June 26, 2015

GOP Rips ‘Imperial’ Supreme Court for ‘Assault’ on Christianity

The Republican reaction to the Supreme Court legalizing gay marriage across the nation was instant and heated. Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said the ruling “tramples on states’ rights” and will “pave way for an all-out assault against the religious freedoms of Christians.” Rick Santorum tweeted that five “unelected judges redefined the foundational unit of society.” Mike Huckabee: “I will not acquiesce to an imperial court any more than our Founders acquiesced to an imperial British monarch.”

Jeb Bush struck a more measured tone: “Guided by my faith, I believe in traditional marriage. I believe the Supreme Court should have allowed the states to make this decision. I also believe that we should love our neighbor and respect others, including those making lifetime commitments. In a country as diverse as ours, good people who have opposing views should be able to live side by side. It is now crucial that as a country we protect religious freedom and the right of conscience and also not discriminate.”

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http://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2015/06/26/republicans-imperial-supreme-court-assaults-christians.html

June 26, 2015

UPDATED: Marriage Equality Granted 5 to 4

Source: SCOTUS Blog

Each of the four dissenters has written a dissent
by Amy Howe 10:02 AM

Sixth Circuit is reversed.
by Amy Howe 10:02 AM

Alito has filed a dissenting opinion, joined by Scalia and CT.
by Amy Howe 10:02 AM

Thomas dissents, joined by Scalia.
by Amy Howe 10:02 AM

Justice Scalia dissents, joined by Justice Thomas.
by Amy Howe 10:02 AM

Chief dissents, joined by Scalia and Thomas.
by Amy Howe 10:02 AM

It's 5-4.
by Amy Howe 10:02 AM

And to recognize a marriage between two people of the same sex when a marriage was lawfully licensed and performed out of state.
by Amy Howe 10:02 AM


Kennedy writes opinion

Holding: Fourteenth Amendment requires a state to license a marriage between two people of the same sex. -

See more at: http://live.scotusblog.com/Event/Live_blog_of_opinions__June_26_2015#sthash.23adV3qx.dpuf

Read more: http://live.scotusblog.com/Event/Live_blog_of_opinions__June_26_2015#sthash.23adV3qx.dpuf

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UPDATE 1:

The electronic version of the opinion is up.
http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/14pdf/14-556_3204.pdf

UPDATE 2:

The Chief Justice has the principal dissent, which is 31 pages long. Toward the end of it, he says, "If you are among the many Americans--of whatever sexual orientation--who favor expanding same-sex marriage, by all means celebrate today's decision. Celebrate the achievement of a desired goal. Celebrate the opportunity for a new expression of commitment to a partner. Celebrate the availability of new benefits. But do not Celebrate the Constitution. It had nothing to do with it."

by Tejinder 10:11 AM

See more at: http://live.scotusblog.com/Event/Live_blog_of_opinions__June_26_2015#sthash.23adV3qx.dpuf

UPDATE 3:

Same-Sex Marriage Is a Right, the Supreme Court Rules, 5-4

Friday, June 26, 2015 10:04 AM EDT

In a long-sought victory for the gay rights movement, the Supreme Court ruled on Friday that the Constitution guarantees a nationwide right to same-sex marriage.

The decision, the culmination of decades of litigation and activism, came against the backdrop of fast-moving changes in public opinion, with polls indicating that most Americans now approve of same-sex marriage.

Read more » http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/27/us/supreme-court-same-sex-marriage.html?emc=edit_na_20150626&nlid=57435284&ref=cta&_r=0

June 25, 2015

Jury Finds That Ex-Gay Therapy Is A Fraud

BY ZACK FORD POSTED ON JUNE 25, 2015 AT 2:45 PM

After three weeks of trial, a New Jersey jury reached a quick verdict in the case against JONAH, a Jewish ex-gay organization sued under the state’s consumer fraud laws. The jury unanimously found against JONAH on all counts, meaning it will have to pay upwards of $25,000 in damages to the clients and their families for undergoing ex-gay therapy.

The verdict is a big loss for the ex-gay therapy movement. Though JONAH was not permitted to present “expert” testimony — the judge compared it to testimony about the Earth being flat — the extensive trial offered a thorough examination of various ex-gay programs. This included not only the troubling practices of the Alan Downing, the JONAH-affiliated counselor who worked with the plaintiffs, but also a popular People Can Change retreat program called Journey Into Manhood (JiM). Two of the stars of TLC’s My Husband’s Not Gay, both Mormon, testified in the trial on behalf of their experiences with JiM.

The victory for these plaintiffs and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) opens the door to similar challenges across the country that could hold other reparative therapists accountable for their harmful shame-based treatment. It also may encourage other states to follow the lead of California, New Jersey, and D.C. to pass laws banning ex-gay therapy for minors. Challenges to those laws have similarly failed in court.

The judge’s instructions to the jury Thursday morning outlining how they should consider the charges seemed to indicate the inevitability of the outcome. If the jury felt that JONAH presented homosexuality as a “mental illness, disease, disorder or something equivalent” or if they determined that JONAH indicated any kind of “success rate” for reparative therapy, it had to find the organization in violation of the Consumer Fraud Act.

more
http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2015/06/25/3674068/ex-gay-fraud-verdict/

June 25, 2015

Yet Again, A Scalia Dissent Is Used Against Him

Justice Antonin Scalia strongly objected to Thursday's Supreme Court decision upholding the Affordable Care Act, so it was amusing to see Chief Justice John Roberts use Scalia's own dissent in the last major Obamacare case against him. It was buried in a footnote and amounted to a small dart lobbed Scalia's way, especially when compared to Scalia's blistering dissent that ripped Roberts' legal reasoning.

To defend making the subsidies available to consumers everywhere, Roberts cited a line the dissent to the 2012 decision in favor of Obamacare, in which Scalia said, "Without the federal subsidies . . . the exchanges would not operate as Congress intended and may not operate at all."

Roberts used the line to argue that it "is implausible that Congress meant the Act to operate" in a manner to limit the subsidies only to those states with state-operated exchanges, as the challengers in King v. Burwell argued.

This is not the first time Scalia has seen one of his dissents used against him. His dissent to the 2013 Windsor decision that struck down the Defense of Marriage Act was widely cited by lower courts to invalidate state bans on same-sex marriage.

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http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/scalia-dissent-obamacare-used-against-him

June 25, 2015

Text of President Obama’s remarks on health care ruling

Text of President Barack Obama’s remarks about the Supreme Court ruling Thursday on subsidies in the health care law:

___

Five years ago, after nearly a century of talk, decades of trying, a year of bipartisan debate, we finally declared that in America, health care is not a privilege for a few, but a right for all.

Over those five years, as we’ve worked to implement the Affordable Care Act, there have been successes and setbacks. The setbacks I remember clearly. But as the dust has settled, there can be no doubt that this law is working. It has changed, and in some cases saved, American lives. It set this country on a smarter, stronger course.

And today, after more than 50 votes in Congress to repeal or weaken this law, after a presidential election based in part on preserving or repealing this law, after multiple challenges to this law before the Supreme Court — the Affordable Care Act is here to stay.

This morning, the court upheld a critical part of this law — the part that’s made it easier for Americans to afford health insurance regardless of where you live. If the partisan challenge to this law had succeeded, millions of Americans would have had thousands of dollars’ worth of tax credits taken from them. For many, insurance would have become unaffordable again. Many would have become uninsured again. Ultimately, everyone’s premiums could have gone up. America would have gone backward. And that’s not what we do. That’s not what America does. We move forward.

So today is a victory for hardworking Americans all across this country whose lives will continue to become more secure in a changing economy because of this law.

If you’re a parent, you can keep your kids on your plan until they turn 26 — something that has covered millions of young people so far. That’s because of this law.

If you’re a senior or an American with a disability, this law gives you discounts on your prescriptions — something that has saved 9 million Americans an average of $1,600 so far.

If you’re a woman, you can’t be charged more than anybody else — even if you’ve had cancer or your husband had heart disease or just because you’re a woman. Your insurer has to offer free preventive services like mammograms. They can’t place annual or lifetime caps on your care because of this law.

Because of this law and because of today’s decision, millions of Americans who I hear from every single day will continue to receive the tax credits that have given about 8 in 10 people who buy insurance on the new marketplaces the choice of a health care plan that costs less than $100 a month.

And when it comes to pre-existing conditions — someday, our grandkids will ask us if there was really a time when America discriminated against people who get sick. Because that is something this law has ended for good. That affects everybody with health insurance, not just folks who got insurance through the Affordable Care Act. All of America has protections it didn’t have before.

As the law’s provisions have gradually taken effect, more than 16 million uninsured Americans have gained coverage so far. Nearly 1 in 3 Americans who was uninsured a few years ago is insured today. The uninsured rate in America is the lowest since we began to keep records. And that is something we can all be proud of.

Meanwhile, the law has helped hold the price of health care to its slowest growth in 50 years. If your family gets insurance through your job — so you’re not using the Affordable Care Act — you’re still paying about $1,800 less per year on average than you would be if we hadn’t done anything. By one leading measure, what business owners pay out in wages and salaries is now finally growing faster than what they spend on health insurance. That hasn’t happened in 17 years, and that’s good for workers and it’s good for the economy.

The point is, this is not an abstract thing anymore. This is not a set of political talking points. This is reality. We can see how it is working. This law is working exactly as it’s supposed to. In many ways, this law is working better than we expected it to. For all the misinformation campaigns, all the doomsday predictions, all the talk of death panels and job destruction, for all the repeal attempts, this law is now helping tens of millions of Americans.

And they’ve told me that it has changed their lives for the better. I’ve had moms come up and say, ‘My son was able to see a doctor and get diagnosed, and catch a tumor early, and he’s alive today because of this law.’ This law is working. And it’s going to keep doing just that.

Five years in, this is no longer about a law. This is not about the Affordable Care Act as legislation, or Obamacare as a political football. This is health care in America.

And unlike Social Security or Medicare, a lot of Americans still don’t know what Obamacare is beyond all the political noise in Washington. Across the country, there remain people who are directly benefiting from the law but don’t even know it. And that’s OK. There’s no card that says “Obamacare” when you enroll. But that’s by design, for this has never been a government takeover of health care, despite cries to the contrary. This reform remains what it’s always been: a set of fairer rules and tougher protections that have made health care in America more affordable, more attainable, and more about you — the consumer, the American people. It’s working.

And with this case behind us, let’s be clear, we’ve still got work to do to make health care in America even better. We’ll keep working to provide consumers with all the tools you need to make informed choices about your care. We’ll keep working to increase the use of preventive care that avoids bigger problems down the road. We’ll keep working to boost the steadily improving quality of care in hospitals, and bring down costs even lower, make the system work even better. Already we’ve seen reductions, for example, in the number of readmissions at hospitals. That saves our society money, it saves families money, makes people healthier.

We’re making progress. We’re going to keep working to get more people covered. I’m going to work as hard as I can to convince more governors and state legislatures to take advantage of the law, put politics aside, and expand Medicaid and cover their citizens. We’ve still got states out there that, for political reasons, are not covering millions of people that they could be covering, despite the fact that the federal government is picking up the tab.

So we’ve got more work to do. But what we’re not going to do is unravel what has now been woven into the fabric of America. And my greatest hope is that rather than keep refighting battles that have been settled again and again and again, I can work with Republicans and Democrats to move forward. Let’s join together, make health care in America even better.

Three generations ago, we chose to end an era when seniors were left to languish in poverty. We passed Social Security, and slowly it was woven into the fabric of America and made a difference in the lives of millions of people. Two generations ago, we chose to end an age when Americans in their golden years didn’t have the guarantee of health care. Medicare was passed, and it helped millions of people.

This generation of Americans chose to finish the job, to turn the page on a past when our citizens could be denied coverage just for being sick. To close the books on a history where tens of millions of Americans had no hope of finding decent, affordable health care, had to hang their chances on fate. We chose to write a new chapter, where in a new economy, Americans are free to change their jobs or start a business, chase a new idea, raise a family, free from fear, secure in the knowledge that portable, affordable health care is there for us and always will be. And that if we get sick, we’re not going to lose our home. That if we get sick, that we’re going to be able to still look after our families.

That’s when America soars, when we look out for one another, when we take care of each other, when we root for one another’s success, when we strive to do better and to be better than the generation that came before us, and try to build something better for generations to come. That’s why we do what we do. That’s the whole point of public service.

So this was a good day for America. Let’s get back to work.

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http://www.salon.com/2015/06/25/text_of_president_obamas_remarks_on_health_care_ruling/

June 25, 2015

Pat Boone asks Obama to empathize with Dylann Roof as he echoes Charleston gunman’s racist fears

Pat Boone asks Obama to empathize with Dylann Roof as he echoes Charleston gunman’s racist fears

Pat Boone is sick of racism – at least, he’s sick of people pointing it out.

The conservative commentator and one-time teen idol complained that President Barack Obama pointed out the racial element in every highly publicized killing of an unarmed black person by a white police officer or vigilante, reported Right Wing Watch.

“Mr. President! For God’s sake, and America’s sake, quit so often calling crimes that involve a black person ‘racist’!” said Boone, who was best known for his sanitized versions of rock songs by black artists in the 1950s, in a column posted online by World Net Daily.

Boone said he was deeply disappointed that Obama, the nation’s first black president, continued to discuss racial issues.

“As the president who came to office, a black man promising to bring people together, a man ideally suited for that job since you were born both black and white, you had a God-given chance to actually proclaim and demonstrate that racial divides and prejudice had greatly diminished and that our society was truly becoming colorblind,” the former pop singer complained.

more
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/pat-boone-asks-obama-to-empathize-with-dylann-roof-as-he-echoes-charleston-gunmans-racist-fears/

June 25, 2015

More challenges to Obamacare making their way through the courts

Source: Reuters

-snip-

Here is a look at some of the major cases and the grounds on which they have been brought.

U.S. House of Representatives v. Burwell

Filed last November by House Republicans, the lawsuit challenges the Obama administration’s implementation of the Affordable Care Act, widely known as Obamacare. The lawsuit claims some of the administration’s actions to put the law into effect required, but did not receive, congressional authorization. Those actions included delaying implementation of a mandate that certain employers buy insurance for their employees and authorizing the Treasury to make payments to health insurers without getting funding from Congress. The administration’s motion to dismiss the case is pending before the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

Sissel v. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Hotze v. Burwell

These lawsuits assert that the law, which originated in the Senate, violates the Constitution’s “origination clause,” which requires a bill raising revenue to originate in the House. In 2012, the Supreme Court said the penalty on individuals for failing to buy health insurance could be regarded as a tax. The Sissel lawsuit was rejected last July by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, which found the “origination clause” did not apply because raising revenue was incidental to the main purpose of the law. The plaintiff, an artist who sells his work out of his studio, is asking for a rehearing. The other case, Hotze v. Burwell, was dismissed by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in April for lack of standing. The plaintiff, a Texas doctor, is also seeking a rehearing.

Michigan Catholic Conference v. Burwell and other lawsuits challenging the contraception mandate and related waiver

In a series of cases, non-profit employers have objected to the process for opting out on religious grounds of the law’s requirement to buy contraception coverage for their employees. Such employers must provide a form to their insurers, which then separately must provide contraception coverage for employees. Numerous employers have claimed in lawsuits that submitting the form goes against their religious objections. One of the most closely watched is Michigan Catholic Conference v. Burwell, which was dismissed by the 6th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals last June. The plaintiffs, a group of Catholic employers, are asking the Supreme Court to take the case. Another is Zubik v. HHS, which was brought by Pittsburgh Catholic bishop David Zubik. Though the 3rd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals dismissed Zubik’s case in 2013, Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito put that decision on hold in April pending further review.

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Read more: http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/more-challenges-to-obamacare-making-their-way-through-the-courts/

June 25, 2015

Cruz: Any Candidate Unwilling To Repeal Obamacare 'Should Step Aside'

Source: TPM

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) told his fellow Republican candidates for President on Thursday that if they still aren't concentrated on wiping out Obamacare, they should drop out of the race.

“I have made repeal of this disastrous law a top priority since the first day I arrived in the Senate and have made its repeal central to my campaign," Cruz said in a statement. "Any candidate not willing to do the same—and campaign on it every day—should step aside," he added.

The rest of the statement was a colorful condemnation of the Supreme Court's "nakedly political" decision to uphold Obamacare's tax subsidies in King v. Burwell.

&quot C)rocodile tears are flooding our nation’s capital today over the Supreme Court’s decision to illegally rewrite Obamacare, which has been a disaster since its inception," he said. "These robed Houdinis transmogrified a ‘federal exchange’ into an exchange ‘established by the State,'" Cruz added.

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Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ted-cruz-obamacare-step-aside

June 25, 2015

Ted Nugent: Thank you, Obama, for giving whites the go-ahead to say ‘n****r’

Ted Nugent finally found a reason to praise President Barack Obama.

The hard rocker-turned-conservative commentator suggested that Obama had finally given white people a license to use a notorious racial slur by uttering it himself in a recent interview.

The president told comedian Marc Maron that racism could not be cured by being too “polite to say n****r in public” – which Nugent took as a green light.

“For those who have chosen terminal denial and have completely lost touch with the real world, the word n****r has historically been used in a powerfully positive way when describing the proud heritage and history of deeply respected, even revered ‘blackness,’” Nugent wrote in a column posted at World Net Daily that contained five unobscured uses of the racial slur.

He complained that the racial slur had remained publicly off-limits for whites – even as some famous and non-famous black people continued to use the word in music, comedy routines, or casual conversation.

more
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/ted-nugent-thank-you-obama-for-giving-whites-the-go-ahead-to-say-nr/

June 25, 2015

Twitter heaps mockery on Bobby Jindal for being ‘done with’ Indian-American background

Source: Reuters

Louisiana Governor and U.S. presidential candidate Bobby Jindal caused a Twitter storm of jokes and insults in India on Thursday after he said he dislikes being called an Indian-American.

Republican Jindal is the first person of Indian origin to join the U.S. presidential race. During his campaign launch on Wednesday, Jindal said he was “done with” descriptions that identified Americans by their origin, ethnicity or wealth.

“We are not Indian-Americans, African-Americans, Irish-Americans, rich Americans, or poor Americans. We are all Americans,” the two-term governor said to loud cheers at the event in a suburb of New Orleans. The comment, however, was interpreted by some people on Twitter as an attempt to distance himself from India.

The hashtag #BobbyJindalIsSoWhite recorded more than 6,400 tweets and was among India’s top trending topics on Thursday. “#BobbyJindalIsSoWhite teacher used to use him as a chalk on board,” said one Twitter user named aindrila. Another user, Yusuf B, said: “#BobbyJindalIsSoWhite that we only see the outline of his body when he stands in front of a white wall.”

-snip-

Read more: http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/twitter-heaps-mockery-on-bobby-jindal-for-being-done-with-indian-american-background/