The Week That Was

What has been exciting the nattering classes on Twitter and the net in general this week?

The "comedian" set to replace Jon Stewart on The Daily Show had a set of Tweets from his Twitter feed emblazoned around the net, Tweets which indicate that either a) he is sexist; b) he is anti-Semitic; c) he is both and/or immature; or d) those by whom he was chosen to pick up JS's crown were seriously bad judges.

Most of today's comedians (and script writers) aren't witty enough or clever enough to be funny without being mean, cruel or outright gross, so Mr Noah's attitudes ought not to be surprising. What does puzzle me is why replacements for a couple of shows (The Daily Show and the Late Late Show on CBS vacated by Scot, Craig Ferguson) could not have been found among American comedians or presenters. Why go to English (James Corden) and South African (Trevor Noah) individuals?

The net was also excited by a legal matter - what I'm thinking of as "Son of Hobby Lobby" - for reminders about the parent see archived posts here, here and here.

This week's bout of chattering and nattering included Indiana's Religious Freedom Law

From link above:

If you’ve been following the controversy over Indiana’s new religious freedom law, you might be confused about what it really says and what it will actually do.

Some people describe the law as a “sword” that would allow discrimination against same-sex couples. Others say it’s a “shield” that would give people more freedom to follow the dictates of their faith.

Some say the law would give businesses more leeway to pick and choose which customers to serve. Others say it won’t make much difference -- that even with the law in place, virtually all businesses will end up behaving just as they would have before.

Some say the statute represents a significant change in the legal landscape, enacted at the behest of the Republican Party’s most conservative supporters. Others say it is strikingly similar to existing laws, including one that Congress passed with overwhelming bipartisan majorities and that a Democratic president, Bill Clinton, happily signed more than two decades ago.
Which one of these statements is correct? All of them.

Here we go again then, on a slightly different track from Hobby Lobby, but heading in the same direction...trying to get rid of that pesky (to some) separation of church and state.

The most popular example of what Indiana's (and some other states') laws might bring about has been related to wedding arrangements for a same-sex marriage. For example, a business refusing to provide flower arrangements or wedding cake, etc. to a same sex couple on religious grounds would not be liable to legal proceedings brought on the basis of discrimination.

Never having been in the market for either wedding flowers or wedding cake, in spite of having been married twice (fluffy weddings are not my thing, marriage I can just about tackle), I can still see how insulting and hurtful it would be, at such a happy time in life, to be refused service on such grounds as sexual orientation. There'd be a rather odd, counter-productive business practice going on, on the part of the other party too! While same sex marriage pairs are free to vote with their feet and purses to go elsewhere with their business and obtain their wedding fineries from more enlightened retailers, a scar from that refusal will remain, and it'd be one that surely ought to be unthinkable to have been caused by any business person claiming to follow the paths laid out by Jesus Christ.

A comment under another Huffington Post piece struck me as worthwhile saving - it was by one Fran Moore:

These laws are clearly a promotion of religion. They provide those who profess a particular religious belief the privilege of being exempt from the law...a privilege not granted to those citizens who don't have that particular belief.

That would give ALL those found guilty of illegal discrimination either an appeal based on claiming a sincere religious belief or even the basis for claiming the enforcement of anti-discrimination laws violates their XIV amendment protections of equal protection!

It was interesting that in the Hobby Lobby case five members of the court that is supposed to determine the constitutionality of a law ignored the constitution and cited congressional legislation instead.

What is even more remarkable about that is the law they cited was held unconstitutional as applied to the states in the City of Boerne v. Flores decision in 1997, which ruled that the RFRA is not a proper exercise of Congress's enforcement power.

So why did those justices decide that their "interpretation" of that law and not the Constitution had jurisdiction in that case?

They not only avoided applying the Constitution to the Hobby Lobby case, they did so by ignoring the serious constitutional problems of the law they used to justify their ruling.

As Ginsberg implied...what now see what the obvious motivation behind using the RFRA was...the five conservative Justices wanted to grant states the precedent for establishing their own RFRAs...
These ideological justices feel they have now addressed the previous ruling against the federal RFRA in 1997 without addressing the underlying constitutionality of providing exemptions to constitutional law.

RFRAs clearly violate of the establishment clause and the XIV amendment...so all the SCOTUS did in the Hobby Lobby case was to delay the inevitable ruling on the constitutionality of the federal RFRA and subsequent state enacted religious "freedom" laws.

If that comment was a bit too sober and serious, and you have a spare few minutes still, do go take a look at what blogger Jim Wright of Stonekettle Station had to say about this topic in his post headed Dear Christians: A Modest Proposal.

And FINALLY...some good news!

Though the deal will not be sealed until later this year, a framework agreement, relating to Iran's nuclear program, was announced in Switzerland on Thursday. Agreement was reached between Iran and the P5+1 (five permanent members of the UN Security Council: China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the USA, plus Germany). It could be indication of better days ahead unless, of course, opponents manage to derail the agreement. Nothing is ever certain, but there is now at least room for hope. See HERE.

NEXT RIGHT TURN...?

Once upon a time I lived in a land where judges or justices were not supposed to be, overtly, members of a political party, or particular religion. Maybe you did too. They did not talk publicly about their religion or political views. Their job was applying the law, interpreting the law even-handedly, whatever the political flavour of the nation's government happened to be at the time. Judges or justices were appointed for their excellent record, their wide experience and their intellectual brilliance. Nobody even knew, for sure, their political leanings. Their decisions were almost always clear, trusted and highly respected, even when there was room for some disagreement. In the USA, though, the Supreme Court is politicized and religion-led, which seems to me to be at root of all recent problems with their rulings, as well as their apparent inability to write clear, concise decisions.

While I have no respect for Hobby Lobby and the Green Family who created and incorporated it, and my respect for the Supreme Court of the United States is dwindling rapidly, I am surprised (perhaps ought not to be), at some early misunderstandings appearing as a result of the SCOTUS ruling in the Hobby Lobby case. Threads of outrage, making some points with which I agree wholeheartedly, but some which were quite incorrect, have been all over the net this week. As usual in the USA everything becomes hyper-hyperbolic.

Again, I hate to say anything even vaguely in favour of Hobby Lobby or SCOTUS, but facts are facts. Hobby Lobby and the Green family are not objecting to contributing towards all contraceptive methods. What Hobby Lobby will not cover are the four contraceptive methods listed below. These, Hobby Lobby owners fear, are abortifacients - they believe that these methods are "tantamount to abortion because they can prevent embryos from implanting in the womb". Most commenters say they are mistaken. The four methods to which Hobby Lobby owners object:

Plan B (“The Morning After Pill”)
Ella (a similar type of “emergency contraception”)
Copper Intra-Uterine Device
IUD with progestin

(How odd, then, that Hobby Lobby's healthcare plan pre-2012, pre- the Affordable Care Act, included the first two of those 4 items.)

Other forms of contraception are still covered, for instance:

Male condoms
Female condoms
Diaphragms with spermicide
Sponges with spermicide
Cervical caps with spermicide
Spermicide alone
Birth-control pills with estrogen and progestin (“Combined Pill)
Birth-control pills with progestin alone (“The Mini Pill)
Birth control pills (extended/continuous use)
Contraceptive patches
Contraceptive rings
Progestin injections
Implantable rods
Vasectomies
Female sterilization surgeries
Female sterilization implants.

But wait.....that was in relation to Hobby Lobby's case. The Supreme court, the next day, 1 July, confirmed that its decision a day earlier extending religious rights to closely held corporations applies broadly to the contraceptive coverage requirement in the new health care law, not just to the handful of methods the justices considered in their ruling. (See HERE)

The justices did not comment in leaving in place lower court rulings in favor of businesses that object to covering all 20 methods of government-approved contraception.

Oklahoma-based Hobby Lobby Inc. and a Pennsylvania furniture maker won their court challenges Monday in which they refused to pay for two emergency contraceptive pills and two intrauterine devices.

Tuesday's orders apply to companies owned by Catholics who oppose all contraception. Cases involving Colorado-based Hercules Industries Inc., Illinois-based Korte & Luitjohan Contractors Inc. and Indiana-based Grote Industries Inc. were awaiting action pending resolution of the Hobby Lobby case.

They are among roughly 50 lawsuits from profit-seeking corporations that object to the contraceptive coverage requirement in their health plans for employees. Contraception is among a range of preventive services that must be included in the health plans, at no extra cost to workers.

The justices also ordered lower courts that ruled in favor of the Obama administration to reconsider those decisions in light of Monday's 5-4 decision.

Saying anything at all in SCOTUS' favour is now impossible. The whole caboodle is blatantly against Separation of Church and State. Christian groups are being allowed to dictate to their employees on matters which should be immune to outside interference. Some see this as a "slippery slope" - actually I think we're already half-way down that slope and gaining speed. Family planning clinics being closed down, "Christian" employers dictating to their female employees on matters of birth control; several new abortion restrictions also became law this week in at least five states (detail HERE). A road sign in the near distance says:
Handmaid's Tale & Theocracy NEXT RIGHT TURN!

The most significant factor is that this recent ruling of SCOTUS grants corporations religious freedom, along with the "person hood" they already enjoy. What next?

First Female US Prez? & SCOTUS on Hobby Lobby

Something that brought on a mini-rant from me in 2007 is bubbling up once again, with 2016 in the far distance, but just about visible. Hillary Clinton. Yeah, yeah - she's female. Feminists with a capital "F" (which I'm not) keep on about how right and good it would be for the first woman president of the USA to follow the first African-American president of the USA. Tommyrot!!! Absolute wrong thinking, in my opinion. The USA's presidential position is not there to provide a platform for celebration of equality of the sexes (or races). It's the right person that's important, not that person's gender or ethnicity. Hillary Clinton is a "hawk" (“hawks” are those who advocate an aggressive foreign policy based on strong military power). How very feminine! She's also a corporatist, and scarcely more than a fraction of a degree left of conservative. How can this be thought desirable by anyone calling themselves Democrat or Liberal?

It's looking ominously as though Hillary Clinton will run in 2016. Most of those who seem to be in the know think that, if she runs, she'll be nominated, never mind who else dares to run against her from her own party. I use the word "dares" advisedly. It is, apparently, a done deal. Whether she could win in the General Election is another matter.

Snip from 2007 rant:

Leading off from this topic is something currently in spotlight in the USA - the possibility of a woman president.

If mainstream media and the corporations get their way, Hillary Clinton will be the next US Prez. Some people think that a woman president would be something to celebrate - just because she is a woman. Huh?? Why?

Yes, women have been held back for too many years, and still have a legendary glass ceiling to negotiate before they can get a look-in in many spheres. That does not automatically mean that a woman who manages to negotiate the glassware would make a good president or a good anything. There's as much chance of a woman being a good president as there is a man - good/bad = 50/50.

Let's not get all starry eyed about women in charge. They are no better and no worse than men - it's just that there are fewer of them in that position. My own life and work experience has led me to trust women in charge less than men - due purely to experience, not because I think they are less able or psychologically different. My own experience has taught me that the old myth that "if women were in charge this world would be a better place" is wishful thinking, at best.

A woman could make the best president ever seen in the history of the world - but equally, so could a man.

I still feel the same in 2014, only more so.

As mentioned in a post some days ago, the person I'd most like to see running in the presidential campaign 2016 would be Al Gore. I found an article from 2011 in which the author, someone who appeared fairly regularly on all the usual liberal-type websites, wrote that it'd be a good idea to begin a movement to draft Al Gore for 2016. The same author wrote a more recent article proposing that Hillary Clinton will be the likely 2016 nominee. He appears to be an avid fan of Clinton. As there was a contact e-mail address for the author (I'll not mention his name here), I dropped him a note reminding him of his earlier feelings. He kindly replied immediately, and twice, that he's pretty sure Clinton will run and be nominated (he seems to be "in the know") and that he has seen no evidence that Al Gore is interested in running...unless, perhaps Clinton decided for some reason to decline to run, but this is not expected. He said that in the absence of a run by Clinton "all bets are off". My fingers are crossed for one of those "all bets off" situations, unlikely as one such might seem to be right now.

When Al Gore was asked in a Politico interview recently about 2016 he responded only that he's "a recovering politician" ... he didn't say, "No way, no how."

AG: You say you can ask the question a million ways. I’m going to only answer it one way. With apologies, I’m sure you’ve heard this answer before. I am a recovering politician. And the longer I avoid a relapse the more confidence that I will not succumb to the temptation to run yet again. But I’m a recovering politician. I’ll just leave it at that.

I'd hate to knock a recovering alcoholic off the wagon, but this is different. If somebody doesn't do something pretty major soon there'll be no wagon, and no anything much, as climate change advances during the years to come.

Does anyone have any ideas? Writing to Al Gore, snail mail, via his Tennessee office is the only thing I can think of, but it'd be highly unlikely he'd ever even see the letter. Why aren't other people thinking along these same lines regarding a run by Gore? Am I right around the loony bend on this?

Yesterday's ruling by the Supreme Court in favour of Hobby Lobby (+ Another) probably came as no surprise to most people. My 2012 post about the issue is HERE. The ruling was limited though, and applies only to "closely held" corporations which, I think, means privately or family owned rather than publicly held corporations. That's some crumb of relief, I guess. It still opens the door for other creatively imagined religion-based claims though. Watch that space! And wonder at the blatant hypocrisy of it all.
From The Week.com

"We're Christians," Hobby Lobby's president Steve Green proclaims, "and we run our business on Christian principles."

That is music to the ears of many conservative Christians, who rallied around Hobby Lobby when the retail chain argued at the Supreme Court that ObamaCare's contraception mandate unlawfully burdened their religious beliefs. But a closer look at Hobby Lobby's actual business practices reveals this claim to be as hollow as a flute. Turn over just about any trinket in a Hobby Lobby store and you'll find a gold oval stamped with "Made in China," a country that is one of the worst offenders of human dignity, unborn infant life, and economic justice anywhere in the world.

As such, those shiny stickers littering every Hobby Lobby from sea to shining sea are more than a statement about a product's geographical origin; they are also a stinging indictment against the way the retailer has sought to label itself.

Imagine for a moment a nation with nightmarish labor conditions, inadequate workplace regulation, and rampant child labor. You've just imagined 21st century China. Seventy thousand Chinese employees die every year in workplace accidents — that's roughly 200 humans snuffed out of existence every day........................

If Hobby Lobby was concerned with religious freedoms — not just those of conservative American Christians — it would quit doing business in China.

We haven't entered Hobby Lobby since 2012, apart from once, when away from home, we were waiting for another nearby store to open and it began to rain heavily. We walked into Hobby Lobby to keep dry, wandered round the perimeter of the store's interior, and out again.

"The Lord's Work"? Hobby Lobby? Really?

During my first couple of years in the USA one of my favourite places to look around, when out shopping, was the Hobby Lobby store in a nearby city. Over recent years I've become disenchanted with the store. Their merchandise has seemed increasingly shoddy, over-priced and less imaginative than it once was - and now almost all of it is made in Chinese sweatshops. We now make a point of looking for alternative outlets when in search of art materials, decor, frames, holiday items etc.

Now I read that Hobby Lobby - (for any passing reader unaware of this company, it's a privately held retail chain of arts and crafts and general decor stores based in Oklahoma City) is bringing a lawsuit against the "contraceptive mandate" i.e. health insurance coverage for employees that covers emergency contraceptives (morning after pill and anything similar). Hobby Lobby has some 13,600 employees in 41 states.

The lawsuit, against U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius regarding The Affordable Care Act, opposes the mandate that a wide range of preventative health-care services, including birth control, be offered to women without out-of-pocket expenses. The suit lists Hobby Lobby, Mardel Inc. and family members of company founder David Green as the plaintiffs. Plaintiffs state that requirements of the Act would violate their religious beliefs. CEO David Green has said "We simply cannot abandon our religious beliefs to comply with this mandate. Hobby Lobby has always been a tool of the Lord's work, but now our faith is being challenged by the federal government."

I'll be very interested to discover how this lawsuit is eventually resolved.

My own views, for what they're worth, are that, whether or not one agrees with a law of the land, it remains the law and must be adhered to. Religious proclivities are not involved in the laws of the USA, as I understand it, other than the fact that freedom of religion is protected by the Constitution. Freedom of religion means exactly what it says. CEOs such as Mr Green who profess to being good Christians can lead their lives in whatever way they wish, within the laws of the land. So can everyone else, whether of Christian belief or any other belief, or of no belief at all.

The Affordable Care Act outlined what should be included as part of a health insurance plan. An American for profit company is obligated to follow US law.

Employees of Hobby Lobby, or those employees covered by the company's health insurance scheme - which might well be a small proportion considering the number of part-time employees - take up employment with the company agreeing to the level of pay, which has embedded within it healthcare insurance coverage. That is part of what they are paid in return for their daily work in making profits for the company. The insurance coverage is not something benignly bestowed upon them by their employer - it's part of their wage for the work they do. As such it does not include the right of the employers to make medical-related decisions for their employees.

The employers would not, in any case, be "paying for the morning after pill", the main thorn in Mr. Green's side (or so he proclaims), the insurance company would be paying for it. The employer pays, as part of the full-time employees' recompense for the work they do, to have their medical needs covered; involvement in employees' healthcare stops right there - any further meddling could be seen as discrimination.

As a side issue: why, if Mr Green and his family are against supporting anything related, however vaguely, to abortion, and are intent in "doing the Lord's work" does their company sell so much merchandise made in China? Over 13 million abortions a year are carried out in China, including both forced and elective operations. Of course to take that into account would mean a hefty drop in profits for Hobby Lobby - wouldn't it? In China and other third-world countries from which his company's merchandise comes, people have little resembling human rights. Merchandise sold by Hobby Lobby stores is manufactured in "sweat shop" conditions. The company makes vast profit from the work of those paid a pittance and working in terrible conditions. Which Christian priciple is Mr Green and Co. following when deciding the source of their merchandise?