Daily Archives: January 3, 2011

“I don’t think the court should be in the business of telling the governor and the Legislature how to spend the people’s money. But we’ll see what the court rules.”

The Ledger: “Atheists of Florida Inc. intends to file suit against the Polk County Sheriff’s Office over its donation of jailhouse basketball goals to churches, the nonprofit’s legal coordinator said Thursday.”

Jill Stanek: “Any person with common sense could cue the researchers that the more casual sex one has, the greater likelihood there will be of pregnancy, contraception use notwithstanding. Contraceptive use only provides a false sense of security.”

Kansas City Star: “Kansas Gov.-elect Sam Brownback wants to change rules for state social service programs that he says discourage marriage.”

CNSNews: “Rep. Steve King (R.-Iowa) says that House Republicans should include language that prohibits any funding for implementation of Obamacare in literally every appropriations bill that passes the House of Representatives this year, thus forcing a showdown on the issue with the Democratic majority Senate and President Barack Obama.”

Yankton Press & Dakotan: “Abortion foes made strides in the last legislative session in further restricting the procedure in Nebraska, but the issue isn’t expected to fall by the wayside in 2011. Two anti-abortion groups that lobbied lawmakers during the last session are shopping new proposals for introduction after the Legislature convenes Wednesday, and at least one senator is working on an abortion bill of her own.”

Jeff Walton writing in The American Spectator: “[S]ignals emanating from the State Department indicate that the U.S. government may be engaged in its own evangelistic efforts — to help legitimize homosexual practices in those socially traditional countries . . . Clinton said the State Department is supporting efforts to advance homosexual rights around the world.”

Associated Press: “The announcement of the Jan. 12 vote by the No. 2 House Republican, Virginia Rep. Eric Cantor, sets the stage for a showdown with the Democratic-led Senate.”

John Vinocur writing in the New York Times: “Of all Europe’s great and present miseries, the one receiving the most uncertain remedies is the failing integration of its increasingly large and alienated Muslim communities . . . The disintegration of the European Union and its common currency may well be steered into a rational, livable outcome. The increasingly mean and mutually demeaning confrontation between Europe and its Muslim immigrants finds no signs of a clear resolution, just more misery.”

Minneapolis Star Tribune: “As the Muslim student population grows in Minnesota, some educators detect a glaring gap: a dearth of books the students can relate to and from which others can learn.”

Yahoo (AFP): “‘I have … taken the initiative for Denmark to host next week a seminar with the participation of religious leaders from a number of Iraqi communities, including Christians and Muslims, to promote dialogue between religious groups in Iraq,’ Danish Foreign Minister Lene Espersen said in a statement.”

BBC: “Like some governments around the world, Syria is taking measures against what it sees as the growing influence of Islamic conservatives.”

Jerusalem Post: “French police said Monday they have tightened security at Coptic Christian churches and opened a probe into online messages threatening terror attacks against such religious sites in France.”

Canadian Jewish News: “The Association of Child Care Centres of the Jewish Community along with Quebec Jewish Congress (QJC), Federation CJA and the Association of Jewish Day Schools are looking at their options to challenge the new regulations, announced Dec. 17, including going to court.”

The News Tribune: “Lawyers for the city are reviewing the council’s practice of opening meetings with an invocation after a local resident’s complaint was supported with a challenge from a national group that opposes prayer in government.”

Washington Post: “Democrats in Virginia are hoping to translate momentum from the successful national repeal of the military’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy into new traction for legislation that would explicitly ban discrimination against gays in the state workforce.”

Reuters: “After nearly two decades of hearing ‘don’t ask, don’t tell,’ gay U.S. military men and women are now hearing, ‘do ask, do tell,’ and even, ‘find a friend’ from a new social network website, Out Military.”

PRlog: “The ABA has issued an analysis warning students that going to law school may not be worth it because the huge debt may not be recouped by high salaries, and that the ‘high debt can limit career choices . . . or delay home ownership or marriage.’”

The Boston Globe: “Gay-rights activists, acknowledging they will lose momentum for their agenda in Congress when Republicans assume control of the House this week, are pinning their hopes for further gains in 2011 on a series of incremental measures and a host of federal court cases.”

Nashua Telegraph: “One of the bills, still in its initial phases, would revert state law to civil unions rather than full marriage rights, legislators say, while another would call for a full constitutional amendment defining marriage as between one man and one woman.”

Providence Journal: “The drive to legalize same-sex marriage, turn the state’s slot parlors into full-fledged casinos and impose a 1-percent sales tax on food, clothing and prescription drugs — among other items — has set the stage for months of late-night hearings and high-stakes battles at the State House.”

Breitbart (AFP): “US biotech company Advanced Cell Technology said Monday it was cleared by the government to start its second trial using human embryonic stem cells to treat blindness, this time in older people.”

KJCT 8: “A new treatment for people suffering a psychological condition that causes an obsession with morality and religion is being studied at Utah State University.”

LifeSiteNews: “The Ontario Human Rights Tribunal has ordered a Catholic school board to compensate three members of a prominent UFO cult after finding the board guilty of religious discrimination.”

Los Angeles Times: “As it becomes more common for teenagers to realize — and then tell others — that they are gay or lesbian, there is also a growing number of teen characters on TV programs geared toward teens going through the same thing.”

Tennessean: “Currently, appeals court judges are appointed by the governor and run for re-election every eight years. The races are uncontested, but residents are asked to vote yes or no on whether the judges should be kept on the bench . . . The Tennessee Plan will expire in 2012. Emboldened by new Republican majorities after November’s elections, however, opponents may press the issue sooner. Opponents say that in addition to being unconstitutional, the Tennessee Plan makes judges unaccountable to voters.”

My San Antonio (AP): “‘I have never been aware of any case that includes such a broad-based censorship,’ said [David Cortman], senior legal counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund. ‘In our opinion, it violates the federal constitutional rights of the teachers and the students.’”

ISRIA: “Minister Frattini has called for discussion at the next meeting of the EU Council of Foreign Ministers, to be held on 31 January, of the themes of violence and discrimination against Christians around the world.”

Irish Times: “The next government should upgrade the Civil Partnership Act to bring it into line with same-sex legislation in Northern Ireland, the Church of Ireland Changing Attitude Ireland group has said.”

Yahoo / PRWeb: “The historic marriage of Episcopal Divinity School, dean and president, the Very Reverend Katherine Hancock Ragsdale and Mally Lloyd, Canon to the Ordinary, took place today at the Cathedral Church of St Paul in Boston.”

Thomas Farrell writing at opednews.com: “But where exactly does the chilling effect of Bishop Olmsted’s actions come from? The chilling effect comes from the questionable ethical teachings advanced by the Catholic bishops regarding abortion. Therefore, those of us who are concerned about the chilling effect of his example should debate the questionable ethical teachings advanced by the Catholic bishops regarding abortion.”

“Bob Vander Plaats and three newly elected state legislators are absolutely wrong to call for the resignation or impeachment of Iowa’s Supreme Court justices. Fellow legislators should refuse to support these views.”

Atlanta Journal Constitution: “Across metro Atlanta, church campuses are becoming sanctuaries for cash-strapped start-up charter schools. The partnering has provided classrooms for hundreds of Georgia public school students. Charter schools save on rent and churches get help covering expenses.”

Robert Knight writing in the Washington Times: “Over the past year, it has become obvious that what leftists cannot win at the ballot box, they will accomplish via bureaucratic dictate . . . The new House should propose legislation and hold hearings as soon as possible, before the sticky web of bureaucratic tendrils gets too dense to penetrate.”

Washington Times: “A long-standing tit-for-tat between Texas and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency over how to regulate pollution has grown fierce in recent months, leaving industry frustrated and allowing some plants and refineries to spew more toxic waste into the air, streams and lakes than what is federally acceptable.”

Daily Telegraph: “An autistic schoolboy has been granted court approval to begin treatment to become a woman – on the proviso the teenager has his sperm frozen in case he wants to have children in the future.”

Tennessean: “A new mosque is taking shape in Antioch without the protests and court battles one drew in a neighboring city. For the past few months, work has been under way at the former Carmike Bell Forge 10 cinemas, converting the movie theater into the new home of the Islamic Center of Tennessee.”

Wesley J. Smith writing at First Things / Secondhand Smoke: “The latest installment, in today’s Magazine, presents a very long article about a couple who paid for eggs and hired two surrogates to gestate two children at the same time so that it would be like having twins. The children are called ‘twiblings.’ It is called very chirpily, the ‘futuristic insta-family.’ I also learned a new term: ‘gestational carriers,’ for the women who rent their uteresi–and breasts for nursing.”

Wesley J. Smith writing at First Things / Secondhand Smoke: “Sorry, this not a scientocracy. The people’s views–and the law–matter in federal scientific funding, just as they do in other important societal endeavors. Moreover, just because a scientist wants to do it, doesn’t mean the taxpayers have to pick up the bill, or indeed, that it should be allowed legally. Dictatorships can pour all the resources into favored science projects that the government wants. But this is how free societies work. No blank checks.”

USA Today: “Starting on Saturday, Baby Boomers begin turning 65 and qualifying for Medicare — one every eight seconds. A record 2.8 million will qualify in 2011, rising to 4.2 million a year by 2030, projections show.”

David Wessel writing in the Wall Street Journal: “All signs point to President Barack Obama pursuing far-reaching changes to the corporate income tax, seeking to lower one of the highest statutory corporate-tax rates in the world by eliminating deductions, credits and loopholes.”

California Lawyer: “In its most important aspects, the Constitution tells the current society that it cannot do [whatever] it wants to do. It is a decision that the society has made that in order to take certain actions, you need the extraordinary effort that it takes to amend the Constitution. Now if you give to those many provisions of the Constitution that are necessarily broad . . . an evolving meaning so that they have whatever meaning the current society thinks they ought to have, they are no limitation on the current society at all.”

David Quinn writing in the Irish Independent: “‘Meet the parents: a son at last for Elton and David,’ ran a typical headline. The two men had fathered a child, we were informed. Er, no they didn’t, because such a thing is impossible . . . I . . . ask you to forget that Elton and David are gay because whenever the issue of homosexuality enters our thoughts, our brains seem to melt. We give in to whatever demands the gay lobby makes of us simply in order to show our ‘tolerance’. So I emphasise again, they could just as easily have been heterosexual and most of the same ethical issues would still have to be considered.”

New York Times: “[A]t three local high schools here this fall, dozens of gay students and their supporters finally convened the first Gay-Straight Alliances in the history of this conservative, largely Mormon city. It was a turning point here and for the state, where administrators, teachers and even the Legislature have tried for years to block support groups for gay youths, calling them everything from inappropriate to immoral.”

Christian Science Monitor: “This year also saw a low profile for social conservative groups as Congress debated the repeal of ‘don’t ask, don’t tell.’ The Senate’s decision to allow openly gay service members in the armed forces – a vote that eight Republicans backed – sent a signal that the influence of social conservative groups on Capitol Hill is slipping.”

Yahoo (AFP): “Egypt was on high alert on Monday ahead of the Coptic Christmas holiday following a New Year’s Day church bombing that killed 21 people, as investigators raced to identify those behind the attack.”

Danna Harman writing in The Huffington Post: “In Malta, divorce is illegal . . . For the vast majority of those separating Maltese couples, for whom neither an annulment or a foreign divorce is an option, the solution is to avoid the extra headache, heartache and expense and simply separate unofficially. Meaning, people move on with their lives: Leaving the family home, co-habitating with new partners, having new families, and yet all the while still married to their original partner.”

Emily V. Gordon writing at The Huffington Post: “When I started talking to friends about leaving my marriage, they would ask about how entangled our lives were, and I realized that they weren’t entangled… at all. Instead of feeling proud, I was horrified. It dawned on me that I might have been doing this wrong. As my (still-married) parents said to me at some point during my sad, bloodless divorce process, what’s the point of marriage if you’re not rolling up your sleeves and getting your hands dirty?”

Globe Gazette: “My issue with all of this is not being for or against same-sex marriages. It’s with people who stomp on the Constitution and on state law when they don’t get their way.”

Lambda Legal: “Lambda Legal has sent a letter to Governor-Elect Jerry Brown urging him to scrutinize closely the judicial philosophies of those he appoints as state court judges and to add greater diversity to the bench.”

Eugene Volokh writing at The Volokh Conspiracy: “That’s the issue lurking in In re Aramco Servs. Co., now on appeal to the Texas Supreme Court . . . The contract provided that it was to be interpreted under Saudi law, and arbitrated under Saudi arbitration rules and regulations. Those rules and regulations apparently call for the arbitrators to be Muslims or Saudi citizens.”

Chris Patti writes at the Washington Post: “Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates will now try to fashion a policy that will filter down to all of us in the services. That policy needs to set a standard for the ethical and equitable treatment of all service members, regardless of their sexuality.”

Washington Examiner: “Comparing the words of the Constitution to the actions of our leaders in recent years will surely make clear the enduring wisdom of James Madison’s warning that ‘there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.’ Talking seriously about this condition is the first step to remedying it, just as Madison and the rest of the Founders intended.”

Townhall: “No one knows how many residents have left the city of 1.4 million since a turf battle over border drug corridors unleashed an unprecedented wave of cartel murders and mayhem. Business leaders, citing government tax information, say the exodus could number 110,000, while a municipal group and local university say it’s closer to 230,000. Estimates by social organizations are even higher.”

The Hill: “Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) is distancing himself from a memo sent by his office that urged health reform advocates not to advertise new end-of-life counseling regulations to avoid reviving talk of ‘death panels.’”

LifeNews: “Vermont and Montana will form ground zero for the debate over assisted suicide in 2011 as legislatures in both states are expected to tackle bills related to the subject.”

“The Nevada Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal by a group seeking a constitutional amendment to ban abortions. The court rejected the arguments of Personhood Nevada, which wanted a question on the election ballot this past November.”

Marketing Intelligent Design
Law and the Creationist Agenda
Frank S. Ravitch, Michigan State University

“Recently a new battle has emerged between science and religion. The battle has focused on intelligent design (ID) and the numerous legal, philosophical, and educational concerns surrounding it. Resolution of these concerns centers on two questions: Is ID science? And is ID religion? Despite the fact that ID does not meet the standards of scientific rigor, ID proponents have been able to create a remarkably well-designed marketing plan aimed at imposing a theistic naturalism in schools and scientific discourse. Both the ID movement and some of its most vociferous opponents have a vested interest in suggesting that science, especially evolutionary biology, and religion are incompatible. This book presents a philosophical and legal counterpoint by demonstrating the compatibility between religion and evolutionary biology and the incompatibility between ID and mainstream science.”

Mike Adams writing at Townhall: “Those of us who are conservative Christians are apt to blame the problems of the world on others. When we aren’t blaming Obama specifically, we are blaming socialism and socialists generally. But none of these things are really problems. They are symptoms of a larger problem; namely, that others are assuming the responsibilities that Christians have been neglecting for years.”

LifeNews: “Rep. Fred Upton of Michigan, incoming chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said yesterday that a vote on the repeal legislation and a companion bill to ensure there is no abortion funding under ObamaCare, will take place before President Barack Obama delivers his State of the Union address later this month.”

Associated Press: “The new violence over the past two weeks highlights the tensions between Nigeria’s two major faiths – Christians and Muslims – and threatens peace ahead of the young democracy’s April presidential election.”

Associated Press: “The New Year’s Day suicide bombing of a church that killed 21 people has opened up a vein of fury among Egypt’s Christians, built up over years of what they call government failure to address persistent discrimination and violence against their community.”

RNC Debate: “View the debate live on Monday, January 3, 2011 at 1:00 PM ET, here and at www.dailycaller.com.”

New York Times: “Despite a growing wave of student protests in Britain over government plans to sharply raise university tuition fees that saw buildings occupied at campuses across the country, and battles in the streets between demonstrators and the police whose ferocity at one point even seemed to threaten the heir to the British throne, the year 2010 ended quietly, with students heading home for the holidays and university authorities once again in control of their premises.”

“[I]n agreeing that marriage is a comprehensive union of persons but denying that it includes true bodily union, Yoshino must be reducing the person to a center of consciousness and emotion, which just uses a body as an extrinsic (and thus subpersonal) instrument for achieving satisfactions or other goals.”

Heritage Foundation: “The problem with government unions is that, unlike the private sector, governments have no competitors. If a union ends up extracting a contract from a private firm that eats up too much profits, that firm will lose out to the competition. But when a union extracts a generous contract from government, there is no check on that spending. Instead of being disciplined by more efficient competitors, the government just pays for higher spending with higher taxes or borrowing.”

SCOTUSblog: “Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., with a not-so-subtle suggestion that the Senate should stop playing politics with nominations of judges to the federal courts, on Friday called for a ‘long-term solution to this recurring problem.’ In another notable feature of his annual year-end report on the federal judiciary, the Chief Justice notified Congress that the Court itself, through belt-tightening, will be asking for less money in its new budget than it did last year. The text of the report can be read here.”

The Hill: “Democrats will control the Senate in the 112th Congress but lawmakers and aides expect a different power dynamic with Republicans in control of 47 seats. Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) will take a bigger role in crafting the floor strategy and freshman Republicans are poised to take over the role Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) has played in challenging the Senate GOP leadership.”

Ross Douthat writing in the New York Times: “This is the paradox of America’s unborn. No life is so desperately sought after, so hungrily desired, so carefully nurtured. And yet no life is so legally unprotected, and so frequently destroyed.”

WorldNetDaily: “Unspecified psychological studies or evaluations have been ordered for a jailed father who, in violation of the procedures of the government-run social services that instructed police officers to abduct his then-7-year-old son because he was being homeschooled, took him home for a visit . . . ‘Despite the ill-advised decision on the part of Mr. Johansson, the only menace here is a government drunk with its own power,’ said Roger Kiska, legal counsel for the ADF.”

ADF Attorney Casey Mattox writing at Speak Up Movement / University: “The First Amendment is now 10-8 this bowl season . . . Now the games get really good. And the First Amendment gets a chance to have its revenge in the Rose Bowl (a sentence that perhaps has never before been written). As always, if you’re a student or know students at a school subject to one of these unconstitutional policies, let us know so that we can work with you to have the school change them. That is, after all, the ultimate purpose here.”

OneNewsNow: “Alliance Defense Fund attorney [Jordan Lorence] was disappointed that the court chose to affirm a policy [in Martinez] that very few universities have. He said of the handful of law schools that have this policy, most of them require no discrimination based on religion. ‘Groups that have nothing to do with religion — environmentalist groups, homosexual groups, feminist groups, etc. — they are allowed to kick out members who don’t agree with their message,’ said Lorence. ‘But only the religious groups are the ones that are required to accept people who don’t agree with their message.’”

OneNewsNow: “[Jordan Lorence] of Alliance Defense Fund was there for arguments in early December before the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. ‘It was a very vigorous argument, and I feel that Chuck Cooper and Bob Tyler did an excellent job explaining why this was a rational decision and a constitutional decision by the voters to define marriage as one man and one woman,’ said the senior counsel.”

“Christians clashed with Egyptian police in the northern city of Alexandria on Saturday, furious over an apparent suicide bombing against worshippers leaving a New Year’s Mass at a church that killed at least 21 people. It was the worst violence against the country’s Christian minority in a decade.”

An Abortion Exception to the First Amendment? Evaluating Recent Efforts to Regulate Speech About Pregnancy Options
Engage Volume 11, Issue 3, December 2010
December 23, 2010
Mark L. Rienzi

“Abortion is a highly-charged and intensely-debated issue. Partisans on both sides believe abortion implicates fundamental human rights, with abortion supporters comparing abortion prohibitions to slavery, and abortion opponents comparing a permissive abortion regime to the holocaust. Some people believe so strongly that abortion should be available that they endure protests, threats, and physical violence to provide a service they deem critically important. Others refuse to refer or provide for abortions under any circumstances.”