Daily Archives: November 1, 2011

Twelve nurses represented by Alliance Defense Fund attorneys filed suit Monday against their employer, a hospital run by the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, for requiring them to participate in abortions. Federal and state law both protect them from being forced to do so.

BBC News: The UK is showing a “bullying mentality” by threatening to cut aid to countries where homosexuality is illegal, a Ugandan official says.

Europa: Child abusers and viewers of child sex images on the web will face tough penalties in the EU, under new rules approved by Parliament on Thursday. The directive will also require EU countries to remove child porn web sites, or, should this prove impossible, allow them to block access to those pages within their territory. Studies suggest that between 10% and 20% of minors in Europe may be sexually assaulted during childhood.

Christian Post: A legal battle is raging on in southern Illinois over a 111-foot cross and whether or not it should be repaired with state tax dollars.

Human Events: The freshman senator from Pennsylvania announced Oct. 20 he will co-sponsor the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act to thwart a regulation he said forces Catholic organizations to cover contraceptives against their faith.

The Blog of Legal Times: President Barack Obama on Monday withdrew the nomination of a U.S. magistrate judge whom he tapped for a seat on the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland.

ADF President and General Counsel Alan E. Sears at the TellADF Blog: For five years, members of the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners have been under legal attack from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) – the number one religious censor in America – and Americans United for Separation of Church and State (AU). Both object to the Commissioners’ custom of allowing “sectarian” prayer to open public meetings … even though the person offering the invocation has always been allowed to do so in keeping with his own faith, whatever that may be.

Courant.com: The U.S. Supreme Court Monday ended former Connecticut high school student Avery Doninger’s First Amendment fight when it let stand a prior ruling that school administrators acted reasonably when they disciplined her for using a vulgar term to criticize faculty.

ADF Attorney Erik Stanley at Speak Up Movement Church Blog: A total of 539 pastors participated in Pulpit Freedom Sunday which was a massive increase from the 100 pastors that participated last year.

Scotsman.com: ONE of Scotland’s most eminent scientists has argued that couples in the UK should have no more than two children to help tackle the world’s soaring population.

BosNewsLife: Five Algerian Christians remained jailed in north-eastern Algeria Tuesday, November 1, after they were reportedly detained this weekend for “worshiping in an unregistered location.”

CourtHouse News: A sex superstore in southeastern Pennsylvania can’t enjoin a Catholic group from protesting outside its business, a federal judge ruled. | Routes 202 and 306 and Novelties and Gifts v. The Kings Men, No. 2:11-cv-05822-PBT (E.D. Pa.)

CSMonitor.com: One of the most hidden and hideous crimes in America is the sex trafficking of children. But this selling of minors quickly becomes less hidden when Internet sites for community advertising become giant magnets for the sex trade.

WZTV FOX 17 (ADF attorneys Byron Babione and Jim Campbell in the video) Sky Arnold: Attorneys who are fighting a controversial new state law want to see e-mails and documents of those who supported it . . .

LifeSiteNews.com (includes video): Anytime journalists feel the need to reinforce unexamined Planned Parenthood statements, they pull the Guttmacher card. The Guttmacher Institute, founded by former Planned Parenthood President and former Vice President of the American Eugenics Society, Alan F. Guttmacher, is continually lavished with misleading credentials by mainstream media. NPR and the Washington Post call it a “nonpartisan research group”.

LifeSiteNews.com: Pro-life advocates in Tennessee can breathe a sigh of relief, now that their years-long battle to defund Planned Parenthood in the state has reached its conclusion.

BaltimoreSun.com: Judge Eagles wrote, “The First Amendment generally includes the right to refuse to engage in speech compelled by the government,” adding that freedom of speech precludes limits on “both what to say and what not to say.” . . . Let’s apply this twisted reasoning to commercial airline travel. FAA regulations require that passengers receive an oral and video demonstration of the plane’s safety features.

PR Newswire – sacbee.com: U.S. News Media Group and Best Lawyers® have released the 2011-2012 “Best Law Firms” rankings, marking the second edition of this highly-anticipated annual analysis.

NYTimes.com: In its infancy the H.R.C. effort, called Americans for Marriage Equality, has showcased three prominent black Americans in a row. That’s no accident.

KansasCity.com: A Muslim mosque in Wichita that was heavily damaged by fire early Monday had received anti-Islam letters in recent months.

NYTimes.com: With open enrollment season in full swing, several big companies have said that they would begin to reimburse gay employees for the extra taxes they pay on health insurance for their significant others. Now, two more technology giants, Microsoft and Yahoo, have decided to join in, starting Jan. 1.

NJ.com: The latest lawsuit that seeks to force New Jersey to recognize gay marriage will soon be going before a judge for the first time.

Guardian.co.uk: Britain has threatened countries that ban homosexuality with losing aid payments unless they reform, David Cameron has said.

Ken Connor at the Christian Post: For decades now, the “pro-choice” movement has successfully distorted the abortion debate by ignoring the essential question – is an unborn child a living human or isn’t it? – in favor of their infamous “right to choose” canard. A recent op-ed in the Washington Post entitled “How an anti-abortion push to redefine ‘person’ could hurt women’s rights” employs this tactic shamelessly . . .

Pat Buchanan at Townhall : Second, if the Office of Human Rights has nothing better to do than spending six months investigating these nonsensical charges, it ought to be abolished. Give the taxpayers back the money these bureaucrats are wasting, and let them go and, as Ronald Reagan used to say, “test the magic of the marketplace.”

TimesDaily.com: Lauderdale County Superintendent of Education Bill Valentine said his school district’s position on Christian prayer being offered via public address before football games focuses on one thing: abiding by the law.

Michael LeGault at The Detroit News: In a 2010 NBC-Wall Street Journal poll, 63 percent of respondents said the standard of living will not get better for average families. Hope has been replaced by despair for tens of millions of Americans, the notable exceptions being those lucky enough to reside in Hollywood, academia, Silicon Valley, lawyer-ville or Washington, D.C. — the hotbeds of American liberalism.

The Washington Post: Nepalese police detained more than 100 Tibetan exiles on Tuesday who had gathered to pray for nine Tibetans who set themselves on fire to protest against Chinese rule.

NCPA Policy Digest: “By providing aid and subsidized loans, the government is trying to protect students, but the effect is perverse,” said Jane Shaw, president of the John W. Pope Center for Higher Education Policy. “They increase demand and enable colleges to hike tuitions virtually without restraint.”

Flying proudly over the birthplace of Libya’s revolution, the flag of Al Qaeda | Mail Online: The black flag of Al Qaeda was hoisted in Libya yesterday as Nato formally ended its military campaign.

Phyllis Schlafly atTownhall: Does Rick Perry want to undermine traditional marriage? This question leaps out from his new 20 percent flat-tax plan, which would eliminate all tax advantages for married couples where one spouse is the primary breadwinner.

Dennis Prager at Townhall: The first was the feminist message to young women to have sex just like men do . . . The second awful legacy of feminism has been the belief among women that they can and should postpone marriage until they develop their careers — and that only then should they seriously consider looking for a husband . . . The third sad feminist legacy: So many women — and men — have bought into the notion that women should work outside the home that for the first time in American history, and perhaps world history, vast numbers of children are not primarily raised by their mothers or even by an extended family member . . . And the fourth awful legacy of feminism has been the de-masculinization of men.

LifeNews.com: The nation’s Catholic bishops are considering a lawsuit against the Obama administration for denying a grant previously granted for a program helping victims of sex trafficking because the bishops would not refer the women for abortions.

Religion Clause: According to yesterday’s Jacksonville Times-Union, in Clay County, Florida, the attorney for the county school board last week sent the board a Legal Memorandum (full text) concluding . . .

Eugene Volokh at The Volokh Conspiracy: The proposed law would mandate that public and charter schools, city parks, city libraries, and the University of District Columbia ban any gesture or written, verbal or physical act, including electronic communication, that is …

The Volokh Conspiracy: Since First Amendment controversies involving the government as K-12 educator often come up on the blog, I thought I’d summarize the Supreme Court’s precedents on the subject . . .

Telegraph: Global stock markets dropped sharply as investors sold off shares after Greece’s shock decision to hold a referendum on its eurozone bail-out package thratened to intensify the region’s debt crisis.

The Volokh Conspiracy: The New York Times Room for Debate Forum has an interesting symposium on the role of religion in presidential elections. In his contribution, polling expert Andrew Kohut cites a 2007 Pew survey showing that atheism is viewed more negatively by voters than virtually any other possible trait of a presidential candidate.

LaTimes.com: Beating up on federal judges is nothing new for conservative politicians. But the near-unanimous embrace of that tactic by the 2012 Republican presidential field is nevertheless depressing. Candidates who trumpet their support for the Constitution are seeking to hobble one of that document’s central protections: an independent judiciary.

NCRegister.com: The federal government’s decision to end funding for a Church program for trafficking victims has fueled concerns that “abortion politics” are at work.

A Florida federal district court upheld against free expression challenges a school’s dress codes that were applied to send students home for wearing T-shirts carrying the slogan “Islam is of the Devil.”

LifeNews.com: “Pro-life nurses shouldn’t be forced to assist in abortions against their beliefs,” Bowman told LifeNews. “No less than 12 nurses have encountered threats to their jobs at this hospital ever since a policy change required them to participate in the abortions regardless of their religious objections. That is flatly illegal.”

Baptist Press: The Alliance Defense Fund reports that in all the state votes on same-sex marriage over the last decade, 63 percent of all active voters have voted to affirm natural marriage. The record that counts — the one at the ballot box — show that those who report supporting same-sex marriage are not as likely to show up to vote their convictions.

WorldNetDaily: The Alliance Defense Fund has been fighting on behalf of the Utah Highway Patrol Association to memorialize fallen troopers “in a way they see fit . . . ADF Senior Counsel Byron Babione argued “one atheist group’s agenda shouldn’t diminish the sacrifice made by highway patrol officers and their families.” “Thirteen heroic men fell, leaving their survivors to mourn and memorialize their loved ones, and now those widows, children, parents, colleagues, and many more must suffer through losing the very memorials that honored those heroes,” he said.

Ken Klukowski at the Washington Examiner: The Utah Highway Patrol Association participated in the case as intervenors represented by the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF). The ADF’s lead counsel for UHPA, Byron Babione, said, “One atheist group’s agenda shouldn’t diminish the sacrifice made by highway patrol officers and their families.” ADF would continue to fight to protect these memorials, he added. The slight silver lining in this denial is that Thomas’s dissent suggests that the High Court might not have seen the 10th Circuit’s judgment as covering all roadside crosses, instead regarding it as covering only roadside crosses bearing government insignia (which are presumably rare).

Paul.Hous.gov: While I applaud the spirit of this announcement – since all our troops should come home from overseas – I have strong reservations about any actual improvements in the situation in Iraq, since plans are already being made to increase the number of troops in surrounding regions. What we really need is a new foreign policy and there is no indication that that is what we have gotten.

News from The Associated Press: This year’s Conference of European Rabbis will focus on a range of issues affecting European and global Jewry, including attempts in Europe to ban the Jewish method of religious slaughter of animals.

News from The Associated Press: Only Argentina’s much smaller economy matched China’s 9.5 percent annual growth rate. By contrast, the U.S. economy grew at a 1.3 . . .

Matthew J. Franck at Public Discourse: But the tenure system makes the faculty themselves the gatekeepers of intellectual life, without much serious constraint on their decisions to hire, tenure, and promote their junior colleagues other than their own sense of what is right and fitting. This is a recipe for power without responsibility, anywhere self-interest conquers ethics, as it all too commonly does. The price is paid by junior faculty, adjuncts, graduate students being trained to be the next generation of professors . . .

News from The Associated Press: On a YouTube clip that has gone viral, brash Texas handgun instructor Crockett Keller defiantly tells Muslims and non-Christian Arabs he won’t teach them how to handle a firearm.

POLITICO.com: If a church broadcasts the word of God on TV without closed captions, it risks incurring the wrath of the FCC.

The National Law Journal’s Law School Review: U.S. Legal Education is in the midst of a large, structural transformation. This structural shift is driven by a confluence of factors, which includes three significant trends:

The Hill : Despite these dire circumstances, those responsible for these pressing national concerns, the United States Congress, still receive pay and benefits totaling $285,000 per year. This makes members of Congress among the highest-paid five percent of American workers.

The Hill reports on the expected confirmation today of Stephen Higginson to serve on the fifth circuit court.

The Washington Post: On the trafficking contract, senior political appointees at HHS awarded the new grants to the bishops’ competitors despite a recommendation from career staffers that the bishops be funded based on scores by an independent review board, according to federal officials and internal HHS documents.

In recent years, five of the Supreme Court Justices have been highly critical of how the Court decides the constitutionality of public displays of religious symbols or messages.

Reuters: Germans expressed fury and frustration at Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou’s shock decision to call a referendum on the latest aid package, with some saying the gamble would push Greece out of the euro zone.

News from Missouri Family Policy Council: Springfield, Missouri attorney is spearheading a statewide campaign to restore respect for “In God We Trust” as our national motto. Dee Wampler is leading an effort to convince county commissions and municipal governments to post copies of the national motto on county courthouse walls and in city halls.

Raymond Ibrahim at Hudson New York: Western media coverage of the recent massacre of Coptic Christians in Cairo, Egypt—in which the military killed dozens of Christians and injured some 300—was, as discussed earlier, deplorable. It merely repeated the false propaganda of the complicit state-run media, without checking facts. Since then, further proofs of the lies and brutality surrounding the massacre have emerged . . .