Daily Archives: October 14, 2010

“The notion of marriage as a haven for procreation, a promise to tie the child to her biological father and to keep him from dividing his energies between many families, rarely occurs to them when they discuss marriage. The exceptions, which have always been with us — some women raise their children alone, some couples adopt or remain childless — are now viewed as undermining the rule, making it impossible for young adults to view the biological family as a norm or ideal.”

“A federal appeals court has rejected a Dallas-area parent’s bid to have “under God” removed from the Texas pledge of allegiance that is recited every day by public schoolchildren.”

Freedom from Religion Foundation: “The Freedom From Religion Foundation wrote the superintendent of Hamilton County Schools [Chattanooga, Tenn.] over two serious, recurring state/church violations: Christian-based prayers played over the school’s loudspeaker system at high school football games and scheduling Christian prayer at annual graduation ceremonies.”

Tom Strode writes at Baptist Press: “Southern Baptist public policy leader Richard Land has urged 11 Republican senators to oppose a United Nations treaty critics say would undermine parental rights and American sovereignty.”

Catholic Culture: Violence against Christian girls is “unfortunately common” in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, according to Father Khalid Rashid Asi, vicar general of the Diocese of Faisalabad . . . “Episodes of violence and abuse of Christian girls are part of daily life,” a Fides source said. “Those that make the news are just the tip of the iceberg.”

ADF attorney Joe Infranco appeared on the Hugh Hewitt Show to discuss this: Calif. school district threatens to terminate principal for endorsing prayer breakfast. | MP3 Audio 5:39 mins

“The U.S. Defense Department said it will abide for now by a federal court order against enforcement of the military’s ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell ban”

ADF attorney Joe Infranco appeared on Moody Radio’s “In the Market” with Janet Parshall to discuss this: Fire alarm in San Diego: ADF-allied attorney argues for firefighters on appeal. | MP3 audio 14:59 mins

Corey J. Hodges writes at The Salt Lake Tribune: “Some argue that tax exemption is a government subsidy, opening the door to some federal oversight. The ADF disagrees.“Churches are exempt from taxation under the principle that there is no surer way to destroy religion than to begin taxing it,” ADF Senior Legal Counsel Erik Stanley said. “As the U.S. Supreme Court has noted, the power to tax involves the power to destroy.”

Reuters: “Germany announced on Thursday it would fund Islamic studies at three state universities to train prayer leaders and religion teachers more in tune with Western society than the foreign imams preaching at most mosques here.”

PR Newswire: “Later today (October 14), the family of Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah and community leaders will hold a news conference in Detroit to offer their response to a report released yesterday by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Civil Rights Division that exonerated FBI agents in the fatal shooting of Imam Abdullah last October.”

Conrad Black writes at National Review: “It is certainly time that the West considered systematically whether it has irreconcilable differences with Islam. The belligerence of many Islamic spokesmen and the unassimilable quality of many Muslim immigrants in the West, as well as the spectacular terrorist provocations of extreme Islamic groups, make this a very legitimate question.”

AP: “However, Obama says he can’t end the “don’t ask, don’t tell” law with an executive order and is urging Congress to repeal it.”

Breitbart: “As a young woman Bibi Ayesha’s nose and ears were mutilated by her husband under the authoritarian Taliban regime, and she came to California a few months ago, aged 18, to undergo reconstructive surgery.”

“Justice Department lawyers wrote they will take their emergency request for a stay to the Ninth U.S. Circuit of Appeals if the judge denies it.”

Reuters: “States can proceed with a lawsuit seeking to overturn President Barack Obama’s landmark healthcare reform law, a Florida judge ruled on Thursday.”

Leah Libresco writes at Yale Daily News: “While checking Facebook during the Yale Political Union debate between Evan Wolfson, head of Freedom to Marry, and Maggie Gallagher, a leader from the National Organization for Marriage, I was pleased to see a steady stream of debate-related statuses. As the night went on, the tenor of the statuses from my mostly liberal friends began to shift. The people who referred to Ms. Gallagher as evil earlier in the night ended up with ‘I think I enjoyed talking to [Gallagher] … What’s wrong with us?’

“According to the Times article, ‘recruiters turned [the ex-sailor] away hastily, saying they had no knowledge of any injunction,’ Log Cabin lawyer Dan Woods wrote in a letter Thursday to the Justice Department.”

Kennebec Journal: “A majority of voters at Wednesday night’s special town meeting at the junior high school voted to usher in an adult-entertainment ordinance that prohibits nudity in a commercial establishment.”

Christian Newswire: “The leader of LivePrayer.com an internet ministry that has over 2.4 million subscribers worldwide reading his Daily Devotional, host of the “Liveprayer with Bill Keller” television program, and founder of the newly opened “9-11 Christian Center at Ground Zero,” has been targeted by Muslims to be put to death for “disrespecting Allah” and the Islamic religion.”

AP: “Bolstered by the passage of unique abortion restrictions in his home state of Nebraska, U.S. Sen. Mike Johanns is pushing for a new federal discussion of the notion of fetal pain.”

LifeNews: “It’s the dirty little secret the abortion industry doesn’t want you to know about.Under the cloak of the so-called “right to privacy,” women are being bullied into abortions.”

C-Span carries video of the entire debate here. It runs one and a half hours.

Father Frank Pavone writes at Washington Times: “First of all, to ask us to “agree to disagree” about abortion is to ask us to change our position on it. Why do we disagree in the first place? When we oppose abortion, we disagree with the notion that it is even negotiable. We do not only claim that we cannot practice abortion, but that nobody can practice it, precisely because it violates the most fundamental human right, the right to life.”

Post Chronicle: “He told the website: ‘Clearly there cannot be any rape within the marriage. Maybe aggression, maybe indecent activity… Because when they got married, the understanding was that sexual intercourse was part of the marriage, so there cannot be anything against sex in marriage. Of course, if it happened without her desire, that is no good, that is not desirable.’”

Pajamas Media: ” Last month, I reported exclusively at PJM about video showing al-Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaki leading prayers on Capitol Hill for Muslim congressional staffers and officials for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) . . . But a recent New York Post article about how Johnson’s former employer, Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY), complained to Homeland Security in 2006 about the questioning of another al-Qaeda-linked cleric, Anwar Hajjaj, stated that Hajjaj was then leading prayers for the Muslim staffers on Capitol Hill.”

Washington Post: “A group of Ohio ministers has asked the Internal Revenue Service to investigate the organization that sponsors the National Prayer Breakfast because it received money six years ago from an alleged Islamic terrorist organization trying to finance illicit lobbying.”

E Christian Brugger writes at the Culture of Life Foundation: “Dr. Robert Edwards, IVF pioneer and recipient of the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine, first fertilized a human egg in vitro (literally “in glass”) in 1969. The embryo died after the first cell division. He surmised that successful in vitro embryonic development required the harvesting of mature eggs.”

CBS (includes video): “O’Donnell said. Pressed multiple times to share her beliefs, she said that she believes local school districts should make the determination about what is taught, and that the federal government should not be mandating that schools do not teach creationism.”

Washington Post: “But it was O’Donnell and Coons’ reflections of the role of religion in politics that provided a rare point of agreement for the Republican and Democrat.
From a transcript of the debate . . . ”

Fox43.com (AP): “Making sure that we’ve got on the record Ms. O’Donnell’s views on things like prayer, abortion and evolution is important,” Coons said. “These aren’t just random statements on some late-night TV show. These are relevant to her service in the United States Senate, what sort of judges she would confirm, what sort of issues she would take up.”

Sydney Morning Herald: “However, in his final directions to the jury, Judge Bill Everson said they had to be satisfied the drugs were noxious to Ms Leach’s health, rather than the foetus.”

Augusta Chronicle: “. . . schools Superintendent Dr. Frank . . . Roberson said in opening the news conference. “Nor does the Richmond County School System have a partnership with Planned Parenthood, nor any other community, county or state agency, to provide methods or education on abortion or contraceptive education. This needs to be clear.”

Life News: “The Planned Parenthood abortion business has launched a new national campaign designed to promote forcing insurance companies to cover birth control via the ObamaCare health care law.”

PR Newswire: “The New York chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-NY) today called for state and federal hate crime charges to be brought against a man who allegedly used religious slurs while attacking a Muslim mother and her 4-year-old son.”

GlobeGazette.com: “Calling it an ‘extremist hate group’ trying to manipulate votes by using fear, religious leaders across the state Wednesday asked Bob Vander Plaats and his group, Iowa For Freedom, to denounce the American Family Association.”

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “The operators of a Milwaukee tavern that features erotic dancing are suing the City of Milwaukee, claiming its method of regulating such entertainment is unconstitutional. The suit was filed in U.S. District Court by Six Star Holdings LLC and Ferol LLC. ”

STLToday: “The threat of a lawsuit has prompted aldermen to consider voting tonight to repeal an ordinance prohibiting protests at funerals. The American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri sent a letter last month that said it would sue if the city did not repeal the ordinance by Friday.”

One News Now: “Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness, argues that a ruling based on “don’t ask, don’t tell” is flawed — and points out that Phillips’ ‘short-sighted conclusion’ came after eight days of “one-sided testimony from gay activists.”

Boston Globe: “The leading candidates include: SJC Justices Margot Botsford, Ralph D. Gants, and Roderick L. Ireland; US District Court Judge Patti B. Saris; state Appeals Court Justice Fernande R.V. Duffly; and Superior Court Judge Barbara A. Dortch-Okara. ”

Connie Hair writes at Human Events: “An organized effort is underway worldwide orchestrated by a powerful Islamic political body to criminalize speech that “offends” Muslims. As much as that may sound like some fantastic conspiracy theory, these Muslim leaders broadcast their group’s every move on their website—yet America’s ruling elites refuse to listen.”

One News Now: “‘You cannot lose your tax exemption as a church because as a church, you have a constitutional standing for tax exemption,’ he points out. ‘So with that basis, losing your letter means absolutely nothing – and that’s something pastors are now figuring out.’”

“Most federal appellate courts have said that a judge cannot issue a ruling that goes well beyond the parties who sued.”

“That’s what is at stake in this debate. Right and wrong. I’m troubled by the fact that so few Americans are willing to stand up and say it.”

NY Times: “The report, on the rise of right-wing extremism, was prepared by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, a research organization affiliated with the opposition Social Democratic Party. Its publication coincides with a emotionally charged debate about immigration and the integration of the seven million foreigners living in Germany. With leading politicians singling out Turks and Arabs — even suggesting, as the Bavarian premier, Horst Seehofer, did last week that they would be better off returning to their countries of origin — public attitudes about foreigners are swinging increasingly toward intolerance and racism, according to the report . . . ”

Marci Hamilton writes at Findlaw: “Child safety has routinely been undermined by religious organizations arguing for religious liberty “guarantees” in cases involving medical neglect by faith-healing parents; the regulation of religious schools, camps and social-service providers; and child sex abuse by clergy. I discussed these issues in some detail in my 2007 book God vs. the Gavel: Religion and the Rule of Law, so Professor Dwyer’s remarks did not surprise me, but they apparently did surprise many in the law-and-religion field — testifying, I suppose, to the larger problem of the overspecialization of law professors. On the RFRA issue, as I will explain, it is the family-law professors who are correct: RFRAs were, and continue to be, a dangerous legal innovation.”

Victor Davis Hanson writes at Townhall: “. . . there is a growing sense of despair that even vastly increased income taxes cannot cover the colossal shortfalls . . . That bleak reality creates hopelessness — and anger — among voters, who feel they are being taken for fools by their elected officials. The public opposes tax hikes not because they don’t wish to pay down the debt, but because they suspect the increased revenue will simply be a green light for even greater deficit spending.”

Des Moines Register: “A new advocacy group that includes former Iowa Gov. Robert Ray and former Lt. Gov. Art Neu has been formed to campaign in favor of retaining three Iowa Supreme Court justices.”

Religion Clause Blog: “In Canada yesterday, Ontario’s highest appellate court held that a judge conducting a preliminary inquiry in a criminal case has discretion whether or not to permit Muslim women to testify with her face covered. In The Queen v. N.S., (Ont. Ct. App., Oct. 13, 2010), defendants were charged with criminal sexual assault.”

Religion Clause Blog: “Baptist Press yesterday interviewed retired Chaplain (Col.) Keith Travis who is now chaplain team leader for the North American Mission Board, who said: ‘In order to best serve soldiers, our chaplains need to be able to practice their faith freely. Under this order, there’s a question as to whether our chaplains would be able to offer the full counsel of Scripture to soldiers who seek their guidance.’”

Religion Clause Blog: “Today’s Daily Tar Heel reports that, in response, residents have been protesting. They placed a new Christian flag there on a temporary stand and are guarding it 24 hours a day.”

AP: “Awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to imprisoned dissident Liu Xiabo encouraged crime in China, the government said Thursday, while telling his supporters to stop interfering in his case.”

AP: “A feared Islamic sect responsible for a recent federal prison break and targeted killings in northern Nigeria has demanded an amnesty offer from the government to stop the violence.”

AP: “Tentative links are developing between supporters of the Tea Party movement in the United States and right-wing fringe groups in Britain that are opposed to what they call the “Islamification” of Europe.”

US News and World Report: ”Its current approval rating is just barely 50 percent, with its lowest rating over the past decade hovering just above 40 percent. Toward the end of the year 2000 its approval rating was above 60 percent–the highest it has been over the last 10 years. See the graphic below to get a better sense of the data.”

LifeNews: ” . . . U.S. District Judge Nora Barry Fischer, this summer, granted a request from pro-life advocate Mary Kathryn Brown and ordered the city to pay $209,276 in attorney fees and costs, mostly to attorneys from The Alliance Defense Fund, a pro-life legal group that represented Brown.”

Newzhawk: “A lawsuit alleging religious discrimination has been filed on behalf of Foothill Elementary School Principal Craig Richter, who says he has been targeted for his beliefs and threatened to be fired. The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in federal court by Richter’s attorney, William Rehwald, who is one 1,800 attorneys working with the Alliance Defense Fund, a legal group dedicated to defending religious freedom . . . ”

LifeSiteNews: “A pro-abortion Maryland councilmember and prominent foe of local crisis pregnancy centers is locked in a battle over allegations that she used over $10,000 of funds from the abortion organization National Organization for Women (NOW) for personal shopping sprees. . . . An Alliance Defense Fund lawsuit against Trachtenberg’s law restricting pregnancy resource centers is ongoing.”

NewsReview.com: “Pugno also neglects to mention that his first real job, before he became a lawyer, was working for the notorious anti-gay state legislator William “Pete” Knight, who was the driving force behind Proposition 22, the first anti-gay marriage initiative that was declared unconstitutional by the California Supreme Court in 2008.  Also absent is Pugno’s work with the Alliance Defense Fund, which litigates cases involving religious liberties for Christians. ADF insists that it’s not a law firm and is instead a ministry, which means it won’t hire anyone who is not Christian. It was founded by conservative radio pastor and self-proclaimed family expert James Dobson in 1994. ADF was the major legal arm of the Prop. 8 campaign and defended the measure in court.”

Iowa Independent: “A Sioux City church facing an IRS investigation did nothing wrong when it organized its own campaign to unseat three justices from the Iowa Supreme Court, 3rd District Republican congressional candidate Brad Zaun said in an interview this week with a Christian blogger . . . The church’s pastor told The Iowa Independent that he also participated in Pulpit Freedom Sunday, a national effort organized by the conservative Alliance Defense Fund aimed at convincing pastors to endorse political candidates from the pulpit in violation of the current tax code.”

Winston Salem-Journal: “Kaplan and Whiteheart differ over how to handle a court challenge to pre-meeting invocations. Kaplan opposed the policy that the Alliance Defense Fund, a conservative Christian organization, persuaded a board majority to pass. The group is paying the county’s costs to litigate the case. Whiteheart consistently backed the county’s prayer policy — and its fight with the American Civil Liberties Union over it — while he was on the board.”

NorthJersey.com: “‘Christians shouldn’t be censored from expressing their beliefs while others are freely allowed to express theirs,’ said David Cortman, senior counsel at the Alliance Defense Fund, which filed the suit in 2005.”

One News Now: ADF attorney Austin R. Nimocks explains that the high court is being asked to intervene because “the citizens of D.C. have a clear right to vote on the question of marriage, and the D.C. courts have suppressed that right. Now we’re asking the Supreme Court to take up their case and their cause for democracy and the question of marriage in the District of Columbia.” He continues . . . ”

“As the Obama administration considers appealing a judge’s order to stop the law prohibiting gays from serving openly in the military, some officers and service members say they are uncertain how to react.”

Freedom from Religion Foundation: According to information from a local complainant to the Freedom From Religion Foundation, Puterbaugh Middle School in McAlester, Okla., is allowing illegal religious proselytizing during school hours at the school. Foundation Staff Attorney Patrick Elliott sent a letter of complaint Oct. 13