tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post6850966220119425833..comments2024-03-18T21:09:10.627-05:00Comments on Every goddamn day: 03/19/24: Margaret Sanger, we need you againNeil Steinberghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11468057838260476480noreply@blogger.comBlogger25125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-80691099605438789822014-07-08T18:06:56.768-05:002014-07-08T18:06:56.768-05:00Only in the mad world of the far right. Once upon ...Only in the mad world of the far right. Once upon a time, the government requires things of its citizens -- it had a draft, and could call you into the army. Then the near-treasonous decided that any requirement of government impinged upon the anarchy they prefer, perhaps so their firearms will finally be needed. The fact that you don't see it doesn't mean it isn't plain to be seen. Neil Steinberghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11468057838260476480noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-8165619572007927802014-07-08T15:35:41.150-05:002014-07-08T15:35:41.150-05:00It's not like paying them.Wages are a voluntar...It's not like paying them.Wages are a voluntary exchange between the employee and the employer. In Obamacare, Congress has mandated that one class of citizens (employers )*must* pay for a certain specified good for another class of citizens (employees). IMO that is, in itself, unconstitutional, leaving aside the question of religious freedom.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13877137208397390419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-5627378528731651782014-07-07T22:43:04.995-05:002014-07-07T22:43:04.995-05:00"r womyn"?
Really?
I can't wait to s..."r womyn"?<br />Really?<br />I can't wait to see what a federal judge will do to you if you filed a brief with that grammar & linguistic atrocity.Clark St.https://www.blogger.com/profile/09634234069783123180noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-17211679068706865802014-07-07T20:24:10.762-05:002014-07-07T20:24:10.762-05:00The McTavishes of Avalon Park like/this comment.The McTavishes of Avalon Park like/this comment.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-51094151986842589302014-07-07T20:21:47.484-05:002014-07-07T20:21:47.484-05:00Is there a test to ensure that 3 members of the co...Is there a test to ensure that 3 members of the court r womyn and not gendered-neutral? Perhaps the clerks write the opinions, the judges sign them, and the other clerks stamp them for the scribes to write on. And on in their busy schedules.<br /><br />--A law student at DePaul's rank Law College.<br />Class of 2016, future court officer.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-54881587587743823902014-07-07T18:56:03.977-05:002014-07-07T18:56:03.977-05:00Thanks, Neil. If only I *wanted* to have the disc...Thanks, Neil. If only I *wanted* to have the discussion. ; )<br /><br />Jerry, <br /><br />Yes, 5 members of the Court agreed that the RFRA provided "very broad protection for religious liberty" such that Hobby Lobby won the case. As you know, 4 members, including the 3 justices who are women, were "persuaded that Congress enacted RFRA to serve a far less radical purpose." They were also "mindful of the havoc the Court’s judgment can introduce," some of which we are reading about with each passing day. I'm in no position to argue the law with a fine lawyer such as yourself, but, to me, this came down to politics, as Supreme Court decisions often seem to. This was no 9-0 decision, like some others, which might have indicated a much clearer legal consensus. Your "side" won. I realize that. You may consider it a matter of drawing "the line closer to the side of liberty and diversity than" I do. I consider it a matter of 5 Catholic men, who happen to form the majority in this case, deciding that a company shouldn't have to provide insurance for birth control for its women employees, if the Christian owners don't like the idea. Please note that, as I referenced at 10:36, this is not meant to apply only to the methods that Hobby Lobby found problematic, but even the kinds that Hobby Lobby provided in its insurance plan willingly already, but which are of concern to Catholic employers. Jakashnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-64396817359590722122014-07-07T17:40:10.540-05:002014-07-07T17:40:10.540-05:00No joke, always good to see Chicago's Finest.
...No joke, always good to see Chicago's Finest.<br /><br />(future pics could display the reality that is Chicago's diverse and <br />honorable law enforcement officers)<br /><br />Murphy familyAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-66061135768823495892014-07-07T17:20:13.928-05:002014-07-07T17:20:13.928-05:00Thanks Ns,
For being a voice on all this.
Aside to...Thanks Ns,<br />For being a voice on all this.<br />Aside to point, are the trains running on time? METRA shuts down in this kinda heat.<br /><br />--DavetheWaveAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-49285225208848264052014-07-07T17:10:47.487-05:002014-07-07T17:10:47.487-05:00Jakash:
Thanks again for a civil post directed to...Jakash:<br /><br />Thanks again for a civil post directed to me.<br /><br />In order to talk to you rather than past you – I will concede that a person running a business – serving the public and employing others -- should have fewer liberties in running that business than a person not so engaged. That is why I am OK with banning “women not allowed” or “women need not apply” policies.<br /><br />On the other hand – lawyers know many ways to skin a cat. Thus they know many ways to hobble free speech and other liberties without employing outright bans.<br /><br />To say that people cannot join together in organized groups to express their liberties – would be one type of hobble. To say that each member of the group is liable for all the debts the organized group incurs would similarly dissuade people from joining an organized effort. The main benefit of incorporation is limited liability of it shareholders.<br /><br />That is why the S. Ct. held:<br /><br />“”... Held: As applied to closely held corporations, the HHS regulations imposing the contraceptive mandate violate RFRA. <br /><br />(a) RFRA applies to regulations that govern the activities of closely held for-profit corporations like Conestoga, Hobby Lobby, and Mardel.<br /><br />(1) HHS argues that the companies cannot sue because they are for-profit corporations, and that the owners cannot sue because the regulations apply only to the companies, but that would leave merchants with a difficult choice: give up the right to seek judicial protection of their religious liberty or forgo the benefits of operating as corporations. RFRA’s text shows that Congress designed the statute to provide very broad protection for religious liberty and did not intend to put merchants to such a choice. It employed the familiar legal fiction of including corporations within RFRA’s definition of “persons,”but the purpose of extending rights to corporations is to protect the rights of people associated with the corporation, including shareholders, officers, and employees. Protecting the free-exercise rights of closely held corporations thus protects the religious liberty of the humans who own and control them.””<br /><br />Jakash – I am sure you can come up with hypotheticals where you and I agree that the general law should prevail over sincere religious beliefs. I believe that these should be handled separately as they occurred. <br /><br />Thus I simply draw the line closer to the side of liberty and diversity than you.<br /><br />--JerryB<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-86367586830090819612014-07-07T17:06:01.901-05:002014-07-07T17:06:01.901-05:00Jakash:
I welcome all discussion that is halfway ...Jakash:<br /><br />I welcome all discussion that is halfway civil and doesn't involve wildly snide comments about the author of the blog. Other than that, go to it. <br /><br />NsNeil Steinberghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11468057838260476480noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-55718516528823814702014-07-07T17:03:43.050-05:002014-07-07T17:03:43.050-05:00Health care. The Congress has instituted a system ...Health care. The Congress has instituted a system of health care, which Hobby Lobby is trying to shield its employees from fully enjoying. It's like paying them, but stipulating what the money can be used for. Neil Steinberghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11468057838260476480noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-70510546793858121132014-07-07T16:29:54.165-05:002014-07-07T16:29:54.165-05:00I doubt that Mr. Steinberg will welcome us having ...I doubt that Mr. Steinberg will welcome us having a discussion about this on his blog, so I'll leave it at this. I think a Native American PERSON should be allowed to exercise his right to engage in religious rituals using peyote if he so desires, and so long as it doesn't adversely affect others. I think that a Christian PERSON should be allowed to refuse to use contraception, without doubt. I don't think that a CORPORATION run by Christians should be able to use the beliefs of its owners to opt out of providing insurance for legal methods of contraception to whatever workers it employs that don't share those beliefs. In my mind, there's a pretty clear distinction between providing insurance and providing contraception, and an even clearer one between providing insurance and USING contraception. As I noted, I understand that certain members of this Court think that corporations are people and money is speech. I'm not required to agree with them on the internet... <br /><br />And my initial remark was a JOKE, not a cheap shot. That's why I put the ; ) there! Jakashnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-11156848417825780652014-07-07T15:35:45.143-05:002014-07-07T15:35:45.143-05:00Jakash:
Thanks for the reply.
Let’s see if we ca...Jakash:<br /><br />Thanks for the reply.<br /><br />Let’s see if we can talk to one another rather than past one another.<br /><br />I have nothing against non-aborticient contraceptives.<br /><br />A restaurant that plays nothing but Sinatra purposely discriminates against the “younger set.”<br />I concede that the Hobby Horse folk discriminate against some women by not giving them everything they want. But not giving them everything they want is not the same as saying “women need not apply” or “no women allowed.” That is what I meant by “discriminates only against a particular medicine.” I think you knew that. Thus your initial remark was a cheap shot.<br /><br />As you conceded on the Zorn blog – I am a right of center “moderate.” If this was Ireland or Poland – where it is either the Roman Catholic Church or the State – then I would side more with you. But in the U.S. we have a vast diversity of religious and secular beliefs.<br /><br />I simply see little problem with letting liberty and diversity flourish. Note that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act was almost unanimously passed by Congress and signed into law by Bill Clinton. The original impetus for the Act was to allow some American Indians to engage in religious rituals using peyote. Surely you are not asserting that the American Indians are entitled to their religious liberties but some white Christians are not?<br /><br />--JerryB<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-42197400915319870472014-07-07T15:28:02.251-05:002014-07-07T15:28:02.251-05:00Ross Douthat wrote a column in the NY TImes Sunday...Ross Douthat wrote a column in the NY TImes Sunday about how many things liberals would otherwise embrace about Hobby Lobby. Pays its lowest skilled workers $15/hour, raised wages during the recession, gives 10% of its profits to charity, gives all workers Sundays off. Sounds pretty sincere to me. What's more puzzling is why, with a Democratic administration in office since 2008, the FDA hasn't approved Plan B/RU-486 for OTC: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5705260Anon-not-Anonnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-61352935433973569212014-07-07T14:58:20.724-05:002014-07-07T14:58:20.724-05:00"discriminates only against a particular medi..."discriminates only against a particular medicine" <br /><br />And I bet the medicine doesn't even care! You could probably even call the medicine "Redskin" and it wouldn't mind. I've become aware that corporations are people, of course, but discrimination against inanimate objects is new to me. ; ) No, the discrimination is against the WOMEN who would like this medicine, along with all the other medicines that the Hobby Lobby owners deign to allow them insurance for. You can get flu shots all kinds of places -- cheaply, too -- but insurance pays for those. Should it not? I'm sure we'll be seeing what creative exemptions will be sought in the future, based on this precedent. <br /><br />By the way, Jerry, if you want people to know it's your comment, you can pick "Name/URL" under the "select profile" list, put your name and just leave URL blank...Jakashnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-35660022564291298722014-07-07T14:22:13.550-05:002014-07-07T14:22:13.550-05:00I rather live in a pluralistic society where vario...I rather live in a pluralistic society where various religious denominations live in a healthy tension with the secular authorities. I believe Martin Luther King would agree. See ON LIBERTY by John Stuart Mill.<br /><br />A separation of church and state is exactly what we have here. The state is accommodating the religious beliefs of the employer. This was not the banning of contraceptives dealt with in Griswold.<br /><br />If liberty matters -- then we have to tolerate and legally accommodate views with which we disagree. That is why I believe Lawrence v. Texas -- striking down anti-sodomy laws -- was correctly decided. We all find Nazis marching in Skokie and flag burning loathsome – but we must tolerate it in the name of free speech.<br /><br />The banning of blacks from a business establishment is not an apt analogy since<br />it involves excluding an entire person. That is more serious. The Hobby Horse Case discriminates only against a particular medicine which can easily be gotten elsewhere. Has anyone ever used the U.S. Post Office?<br /><br />This liberal/progressive “war on women” trope merely spreads heat and no light. It is merely used to “gin –up” otherwise apathetic or disheartened liberals/progressives. That is ignoble. <br /><br />--JerryBAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-41818524818409824932014-07-07T14:04:00.925-05:002014-07-07T14:04:00.925-05:00I think what they said was, a corporations religio...I think what they said was, a corporations religious freedom, is more important than your freedom from religion.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-10530550719165297382014-07-07T13:43:19.944-05:002014-07-07T13:43:19.944-05:00By that logic, because my employer doesn't buy...By that logic, because my employer doesn't buy my lunch, they are blocking my access to food. Both contraceptives and sandwiches are widely available at reasonable prices in stores everywhere.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13877137208397390419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-21538263945291073132014-07-07T10:48:55.331-05:002014-07-07T10:48:55.331-05:00They're blocking their employees from using th...They're blocking their employees from using the employees' own benefits.Bitter Scribehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04645909858616987997noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-71058887527461942622014-07-07T10:36:21.134-05:002014-07-07T10:36:21.134-05:00Thomas Evans,
That's a wonderful Mencken quot...Thomas Evans,<br /><br />That's a wonderful Mencken quote. <br /><br />"Of course, the Hobby Lobby case was not about contraception per se..." Well, up until the next day, that is. "The Supreme Court on Tuesday 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 the handful of methods the justices considered in their ruling.<br />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."<br /><br />http://news.yahoo.com/justices-act-other-health-law-mandate-cases-133633160--politics.html Jakashnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-91386055001567088142014-07-07T09:55:50.495-05:002014-07-07T09:55:50.495-05:00Declining to pay for something is not the same as ...Declining to pay for something is not the same as blocking access to itAnonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13877137208397390419noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-65869172806511085822014-07-07T08:37:40.991-05:002014-07-07T08:37:40.991-05:00Looking into the history of religious opposition t...Looking into the history of religious opposition to contraception, one finds no scriptural prohibitions but various statements by"Church Fathers" claiming it to be a sin. It probably made social sense when children were needed to work the fields and support you in your old age and high child mortality posed difficulties in that respect. But them days have been over for a long time. Most Christian mainstream denominations have moved away from it, and a crack in the dike of Catholic teaching really appeared during the 1930's when it began to be conceded that sex for reasons other than procreation might not be sinful as long as "artificial" means of contraception were not used. I like what H.L. Menkin wrote when use of the "rhythm method" was approved. "It is now quite lawful for a Catholic woman to avoid pregnancy by a resort to mathematics, though she is still forbidden to resort to physics or chemistry." Of course, the Hobby Lobby case was not about contraception per se but a belief, usnupported by the scientific community, about some methods being abortificants.Tomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09641357239788323783noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-72350581728588236102014-07-07T07:36:17.862-05:002014-07-07T07:36:17.862-05:00Thanks for lending your protest to those that woul...Thanks for lending your protest to those that would say this is no big deal. I disagree that Hobby Lobby should be the target for dismantling, though I certainly will never spend a dime there. You can't eliminate the loathsome. What should be dismantled brick by brick is the supreme court which says that the loathsome is lawful, and that a corporation's religious freedom is more important than a woman's health. <br />Ellen<br />Lizhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01183606631980015813noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-7146609553143869162014-07-07T03:01:23.750-05:002014-07-07T03:01:23.750-05:00It seems that Hobby Lobby invests in companies tha...It seems that Hobby Lobby invests in companies that produce the objectionable birth control. How sincere could their convictions be? But profits nullify hypocrisy, right? Pretty sure that's in the Bible.halcyonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16153075174949462914noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3972382144120426476.post-65874831313201677432014-07-07T00:06:09.954-05:002014-07-07T00:06:09.954-05:00About 18 months ago, the Searle Research Building ...About 18 months ago, the Searle Research Building on Niles Ave. in Skokie was torn down.<br />I think this is where the original pill, Enovid, was created.Clark St.https://www.blogger.com/profile/09634234069783123180noreply@blogger.com