Daily Archives: August 25, 2011

ADF Attorney David Cortman appeared on the Citizen Link Report (Aug. 23) to discuss the issue. The video can be viewed here. It runs just under 10 minutes

ADF Attorney Jeremy Tedesco on the Pilgrim Radio Network. | MP3 audio 25:01 mins

Christian Concern: The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) has changed its mind over how it will intervene in the four cases of discrimination against Christians that will be heard in Europe soon.

Beliefnet News: The ACLU “is pushing its radical sexual agenda for children by intimidating school districts with a long string of scare tactics disguised as a concern over censorship,” says David Cortman, Senior Counsel for the Alliance Defense Fund. “In truth, these school districts have no obligation to cave to the ACLU’s unwarranted demands. Our children come first.”

Read more: http://blog.beliefnet.com/news/2011/08/aclu-campaign-schools-must-stop-blocking-kids-access-to-pornography.php#ixzz1W5432Jyc

WSJ: Children of divorce are more likely to be in poverty and to live with their mothers, according to a new Census report on marriage released today.

Ramesh Ponnuru at National Review : The Republican House is blocking a Senate recess by holding pro forma sessions, and thus blocking the president from making recess appointments.

Catholic Culture: Georgia–the former Soviet republic located between Russia and Turkey–has granted juridical status to the Catholic Church and other ecclesial communities “that have close historical ties with Georgia or that have become lawfully recognized as religions in member states of the Council of Europe.”

CSMonitor.com: In an effort to combat gender stereotypes, a government-funded preschool in Stockholm has eliminated the use of gendered pronouns.

Baptist Press: Britain aborted more than 2,200 unborn children for every baby under 1 year old adopted in 2009, a pro-life leader has reported.

LGBTQ Nation: The sudden resignation on Wednesday of Apple Chief Executive Steve Jobs paves the way for the ascension of Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook, who, upon being named Apple’s new CEO, was hailed by many in the LGBT community as possibly the world’s most powerful gay executive.

Conversation with Associate Justice Elena Kagan (video): In an Aug. 2 interview at the Aspen Institute, Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan ‘86 spoke about life as a Supreme Court justice, cameras in the courtroom, and interpreting the law. She was interviewed by Elliot Gerson, a former law clerk to former Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart.

Nathan Koppel at WSJ: The issue: Should the legal business be deregulated? In many states, people need to graduate from an ABA-accredited law school to take the bar exam. And state bars, of course, impose numerous regulations on who can and can’t practice law.
Unleash these shackles, the argument goes, and you’d allow a broader array of folks to offer legal services, thus lowering their cost.

BBC News: Islamic police in the Indonesian province of Aceh have forced two women to have their marriage annulled and sign an agreement to separate.

Mail Online: A U.S. population census has named North Dakota as the top American state to live in for a secure and happy marriage.

Iowa Independent: publican 2012 presidential candidate Rick Santorum sat down with Douglas Burns, co-publisher of The Carroll Daily Times Herald and an alum and frequent contributor to The Iowa Independent, to discuss Catholicism in relation to the GOP, rival Michele Bachmann and, of course, some of the social conservative issues well known to those who have seen Santorum on the Iowa stump

The Boston Globe: “There needs to be a means of true communication,’’ said Michael J. DePrimo, a civil rights lawyer based in Connecticut who represents several of the protesters in the case. They include an 84-year-old doctor, an 83-year-old grandmother, and a 30-year-old seminary student.

ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation): A survey of residents in Bundaberg and the Fraser Coast in southern Queensland has revealed almost 98 per cent of people are against same-sex marriage.

Star Online: Only 31 out of the 150 Members of the House of representatives have reported back to the Parliament on their consultations with constituents on same-sex marriage.

The Border Mail: To this point just over 80 per cent are indicating they are against legalising same-sex marriage.

North West Star: QUEENSLAND federal MPs have overwhelmingly voiced their opposition to same-sex marriage, buoying conservative Christian lobbyists ahead of today’s discussion of the issue in the House of Representatives.

Pew Social & Demographic Trends: The Census Bureau has just completed the release of state-by-state total counts of same-sex couples from the 2010 Census, which adds up to a national total of about 902,000. Later this year, the bureau will release a highly anticipated count of same-sex married couples from the 2010 Census, the first time it has done so from a decennial census.

Spero News: Mehek Masih was taken from her home in broad daylight and under the threat of a gun. Muslim man intends to “purify her” making her “Muslim and my mistress.” Archbishop Saldanha cases of this type are “frequent,” the law does not protect minorities. One of the many “crosses” that Pakistani …

The Commercial Appeal: The effort and others supportive of prayers at school sports events is a push-back to the DeSoto County Schools decision to halt prayers over public address systems. School officials made the decision after Freedom From Religion Foundation complained by letter that Supreme Court decisions prohibiting school-sponsored prayer were being violated.

ABC News: In fact, a shocking 49 percent of all babies born in the U.S. are born to families receiving food supplements from the WIC program, according to Jean Daniel, spokesperson for the USDA.

LifeSiteNews.com: A political battle is heating up in Angola over an attempt to eliminate criminal penalties for abortions in a variety of circumstances, including all abortions performed in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy.

LifeSiteNews.com: Pro-life and pro-abortion representatives in the congress of the Mexican State of Hidalgo are offering opposing laws, one to protect the right to life from conception, and the other to depenalize the deadly procedure during the first 12 weeks of gestation

LifeNews.com: North Carolina officials are examining a potential appeal of a recent judge’s ruling saying the state must fund the Planned Parenthood abortion business while the court move forward with hearings on the lawsuit it filed.

LifeNews.com: The UN has reversed a decade of speculation about a demographic winter in the West, and now says that every country will achieve replacement fertility by 2100 resulting in a global population of 10 billion. The problem is there is no basis for their turnabout.

Religion Clause: According to a press release this week from the Simon Wiesenthal Center, Delta Airlines has now give assurances that, even though Saudi Arabian Airlines will join the Sky Team global airline alliance in 2012, Delta does not currently and will not in the future request on behalf of any airline that passengers disclose their religious affiliation

AP: China’s state news agency on Thursday blasted a Pentagon report on the Chinese military as a smear that exaggerates the threat Beijing poses to the region.

AP: ingles, take note: With marriages at an all-time low, states in the South and West rank among the highest for couples hearing wedding bells. But many of these states also have higher rates of divorce.

AP: he National Labor Relations Board has approved a new rule that requires private employers to display posters that tell workers about their right to form a union.

AP: Only about half of the teenage girls in the U.S. have rolled up their sleeves for a controversial vaccine against cervical cancer – a rate well below those for two other vaccinations aimed at adolescents.

Renew America: Students attempting to enroll in classes at the Christian college had to wade through gay activists carrying homosexual advocacy signs and others from the organization offering students informational paraphernalia on the lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgender lifestyles.

AP: America is swiftly becoming a granny state. Today’s grandparents are shunning retirement homes and stepping in more than ever to raise grandchildren while young adults struggle in the poor economy.

Ed Whelan at Public Discourse: In developing their positions on Supreme Court appointments and the Department of Justice, presidential candidates should 1) welcome the battle over the Supreme Court, 2) determine to fight hard for high-quality justices, 3) frame the argument for why abortion policy should be restored to the democratic processes, 4) support the Defense of Marriage Act, and 5) commit to select senior legal leaders who fully embrace their goals and priorities.

SCOTUSblog: John Eastman, professor of Law at Chapman University, questions whether the Court should hear a marriage equality case . . . That the state can lend support to such an institution, rooted in human nature and drawing its unique benefit from the biological complementarity of the sexes, without running afoul of the commands of the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses, should be self-evident. The Equal Protection Clause, after all, demands that government afford equal treatment to those who are similarly situated.

Pacific Justice Institute: A California case being appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court raises nationwide concerns that cities are trying to seize unprecedented authority over private property, according to attorneys involved in the case.
Pacific Justice Institute represents a church in San Leandro—across the bay from San Francisco—that was prevented from moving into a building it had purchased on the open market, because the city wanted a moneymaking enterprise to get the property.

RealClearPolitics (includes video): Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) on the challenges in reining in government spending. “There’s going to be an inflation tax to hit us and I am just afraid there will be people in the streets when they don’t get what they want,” Paul told the FOX Business Network.

NBC Chicago: “Would you consider yourself to be a member of the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered) community?”

SCOTUSblog: Robert Levy, Chairman of the Cato Institute, responds to Brian Raum as part of our same-sex marriage symposium . . . Contrasting Lawrence v. Texas with Perry, Brian Raum contends in his post (“If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em”) that “the central holding in Lawrence is perfectly reasonable because the law need not promote everything it protects.” Brian continues, “The Constitution contains an equal protection clause, not an equal promotion clause.” . . . Yet Brian suggests that Kris Perry’s goal, expedited by Judge Walker, was to promote same-sex marriage rather than protect a right to marriage equality. That suggestion is totally unsubstantiated. No part of Judge Walker’s holding actively encourages, much less expresses a preference for, same-sex marriage.

SCOTUSblog: Harvard law professor and former Solicitor General Charles Fried argues that although a legislative solution would be ideal, a narrow ruling invalidating the Defense of Marriage Act is preferable to a broad ruling in favor of a constitutional right to same-sex marriage.

OneNewsNow.com: “I’m pleased to report that … both the constitution and common sense prevailed in the Lake County School District of Florida,” the attorney tells OneNewsNow. “The school board completed its — quote, unquote — ‘investigation’ and concluded that Jerry Buell has done absolutely nothing wrong, has done nothing that would warrant disciplinary action, and therefore has reinstated him effective immediately.” Buell returns to his job today.

Catholic League: The reason given for this grand act of censorship is spurious: Bloomberg’s office says the focus should be on the families who lost their loved ones. According to this logic, when the clergy are invited to speak at public events, or to open ceremonies with an invocation, they are detracting—not adding—to the overall theme.

LifeNews.com: New figures directly from the Komen for the Cure foundation show 18 affiliates of the breast cancer charity gave a total of more than $569,000 to the Planned Parenthood abortion business in 2010.

LifeNews.com: A new study conducted by a former research arm of Planned Parenthood shows the policies of the abortion business promoting contraception and birth control to poor women aren’t working, as unplanned pregnancy rates are rising. The Guttmacher Institute released a new study Wednesday . . .

SCOTUSblog: Brian Raum, head of marriage litigation for the Alliance Defense Fund, replies to Robert Levy as part of our same-sex marriage symposium . . . Some rights are so foundational to our system of government that we deem them “fundamental.” In his response to my earlier post in the SCOTUSblog marriage symposium, Robert Levy states that, under our current constitutional construct, a right is deemed fundamental if it is either “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty” or “deeply rooted in the Nation’s history and traditions.” But what he has missed is that it is not “either…or.”

ADF Attorney Steven Aden at Townhall: History is repeating itself; as World Magazine’s Marvin Olasky observes, a century ago, a rising tide of abortion swept in as industrialization and urbanization caused family breakup and isolation. Churches responded by providing compassionate aid through individual efforts and opening maternity homes, resulting in a dramatic decline in abortion rates in the latter part of the century – rates that stayed relatively low until the “sexual revolution” of the 1960s sent the numbers soaring again, along with rates of sexually transmitted infections and single parenting. Now, again, churches are answering the call to revive what the disordering of sexual ethics has left blighted. [This article also appears at LifeNews]

God Discussion: Bohon believes, despite statistics otherwise regarding religion and the American people, which we reported on a few days ago, “that in reality, a majority of Americans are probably more aligned with the views of legal advocacy groups like the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), which in a similar case involving the FFRF has advised a Mississippi school district that its officials and students are well within their constitutionally guaranteed rights to pray at school functions.” The Alliance Defense Fund sent its own letter . . . [quoted]

The New American: In reality, a majority of Americans are probably more aligned with the views of legal advocacy groups like the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), which in a similar case involving the FFRF has advised a Mississippi school district that its officials and students are well within their constitutionally guaranteed rights to pray at school functions . . . ADF Senior Counsel David Cortman noted in reference to the case. “Contrary to what the Freedom From Religion Foundation is arguing, this is not a government establishment of religion by any stretch of the imagination, except theirs.” . . . ADF Legal Counsel Jeremy Tedesco noted that the circumstances in question “would be no different from Principal Sparkman teaching a Sunday school class at a church that rented school facilities for its Sunday services. In both situations, Principal Sparkman is acting in his personal capacity as a citizen and has the same right to express his religious beliefs as any other citizen.”

Yall Politics: “Public school principals, teachers, and staff members should not be threatened for exercising their constitutionally protected right to organize and participate in private, religious events in their personal capacities. Contrary to what the Freedom From Religion Foundation is arguing, this is not a government establishment of religion by any stretch of the imagination, except theirs,” said ADF Senior Counsel David Cortman.

The Christian Institute: ADF lawyer David Cortman said that the “ACLU is pushing its radical sexual agenda for children by intimidating school districts with a long string of scare tactics disguised as a concern over censorship”. And he added: “In truth, these school districts have no obligation to cave to the ACLU’s unwarranted demands. Our children come first.” Another ADF lawyer cautioned: “Parents expect schools to be places where their children learn – not places where they access pornography.