal salary data . . . The growth in six-figure salaries has pushed the average federal worker’s pay to $71,206, compared with $40,331 in the private sector.”

Dr. Mark W. Hendrickson writes at Grove City College Center for Vision and Values: “2009 marks the 250th anniversary of the publication of Adam Smith’s masterful treatise on ethics, “The Theory of Moral Sentiments.” . . . The genius of ‘Moral Sentiments’ lies in its clear, thorough explanation of the necessary preconditions for social harmony. Smith cites three cardinal social virtues: prudence, justice, and beneficence. Indeed, as we survey our discordant, divided society today, we can see that many of our problems stem from confusion about these three virtues. Smith, in spite of writing his book so long ago, provides the solutions to today’s most vexing social problems.”

Washington Times Editorial: “The new whoops is a safe-sex guide distributed in a Massachusetts high school in 2005. Included in the book are the addresses and phone numbers of Boston-area gay bars to make it easier for teens to find the businesses that cater to homosexual men over the age of 21.”

Catholic League: “For whatever reason, there are more raunchy Christmas plays this year than ever before. Not surprisingly, many are gay-themed, most are confined to the east and west coasts, and all are loved by art critics. The plays run the gamut from the irreverent to the vulgar.”

Law Professor Eugene Volokh has written this response to ADF attorney David French. It concludes: “So whether the matter arises as to funding or room access at public universities, or funding or room access in other government-owned institutions, the result is the same: The First Amendment doesn’t stop the government from making such benefits available only to groups that don’t discriminate based on race, religion, sexual orientation, and the like.”

LA Daily News: “The Police Commission voted two months ago to end its relationship with the Scouts because of the organization’s policies that discriminate against gays.”

DC Agenda: “Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) said in an interview with DC Agenda that lawmakers will work on passing other pro-LGBT bills next year, and could take up legislation to repeal DOMA — known as the Respect for Marriage Act — at the end of the two-year session starting in 2011.”

One News Now (AP): “As currently written, the Senate Democratic health care bill would permit insurance companies to place annual limits on the dollar value of medical care, as long as those limits are not “unreasonable.” The bill does not define what level of limits would be allowable, delegating that task to administration officials.”

Religion Clause Blog: “Yesterday the Arkansas Society of Freethinkers filed a federal court lawsuit against the Arkansas secretary of state challenging the state’s refusal to allow the Freethinkers to install a temporary Winter Solstice display on the state capitol grounds.”

Freethinkers v. Daniels, (ED AR, filed 12/10/2009)

Religion Clause Blog reports that the ACLU is complaining because the Salvation Army has been given the exclusive right to solicit donations at Meriden, Connecticut’s Festival of Silver Lights. “The Salvation Army says that the $1400 collected so far will be used for social services, not religious programming.”

“Bryan Brown is a conservative, activist and unapologetic Christian. Of that there is no doubt. But does that mean he is also mentally ill?”

Politico: “In a bold but risky year-end strategy, Democrats are preparing to raise the federal debt ceiling by as much as $1.8 trillion before New Year’s rather than have to face the issue again prior to the 2010 elections.”

Catholic Culture: “Two Christian Brothers were shot and killed in Mosul, Iraq. The execution-style killings sparked new fears among the Christians of Mosul.”

The House passed a $1.1 trillion spending bill Thursday that gives the District of Columbia more control over such local issues as funding abortions and legalizing medical marijuana . . . The Senate is expected to pass the legislation, with a vote as early as Saturday.”

Telegraph: “Pope Benedict XVI will preach in Westminster Hall, where Catholic martyrs including Sir Thomas More were condemned to die, when he visits England next September, it has emerged.”

Eugene Volokh writing at The Volokh Conspiracy: “As I argued in my law review article on the freedom of expressive association and government subsidies, the test for content discrimination is whether a rule is justified with reference to the content of the speaker’s speech. A no-religious-discrimination condition is likely not justified by the content of the groups’ speech. Rather, it’s justified by a judgment that discrimination against prospective group members based on their religions is less proper than discrimination based on their other ideologies.”

ADF attorney David Cortman appeared on The Michael Medved Show to discuss this: Lawsuit filed after Idaho commission bans all religious texts from curriculum.

The MP3 runs just over 31 minutes.

AP: “A former Bronx synagogue that was turned into a church was torched by assailants who smeared Satanic graffiti on its walls.”

The AP: “The 720-page report found that dozens of church leaders in Ireland’s most populous diocese kept secret the record of child abuse by more than 170 clerics since 1940.”

Patrick Buchanan writes at Townhall: “Is it not an admission that, though Congress was created by the Constitution, and the Fed is a creation of Congress, our elected representatives cannot be trusted with the money supply, cannot be trusted with control of the nation’s central bank? To have decisions made in the national interest, we need folks who do not have to answer to voters. If this be true, the republic is closer to its end than its beginning . . .”

Charles Krauthammer writing in the Washington Post: This naked assertion of vast executive power in the name of the environment is the perfect fulfillment of the prediction of Czech President (and economist) Vaclav Klaus that environmentalism is becoming the new socialism, i.e., the totemic ideal in the name of which government seizes the commanding heights of the economy and society.

Law.com (Texas Lawyer): On Nov. 20, state Rep. Ellen Cohen, D-Houston, and two advocacy groups submitted an amicus brief to the high court in Susan Combs, et al. v. Texas Entertainment Association, et al. in the hopes of shedding more light on the reasons the Texas Legislature passed the 2008 law. The law imposes a $5 tax on each customer who enters a sexually oriented business (SOB) that serves alcohol. Cohen, who directed the Houston Area Women’s Center for 18 years, sponsored H.B. 1751, which created the SOB law. [See Cohen's amicus brief, the petitioner's brief on the merits and the respondents' brief on the merits.]

The National Law Journal: “On Thursday, the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System announced the creation of the O’Connor Judicial Selection Initiative, a project that will assist state level efforts to move away from judicial elections.”

Yes Weekly: “Lawyer Michael Johnson of the Alliance Defense Fund is representing the county in the case and filed the objection to Sharp’s recommendation. Katy Parker, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina, represents plaintiffs Janet Joyner and Constance Lynn Blackmon. Parker said she would respond to the county’s objection by the end of the week with a filing of her own.”

W. Bradford Wilcox writes at the Wall Street Journal: “Judging by recent press reports, the family fallout associated with the Great Recession has been severe . . . But there may be a silver lining in all this financial pain. For most married Americans, the Great Recession seems to be solidifying, not eroding, the marital bond. The divorce rate is actually falling. It declined to 16.9 divorces per 1,000 married women in 2008 from 17.5 divorces in 2007 (a 3% drop), after rising from 16.4 divorces per 1,000 married women in 2005 (a 7% increase).”

Daily Iowan: “The clause has generated controversy across the country and at the UI . . . The decision will affect all chapters . . . ‘It’s completely unreasonable — and unconstitutional — for a public university to disrupt the purposes of private student groups by forcing them to accept as members and officers those who oppose the very ideas they advocate,’ Gregory Baylor, a lawyer with the Alliance Defense Fund Center for Academic Freedom, said in a press release.”

The Hill: “A deal between the White House and the pharmaceutical industry is holding up a bipartisan amendment to allow the importation of cheaper prescription drugs from abroad, according to a member of the Senate Democratic leadership.”

WorldNetDaily: “A Mumbai-based Indian multinational conglomerate with business ties to Rajendra K. Pachauri, the chairman since 2002 of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, stands to make several hundred million dollars in European Union carbon credits simply by closing a steel production facility in Britain with the loss of 1,700 jobs.”

FIRE: “Today, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) releases its 2010 report on campus speech codes, revealing that for the second year in a row, the percentage of American colleges and universities that systematically violate students’ and faculty members’ right to freedom of expression has dropped. However, 71 percent of the 375 campuses analyzed still maintain codes that grant students less freedom of speech than they enjoy off campus.”

EducationNews.org: FIRE Report: 88 Percent of Texas Colleges Restrict Free Speech

“‘They’re committing sin and that sin will keep them out of heaven…. But you don’t hate the person. You hate the sin that they commit.’ This statement has led to calls for the Mayor’s resignation . . . ”

Knox News: “Maryville Mayor Tom Taylor broke a quarter-century of tradition Monday night when he followed the advice of an attorney who represents the city and removed the reading of the story of Christ’s birth from the city’s Christmas tree-lighting ceremony . . . J. Michael Johnson, senior legal counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund . . . ‘[This] was a knee-jerk reaction, and it is tragically incorrect,’ Johnson said in an interview. The Alliance Defense Fund is a conservative organization that defends religious liberty across America.”

The Record: “Tolerance and respect is very much a matter of deeds and actions, not pious sounding phrases; and the recent actions of the gay rights movement in Maine speak for themselves. The aftermath of the vote on same sex marriage unleashed a spectacle heretofore not seen in Maine. Immediately following the loss on election night, Jesse Connolly, the leader of the No on 1 campaign, proclaimed, ‘We will not quit until we know where every single one of these votes lives.’”

Libertarian News Examiner: “During a protest and counter protest between a Christian group and a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) group on the Kutztown University campus last summer campus police Corporal Steven Armbruster was ordered by his chief to ‘push’ members of the Christian group off of the campus [and he refused] . . . The Christian-based Alliance Defense Fund is defending him in the ongoing suit while Oath Keepers named Armbruster their Oath Keeper of the year at their October conference.”

The Record: “The Christian Civic League of Maine has learned that Maine Senate President Elizabeth H. (Libby) Mitchell (Democrat – Kennebec County) is planning to hold a closed-door, high-level strategy meeting at her legislative office in the Capitol with the leading proponents of homosexual marriage in the state.”

Associated Press: “Assembly Democrats on Thursday unanimously backed John Perez, the chairman of the Assembly Democratic Caucus, to be its next speaker.”

Google News (AP): “A San Francisco Bay area school board will use broad lessons against bias to replace a curriculum against bullying gay people that had become a national centerpiece in the opposition to same-sex marriage.”

Faith in the Future: Sexuality, Religion and the Public Sphere
Carl F. Stychin, 29 Oxford J. Legal Stud. 729 (2009)

“The clash between religious freedom and equality for lesbians and gay men has become a controversial legal issue in the United Kingdom. Increasingly, claims are made that compliance with anti-discrimination norms impacts upon conscientious, faith-based objectors to same-sex sexual acts. This article explores this issue and draws insights from North American case law, where this question has been considered in the context of competing constitutional rights. It raises farreaching issues concerning the distinction between belief and practice, as well as the role of identity in the public sphere. The author advocates that courts and tribunals should adopt a fact-specific approach which is sensitive to the rights in a particular context, and which focuses upon the values of accommodation, tolerance and mutual respect.”

Florida’s Regulation of Child Exploitation: Senate Bill 1442
Laura R. Salpeter, 33 Nova L. Rev. 729 (2009)

“This article discusses the history and issues surrounding child exploitation laws and the changes SB 1442 intends to make. This article will first present an overview of the child exploitation problem and discuss the development and progression of legislation both federally and in the State of Florida. Next, this article will analyze the constitutionality of SB 1442. In order to determine the constitutionality of SB 1442, this article will discuss both the First Amendment and the Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution. This article will additionally evaluate the impact of SB 1442 on the victims and the State of Florida. Finally, this article will conclude with recommendations toward any present or potential concerns surrounding SB 1442.”