Category Archives: Miscellaneous

Baptist Press: Russell Moore, president-elect of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, sat down with a Baptist21 leader to discuss the role of the ERLC and related matters in a set of short videos, the first three of which were posted online April 9.

Guardian: Final draft of nonbinding education standards ‘buries’ human role but gives cohesion in introducing students to climate science

NCPA Policy Digest: Taxpayers around the country will soon be grappling with massive amounts of debt they had no idea they were responsible for. The hidden debt is the result of $7.3 billion in promises that were made by state legislators but never approved by taxpayers, says Steven Malanga, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute.

a href=”http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_MEDICAL_MARIJUANA_MARYLAND?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-04-09-06-10-43″>AP: The Maryland General Assembly on Monday approved a measure allowing medical marijuana programs at research centers that choose to participate.

The Hill: A House Republican chairman promised on Monday to look out for the interests of broadcasters during the Federal Communications Commission’s auction of airwave licenses.

AP: Private investment groups could place sports wagers on behalf of investors under a proposed law in Nevada that would allow the state to reap millions of dollars in untapped revenue.

NCPA Policy Digest: Everything the government does should be justified by law, including the levying and spending of taxes and fees. Nearly all states have adopted a meaningful definition of what a “tax” is.

The HIll: House GOP leaders are serious about quick, bipartisan action to permanently repeal Medicare’s payment system for doctors, Rep. Michael Burgess (R-Texas) said Wednesday.

The Hill: Former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford (R) has won his House primary runoff, setting up a high-profile special election against businesswoman Elizabeth Colbert Busch (D), the sister of comedian Stephen Colbert.

SCOTUS Blog: Prostitution seems like an unlikely topic for a battle over freedom of speech, but that is precisely the focus of an important case to be argued in late April that tests the limits of the federal government’s ability to attach conditions to federal spending. The case is Agency for International Development v. Alliance for Open Society International, Inc., to be argued on April 22.

NCPA Policy Digest: As the health care system changes drastically over the next three years, more doctors than ever are planning on retiring. The retirements will occur as autonomy decreases under federal oversight and income falls under price controls. A survey of 600 doctors finds that physicians are pessimistic about the future, says Everyday Health.

The Hill: Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) doubled down Monday in his opposition to expanding Medicaid under President Obama’s healthcare law, even though opposing it could cost his state $90 billion.

Keepers, Inc. v. City of Milford, Conn., Civ. No. 3:07-CV-1231 (D. Conn. Mar. 30, 2013) Excerpts from the 98 page ruling: Plaintiff Keepers, Inc. (“Keepers”) is a Connecticut corporation operating a cabaret-style nightclub in Milford. The establishment features live clothed …

Washington Examiner: Not even a million dollars could convince Lady Gaga to perform at last summer’s Republican National Convention.

David Stokes at Townhall: Evangelicals, those who take the Bible and their faith seriously, need to be reminded that when it comes to issues like gay marriage – even abortion – there is not really any middle ground with those on the left, even the so-called Christian left.

Steven Malanga at WSJ (via Google): State and local governments owe $7.3 trillion in promises they’ve made that were never approved by taxpayers.

Pat Buchanan at Human Events: What killed the New Majority? First, there was mass immigration . . . Second came party acquiescence in dropping half the nation off the income tax rolls, while making half dependent on government . . . Third, to accommodate its K Street bundlers, the GOP embraced globalism, empowering Corporate America to shed its U.S. labor force . . . Fourth, rather than bringing the troops home after our Cold War triumph and telling our allies the free rides were over, Bush I and II went crusading for a “New World Order” to “end tyranny in our world.” . . .

AP: The Camarillo City Council has instituted a 45-day moratorium on production of pornographic movies, as it decides how to handle a recent rush of film permit requests.

Reuters on Yahoo: On the Republican side, former Boston U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan was the one candidate to express opposition both to abortion and gay marriage – the latter issue the topic of Supreme Court arguments on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Investor’s Business Daily: Americans are migrating from less-free liberal states to more-free conservative states, where they are doing better economically, according to a new study published Thursday by the George Mason University’s Mercatus Center . . . The freest state overall, the researchers concluded, was North Dakota, followed by South Dakota, Tennessee, New Hampshire and Oklahoma. The least free state by far was New York, followed by California, New Jersey, Hawaii and Rhode Island
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Authur B. Laffer and Stephen Moore at WSJ: In short, red states of the South and other areas of the country are moving forward with pro-growth tax reform, while California and the blue states of the Northeast are doubling down on Obamanomics and European progressivism. Who will come out on top? Our money is on the red states and those wisely following their lead.

Charisma News: A new report released Tuesday finds that Americans overwhelmingly believe morals and values are declining in the U.S. (77 percent). The most-cited cause for the decline? A lack of Bible reading. The findings are reported in the American Bible Society’s annual State of the Bible survey released Tuesday

Chicago Sun Tribune: The owners of a proposed strip club are suing the city of Angola in federal court alleging their rights were violated when permits were delayed until after a new city ordinance restricting sexually oriented businesses took effect.

Real Clear Politics: A new study finds that insurance companies will have to pay out an average of 32 percent more for medical claims under President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul. What does that mean for you?

Michael F. Cannon at Wall Street Journal: Despite surviving a number of threats, President Obama’s health care law remains harmful, unstable, and unpopular. It also remains vulnerable to repeal, largely because Congress and the Supreme Court have granted each state the power to veto major provisions of the law before they take effect in 2014.

Baptist Press: Russell Moore has been elected as the next president of the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.

Manuel Possolo, Morals Legislation After Lawrence: Can States Criminalize The Sale Of Sexual Devices?, 65 Stanford L. Rev. 565

AP: South Dakota Sen. Tim Johnson was expected to announce his retirement Tuesday, making the state the fifth where Democrats will have to defend a seat without an incumbent seeking re-election.

NCPA Policy Digest: Sears Holdings Corp. and Darden Restaurants Inc. have a new approach to offering their employees health benefits. Each firm gives their workers a sum of money and allows them to choose their health plans from an online marketplace. The system allows workers to take on health cost risks to save money, says the Wall Street Journal.

NRO: Reince Priebus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee, acknowledges that reforming the GOP’s presidential primary is one of his top priorities. But he doesn’t want to be heavy-handed about it, he says, in a briefing at National Review’s Washington, D.C., office. “Making those decisions and amending the calendar is a decision the entire RNC has to make,” he says. “That takes 75 percent of the voting body.”

AP: Three years, two elections, and one Supreme Court decision after President Barack Obama signed the Affordable Care Act, its promise of health care for the uninsured may be delayed or undercut in much of the country because of entrenched opposition from many Republican state leaders.

NBCNews: The U.S. government is expanding a cybersecurity program that scans Internet traffic headed into and out of defense contractors to include far more of the country’s private, civilian-run infrastructure.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: The Goliath that Pittsburgh faces is UPMC, a $10 billion medical enterprise defined by superlatives — largest health care provider in the region, biggest property owner in Allegheny County. It is considered a tax-exempt nonprofit, which means it gets a $20 million tax break from the city every year because it pays taxes on only a portion of its properties and no payroll preparation tax.

David Limbaugh at Newsmax: For the first time, I am wondering about the long-term viability of the Republican Party. I say this not as an advocate of its demise or restructuring but as an observer of troubling signs.

Ezra Klein at Washington Post: A more accurate way to put it would be that in the coming decades, new spending is almost entirely driven by health-care programs. But what’s really driving the spending in those programs is the aging of the population, not the rise in health-care costs.

Wall Street Journal: The owner of a Hudson Valley strip club is suing a local town after its plans to open a new adult business hit some snags when neighbors complained.

CNSNews: Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said Democrats set up the Affordable Care Act, popularly known as Obamacare, to “fail” in order to establish a single-payer health care system, “where the government controls everybody’s lives.”

ULaw Today: Yesterday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled in favor of Amy and Vicky, two child pornography victims, in an appeal brought by the Utah Appellate Clinic. | In re: Amy & Vicky

Reuters: A federal appeals court rebuked a Connecticut judge on Tuesday for allowing his views on Facebook and the growth of child pornography to influence the sentence he handed a woman in a case unrelated to the Internet.

Daily Caller: Why are GOP presidential hopefuls agreeing to meet for a debate hosted by an outlet like MSNBC, a cable network that has increasingly grown hostile to Republicans as it self-identifies as a liberal news network?

AP: Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky is vowing to repeal President Barack Obama’s sweeping health care law.

The Hill: The party’s principal fiscal road map, Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) budget blueprint, has left some Republican conservatives dissatisfied because it would not repeal the Obama administration’s healthcare reform law entirely.

The Hill: House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said Wednesday that the House will vote again soon to repeal or defund President Obama’s healthcare law.

Chicago Tribune: The Obama administration is drawing up plans to give all U.S. spy agencies full access to a massive database that contains financial data on American citizens and others who bank in the country, according to a Treasury Department document seen by Reuters.

Kevin C. Walsh at WalshLaw: The panel opinion is right that “the Commonwealth cannot simply wave a magic wand and decree by fiat conduct as criminal . . .” But the Commonwealth did no such thing. It declared conduct criminal through ordinary legislation, and the Fourth Circuit has now erroneously set aside a conviction for violation of that ordinary state legislation through an extraordinary exercise of the federal judicial power.

Washington Post: Which is why we were very excited to see a new and comprehensive study from Nonprofit Vote, a nonpartisan origination that works with nonprofits to encourage voter participation. The study, which you can read in its entirety on the group’s Web site, includes a breakdown of 2012 turnout rates in all 50 states and the District. The percentages were calculated by dividing the number of ballots cast by the voting eligible population.

Washington Post: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) announced Tuesday that he will push for an amendment to Senate Democrats’ continuing budget resolution that would defund President Obama’s health-care bill.

John Berlau at National Review: Small firms are boarding as fast as they can onto the SS Self-Insurance. And that has the Times and other boosters of the Obamacare Titanic in a tizzy . . . But now a market for “stop-loss” insurance for firms that self-insure has emerged to address that problem. This type of insurance will reimburse a firm for its employees’ health costs if those costs go beyond a certain threshold, known as an “attachment point.”

CNSNews: The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has awarded $1.5 million to study biological and social factors for why “three-quarters” of lesbians are obese and why gay males are not, calling it an issue of “high public-health significance.”

Cronkite News: To Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne, the state law requiring proof of citizenship for voter registration is “common sense,” not a burden. To opponents, Arizona’s Proposition 200 is just another obstacle that would restrict access to the polls for the young, elderly and minorities.

Liberty Counsel is pleased to welcome the Florida Faith & Works Coalition into the Liberty Counsel family! Comprised of over 600 Florida pastors plus supporting volunteers, Florida Faith & Works Coalition is built on the belief that America was established as a Christian nation, and the guardian of those Biblical principles has always been His church.

Education News: The split is the result of chronic differences over money, support and communications, not only between UHPA and NEA, but between UHPA and HSTA, who often do not see eye-to-eye on union issues. In a February 2012 memo, UHPA executive director J.N. Musto laid out the arguments for disaffiliation that centered on value added for money spent.

AP: Gov. Chris Christie says he’ll take the fight to legalize sports gambling in New Jersey to the U.S. Supreme Court, if necessary.

Rasmussen: President Obama handily defeated congressional Republicans in the political fight over his health care law. But the law will now face a much tougher opponent — the creativity of Americans determined to gain more control over their own health care decisions. The end result will be a system much different than the president hopes for — and his opponents fear.

AP: Democratic Sen. Carl Levin’s decision to not seek re-election in 2014 has set the stage for a wide-open race to replace the longest-serving senator in Michigan history.

FRC Washington Update: ccording to Claire Lilley of Britain’s National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC), “Technology and easy access to sexual material is warping young people’s views of what is ‘normal’ or acceptable behavior.” She was referring to data obtained via a Freedom of Information request from 34 of 43 police forces in England and Wales, which showed that in a three-year period from 2009-2012, over five thousand sex offenses were committed by 4,562 offenders who were under eighteen years of age–some as young as five or six years old.

Education News: New Jersey’s governor has branded them “political thugs.” A former federal education official has likened them to terrorists. Less vilified in Kansas than some other parts of the country, those teachers unions still find their clout under attack in the Legislature.

National Review: Washington’s statement could easily have been aimed at the anti–Electoral College National Popular Vote effort, which is currently working to win support in several states. The measure has been approved by committees in Minnesota and Oklahoma and is pending on the Minnesota House and Oklahoma Senate floor. NPV is still pending in and could soon be approved by Connecticut, Maine, and Rhode Island legislative committees.

Human Events: Reuters reports a hitch in Governor Rick Scott’s plans to expand Medicaid coverage, as directed by the ObamaCare plan he once vowed to oppose . . .

NPR: A panel of the the San Francisco-based U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals stood with a lower court, ruling that a ban on drivers soliciting day laborers violates the constitution’s free speech guarantee.

Tim Carney at Washington Examiner: Republicans around the country railed against President Obama’s health-care law for four years, but in recent weeks, GOP governors and state legislators have embraced some of the bill’s provisions. How did Republicans learn to stop worrying and love Obamacare? In a word: industry.

LifeSiteNews: An insurance company known for not keeping its contractual obligations has received $340 million in federal loans to set up a health care exchange under ObamaCare. Critics say the only apparent criteria for the loan is the fact that the company is led by a friend of Barack Obama during his community organizer days. She is also a former leader of a George Soros-funded politically radical organization.

The Hill: All five candidates pursuing the seat vacated by Secretary of State John Kerry (D) have collected far more than the necessary 10,000 signatures to join the primary ballot, indicating there will likely be a three-way Republican primary and a two-way Democratic primary in the special election.

Daily Caller: Some members of Congress apparently don’t like to be reminded about how much debt the country continues to rack up.

AP: New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie has signed a bill legalizing Internet gambling, making his state the third in the nation to offer online betting.

Washington Post: Chuck Hagel won confirmation Tuesday to become defense secretary over objections to his views on Middle East security and the administration’s handling of an attack on a U.S. consulate in Libya.

World Net Daily: They’re targeting 12 key states: Colorado, Iowa, Louisiana, Montana, Alaska, Arkansas, Nevada, North Carolina, South Carolina, South Dakota, Virginia and West Virginia. The strategy was profiled Monday by David Brody of CBN News. Brody said the groups – led by the American Renewal Project – are planning briefings for evangelical pastors, voter-registration drives and other events in an attempt “to restore American to its Judeo-Christian heritage.”

The Hill: Regulations the Obama administration finalized on Friday will lead to a steep and sudden increase in healthcare costs for young people, the health insurance industry said.

Baptist Press: Pornography is the “pink elephant in the pew” — the embarrassing, big subject no one wants to talk about — and that silence is feeding a “bubonic plague” harming churches, pastor Jay Dennis told state Baptist convention executive directors and editors gathered in Oklahoma City.

PBS: However, even as Christian evangelicals continue to organize in this beautiful corner of Colorado to fulfill their vision of America, some within these groups are starting to reassess their activism. They wonder just how deeply they should be involved in American politics and whether they should start building bridges to people who don’t agree with them.

NCPA Policy Digest: The Obama administration issued its long-awaited final rule on essential health benefits that insurers must offer consumers in the individual and small-group market beginning in 2014 under the health care reform law, says Reuters.

Discovery.com: The study, which examined the brain activity of 35 men and 47 women registered as either Democrat or Republican, found no difference in the amount of risk people of each political persuasion were willing to take on during a gambling game. But the way the brain processed risk worked differently between the groups, with Republicans showing more activity in an area linked with reward, fear and risky decisions and Democrats showing more activity in a spot related to processing emotion and internal body cues.

NCPA Policy Digest: Villarreal demonstrates that there is a mismatch between job demand through the next decade and the graduates we are producing. It is important that the federal government stop interfering in employment and education markets by curtailing federal student loan programs and equalizing tax credits for all students at all colleges, be they four year or otherwise.

NY Times: The college degree is becoming the new high school diploma: the new minimum requirement, albeit an expensive one, for getting even the lowest-level job.

LifeSiteNews: Despite the Obama administration urging states to run their own markets for those without health insurance to purchase subsidized plans, the majority have opted to leave the job to the federal government. Twenty-six states opted to let the deadline for forming state insurance exchanges pass on Friday, leaving the Obama administration to handle the details – and the costs – itself.