Daily Archives: August 17, 2010

CBS New York: “CBS 2′s Marcia Kramer has learned it looks as if the developers of the mosque may be willing to budge and move away from the Park 51 location where they originally planned the construction . . . New York Gov. David Paterson plans to meet with developers of the controversial ground zero mosque as early as this week to offer them state land – at another location – for their cultural and religious center.”

“A prestigious North Carolina private college cannot have police officers with the power to arrest suspects and enforce state law because the school is a religious institution, the state Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday.”

ACLU: “The American Civil Liberties Union and a broad coalition of religious, political, human rights and civil rights groups today called on U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to immediately adopt a set of proposed standards aimed at eradicating sexual assault in the nation’s prisons.”

ChristianNewsWire: “Amid mounting pressure surrounding its controversial zoning code, the Borough of Pemberton conceded yesterday that the Apostolic Church of Deliverance (ACD) can worship at 207 Hanover Street. This switch in position comes on the eve of a federal hearing and two weeks after the Borough’s Planning Board denied the church’s use application even though it was aware of the church’s federal rights.”

SCOTUSblog: “The Ninth Circuit Court on Tuesday morning ordered an expedited review of a second appeal on California’s Proposition 8 ban on same-sex marriage — a plea by local officials in Imperial County, Calif., to enter the case in order to defend the ballot measure’s constitutionality. The motions panel of the Circuit Court, in a two-page order, set the county’s appeal to be heard at argument along with the appeal by the backers of Proposition 8 — that is, during the week of Dec. 6. The written briefing schedule will be the same in both cases, concluding on Nov. 1.”

Kansas City Star: “A disciplinary panel today ordered a former deputy to Phill Kline to be admonished for not correcting misleading information submitted to the Kansas Supreme Court during Kline’s abortion investigation.”

Associated Press: “Mexico City’s leftist mayor said Tuesday he will take legal action if a Roman Catholic cardinal doesn’t apologize for suggesting he bribed the Supreme Court to uphold a city law allowing adoptions by same-sex couples.”

Christian Today: “The conservative and religious communities are fighting for the right to vote on the issue of same-sex marriage – rather than allowing legislature or the courts to rule on the issue. At the same time, they are also trying to defend their religious liberties.”

Claudia Cowan writing at Fox News Insider: “[Walker] said an appeal may hinge on getting Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger or Attorney General Jerry Brown to join the defense team, which is highly unlikely . . . ‘If the Prop 8 proponents don’t have standing, that means that millions of California voters have no one to represent or defend them . . . so we feel very confident about this standing issue and believe, at the end of the day, the 9th Circuit is going to agree that we do have standing,’ says [Austin Nimocks], with the Alliance Defense Fund.”

ADF attorney Daniel Blomberg appeared on the Rob Schilling Show to discuss the Cal. marriage litigation. | MP3 10:08 mins | Among others, the broadcast includes discussion of the following recurring questions. 1. Should the state get out of the marriage business? 2. A recent study showed that homosexual parents do just as well as biological parents. How do you respond? 3. It doesn’t matter if the majority opposes marriage redefinition. If it violates the Constitution, the judge can overrule the vote? How do you respond?

ADF attorney Doug Napier appeared on the Hugh Hewitt Show yesterday to provide an update on the 9th Circuit stay. | MP3 7:28 mins

Joseph Farah writing at WorldNetDaily: “Glenn Beck may hate socialism and communism, but he showed he shares a materialistic worldview with Marx, Engels and Saul Alinksy in a recent conversation with Bill O’Reilly . . . Beck doesn’t care about one of the most blatant and despicable examples of judicial tyranny in the history of our country. He doesn’t care about the institution of marriage and its 5,000-year history . . . [M]aterialists like Beck don’t understand how upsetting God’s order can have far-reaching effects much more devastating even than a tax increase. I would suggest that many of the dire economic problems we face today are a direct result not of government fiscal policies but of government social engineering.”

WorldNetDaily: “Very simply, most people in today’s America, including conservatives, are afraid of ‘the gay issue.’ Although most know deep down there’s something wrong with homosexuality, they don’t want to be called ‘intolerant,’ ‘bigoted,’ ‘hateful’ or ‘homophobic.’ Even though they don’t really want open gays in the military, and disapprove of same-sex marriage, are repulsed by Obama’s appointment of notorious gay activist Kevin Jennings as the nation’s ‘safe schools’ czar, and on and on – the ‘gay issue’ no longer registers on their radar screen as one on which they should take a public stand.”

The Hill: “The pro-abortion rights group EMILY’s List launched an Internet campaign on Tuesday aimed at creating support for the 32 female candidates it is endorsing for state and federal office this year. The campaign, called ‘Sarah Doesn’t Speak for Me,’ aims to counter former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s (R) high-profile endorsements of ‘Mama Grizzly’ candidates who want to restrict abortion rights . . . The Susan B. Anthony List, for its part, recently launched a bus tour through Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania to build momentum for its endorsed candidates. The group says it has elected 75 pro-life women to the U.S. House of Representatives and seven to the U.S. Senate since 1992.”

The Christian Post: “Somalia’s underground Christian community is asking fellow believers worldwide to pray for their safety during Islam’s holy month of Ramadan. The tiny Christian population is regularly persecuted by Islamic extremists. They are requesting that fellow Christians pray they can live in peace with their Muslim neighbors.”

New York Times: “After years of these societies passively or haphazardly accommodating immigrants from Islamic countries and black Africa, a reversed core notion now insists that the newcomers’ behavior must accommodate the majority’s. The politics surrounding the change can run from shrill to populistic. But as a position paper issued under Ms. Ploumen’s leadership [chairwoman of the Dutch Labor Party] asserted, governments and politicians had too long failed to accept the feelings of ‘loss and estrangement’ faced by national societies in the face of immigrant communities that disregard or mock their laws and customs.”

Jaen Journal [Google translation]: “Jaén province, Andalusia [has the second highest number] of conscientious objectors [to performing an abortion]. More than seventy professionals are a part of this record that has the College of Physicians. The figure is expected to grow.”

ChristianNewsWire: “The Paeth vs. Worth Township verdict is the largest procedural due process and First Amendment retaliation case in the history of the federal courts within the Eastern District of Michigan and one of the largest such verdicts rendered to date nationwide . . . ‘The facts in this case established that throughout the past five years, the elected and appointed officials of Worth Township used their governmental powers in an unlawful and spiteful manner to drive the Paeths out of Worth Township because they dared to question the elected officials’ governance.’”

Ciudad 1 [Google translation]: “The Health Commission of the Legislature [will debate on] Tuesday a bill for comprehensive care of abortions [that] are not punishable in the health system of Buenos Aires.”

La Gaceta [Google translation]: “Representatives of the United Nations (UN) met last week with officials from the Ministry of Health [to] raise concerns about the high rate of maternal mortality in Argentina and [to] support the implementation of [a] guide to address issues of legal abortions. This was announced today the Buenos Aires newspaper Clarin, which said the meeting took place last Friday.” | The New York Times has more information on the guide at issue: “Earlier in July, though, a ministry official said Dr. Manzur had signed a resolution backing a guide to legal abortion services. The guide would allow doctors to carry out abortions for rape victims without securing a police report. But a day later, the minister issued a statement saying he had not signed the resolution, and Argentine news outlets suggested that Mrs. Kirchner had ordered him to halt the effort.”

AICA [Google translation]: “An important group of professors from the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) rejected the ruling of the Superior Council of Aug. 11 for a change in national legislation within the meaning of the decriminalization of abortion and in favor of course right to abortion legal, safe and free.”

ABC [Google translation]: “The Secretary for Equality Policies of the PSM, Carmen Toledano, said today that his party ‘is being vigilant’ with the Community of Madrid in the development of the implementation of the Health Law Sexual and Reproductive Health and the Voluntary Interruption of Pregnancy. Through a note, Toledano has assured that ‘any violation or irregularity will be brought to the Ministries of Health and Equality and Social Policies.’”

Gainesville Times: “The new ordinance, presented at a city council meeting this morning, would require The Top of Gainesville — or any future adult entertainment business — to apply for a new license should the adult dancing establishment have any changes in ownership or partners.”

“In an Islamic country like Saudi Arabia, where they are in a position to impose sharia in full, that is exactly what they do. In other places, the degree of imposition depends on relative Islamic strength, and it increases as that strength increases.”

“. . . [D]espite their massive advantage in resources, Olson and Boies have lost to Cooper and his team on every issue that has been decided by any court other than Walker’s.”

Clarion Ledger: “The Wesson student who chose to wear a tuxedo rather than the customary girl’s drape for her senior portrait has sued her former school for leaving her out of the yearbook.”

LifeNews: “A pro-life group released new documents today from a former abortion facility staffer showing two women injured medically by botched abortions in Columbus, Ohio in the last two months. The organization says it and other documents show women are injured more frequently than most people understand.”

Boston.com (AP): “President Barack Obama isn’t worried about the furor unleashed by his comments on a planned mosque near Ground Zero, a spokesman said Tuesday.”

Los Angeles Times: “A hormonal treatment to prevent ambiguous genitalia can now be offered to women who may be carrying such infants. It’s not without health risks, but to its critics those are of small consequence compared with this notable side effect: The treatment might reduce the likelihood that a female with the condition will be homosexual. Further, it seems to increase the chances that she will have what are considered more feminine behavioral traits.”

The Washington Post / Federal Eye: “Women account for 14 percent of Army soldiers but received 48 percent of the Army’s ‘don’t ask’ discharges in 2009, the study said. Six percent of the Marine Corps is female, but women accounted for 23 percent of its discharges.”

KYTX (CNN): “Missouri’s tight restrictions on protests and picketing outside military funerals were tossed out by a federal judge Monday, over free speech concerns . . . The laws, said the Kansas City-based judge, ‘could have the effect of criminalizing speech the mourners want to hear, including speech from counter-protesters to plaintiffs’ [the Westboro Church's] message.’” | Phelps-Roper v. Koster, (WD MO, Aug. 16, 2010)

The Christian Institute: “Two registrars at Lambeth Council are under investigation because they swapped shifts in order to accommodate their religious beliefs over homosexual civil partnerships.”

Gay couples in Germany who have formally registered their partnerships are entitled to the same inheritance rights as married couples, the country’s top court said Tuesday.”

Christian Science Monitor: “In Mexico City, on the same day that a US federal appeals court put same-sex weddings on hold, the nation’s Supreme Court upheld a law that allows gay couples in the capital to adopt children. The gay adoption decision comes a week after the court upheld the constitutionality in general of gay marriage, after it was granted in Mexico City last year.”

CNN: “As one of the highest officials in the Mexican Catholic Church, Monsignor Victor Rene Rodriguez has been receiving the alarming reports from all over the nation . . . Rodriguez points to states like Chihuahua, the most violent in Mexico. Of the 28,000 drug-related deaths in the last four years, 40 percent have happened in this border state. In Ciudad Juarez, across the border from El Paso, Texas, more than 100 pastors have reported threats, and extortion has become all too common.”

New York Times: “China has increased spending on a military that is becoming larger and more effective even as Beijing has rebuffed exchanges with the Defense Department that could improve stability, according to a Pentagon study released Monday.”

Associated Press: “New York Gov. David Paterson expects to meet soon with developers of a proposed Islamic cultural center and mosque near ground zero.”

“State had ordered divinity college, seminary to stop offering degrees despite agency’s lack of authority.”

“The building was begun in approximately AD 600 as the Christian Visigothic church of St. Vincent.”

“This opinion is arbitrary and capricious, and its alarming legal methodology and overtly policy-driven tenor are too extreme to stand.”

LifeSiteNews: “The departure of several more congregations in central Illinois from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has once again highlighted how the denomination’s decision to approve active homosexual clergy has triggered a slow, steady bleeding of congregations.”

WTOP: “Proponents of a project to convert Gettysburg’s Eisenhower Conference Center into a gambling casino received new support from a surprising corner — the Gettysburg Battlefield Preservation Association.”

Kathleen Gilbert writing at LifeSiteNews: “Speaking with LifeSiteNews.com after the rally, Brown expressed frustration at the timidity of marriage supporters, and the slow abandonment of even conservative media, which has begun shying away from tackling the difficult issue. Even conservative icons Ann Coulter and Glenn Beck have recently indicated that they are at least unwilling to question the homosexualist position. ‘It’s frightening. People need to get their news from some source where it’s fair and the truth is coming out, and they’re just accepting the lies being told,’ he said.”

LifeSiteNews: “A new survey commissioned by the Military Culture Coalition (MCC) indicates that American voters would prefer to keep in place the 1993 law banning homosexuals serving in the military. The poll also indicated that U.S. voters oppose allowing abortion on military bases.”

Ross Douthat writing in The New York Times:”There’s an America where it doesn’t matter what language you speak, what god you worship, or how deep your New World roots run . . . But there’s another America as well, one that understands itself as a distinctive culture, rather than just a set of political propositions . . . The first America is correct to insist on Muslims’ absolute right to build and worship where they wish. But the second America is right to press for something more from Muslim Americans — particularly from figures like Feisal Abdul Rauf, the imam behind the mosque — than simple protestations of good faith.”

K.T. McFarland writing at Fox News: “First, might it become a recruitment station for terrorists? . . . In the Islamic tradition they build monuments to commemorate their great victories . . . So while some see a mosque near Ground Zero as a commemoration for innocents who died; others could claim it as the place where Islamic terrorists triumphed . . . Second, where is the money coming from?”

Rasmussen: “Nearly half (48%) of U.S. voters continue to believe that an abortion is too easy to obtain in this country, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.”

Frank Gaffney writing at Townhall: “What else have we learned so far from Mr. Obama’s teachable shariah moment? We now know that the President is willing to associate with members of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), not just in Cairo – where he insisted they be invited to hear his famous paean to Islam last year – but in the White House. For example, leaders of known MB front groups like Ingrid Mattson of the Islamic Society of North America and Salam al-Marayati of the Muslim Public Affairs Council were in the company at the Iftar dinner Friday when Mr. Obama fervently embraced the Ground Zero mosque.”

Rasmussen: “A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 48% of Likely Voters would vote for their district’s Republican congressional candidate, while 36% would opt for his or her Democratic opponent. Support for Republicans is up two points from the previous week, while support for Democrats dropped three points.Republicans have led on the Generic Congressional Ballot since June of last year, and their lead hasn’t fallen below five points since the beginning of December. Three times this year, they’ve posted a 10-point lead. Prior to this survey, GOP support since June 2009 has ranged from 41% to 47%. Support for Democrats in the same period has run from 35% to 40%.”

Thomas Sowell writing at Townhall: “The Constitution was not only a challenge to the despotic governments of its time, it has been a continuing challenge– to this day– to all those who think that ordinary people should be ruled by their betters . . . It was the Progressives of a hundred years ago who began saying that the Constitution needed to be subordinated to whatever they chose to call ‘the needs of the times.’ . . . The agenda then, as now, has been for our betters to decide among themselves which Constitutional safeguards against arbitrary government power should be disregarded, in the name of meeting “the needs of the times”– as they choose to define those needs.”

Wall Street Journal: “A Texas appellate-court ruling that a newly built Sikh temple near Austin must be razed or moved has sparked an international outcry from members of the religious group, some of whom claim discrimination is at the heart of the case.”

Dennis Prager writing at Townhall: “Men and women as distinct entities no longer have significance. Which is exactly what the cultural left and the gay rights movement advocate — even though the vast majority of Americans who support same-sex marriage do not realize that this is what they are supporting . . . ”

Religion Clause: “A Christian law student at Nigeria’s University of Ibadan has created a campus furor by intruding on a Muslim worship service shouting that those in attendance should accept Jesus. Next reports that the incident occurred last Friday, the first Friday of Ramadan, at a Jumat service led by the university’s Chief Imam.”

California Catholic Daily: “Attorneys for the Diocese of Sacramento and seven donors to the now defunct Loretto High School are mulling whether to appeal an unfavorable ruling in a dispute over $7.75 million the sisters of the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary received when they sold the campus last year . . . In May 2009, the sisters of the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary sold the 9-acre Loretto campus to Aspire Public Schools, a non-profit firm that operates 21 charter schools across California, for $7.75 million — $5.75 million up front, with the remaining $2 million due in 2012 . . . In essence the appellate court said the nuns had, in fact, used the money contributed to Loretto for the purposes for which it was donated, and that the plaintiffs are unlikely to prevail at trial.” | For more information see Religion Clause.

Paul Craig Roberts writing at InfoWars.com: “Here is what can be done. The wars, which benefit no one but the military-security complex and Israel’s territorial expansion, can be immediately ended. This would reduce the US budget deficit by hundreds of billions of dollars per year. More hundreds of billions of dollars could be saved by cutting the rest of the military budget which, in its present size, exceeds the budgets of all the serious military powers on earth combined . . . The only way that the US will again have an economy is by bringing back the offshored jobs. The loss of these jobs impoverished Americans while producing oversized gains for Wall Street, shareholders, and corporate executives. These jobs can be brought home where they belong by taxing corporations according to where value is added to their product. If value is added to their goods and services in China, corporations would have a high tax rate. If value is added to their goods and services in the US, corporations would have a low tax rate.”

Yahoo News (AFP): “Israel has ‘eight days’ to launch a military strike against Iran’s Bushehr nuclear facility and stop Tehran from acquiring a functioning atomic plant, a former US envoy to the UN has said. Iran is to bring online its first nuclear power reactor, built with Russia’s help, on August 21, when a shipment of nuclear fuel will be loaded into the plant’s core.”

“It is thus worth observing in conclusion that President Obama’s claims about the historical relationship between Islam and America seem intended to settle preemptively a question that ought to be debated in the open: is Islam compatible with the free institutions to which Americans are accustomed and to whose preservation Americans should be committed?”

The Desert Sun: “‘I think the basic notion that this case is not final until it’s gone through the complete appellate process really prevailed,’ said [Douglas Napier], a lawyer with the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal firm. ‘Rather than have this kind of ping-pong effect of having the decision overturned, appealed and then overturned again, it’s better to have this kind of decision,’ he said.”

The Orange County Register (Total Buzz): ‘Refusing to stay the decision would only have created more legal confusion surrounding any same-sex unions entered while the appeal is pending,’ said [Jim Campbell] of the Alliance Defense Fund, which is helping defend Prop. 8.”

OneNewsNow: “A Christian author is suing a Tennessee library for barring her from holding a meeting to discuss her book . . . ‘But [she] was told by library officials that she could not do that because she was attempting to use the room for religious purposes,’ [ADF Attorney Jonathan Scruggs] reports. ‘In fact, the library has a policy that explicitly says that the room will not be used for religious purposes.’”

Worthy News: “‘It made no sense to impose a radical change in marriage on the people of California before all appeals on their behalf are heard,’ said Alliance Defense Fund’s Litigation Staff counsel [Jim Campbell]. ‘Refusing to stay the decision would only have created more legal confusion surrounding any same-sex unions entered while the appeal is pending. This case has just begun. ADF and the rest of the legal team are confident that the right of Americans to protect marriage in their state constitutions will ultimately be upheld.’”

California Beat: “The Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian group which opposes same-sex marriage, said the decision was ‘clearly the right call.’ ‘Refusing to stay the decision would only have created more legal confusion surrounding any same-sex unions entered while the appeal is pending,’ said attorney [Jim Campbell] in a statement posted to the group’s website.”

LifeSiteNews: “The Governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Attorney General Jerry Brown are named in the case as defendants, but both declined to defend the law and embraced Walker’s decision. Therefore, the Alliance Defense Fund and other attorneys that represented Prop. 8 during Walker’s 13-day trial have to convince the court that they can actually represent the state of California in an appeal, when the named defendants have refused to take up the case.”

Los Angeles Times: “The Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian liberty group that is helping finance the defense of Proposition 8, called the 9th Circuit’s decision ‘clearly the right call.’ ‘Refusing to stay the decision would only have created more legal confusion surrounding any same-sex unions entered while the appeal is pending,’ said [Jim Campbell], the fund’s litigation counsel.”

USA Today / Faith & Reason: “The Alliance Defense Fund, part of the Prop8 legal support, is delighted with the ruling. It’s press release says, ‘This case has just begun. ADF and the rest of the legal team are confident that the right of Americans to protect marriage in their state constitutions will ultimately be upheld.’”

AFP: “Gay couples in California scrapped wedding plans Tuesday after a court halted same-sex unions until the completion of an appeals process expected to end up in the US Supreme Court . . . ‘If the trial court’s decision is eventually reversed, refusing to stay the decision will senselessly create legal uncertainty surrounding any same-sex unions entered while the appeal is pending,’ said [Jim Campbell], a lawyer for the Alliance Defense Fund, a socially conservative grouping.”

Shreveport Small Business Marketing Examiner: “Among other announcements in an article from TheDailyYou.com is the appointment of J. Michael Johnson, Esq., as Founding Dean . . . Mr. Johnson is a nationally recognized constitutional law attorney who most recently served as Senior Legal Counsel, Allied Attorney Coach and national media spokesman for the Alliance Defense Fund.”

Ben Smith reports at Politico: “‘It made no sense to impose a radical change in marriage on the people of California before all appeals on their behalf are heard, so the 9th Circuit’s decision is clearly the right call,’ said conservative Alliance Defense Fund Litigation Staff Counsel [Jim Campbell].”

Associated Press: “‘I think the basic notion that this case is not final until it’s gone through the complete appellate process really prevailed,’ said [Douglas Napier], a lawyer with the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal firm. ‘Rather than have this kind of pingpong effect of having the decision overturned, appealed and then overturned again, it’s better to have this kind of decision,’ he said.”

Daily Mail (UK): “‘I think the basic notion that this case is not final until it’s gone through the complete appellate process,’ said [Douglas Napier], a lawyer with the Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal firm.”

San Francisco Chronicle: “‘This is the right thing to do, and it makes things less chaotic and uncertain,’ said [Douglas Napier], an attorney with the Alliance Defense Fund. ‘The status quo is going to be maintained until this issue is resolved.’”

Mercury News: “[Douglas Napier], a senior lawyer with the Alliance Defense Fund, one of the groups defending the law, said they have the right to press the appeal. ‘We have standing,’ he said. ‘The people of California shouldn’t lose by a forfeit because the governor refused to do his job.’”

ADF attorney Jordan Lorence appeared on KNX 1070. MP3 2:24 mins. | ADF attorney Daniel Blomberg appeared on Fox 40 Live TV by phone. MP4 2:31 mins

“The cardinal archbishop of Guadalajara is accusing the justices of the Mexican Supreme Court of being ‘well fed’ by international organizations and receiving ‘gifts’ in exchange for their votes, following the Court’s recent decisions approving the constitutionality of homosexual ‘marriage,’ and imposing it on all of the 31 states of Mexico.”

“Unlike Christians and Jews in most Muslim nations, Muslims in America are free to practice their faith. The issue is whether they use that freedom to ultimately undermine freedom for people of different faiths, or no faith.”