What’s interesting in the news today?
1. Hobby Lobby hobbyhorse, and why liberals should get off of theirs.
From BloombergView “After reading the Twitter reaction to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in the Hobby Lobby case, I began researching a post on what women could do now that corporations have exactly the same rights people do, including playing power forward for the Miami Heat, and now that contraception has been outlawed throughout these great United States. Then I read the decision and, to my surprise, found that it didn’t quite say any of that.
So what does it say? The court found that owners of closely held corporations have the same rights as sole proprietors under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. They cannot be forced to violate their religious beliefs unless the government can genuinely find no other way to achieve a compelling public purpose.
But that sounds so boring compared to War on Women! And so that’s the narrative the Internet chose. Here’s a representative tweet from my feed this morning:
So let’s all deny women birth control & get closer to harass them when they’re going in for repro health services. BECAUSE FREEDOM.
Logically, this is incoherent, unless you actually believe that it is impossible to buy birth control without a side payment from your employer. (If you are under this tragic misimpression, then be of good cheer! Generic birth control pills are available from the drugstore for about $25 a month.)“
Or Wal-Mart has them for $9. But I guess mentioning Wal-Mart to a liberal would upset them too, so they would just climb back on their hobbyhorses again.
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2. The Supreme Court decision is already causing consequences for some other cases.
From HotAir “Late yesterday, the first fruits of the Hobby Lobby decision fell into the lap of EWTN, the Catholic satellite television station which has fought the HHS mandate into the appellate court. Today would have been the first day that EWTN would have to start paying ruinous fines for refusing to provide free contraception and sterilization in its health insurance coverage. Fortunately, the Eleventh Circuit granted a stay not long after the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Hobby Lobby:
In a resounding victory for religious freedom, today EWTN was granted last minute relief from the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, one day before the world’s largest religious media network would be forced to violate its deeply help religious convictions or pay crippling fines to the IRS on July 1.
After the district judge recently issued a disappointing ruling against the global Catholic media network, the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty filed an emergency appeal to the Eleventh Circuit. Pending that ruling, the Becket Fund urged the Supreme Court and the Eleventh Circuit to step in to protect EWTN from being forced to provide contraceptives and potentially life-terminating drugs and devices that violate its Catholic teachings. Thanks to the Eleventh Circuit’s decision today to grant temporary emergency relief to the Catholic network, EWTN can now freely practice what it preaches while it pursues its claims in court.
“On the same day as the Hobby Lobby decision, the Eleventh Circuit protected religious ministries challenging the same government mandate,” said Lori Windham, Senior Counsel at the Becket Fund. “It’s time for the government to stop fighting ministries like EWTN and the Little Sisters of the Poor, and start respecting religious freedom.”
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3. So how’s the ObamaCare website working out now that they fixed the problems?
Oh wait, no, they didn’t. 🙄
From FoxNews “The Obama administration is struggling to resolve data discrepancies that could jeopardize coverage for millions who sought health insurance on the federal exchange HealthCare.gov, according to a watchdog report on the still-rocky implementation of ObamaCare.
Though the system’s troubles have faded from the headlines since the problem-plagued launch last October, a report from the health department inspector general provided the first independent look at widespread issues the government is having effectively fact-checking the information applicants are putting in the system.
According to the report, the administration was unable to resolve 2.6 million so-called “inconsistencies” out of a total of 2.9 million such problems from October through December 2013. “
So much for that magic 7 million number huh?
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4. Once again, the Obama admin seeks to silence potential whistleblowers with threats.
Also From FoxNews “A government-contracted security force threatened to arrest doctors and nurses if they divulged any information about the contagion threat at a refugee camp housing illegal alien children at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, sources say.
In spite of the threat, several former camp workers broke their confidentiality agreements and shared exclusive details with me about the dangerous conditions at the camp. They said taxpayers deserve to know about the contagious diseases and the risks the children pose to Americans. I have agreed to not to disclose their identities because they fear retaliation and prosecution.
“There were several of us who wanted to talk about the camps, but the agents made it clear we would be arrested,” a psychiatric counselor told me. “We were under orders not to say anything.”
The sources said workers were guarded by a security force from the Baptist Family & Children’s Services, which the Department of Health and Human Services hired to run the Lackland Camp.”
Wait a minute…. Baptists have a security force?
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5. Yesterday I posted a video about allegations of vote buying against the Cochran campaign in Mississippi. Here’s a very detailed breakdown of the evidence so far.
From RedState “An audio interview has surfaced in which the interviewee claims that he was to be paid by the Cochran camp to grease voters in the Mississippi GOP Senate runoff election. The audio interview, which coincides with a separate audio recording and batch of evidence produced by the newly launched GotNews.com, a project by Charles C. Johnson, alleges that the Cochran campaign conspired with a Mississippi Reverend to buy the votes of African American voters, who happen to be democrats.
Before I get into the weeds of what is in the audio interview and transcript, which are both below, let me set up the stage a bit. What is alleged to have occurred is illegal and very serious business. Under Mississippi law the alleged crimes could lead to Thad Cochran being removed from the Senate. Everything that follows comes from sources either on the ground in Mississippi, or those working closely with them.”
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Wandering Views 
Have you noticed that if you don’t watch Fox News, there are lots of things you don’t know?
I also learn a lot from The Washington Times
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It sure in lonesome over here.
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Chas,
That’s why liberals dislike both. Without outlets like them, liberals would control the message completely. Fox owns them, because they cover what the MSM won’t because it doesn’t jive with the message they wanna push. Makes ’em look bad when they ignore the obvious because Fox won’t play along.
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Have you ever tried listening to “liberal/progressive” radio? Name calling, no facts to back -up statements, tired disproven arguments… It even makes Glenn Beck sound good.
Speaking of radio, from 3 ’til 6 in the afternoon my local station plays reruns of Glenn Beck only to be interrupted by Oakland A’s baseball games. For a transported Dodgers fan… Aaaahhhhh!
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I pop in on Huffington Post and MSNBC every so often just to watch them conniption over stuff like the Hobby Lobby decision. It is also educational to watch “hate crime” stories disappear once the evidence comes out that it wasn’t committed by a right-winger and to read the comments by compassionate liberals mocking Red state natural disasters victims.
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Never seen a group so wrong and so apoplectic about their wrongness as liberals on this Hobby Lobby thing. Absolutely, totally and completely unable to debate that thing rationally. The “bakery” issue may be a close second.
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MSNBC modeled itself after FOX — the idea was to be a left wing version of FOX since CNN had the center sewed up. From a business model perspective it makes sense. In terms of news and accuracy, I believe they employ the same excuse as FOX – — most shows should be considered news magazines and anchors to be commentators. That being said, of all the commentators from both networks, Rachel Maddow is worth watching — Beck and O’Reilley are great when they appear on the Daily Show or on the Colbert Report to promote a book. Maddow is serious the latter two are great as comic foils.
1. I get a lot of US leftist comments in my newsfeed but none as dumb as one selected by the commentator in #1. Most have attempt to ridiucle the decision in a comical manner — such as having Rastafarians demanding religious exemption from marijuana prohibition. One I just saw states “Oh sorry, but paying back my student loans violates my religious beliefs. The Bible says all debts shall be forgiven every seven years. so I’ll stop making payments.” It probably misses the nuances of the decision but its criticism is comic not shrill. Similarly an other favorite of mine; I don’t believe in war; can I have my money back from the Iraq War. Mocking yes. Shrill no.
4. So children’s services is contracted out to a Baptist group yet Obama is to blame?? Its the use of contract workers which should be scrutinized — if the Baptists can’t run the camp then who can you trust.
5. I may be off a bit here but isn’t primary shenanigans quite common? Didn’t Rush L try to promote Republicans to vote in the Democratic primary?? Now if actual money was exchanged then its different but this could also be a sore grapes from a political novice who was outplayed by a political pro.
Reminds me of a Canadian prime minister who bought party memberships for homeless men and then bussed them to various delegate elections in order to win the leadership of the Conservative party. (I guess the American equivalent would be to buy memberships for homeless men and then bus them to a Iowa caucus vote). Its not longer legal to buy memberships for others.
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My recommendation for the day — how free market ideology killed the free market.
http://www.salon.com/2014/06/29/free_markets_killed_capitalism_ayn_rand_ronald_reagan_wal_mart_amazon_and_the_1_percents_sick_triumph_over_us_all/
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I read through the AJ’s excerpts and then the comments and think huh? where did that come from and then reading elsewhere I get the answer. Solarpancake mentions “bakery” and I went huh?? But two minutes later I’m reading this article and I understand. Here is an other side to the “bakery”
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/07/the-great-secession/372288/
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HRW, I believe in “social secession”, but I believe more in actual secession: We need to split into two countries:
In the Northeast and on the West Coast there would be a country that:
1. Kills babies not murderers.
2. Promotes perversion to all its youth.
3. Is completely socialist.
4. Gets it energy from wind, solar, algae and unicorn burps.
5. Is completely unarmed.
In the South there would be a country that:
1. Kills murderers not babies.
2. Does not allow the promotion of perversion to its youth.
3. Has a free enterprise system like that of Hong Kong or Singapore.
4. Gets it energy from the cheapest source.
5. Has an armed populace and a ready militia.
If this does not happen, many of us will take our families from this increasingly perverted country.
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Sorry, Aggies. Here is more evidence that Lubbock is the most conservative college town in the country.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/07/02/texas-cheerleader-big-game-hunter-facebook-critics-backlash/12012007/
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Where to begin with the article linked by hwesseli. It’s just atrocious. If you’re checking in here, hwesseli, could you offer one or two of the strongest points you believe to be made in that piece? I’d be curious to see how anyone could support it.
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hwesseli,
You know, I find FOX pretty middle of the road. CNN has the center… maybe in Canada, but it seems pretty leftist to me. To me Republicans seem centrist. Democrats/Progressives seem way out there.
I was brought up Baptist, northern Baptist. Baptists seem middle of the road as far as religion goes in Protestant America. My church left the American Baptist Convention when the pro homosexual thing became unavoidable. About 30% of the churches left.
I have always thought of myself as center/Right, not far right. The Democrats/Progressives seem to have moved far, far to the left. O’Reilly has never struck me as a Republican. He seems to me to be what a regular Democrat used to be. Just like my father-in-law was.
Why do leftist/Democrats/Progressives want to take my money away from me and give it to others? Why do leftist/Democrats/Progressives want to get in my business and tell me what to do, who to hire, what I have to do? When do leftist/Democrats/Progressives get to compromise? Why do leftist/Democrats/Progressives always have to have things their way or the highway?
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