What’s interesting in the news today?
1. That’s strange. 6 months ago Hagel called them a “JV Team” that he thought wasn’t much of a threat. Wrong again, eh Chuck?
From Reuters “The sophistication, wealth and military might of Islamic State militants represent a major threat to the United States that may surpass that once posed by al Qaeda, U.S. military leaders said on Thursday.
“They are an imminent threat to every interest we have, whether it’s in Iraq or anywhere else,” Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel told reporters at the Pentagon.
Hagel’s assessment of Islamic State, which gained strength during Syria’s civil war and swept into northern Iraq earlier this summer, sounded a note of alarm several days after the group posted a video on social media showing one of its fighters beheading an American hostage kidnapped in Syria.
Asked if the hardline Sunni Muslim organization posed a threat to the United States comparable to that of the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Hagel said it was “as sophisticated and well-funded as any group we have seen.”
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2. This should be interesting.
From NationalReview “A federal judge ordered President Obama’s team to hand over some documents pertaining to Operation Fast and Furious and to provide a list of withheld documents.
Once House Republicans see the list of withheld documents, they will have a chance to challenge the withholding of particular documents.
“This Administration has been so intent on hiding the contents of these documents that it allowed Attorney General Holder to be held in contempt instead of just turning them over to Congress,” House Oversight and Government Reform Committee chairman Darrell Issa (R., Calif.) said of the ruling. “The privilege log will bring us closer to finding out why the Justice Department hid behind false denials in the wake of reckless conduct that contributed to the violent deaths of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry and countless Mexican citizens.”
Holder was held in contempt in 2012 after he refused to produce 1,300 pages of documents subpoenaed by Issa’s committee. Obama said that the documents were shielded from congressional review by executive privilege.”
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3. So it’s not the first time he’s made statements that weren’t true. Could be a problem if this is your star witness.
From IJReview “Dorian Johnson, the primary witness to the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, has an outstanding warrant for a 2011 theft in Jefferson City and pleaded guilty for filing a false police report related to that theft.
St. Louis ABC affiliate ABC 17 cross referenced Johnson’s name against several records and discovered the warrant.
Johnson will be the star witness for any potential prosecution proceedings against Officer Darren Wilson for the shooting of Brown. Johnson was walking with Brown when the shooting occurred.
He has already done multiple media appearances where he falsely claimed Brown was shot by Wilson in the back. He also has claimed that Brown never reached for Wilson’s gun, was “shot like an animal” and that Brown had his hands up and told Wilson he was unarmed.”
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4. Don’t want to host a gay wedding on your farm? There’s a fine for that.
From TheBlaze “Owners of a family farm in Schaghticoke, New York, are being fined $13,000 for refusing to allow a gay wedding ceremony to take place on their property in 2012, just one year after the state legalized same-sex nuptials.
Cynthia and Robert Gifford, owners of Liberty Ridge Farm, a family-friendly farm and special events venue, told Jennifer McCarthy and Melisa Erwin, a lesbian couple from Newark, New Jersey, that they were welcome to hold their reception on the property, but not the actual wedding ceremony, according to Religion News Service.
The Giffords live on the premises and these ceremonies are typically conducted on the first floor of their home or on the nearby property. Considering that they are Christians and consider marriage to be confined to relationships involving one man and one woman, the two weren’t comfortable hosting McCathy and Erwin’s nuptials.”
“McCarthy and Erwin weren’t happy with this rejection, so they took their complaint to the New York’s Division of Human Rights, claiming that they were discriminated against as a result of their sexual orientation.
A judge subsequently ruled in their favor in the case New York State Division of Human Rights v. Liberty Ridge Farm, rejecting the Giffords’ argument that the family owns a private business that is legally permitted to issue such refusals.”
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Wandering Views 
The head of the DOJ doesn’t care if he’s held in contempt. Justice is what he says it is.
That judge (#4) doesn’t realize that he, and others like him are just adding another bit to their wrath account. (Romans 2:5)
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4. If that were me i would redecorate with some appropriate Bible verses in prominent places. If you want to rent my farm you deal with the verses in all your wedding pictures.
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4. It is a sad commentary on the state of our republic to have lost so much of our religious freedom. It is a sad commentary on the church’s lack of being light and salt. Still, we have much opportunity to do so.
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1. Its amazing what six months of Saudi money can do for an organization.
3. Johnson’s testimony is relevant to the actual events at the cruiser door. The rest can be corroborated by other witnesses. That being said eye witness testimony is not nearly as reliable as people think. I really think its going to be impossible for both Johnson or Wilson to recreated with any degree of accuracy what took place during the 5-10 seconds at the car. The autopsy and other forensics (hopefully) will give a better picture (as the autopsy already has) Too bad this police force has to be one of the few in the country without a dashcam……
4. There’s two schools of thought here. One is that human rights supersede religious rights — ie a person is required to serve all people whether at the Woolworth’s counter or a wedding hall, whether black or gay. The other refuses to equate what they see as a behavior (gay) as opposed to an identity (black). The judge here viewed gay as an identity not a behavior and a wedding ceremony as similar to a lunch counter. Similarly one’s religious beliefs can be supersede if they are racist. I can see both sides of the coin here.
I would argue for a business’ right to refuse to host the honeymoon as that pertains to behaviour. (Then again can you refuse to host a mixed race couple at your B&B if your are a member of a racist church?)
In terms of reception, its similar to the lunch counter; you have to host it.
In terms of the ceremony, this gets interesting. If the owners believe that marriage is male and female and this a religious belief should they not think all weddings need to take place in a church? After all its a religious ceremony. Also, if they host weddings do they host only Christian weddings as wouldn’t an Islamic, Jewish or Buddhist wedding conflict with their beliefs concerning marriage??
I do like kbells response.
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I also like KBell’s response.
HRW, Do you think the judge would see polygamy, bestiality, necrophilia and pedophilia as an identity or behavior?
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This is an interesting article and the charts are informative. It makes me sad to compare 1900 Virginia with 2012 Virginia.
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ricky — good question. I’d say you can identify but since consent is not possible in order to act on that identity, the behavior is not permissible. Hence, identity is a moot point.
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How is consent not possible with polygamy or pedophilia?
I can’t see both sides to the gay wedding/farm thing. If the farm wanted to refuse business to Christians, the owners should be entitled to doing so. It’s an act of oppression to force them to do it. In fact, I can’t imagine a thing being more clear cut.
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If the owners believe that marriage is male and female and this a religious belief should they not think all weddings need to take place in a church? After all its a religious ceremony. Also, if they host weddings do they host only Christian weddings as wouldn’t an Islamic, Jewish or Buddhist wedding conflict with their beliefs concerning marriage??
hwesseli, the answer to these things is simply No. There’s no requirement in Scripture for wedding to be held in churches, nor for them to be religious ceremonies at all. Likewise, there is no scriptural proscription against marriages between unbelievers, nor of adherents of different religions. The only thing approaching that–aside from prohibiting marriage (so-called) between people of the same sex–is prohibition of believer and unbeliever *getting* married.
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solarpancake — its generally held that children are incapable of consent, polygamy is generally thought to be unequal relationships and thus not consent may not be freely given …. although there is an argument in the latter case. In British Colombia the courts ruled that the state has a compelling interest in monogamy and consent was compromised in polygamous marriages ( this in response to FLDS in which some of the wives were barely 18).
I agree, there is no scriptural requirement for marriage to be a religious ceremony. However, the owners invoked a religious claim involving marriage thus they think differently and marriage for them is a religious rite ( the Catholic church agrees with this line of reasoning). Thus, I can’t see how they would host weddings at all or to be consistent how they could host any wedding other than those which agreed with their religious views. It would be interesting to know if they did marry Christian to non-Christian or previously married/divorced couples.
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Consent to polygamy could be given just as in homosexuality. Consent could be given to necrophilia prior to death, by written instrument if necessary. What about incest? Consent could clearly be given in cases of incest between adults. It is not realistic to conclude that the trend toward perversion will stop with homosexuality.
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#4.
I have an apt. house and a rental house. If I don’t want to rent to someone, I should always be able to find a reason to not choose them; a good, lawful, reasonable reason for not choosing them. I can always raise the price on them if I choose to. By the way, I do have 1 Apt. rented to a Gay man. I have no idea if all the families I rent to are married or just co-habiting; many latinos aren’t married. Many list the husband by his last name and the wife by her last name (not by her husband’s last name). I will let God judge, I’m just the landlord.
No one should have to rent or sell to someone if they don’t want to. If I don’t want to sell “Plan B’ in my drugstore, I would just add a $500 profit to the cost of “Plan B” and then I would price myself out of the market. Suppose I don’t want to make a cake for a Gay couple. Add a $500 profit to the “Adam and Steve” couple on the top of the cake. I would always be able to price myself out of competition. If that doesn’t work, buy the cake from someone else, add on a profit and sell it to them. Have the other bakery deliver it.
“No Shoes
No Shirt
No Service”
This is setting a standard for the comfort of other customers not a judgement for my sake. It says nothing about sin, just about reasonable attire.
I don’t like tattoos. It is an outward sign of rebellion. I wouldn’t knowingly hire a person with a “Sleeve” but I certainly wouldn’t tell them that! ( My gardener for the rental house has way more than a “sleeve.” I never see it because he has long sleeve shirts on!)
Theologically, since all have sinned and God is the judge I don’t have to choose who to serve and who to sell to by judging their sin and what levels I am willing to put up with.
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Interesting essay on ISIS and the failure of the war on terror — main blame rests on US failure to adequate come down on Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
http://www.thenation.com/article/181339/how-war-terror-created-worlds-most-powerful-terror-group#
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It’s not inherent to polygamy that the marriages are non-consensual, nor, as RickyW pointed out, are incestual or necrophilic ones.
hwesseli, why would the owners making a religious claim about marriage mean that it follows from their logic that wedding ceremonies must therefore be held in churches? I don’t think the farm owners are Catholic.
But behold the morass of goo when trying to dictate by law who merchants have to do business with. So the owners of the farm may have invoked some religious reason to oppose a gay wedding *on their own property* (GASP!). So now with liberal laws invading everyone’s thoughts–as they so often do–we have to judge how *consistent* this family is in applying their objection to all customers and to the services they offer. Their objections are no *more* susceptible to inconsistent application than are those that BobBuckles mentioned regarding shirtslessness and shoelessness. You can construe virtually any business owner’s rationale for denying service in such a way as to depict them as inconsistent, and distinguishing between behavior, nature, affect on customers, or whatever, is *arbitrary.* We don’t all have to have the same hierarchy as lawmakers do when it comes to what we object to, right? Wouldn’t that be anti-liberty? But we still make a jillion laws that try to do just that. It’s cuckoo.
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Laws and rights have to be applied consistently, thats the whole point of rules. Accordingly, the law is we can’t discriminate on the basis of identity (race, color, ethnicity, religion, sexuality,etc), and thus business owners run into problems when they don’t follow rules and/or are arbitrary. We can be more inconsistent in how we regulate or react according to behaviour but even then a degree of consistency is expected. A business which says no shirt no service can’t make an exception for a person who looks really good without their shirt without incurring the wrath of others crying its not fair. (Life resembles a grade seven classroom that way).
Sure we can make the libertarian argument that its my property, business etc and its anti-liberty to force all these rules but then someone calls the city bylaw to cut your lawn, shovel your sidewalk, quiet your dog, keep the cat inside, extinguish outdoor fires, etc. And it gets even worse if you have a condo. The point is we have rules on how we can act towards others some of the rules are stringent and consistently enforced — such as how we act toward others based on identity, or how we pose a risk by our behavior while others are moderately enforced — ie the city doesn’t care if I don’t cut my lawn unless someone complains.
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Your second sentence doesn’t follow from your first. Of course laws have to be *applied* consistently, but they have to be *written* consistently, too. The *real* arbitrariness is to parse out things that can be justifiable reasons for refusing service. So a merchant can be permitted to refuse service based on X, but not based on Y, and distinguishing between X and Y–which is what THE LAW does–is arbitrary.
There’s a significant difference between city codes regarding upkeep of property and building safety (even if I, as a libertarian, begrudgingly grant authority to the govt for regulating all that minutiae), and forcing a merchant to commit an act he believes to be immoral, nor would permitting him to act according to his conscience have a proximate effect on surrounding businesses. Anyway, this farm owner doesn’t (or shouldn’t) have to prove to you or me how “consistent” he is in the rationale he uses determining who he wants to serve.
Or even granting that it was OK to force private citizens to fall in line with Big Brother on private matters of conscience, it’s arbitrary to say it’s the *merchant* who is doing the discriminating, and the customer is the victim. There is no difference in the nature of the objections when the terminology is reversed; that is, the merchant is equally as victimized by discrimination when his lifestyle is rejected over the interests of the demanding customer’s. Parsing all this out is entirely impossible; it’s only obeisance to political correctness and government fix-everythingness that propels this stuff through law.
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Not wanting to rent to a gay wedding is not discrimination against a group of people.
it is merely a refusal to offer a product that violates one’s religious views. if couple had wanted this for a birthday party they probably would have gotten it. If they had sent a straight friend to rent it for them, they wouldn’t have gotten it. It’s not about the customer it’s about the product. You can’t force a Jewish deli to serve you a BLT and you can’t force a Baptist restaurant owner to sell you a beer, so how can you force people to do gay weddings?
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