Cruz: 'Disastrous' Marriage Equality Ruling Led To 'Persecution' That's 'Unprecedented' | Right Wing Watch

Cruz told Mefferd that “we are seeing an assault on religious liberty from Washington that is unprecedented,” citing a number of his favorite cases of people supposedly being persecuted by running afoul of state or local nondiscrimination policies, almost none of which have stemmed from the federal government.

Claiming that “these threats are growing and growing,” Cruz said that “much of this persecution is the fruit of the Supreme Court’s disastrous gay marriage ruling last year” — never mind that every single one of the incidents he referenced happened before the ruling and were in no way connected to it.

Cruz declared that it was “very sad” that some of his rivals for the GOP presidential nomination called the Obergefell ruling “settled law,” which is, he said, why anti-gay leaders have flocked to endorse him.

“I believe that decision was fundamentally illegitimate, it was lawless, it was unconstitutional and it will not stand,” he said. “And I would note, that is precisely why Dr. James Dobson has endorsed me in this campaign, it is why Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council has endorsed me in this campaign, it’s why the National Organization on Marriage [sic] has endorsed me on this campaign and has said it cannot support Donald Trump or Marco Rubio because if we’re not willing to defend marriage, we are giving up the foundational building blocks of the family, we’re giving up the Judeo-Christian values that built this great nation.”

Cruz: 'Disastrous' Marriage Equality Ruling Led To 'Persecution' That's 'Unprecedented' | Right Wing Watch

UPDATE::Will Roberts Court Take Up Case Against Nation's Most Radical Anti-Choice Law?

A coalition of women’s health-care providers, on behalf of Texas abortion providers, are urging the U.S. Supreme Court to consider the legality of the nation’s most radical set of anti-choice policies.

“This case will determine whether Texas can force more than 75 percent of the State’s abortion clinics to close,” opens the brief filed with the Roberts Court late Tuesday night.

The brief asks the Roberts Court to review a June 2015 decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, which upheld portions of HB 2 that advocates say would close more than 75 percent of abortion clinics in Texas and cut off access to safe and legal abortions for millions of Texans.
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Advocates argue in their filing that if the Roberts Court fails to step in, only ten clinics will remain open in the state, down from 41 prior to HB 2’s enactment and a net reduction of more than 75 percent of the abortion facilities in the state in a two-year period. Should this happen, advocates say, “every woman in Texas would have to live under a legal regime that fails to respect her equal citizenship status and would force her to grapple with unnecessary and substantial obstacles as a condition of exercising her protected liberty.”

Will Roberts Court Take Up Case Against Nation's Most Radical Anti-Choice Law?

See also: Abortion Providers Ask Supreme Court to Take Up HB 2Providers want ASC and admit privileges rules gone 

Providers contend the 5th Circuit’s decision is in “direct and acknowledged” conflict with decisions from the 7th and 9th Circuit Courts, as well as the Iowa Supreme Court, which hold that courts, “must examine the extent to which laws regulating abortion actually further a valid state interest in assessing whether the burdens they impose on abortion access are undue.” While the 5th Circuit applied a narrow approach (and didn’t seriously factor in barriers women face), the 7th and 9th Circuit courts used a so-called balancing test for undue burden that weighs the obstacles for women against the state's purported health interest, creating a divergence in Circuit court rulings.

Abortion providers argue the ruling “flouted longstanding [Supreme Court] precedent” by defying standards set by seminal 1992 abortion-rights case, Casey v Planned Parenthood. The 5th’s inability to find that the “abrupt closure” of more than three-fourths of Texas abortion clinics would create substantial obstacles to abortion access, “makes a mockery of the standard articulated in Casey,” they write. Such “blatant defiance” of the Court’s precedents calls for review.

Providers also call into question the law’s ability to uphold Fourteenth Amendment guarantees as it, “fails to respect [a woman's] equal citizenship status and would force her to grapple with unnecessary and substantial obstacles as a condition of exercising her protected liberty.” Review from the nation’s highest court is needed to avert “profound and irreparable harm” to Texas women, they conclude.

Alabama Judge Asks State Supreme Court To Issue 'Landmark' Ruling Nullifying Supreme Court Marriage Decision - The New Civil Rights Movement

An Alabama probate judge has asked the State Supreme Court to overrule the U.S. Supreme Court decision that brought marriage equality to the country - even Alabama.

The 18-page brief, filed Monday by Probate Judge Nick Williams, reads more like a temper tantrum that a legal document, calling the Supreme Court "semi-absolute rulers" and urging Alabama's chief Supreme Court justice, Roy Moore, to end his recusal on marriage cases. Marriage rights activists have compared Judge Williams to Alabama Governor George Wallace, who in the 1960s, stood against desegregation ordered by the federal courts.

"The eyes of the nation are again turned upon Alabama." wrote Judge Williams. "This court has the lifetime opportunity to issue a landmark ruling that could inspire other courts, officials, and legislatures to stand with us."

"For such a time as this, the justices of the Alabama Supreme Court have an opportunity to safety traditional marriage and spark a rebirth of constitutional federalism. Who knows when, or if, that opportunity will come again?"

Judge Williams, who is a product of the radical right-wing Liberty University, sang the praises of the Alabama Supreme Court for its order demanding probate judges stop issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples after a federal district court struck down the state's marriage ban last March.

The State Supreme Court issued that order as the result of a lawsuit filed by two anti-gay groups, the Alabama Policy Institute and the Alabama Citizens Action Program. According to Al.com, both plaintiffs argued there was precedence for rejecting a U.S. Supreme Court mandate believed to be unlawful. The groups cited the rejection of pro-slavery laws in the 1850s, such as the Wisconsin Supreme Court's refusal to submit to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which required runaway slaves be returned to their former owners. They did not, however, suggest the state could defy the Supreme Court.

When the U.S. Supreme Court legalized marriage equality in June, Judge Moore asked the Alabama Policy Institute and the Alabama Citizens Action Program to submit briefs on what they wanted the State Supreme Court to do in light of that decision. It is for that ongoing case that Judge Williams has submitted an amicus brief, asking the state Supreme Court to defy the U.S. Supreme Court, and refuse to accept its decision in Obergefell V Hodge.

Alabama Judge Asks State Supreme Court To Issue 'Landmark' Ruling Nullifying Supreme Court Marriage Decision - The New Civil Rights Movement

A Little-Noticed Supreme Court Case Could Deny Justice For Sandra Bland

In Taylor v. Barkes, all nine justices shut down a lawsuit by family members of Christopher Barkes, a Delaware man who took his own life within a day of being arrested for violating probation. Jail officials' failure to set up safeguards to keep him from hanging himself, the court ruled, was not a violation of his civil rights.

Barkes had a history of “suicidal ideations” and had attempted suicide on several occasions. This and a fuller mental-health picture were contained in Barkes’ probation file. But the intake nurse at the Howard R. Young Correctional Institution in Wilmington, Delaware, had no access to it, and Barkes only told her about one of these attempts. There also was evidence that the nurse didn’t use the latest version of a standard suicide screening form, and that a qualified mental-health professional should have conducted the screening instead.

The night before his death, Barkes called his wife and told her he "can't live this way any more," and planned to take this life. The next morning, while still in custody, he hanged himself.

This failure to properly screen Barkes and take steps to prevent his suicide, his family charged, amounted to cruel and unusual punishment -- a violation of his Eighth Amendment rights.

But a unanimous Supreme Court disagreed. “No decision of this court establishes a right to the proper implementation of adequate suicide prevention protocols,” the court said in a short, unsigned opinion that was decided without briefing or oral arguments. “No decision of this court even discusses suicide screening or prevention protocols.”

In other words, Barkes had no right to be kept alive while in custody.

If that sounds harsh, it’s because the dirty little secret of the case is that it was less about “a troubled man with a long history of mental health and substance abuse problems,” as the court put it, and more about the controversial doctrine of qualified immunity, a legal shield the Supreme Court created decades ago to protect government officials accused of constitutional wrongdoing.

The law of qualified immunity is thorny and rife with controversy. But as characterized by the court, its purpose is as simple as it is overarching: It “protects all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law” from being sued. And not just any law, but “clearly established” law at the time of the violation.

A Little-Noticed Supreme Court Case Could Deny Justice For Sandra Bland

Southern Baptists declare ‘spiritual warfare’ on Supreme Court with resolution denying marriage authority

Some of my posts are going to seem redundant and "silly" considering the opinion handed down today by SCOTUS concerning marriage equality.  But it is important to follow the mind-set as this fight is long from over.  Reich strategists are already at work trying to undermine the opinion of the Court:

Robert P. George, How Republicans Should Respond to a Supreme Court Marriage Ruling:

They should, in other words, treat it as an anti-constitutional and illegitimate ruling in which the judiciary has attempted to usurp the authority of the people and their elected representatives. They should refuse to treat and regard it as a binding and settled matter. They should challenge it legislatively and give the Supreme Court every opportunity to reverse itself—especially as new justices fill vacancies. And they should work to fill vacancies on federal courts at all levels with jurists who reject judicial usurpation and can be counted on to respect the scope and limits of their own constitutionally specified authority.

U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, BREAKING—USCCB Condemns Ruling:

Regardless of what a narrow majority of the Supreme Court may declare at this moment in history, the nature of the human person and marriage remains unchanged and unchangeable. Just as Roe v. Wade did not settle the question of abortion over forty years ago, Obergefell v. Hodges does not settle the question of marriage today. Neither decision is rooted in the truth, and as a result, both will eventually fail. Today the Court is wrong again. It is profoundly immoral and unjust for the government to declare that two people of the same sex can constitute a marriage.

Mike Huckabee, Huckabee blasts SCOTUS "I will not acquiesce to an imperial court" vows to "resist and reject judicial tyranny"

"This ruling is not about marriage equality, it's about marriage redefinition. This irrational, unconstitutional rejection of the expressed will of the people in over 30 states will prove to be one of the court's most disastrous decisions, and they have had many. The only outcome worse than this flawed, failed decision would be for the President and Congress, two co-equal branches of government, to surrender in the face of this out-of-control act of unconstitutional, judicial tyranny."

"The Supreme Court can no more repeal the laws of nature and nature's God on marriage than it can the law of gravity. Under our Constitution, the court cannot write a law, even though some cowardly politicians will wave the white flag and accept it without realizing that they are failing their sworn duty to reject abuses from the court. If accepted by Congress and this President, this decision will be a serious blow to religious liberty, which is the heart of the First Amendment."

Two counties out of marriage business for good after Supreme Court ruling

"My office discontinued issuing marriage licenses in February and I have no plans to put Pike County back into the marriage business," Allen wrote in a statement. "The policy of my office regarding marriage is no different today than it was yesterday."

Geneva County Probate Judge Fred Hamic also said he intends to permanently close the marriage license bureau in his office, if his attorneys don't object.

Both judges cited Alabama Code Section 30-1-9: "Marriage licenses may be issued by the judges of probate of the several counties."

The law says "may" instead of "shall", Hamic said, which makes a big difference. He said the law permits probate judges to opt of of isuing marriage licenses.

These are but a few reactions I have skimmed since the ruling came down, but they are not new.  If one pays close attention you will see the familiar strategy being laid out - 'Established by the State' was ambiguous in the context of the statute as whole - words and how we use them.  In other words King v. Burwell.

The Reich will be and has been planning for this day and they are lead by men like Robert P. George, Judge Tom Parker, Roy Moore et al.  They are lead by organizations such as Southern Baptist Convention:

“Southern Baptists recognize that no governing institution has the authority to countermand God’s definition of marriage,” the statement continued. “No matter how the Supreme Court rules, the Southern Baptist Convention reaffirms its unwavering commitment to its doctrinal and public beliefs concerning marriage.”

In his presidential address to the 5,000 attendees on Tuesday, SBC leader Rev. Ronnie Floyd said that it was time for Christians to declare “spiritual warfare.”

“America: We stand believing that marriage is the uniting of one man and one woman in a covenant commitment for a lifetime; we do not need to redefine what God himself has defined already,” Floyd opined. “”Now we await the outcome of the next possible Supreme Court ruling that could alter our nation’s belief and practice on traditional and biblical marriage, but also our historic commitment to religious liberty for all people.”

Southern Baptists declare ‘spiritual warfare’ on Supreme Court with resolution denying marriage authority

Louie Gohmert tells the Supreme Court: Jesus’ law more important than constitutional law

But Louie, it is not just Moses that is depicted in or on (the East Pediment) the building that occupies 1 First Street, Northeast, Washington, D.C.. You seem to leave out of your narrative that Moses is not given any special emphasis in the numerous depictions:  his figure is not larger than the others;  he is not displaying any type of dominance over the other figures; nor is the Decalogue (a hotly contested notion at best) written in full.  " Over time, the use of two tablets has become a symbol for the Commandments, and more generally, ancient laws. Tablets signify the permanence of the law when “written in stone.”

Specifically in the frieze mentioned, Moses is holding two tablets (let's assume the Ten Commandments),but only commandments six through ten are visible usually considered the more secular of commands.  That would fit with Weinman's design for said frieze,

Weinman’s training emphasized a correlation between the sculptural subject and the function of the building. Gilbert relied on him to choose the subjects and figures that best reflected the function of the Supreme Court Building. Faithful to classical sources and drawing from many civilizations, Weinman designed a procession of “great lawgivers of history” for the south and north walls to portray the development of law. Each frieze in the Courtroom measures 40 feet long by 7 feet, 2 inches high and is made of ivory vein Spanish marble

And, no Louie Christ did not define marriage between one man and one woman.

“It is a matter of a constitutional crisis when the Highest Court in the land not merely strikes down and says that their opinion is more important than Moses’, depicted up there in the center point of this room, more important than Moses’, depicted in the marble wall over the Supreme Court, holding the Ten Commandments,” the congressman said on the House floor.

“The Supreme Court says theirs is more important than the opinions established and stated by Jesus Christ when he said–and he was quoting Moses–that a man shall leave his mother and father, a woman leave her home, and the two will come together and be one flesh, and what God has joined together, let no man put asunder.”

  “The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.”
— U.S. Constitution, Article VI, clause 3

Louie Gohmert tells the Supreme Court: Jesus’ law more important than constitutional law

ADDENDUM::Houston man trolls airwaves with anti-gay ads — Project Q Houston

Houston anti-gay crank Steven Hotze won't give up his quest to have Texas defy a U.S. Supreme Court ruling legalizing gay marriage, now taking his fight to the airwaves and asking for your cash to help.

Hotze and his Conservative Republicans of Texas unleashed a TV and radio advertising campaign on Tuesday to pressure Gov. Greg Abbott into calling lawmakers back to Austin for a special session to fight gay marriage. Hotze wants legislators to pass a measure from state Rep. Cecil Bell that would defy an expected Supreme Court ruling legalizing gay marriage in the 13 states, like Texas, that don't yet have marriage equality.

Bell's proposal flopped and in its wake, Abbott refused to call a special session to consider it again.

Hotze is incredulous that Texas lawmakers won't stand with him to oppose a "lawless Supreme Court ruling on marriage."

"Gov. Abbott and the Republican leadership caved to the homosexual political movement and its cheerleader, the Texas Association of Business, and failed to pass legislation to preserve state sovereignty and the marriage amendment," Hotze's 60-second radio spot says.

He keeps up the pressure on Abbott in a 30-second television ad.

Houston man trolls airwaves with anti-gay ads — Project Q Houston

UPDATE::Court to rule on Texas abortion law which closed clinics across state

As assumed in a previous posting concerning HB2,,,

Abortion is back before the Supreme Court, and the justices could signal by the end of June whether they are likely to take up the biggest case on the hot-button subject in nearly a quarter-century.

If the court steps in, the hearing and the eventual ruling would come amid the 2016 presidential campaign.

The court is considering an emergency appeal from abortion providers in Texas, who want the justices to block two provisions of a state law that already has forced the closure of roughly half the licensed abortion clinics in the state. Ten of the remaining 19 clinics will have to shut their doors by July 1, without an order from the Supreme Court.

The Texas law is among a wave of state measures in recent years that have placed restrictions on when in a pregnancy abortions may be performed, imposed limits on abortions using drugs instead of surgery and increased standards for clinics and the doctors who work in them.

The Texas case involves the last of these categories. The provisions at issue require clinics to meet hospital-like surgical standards and also call on doctors who work in the clinics to have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital. Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry signed the law in 2013 when he was the state’s governor.

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The case could be attractive to the justices because it might allow them to give more definition to the key phrase from their last big abortion ruling, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, in 1992. States generally can regulate abortion unless doing so places “an undue burden” on a woman’s right to get an abortion.

Court to rule on Texas abortion law which closed clinics across state

UPDATE::Supreme Court Refuses to Hear Case on Pre-Abortion Ultrasounds - The New York Times

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to hear an appeal from North Carolina officials seeking to revive a state law that had required doctors to perform ultrasounds, display the resulting sonograms and describe the fetuses to women seeking abortions.

The Supreme Court’s one-sentence order, as is the custom, gave no reasons. Justice Antonin Scalia noted a dissent, also without saying why.

The order left in place an appeals court ruling that had held the law unconstitutional as a violation of the First Amendment.

“The state cannot commandeer the doctor-patient relationship to compel a physician to express its preference to the patient,” Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III wrote in December for a unanimous three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, in Richmond, Va.

Other federal appeals courts upheld similar laws from Texas and South Dakota. Such disagreements among appeals courts often lead to Supreme Court review.

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Monday’s development, which set no precedent, did not affect the validity of any law aside from North Carolina’s.

The important take away from the refusal of SCOTUS can be found in the ruling of the 4^th Circuit Court of Appeal.  Dahlia Lithwick writing for Slate highlights:

Perhaps the most striking part of the opinion comes at the very end, where the court starkly contrasts the standard informed-consent conversation between a physician and her patient with the statute enacted in North Carolina:

Informed consent frequently consists of a fully-clothed conversation between the patient and physician, often in the physician’s office. It is driven by the “patient’s particular needs and circumstances” …  so that the patient receives the information he or she wants in a setting that promotes an informed and thoughtful choice. This provision, however, finds the patient half-naked or disrobed on her back on an examination table, with an ultrasound probe either on her belly or inserted into her vagina. … Informed consent has not generally been thought to require a patient to view images from his or her own body much less in a setting in which personal judgment may be altered or impaired. Yet this provision requires that she do so or “avert her eyes.” Rather than engaging in a conversation calculated to inform, the physician must continue talking regardless of whether the patient is listening. … The information is provided irrespective of the needs or wants of the patient, in direct contravention of medical ethics and the principle of patient autonomy. Forcing this experience on a patient over her objections in this manner interferes with the decision of a patient not to receive information that could make an indescribably difficult decision even more traumatic and could “actually cause harm to the patient.” … And it is intended to convey not the risks and benefits of the medical procedure to the patient’s own health, but rather the full weight of the state’s moral condemnation.

Addressing Liptak's point concerning the First Amendment aspect - the state’s message or script - Lithwick wrote,

Wilkinson noted that, “The requirement is quintessential compelled speech. It forces physicians to say things they otherwise would not say. Moreover, the statement compelled here is ideological; it conveys a particular opinion.

The state freely admits that the purpose and anticipated effect of the Display of Real-Time View Requirement is to convince women seeking abortions to change their minds or reassess their decisions.” He added that, “this Display of Real-Time View Requirement explicitly promotes a pro-life message by demanding the provision of facts that all fall on one side of the abortion debate—and does so shortly before the time of decision when the intended recipient is most vulnerable.”

 The panel then turned to the state’s claim that the ultrasound script is merely a regulation of the practice of medicine that need only satisfy the lowest level of judicial review, and the panel rejected the view that doctors have extremely limited speech protections: “This statutory provision interferes with the physician’s right to free speech beyond the extent permitted for reasonable regulation of the medical profession, while simultaneously threatening harm to the patient’s psychological health, interfering with the physician’s professional judgment, and compromising the doctor-patient relationship.”

So, yes this is a big deal as currently there are 10 states with mandatory ultrasound laws and as Liptak notes, "The Supreme Court is expected to act soon in cases concerning more sweeping challenges to abortion regulations in cases from Mississippi and Texas."

Supreme Court Refuses to Hear Case on Pre-Abortion Ultrasounds - The New York Times

Supreme Court To Hear Case That Could Change 'One Person, One Vote' Rule

 The Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to hear an important case about whether states must count only those who are eligible to vote, rather than the total population, when drawing electoral districts for their legislatures.

The case from Texas could be significant for states with large immigrant populations, including Latinos who are children or not citizens. The plaintiffs claim that redrawing electoral districts based on the population of citizens and non-citizens alike violates the constitutional requirement of one person, one vote.

The challengers claim that taking account of total population can lead to vast differences in the number of voters in particular districts, along with corresponding differences in the power of those voters.

Supreme Court To Hear Case That Could Change 'One Person, One Vote' Rule

Mike Huckabee: Next president must obey ‘Supreme Being’ instead of Supreme Court on gay marriage

According to the GOP candidate, the United States would be operating under “judicial supremacy” instead of judicial review if bans on same-sex marriage were to be struck down.

“Presidents have understood that the Supreme Court cannot make a law, they cannot make it, the legislature has to make it, the executive branch has to sign it and enforce it,” Huckabee said. “And the notion that the Supreme Court comes up with the ruling and that automatically subjects the two other branches to following it defies everything there is about the three equal branches of government.”

“The Supreme Court is not the supreme branch,” he added. “And for God’s sake, it’s not the Supreme Being.”

He really doesn't understand "judicial review" or the fact that SCOTUS is not making "new" law but interpreting laws that are already in place, ie the Fourteenth Amendment:

[T]he courts were designed to be an intermediate body between the people and the legislature, in order, among other things, to keep the latter within the limits assigned to their authority. The interpretation of the laws is the proper and peculiar province of the courts. A constitution is, in fact, and must be regarded by the judges as, a fundamental law. It, therefore, belongs to them to ascertain its meaning, as well as the meaning of any particular act proceeding from the legislative body. If there should happen to be an irreconcilable variance between the two, that which has the superior obligation and validity ought, of course, to be preferred; or, in other words, the Constitution ought to be preferred to the statute, the intention of the people to the intention of their agents.

Mike Huckabee: Next president must obey ‘Supreme Being’ instead of Supreme Court on gay marriage

Franklin Graham Prays Ruth Bader Ginsburg Finds (His View Of) God Before Supreme Court Ruling

“Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them.”

Barry M. Goldwater

There are few different ways that one can respond to the derp coming from one Franklin Graham.  The simplest and most direct as per the First Amendment, religion is not permitted to mingle with the politics of this country and vice versa.  In other words, we are not a theocracy.  Supreme Court Justices must have an open mind. They are called upon to make a decision based upon the arguments presented and determining if voting for or against that issue is to the betterment of the nation.

With that in mind, one can also look at the question before the Court, civil marriage, not religious; marriage is not and never has been "owned" by the Church.  No public official should be enforcing Graham's views against any American citizens, ever.  Graham needs to mind his own business, whether marriage equality is legal nationwide or not, has no affect on him or his followers in any way.

And since we all know that - nothing fails like prayer.  What if God's answer is a big ole NO? Will Graham accept that? Or is the only answer acceptable from God the one Graham decided it should be?

Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the first Jewish woman to take a seat on the Supreme Court, is expected to vote in favor of marriage equality. According to Franklin Graham, this demonstrates that she doesn’t understand “the truth of scripture” and his followers must pray for her eyes to be opened.

That’s right — in the name of (Franklin Graham’s view of) religious freedom, he’d like for people to pray that Jewish Justice Ginsburg is converted to his particular set of Christian beliefs, on at least this particular topic.

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Is having others, particularly Supreme Court Justice Ginsburg, abandon their own beliefs and convictions necessary to Franklin Graham’s religious freedom? Dissenting commenters pointed out that Bader Ginsburg already holds religious beliefs, and presumably a faith in God, as a Jewish woman.

“One point many fail to realize: Ginsburg is Jewish, not a Christian and therefore, her perspective will reflect her personal convictions.

“This complete dismissal of her faith leads me to believe he thinks Jews should have no rights either.”

Franklin Graham Prays Ruth Bader Ginsburg Finds (His View Of) God Before Supreme Court Ruling

Texas plans to defy Supreme Court if they rule in favor of same-sex marriage

Now, while the country waits for the Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage believed to be ruled on in June, Texas is gearing up to pass its own law that will restrict the rights of homosexuals regardless of the court’s ruling, or so they believe.

“We as Texans have a sovereign right to define and regulate marriage,” Republican state Rep. Cecil Bell, the author of the bill, told Talking Points Memo on Tuesday. “I don’t believe that this bill puts anyone in a lesser position than what they were in before. What this does is codify Texas law.”

Texas officials however do not think there is anything discriminatory about the bill because it doesn’t remove rights from same-sex couples, yet.

This is the 20th anti-gay bill state lawmakers have put forth this term. Only two have made it out of committee though; this one and another that is meant to protect clergy from being forced to participate in same-sex marriages, a rather useless bill since the federal law already handles that.

[,,,]
The bill is nothing but Texas being a bully again, and trying to show the federal government they will not listen to their laws and throw around the word “sovereign” as though it means they are above the law. Texas lawmakers seem bent on becoming the most hateful groups of lawmakers in the country.

Texas plans to defy Supreme Court if they rule in favor of same-sex marriage

What Same-Sex Marriage Teaches About Social Change and the Supreme Court | Michael C. Dorf | Verdict | Legal Analysis and Commentary from Justia

Thus, the road to same-sex marriage looks like it has been a long slow slog, followed by a sprint. The issue was placed on the national agenda in the early 1990s, when a state court ruling in Hawaii led a panicked Congress to enact DOMA, but for roughly two decades, the fear of same-sex marriage was a bogeyman invoked by right-leaning politicians to turn out socially conservative voters. Then, in just a couple of years, opposition to same-sex marriage came to be regarded as nearly as retrograde as racism. Where the Justices in 2003 and even 2013 might have worried about backlash if they recognized a constitutional right to same-sex marriage, today they have more to fear if they fail to recognize such a right.

The recent change in attitudes towards same-sex marriage is remarkable for its speed, but that may simply reflect the well-known “tipping point” phenomenon popularized and arguably oversold by Malcolm Gladwell. Even if some of Gladwell’s examples are controversial, however, the underlying phenomenon undoubtedly exists. For example, ice remains ice as one heats it from sub-zero temperatures to above 32° Fahrenheit, and then it rapidly melts.

Tipping points are especially likely in the political realm because of majoritarianism. A position that lacks support will meet with little success, even as it gains considerable support, but then, when popular opinion crosses the fifty percent threshold, rapid legal change can ensue.

What Same-Sex Marriage Teaches About Social Change and the Supreme Court | Michael C. Dorf | Verdict | Legal Analysis and Commentary from Justia

Meet The 'Accidental Activists' Of The Supreme Court's Same-Sex-Marriage Case : NPR

Four reason why marriage equality matters:

The wake-up call about their legal status came after a truck traveling in the wrong lane nearly hit their car head-on.
April DeBoer says the near-miss got them thinking.

"We started to seek out information on protecting our kids, and putting wills and trusts in place to make sure that our kids are protected," she says.

But there was nothing they could do to ensure that if one of them died, the other parent would get custody of the two children adopted by the deceased partner. They could put their wishes on paper, but that paper would have little legal status.

"A judge could award that child to someone else," Jayne observes, effectively making the surviving parent "a legal stranger to the child that they've helped raise since birth."
,,,
There is the ever-present anxiety of unmarried, same-sex parents about what would happen to the children if one of them were to die. But there are more mundane matters too.

They don't qualify for each other's spousal death benefits. Because the state does not recognize them as one family, they have to have two separate family health insurance policies. Over the years, they've learned to shop around for day care, schools and pediatricians who will treat them both as parents.

And when Paul was diagnosed with prostate cancer three years ago, they had to shop for a doctor who would recognize Randy as his full partner with decision-making power should Paul's health make that necessary.
,,,
Although a married heterosexual couple would both automatically be the parents of a child in a situation like this, under Tennessee law, Sophy is not a married spouse and therefore had no legal relationship to Emilia. So the couple sued.

That's how Sophy, through a legal quirk, became the first female "dad" in Tennessee.

Because Emilia was born in the short window of time when there was a court order requiring the state to recognize their New York marriage, Sophy Jesty is listed on the birth certificate as Emilia's father.
,,,
Through a friend, a civil rights lawyer came to Jim and John's home to explain that Ohio would not recognize the marriage.

Jim recalls what happened next: "He pulled out a blank death certificate and said, now, do you realize when John dies, the state of Ohio will say he's single, and this blank here for surviving spouse name will be blank. Your name won't show up there, Jim."

The couple decided to fight. They filed suit just eight days after the tarmac wedding. Because of John's health, the judge heard arguments the following court day, and that same afternoon issued his ruling requiring the state to recognize Jim as John's spouse on a death certificate.

Three months and 11 days later, John Arthur died. The death certificate listed Jim Obergefell as his surviving spouse.

If the state wins its case in the Supreme Court, it can reissue a death certificate without Jim Obergefell's name.

Meet The 'Accidental Activists' Of The Supreme Court's Same-Sex-Marriage Case : NPR

The Supreme Court's Unconscionable Slow-Walk Towards Gay Rights | ThinkProgress

This legacy of state-sponsored discrimination, rooted in stereotypes and deference to anti-gay animus, should have led the courts to conclude that same-sex couples must enjoy full marriage rights many decades ago. As the Supreme Court has long held, groups that have historically been subject to discrimination that bears “no relation to ability to perform or contribute to society” enjoy heightened protection under the Constitution’s promise that no one shall be denied “the equal protection of the laws.” Yet the justices have sat on their hands, refusing to extend this protection to LGBT Americans even in their most recent gay rights decisions. When the Court’s current members have extended gay rights, they’ve emphasized their desire to move slowly almost as much as they’ve focused on the injustices they are correcting.

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Throughout much of this history, the Supreme Court simply turned a blind eye. When an early gay rights case, brought by two Minnesota men seeking the right to marry, reached the Court in 1972, the justices dismissed the case with a single sentence — the appeal was “dismissed for want of substantial federal question.” At the time, this was a common formulation the justices used to dispose of cases that fell within the Court’s mandatory jurisdiction, but that the justices deemed unworthy of their time. This one sentence order in the case known as Baker v. Nelson is still cited to this day by defenders of marriage discrimination, who claim that it represents the Supreme Court’s pronouncement that marriage equality is not protected by the Constitution.

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Though the justices have never explained in a published opinion why they’ve thus far been unwilling to embrace the conclusion dictated by their Equal Protection precedents — that gay Americans have faced a legacy of discrimination that bears no relation to their “ability to perform or contribute to society,” and thus that laws which discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation should be treated with great skepticism by the courts — some members of the Court have indicated why they’ve resisted their own precedents elsewhere. Kennedy’s expressed concerns that the Court’s too often become the venue where political battles are resolved, and he’s fretted about the “uncharted waters” ahead if the Court strikes down marriage discrimination in all 50 states. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has warned that the Court moved “too far, too fast” in Roe v. Wade and has hinted that she is cautious about doing the same on gay rights.

This desire to tread cautiously, however, is hard to square with the Court’s behavior outside of the gay rights context. Kennedy, for example, showed little concern about the “uncharted waters” facing American democracy when he authored the Court’s opinion in Citizens United, which eliminated many longstanding limits on political campaign donations. Nor did Kennedy appear particularly bothered by the turbulent waves that would have ripped through the health care sector if he had succeeded in repealing the entire Affordable Care Act. As the frequent swing vote on the Supreme Court, Justice Kennedy may be the most powerful jurist in the nation, yet his concern about moving too fast does not appear to extent far beyond gay rights.

The Supreme Court's Unconscionable Slow-Walk Towards Gay Rights | ThinkProgress

Republicans Are Now Trying To Pass Obamacare Extension To Save Their Own Asses

An issue to key our eyes on in the coming months,,,

It’s no secret that Republicans have opposed the Affordable Care Act since the very beginning. From death panels to economic Armageddon, the GOP has said and done just about anything they possibly could to make people as irrationally terrified of this law as possible.

But despite their incessant fear-mongering, basically none of their apocalyptic warnings have come true. The “worst” factual talking point they’ve had against “Obamacare” is that around 5 million Americans were forced to switch insurance plans because their previous plans were inadequate.

Oh, the horrors!

So, when I read that Senate Republicans were desperately trying to pass legislation that would extend the subsidies for the Affordable Care Act through 2017, I was a little caught off guard. After all, aren’t these the same subsidies many of them have been pushing the Supreme Court to strike down for years? So, why would Republicans want to pass legislation that guarantees the subsidies through 2017?

Oh, I know why – to avoid having millions of Americans, many of whom are conservative voters, blaming the Republican party for losing their health insurance just before the 2016 elections.

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If the Supreme Court rules against the subsidies, there’s not going to be anyone else to blame but the Republican party – and they damn well know that. That’s why they’re trying to pass this temporary fix so that they won’t have to suffer any sort of political ramifications for being the ones responsible for millions of Americans potentially losing their health insurance.

Republicans Are Now Trying To Pass Obamacare Extension To Save Their Own Asses

Bryan Fischer: Gay 'Supremacists' Will 'Brainwash' Kids, 'Want It To Be Gay Rights Über Alles' | Right Wing Watch

Although the likelihood is small, I wonder what would happen if the SCOTUS ruling in Obergefell turns out to be 6-3 instead of the "predicted" 5-4 split?  Me thinks Fischer's head would implode:

“I got worked up about that but that just tees me off, I cannot tell you the level of aggravation that I got that this thing is even before the Supreme Court, let alone that one man, one man, is going to be allowed to tyrannically dictate to everybody else in America what our definition of marriage ought to be,” Fischer said. “It’s inexcusable, it’s reprehensible, it’s obscene, it’s vulgar to a level that I cannot even begin to put into words.”

And there's that damn agenda thingy I know nothing about:

“Your children will be brainwashed, they will be indoctrinated into the entire homosexual agenda,” he declared. After blasting homosexuality as a “sexual abnormality and sexual perversity,” Fischer said that gay rights advocates “are not even really about equality, they are about supremacy. They want it to be gay rights über alles, they want gay rights to supersede any right to religious liberty.

Bryan Fischer: Gay 'Supremacists' Will 'Brainwash' Kids, 'Want It To Be Gay Rights Über Alles' | Right Wing Watch

James Dobson Does Not Understand Bisexuality: 'That's Orgies!' | Right Wing Watch

I have been sitting on this for a few days.  Pondering.  Can an individual, a prominent one at that, be so,,,so, stupid?

Back in the day, I listened to Dobson on a daily basis.  I won't go so far as to say I idolized the man but he ranked quite high. (Please don't ask,,,roflmao,,,it musta been a delusional state I was in.)  The politics weren't as obvious in those days as the Reich we know today was just in its infancy;  I was able to brush his anti-gay stance off as our walks in faith were different.  But now, I am at a loss,,,can Dobson really be that stupid?

Here is a man, a psychologist who has made a portion of his living "educating" people about homosexuality and bisexuality.  One would think he would actually know what the term bisexual means.


"I would like them to think, just for a moment, about 'LGBT,'" Dobson said. "The 'B' stand for bisexual! That's orgies!  Are you really going to support this?"

Michael Stone over at Progressive Secular Humanist makes an interesting point along the same vane of thought I had:

It is difficult to believe that a man who claims to have a Ph.D. in psychology does not know the meaning of words like “bisexual” and “orgy.”

Indeed, it may be the case that rather than being ignorant, Dobson was simply being dishonest when equating bisexuality with orgies in a despicable attempt to smear ad denigrate individuals who identify as bisexual, and by extension, the LGBT community as a whole.

It should also go without saying that there is nothing morally objectionable to consenting adults engaging in “orgies” or sex parties or group sex or polyamory. What is morally objectionable is the dissemination of false and misleading information in the attempt to defame and shame individuals.

 To which Libby Anne of at Love, Joy, Feminism adds:

Evangelicals’ understanding of LGBTQ individuals is less about reality and more about crafting an image that fits within their worldview. In evangelical parlance, homosexuality, orgies, and pedophilia—these things all naturally go together. This is why evangelicals believe that gay people are naturally promiscuous and that transgender individuals are likely to abuse children in public restrooms. This image they have crafted of LGBTQ individuals may not resemble the reality, but it does allow them to fit the issue snugly into their belief system.

As more people have openly gay individuals in their lives, evangelicals are increasingly faced with a choice. They must either deny the lived experience of the (often few) LGBTQ individuals in their lives, or they must reject the image they have been given of LGBTQ individuals by their pastors or other evangelical leaders as false. If they do the latter, they have to find a way to adjust their belief system to account for this new understanding of LGBTQ individuals. And there are evangelicals today who are doing this, though I don’t have percentages. The past of least resistance, however, is to simply deny, deny, deny, and hold tight to the unquestioned belief system, and that is what most seem to be doing, at least for the moment. It’s certainly what Dobson is doing, though I’m unsure whether he knows any LGBTQ individuals.

The problem here isn’t just religion, though it certainly is that when it comes to LGBTQ issues specifically. When we look more broadly, it’s ideology in general that is the problem. Any time people set out to fit the world around them into a specific preconceived ideology, without a willingness to also look critically at that ideology, they will end up twisting pieces to fit them into their preexisting puzzle. Religion may be the most obvious example of this, but there are others, too. Think of communists or libertarians, for instance. Any time an individuals proclaims an ideology supreme, they run the risk of finding themselves twisting pieces to fit them into it rather than being willing to adjust the ideology when things don’t fit.

So is Dobson really that stupid?  I don't think so!!

James Dobson Does Not Understand Bisexuality: 'That's Orgies!' | Right Wing Watch

Addicting Info – Homophobic Nut: Texas Should Stop Gay Marriage Like They Stopped Abortions (AUDIO)

So, in other words, this man is advocating for ways to openly defy the Supreme Court of the United States simply because people don’t have to live by his version of Biblical law according to the highest court in the land. If this isn’t alarming to rational people, it should be. This sets the precedent for states to decide that it doesn’t matter one iota how the Supreme Court rules on any matter, that they can do as they please anyway via loopholes and backdoor legislation that undermines Supreme Court rulings. Scary stuff.

Addicting Info – Homophobic Nut: Texas Should Stop Gay Marriage Like They Stopped Abortions (AUDIO)