Friday, July 10, 2009
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Pelosi Shuts Down Michael Jackson Resolution
The AP reports that "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi shut the door Thursday to a resolution honoring Michael Jackson because debate on the symbolic measure could raise 'contrary views' about the pop star's life. Lawmakers are free to use House speeches 'to express their sympathy or their praise any time that they wish,' said Pelosi, D-Calif. 'I don't think it's necessary for us to have a resolution.'"
Warren Buffett: Unemployment's "Got A Ways To Go" And Stimulus Was Like A 1/2 Tablet Of Viagra With Lots Of Pet Project Candy Thrown In
Top Story On Drudge Report: "Second Stimulus Package!"
Earlier Today the Drudge Report was declaring "Mr. President!", but now Drudge is going for a stimulus pun with "Second Stimulus Package!" as his lead story. Take a look at French President Nicolas Sarkozy smirking away in the corner there.
L.A. Times: Ninth Circuit Says Pharmacists Can't Refuse To Sell "Morning After" Pill
The L.A. Times reports that "pharmacists are obliged to dispense the Plan B pill, even if they are personally opposed to the 'morning after' contraceptive on religious grounds, a federal appeals court ruled Wednesday. In a case that could affect policy across the western U.S., a supermarket pharmacy owner in Olympia, Wash., failed in a bid to block 2007 regulations that required all Washington pharmacies to stock and dispense the pills. Family-owned Ralph's Thriftway and two pharmacists employed elsewhere sued Washington state officials over the requirement. The plaintiffs asserted that their Christian beliefs prevented them from dispensing the pills, which can prevent implantation of a recently fertilized egg. They said that the new regulations would force them to choose between keeping their jobs and heeding their religious objections to a medication they regard as a form of abortion. Ralph's owners, Stormans Inc., and pharmacists Rhonda Mesler and Margo Thelen sought protection under the First Amendment right to free exercise of religion and won a temporary injunction from the U.S. District Court in Seattle pending trial on the constitutionality of the regulations. That order prevented state officials from penalizing pharmacists who refused to dispense Plan B as long as they referred consumers to a nearby pharmacy where it was available. On Wednesday, a three-judge panel of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals lifted the injunction. Other constitutional challenges are pending with the district court, which had been waiting for the 9th Circuit ruling on the injunction, said Chad Allred, a Seattle lawyer whose firm represents Stormans and the pharmacists. In anticipation of the injunction being vacated, Stormans and the two pharmacists secured an agreement with the state that it would not pursue sanctions against them until the other issues were decided at trial, Allred said."
The 9th Circuit held that Washington's Pharmacy Board rules are neutral regulations of general applicability that need only meet a rational basis test rather than the strict scrutiny standard used by the district court. But within the very opinion itself the judges seem to contradict themselves on this very point.
The Ninth Circuit stated that the new pharmacy rules are nuetral because they "do not aim to suppress, target, or single out in any way the practice of any religion because of its religious content." The Court said that the regulations are generally applicable because there was "no evidence" that the State "pursued their interests only against conduct with a religious motivation. Under the rules, all pharmacies have a 'duty to deliver' all medications 'in a timely manner'" and the challenged regulations in the case do not apply "to refusals only for religious reasons." Yet the opinion also included the following not long thereafter: "How much the new rules actually increase access to medications depends on how many people are able to get medication that they might previously have been denied based on religious or general moral opposition by a pharmacist or pharmacy to the given medication." In other words, the entire success of the law they declare "nuetral" and "generally applicable" will be determined by its effect on religious people.
The Ninth Circuit itself quotes Supreme Court precedent to support the idea that the district court should not have looked to legislative history to determine whether a law is nuetral. The Ninth Circuit writes that "Justice Scalia, the author of the Smith opinion," one of the main cases the Ninth Circuit relies upon, "explained that the Free Exercise Clause 'does not refer to the purposes for which legislators enact laws, but to the effects of the laws enacted.'” How does that then square with the apellate court's own declaration that the increase in the avaliability of medication "depends on how many people are able to get medication that they might previously have been denied based on religious or general moral opposition by a pharmacist or pharmacy to the given medication"?
Businesses, including pharmacies, should be able to sell what they wish without government intervention forcing them to sell a product they find morally repulsive. When the government forces a religious person in a specific business to sell a specific product, in violation of his legitimate and deeply held religious and moral convictions, then common sense dictates that there may in fact be a serious conflict with the First Amendment's ban on government laws that "prohibit the free exercise" of religion.
Justice Ginsburg: When Roe Was Decided I Thought There Was Particular Concern About The "Growth In Populations That We Don’t Want To Have Too Many Of"
Associate Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was interviewed by thew New York Times recently. Remember that Ginsburg was involved in legal issues at the time. She had established in 1970 the first law journal exclusively devoted to feminist issues and held a tenured position at Columbia from 1972-80. And her perception of the Court's intent in Roe v. Wade is astonishing. For seven years she though the purpose of Roe was to rid the country of undesirables. She thought this was the case for seven years. And yet I wonder whether she ever spoke up against Roe in those seven years?
The following is the relevant exchange that took place in the interview:
Q: If you were a lawyer again, what would you want to accomplish as a future feminist legal agenda?
JUSTICE GINSBURG: Reproductive choice has to be straightened out. There will never be a woman of means without choice anymore. That just seems to me so obvious. The states that had changed their abortion laws before Roe [to make abortion legal] are not going to change back. So we have a policy that affects only poor women, and it can never be otherwise, and I don’t know why this hasn’t been said more often.
Q: Are you talking about the distances women have to travel because in parts of the country, abortion is essentially unavailable, because there are so few doctors and clinics that do the procedure? And also, the lack of Medicaid for abortions for poor women?
JUSTICE GINSBURG: Yes, the ruling about that surprised me. [Harris v. McRae — in 1980 the court upheld the Hyde Amendment, which forbids the use of Medicaid for abortions.] Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of. So that Roe was going to be then set up for Medicaid funding for abortion. Which some people felt would risk coercing women into having abortions when they didn’t really want them. But when the court decided McRae, the case came out the other way. And then I realized that my perception of it had been altogether wrong.
Here is the link to the full interview: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/12/magazine/12ginsburg-t.html
Businesses That Win Federal Contracts Must Now Use E-Verify, But No-Match Rule Is Dropped
The New York Times reports that "the Obama administration will require businesses that win federal contracts to use a government electronic database system to verify that their employees have legal immigration status to work in the United States, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said on Wednesday. After a six-month review, Homeland Security officials decided to go ahead with a worker verification plan based on the electronic system, called E-Verify. The system, which the Bush administration sought to put into effect in its final months, is meant to prevent federal contractors from hiring illegal immigrants."
The New York Times reports that at the same time as the e-verify decision, "Homeland Security officials said they would drop another Bush administration proposal that would have forced employers to fire any workers whose Social Security information did not match the records of the Social Security Administration. That measure, called the no-match rule, had been challenged in federal court by immigrant advocates and businesses, who said the Social Security database contained errors that could have cost thousands of legal workers their jobs."
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