“The U.S. Supreme Court has spoken and ruled state same-sex marriage bans to be unconstitutional. While 70 percent of Nebraskans approved our amendment to our state constitution that defined marriage as only between a man and a woman, the highest court in the land has ruled states cannot place limits on marriage between same-sex couples. We will follow the law and respect the ruling outlined by the court.”The first lie was the assertion that 70% of Nebraskans disapproved of gay marriage. The actual figure, of course, was 70% of the people who went to the polls in 2000 to vote on the issue. Ricketts' second lie was his pledge to follow the law and respect the ruling.
The Nebraska chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union asked a Nebraska federal judge on Thursday to issue an injunction ordering the state to list both same-sex spouses as parents on birth certificates of children born to same-sex couples.The request is being reviewed by the Nebraska Attorney General's office.
The Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services has refused to “provide married same-sex couples birth certificates for their children on the same terms and conditions as married different-sex couples,” the ACLU wrote in court records.Since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in late June that same-sex couples could marry, at least two same-sex couples in Nebraska — including the Wagners — have been unable to list both of their names on the birth certificates of their newborns.In the high court’s ruling, the ACLU said, birth certificates were listed as one of the many marital protections that must be provided equally to married same-sex couples.On Thursday, the Nebraska Office of Vital Records and Statistics confirmed the birth certificate form is still the same as it was before the same-sex marriage opinion.“We continue to evaluate the impact of the Supreme Court decision on programs within our agency,” Leah Bucco-White, a spokeswoman for DHHS, wrote in an email.
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| Links to ABC's story about WebMD and the Mayo Clinic's web site no longer seem to work. |
For many generic drugs, industry consolidation has left only one or two companies making a particular medicine. That's led to lengthy shortages for an increasing number of crucial medicines, driving up prices, particularly for drugs for infections, blood pressure and seizures. Even without shortages, prices have jumped tenfold or more for generics only made by one or two companies.The blame for the status of the U.S. status as the most expensive place on earth to get medicinal drugs lies squarely at the threshold of the GOP and the pharmaceutical lobby. Said the Times in an editorial on Tuesday:
At Republican insistence, that law barred the federal government from negotiating with drug manufacturers. It relied on bargaining by private insurers that manage drug benefits for Medicare patients, like UnitedHealth, Aetna and CVS Caremark, to wring discounts from the drug makers.
That wasn’t enough.The Congressional Budget Office has long concluded that curbing Medicare drug spending requires that federal officials have stronger tools, like the power to offer preferential treatment to drug makers that offer big discounts... Congressional Republicans would no doubt balk at having the federal government negotiate Medicare drug prices, but the public is clamoring for action, and it’s the right thing to do.
The road trip was Volkswagen's undoing. When the West Virginia team returned to Los Angeles, they were befuddled by the test results. In theory, the Passat should have spewed the lowest levels of pollutants among the three cars. Equipped with the more modern selective catalytic reduction technology, the team expected to find minimal levels of nitrogen oxide. But the car, which had been certified at a California Air Resources Board facility prior to the start of the road trip, had elevated levels of NOx that were 20 times the baseline levels established beforehand.And how did the software know the vehicle was subjected to an EPA test so it could turn on the vehicle's emissions control equipment just for the test? ComputerWorld described how easy that would be:
The researchers, comprised of professors Gregory Thompson and Dan Carder and students Marc Besch and Thiruvengadam, knew their on-board equipment functioned properly because, early in their research, they had double-checked its accuracy after recording sky-high NOx readings from the Jetta that showed 30 times the level of its baseline testing at the CARB facility. It was particularly noteworthy because the Jetta contained the first-generation Lean NOx Trap technology, not the more efficient SCR, yet both produced large discrepancies. The BMW, on the other hand, performed as expected.
...modern cars can sense when a hood is open for dynamometer testing, "so a smart hood switch could double as a defeat device."Below, a 1997 VW ad for its Golf, aired during the coming out episode of Ellen. VW denied that the actors in the ad were depicting a gay couple and that settled any such suspicions because HEY! — would Volkswagen lie to you?
Or, another sensor could detect when a vehicle's traction control unit was disabled, which is required during emissions testing, and place the emission system into a different mode.
"The possibilities are almost endless," [Arvind Thiruvengadam] told Autoblog. "I'm pretty sure that if you're one of the largest car manufacturers, you could do a lot more."
According to the EPA's violation letter to Volkswagen, dated Sept. 18, "the position of the steering wheel, vehicle speed, the duration of the engine’s operation, and barometric pressure" -- all very specific indicators of an emissions test -- acted as the activation switch for the "defeat device".
He [the attorney] said he received a letter in April from a chief underwriter for Mutual of Omaha denying his appeal. "We do not offer coverage to anyone who takes the medication Truvada, regardless of whether it is prescribed to treat HIV infection, or is used for pre-exposure prophylaxis. This in accordance with our underwriting guidelines," the letter said, according to the complaint.From Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders (GLAD):
Doe alleges that Mutual of Omaha discriminated against him based on sexual orientation and disability, in this case, an assumption that Doe will in the future contract HIV, a health condition covered by the state's antidiscrimination law.
Dr. Kenneth Mayer, a professor at Harvard Medical School and director of HIV Prevention Research at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, said he doesn't understand why Mutual of Omaha would reject an applicant for long-term care insurance because he is taking Truvada.
"The last thing we want to do is discourage people from using this preventive mediation," Mayer said. "The goal is to eradicate the number of new HIV infections."
“Mutual of Omaha’s denial is nonsensical,” said Bennett Klein, Senior Attorney and AIDS Law Project Director at GLAD. “If our client were not taking Truvada, not protecting his health and the health of others, he would have received the insurance. We should be well beyond the days when insurers make decisions based on fear and stereotypes about HIV. The assumption is that gay male sexuality is inherently risky and unhealthy, and that’s just wrong.”In 1998 Lambda Legal and the AIDS Legal Council of Chicago sued Mutual for capping HIV-related care at a fraction of the amount allowed for other illnesses or conditions.
“The governor’s sponsorship of the referendum would show formally that rather than prepare to support, enforce and execute this duly passed law, he has instead aligned himself, his political allies and persons directly controlled and organized by him and sponsored this referendum,” stated the lawsuit, filed in Lancaster County District Court.Ricketts was unavailable for comment as he is absent from the state again on a "trade mission" to China and Japan, shortly after returning from a similar jaunt through Europe.
“He has with his personal and family fortune largely financed the attempt to do away with a law he disfavors.”
The lawsuit said the governor told state lawmakers that if they didn’t uphold his veto of the death penalty repeal, a referendum would be launched.
Nebraskans for Public Safety files lawsuit challenging death penalty referendum
September 17, 2015 - For Immediate Release
Contact: Alan Peterson, General Counsel, Nebraskans for Public Safety, 402-416-3633 alanepeterson@gmail.com NEBRASKANS FOR PUBLIC SAFETY FILES LAWSUIT CHALLENGING DEATH PENALTY REFERENDUM
LINCOLN, Neb – Nebraskans for Public Safety filed suit in Lancaster County District Court today challenging the legal sufficiency of the death penalty referendum petition. The suit was filed on behalf of Lincoln residents and longtime death penalty opponents Christy and Richard Hargesheimer who are taxpayers concerned about the petition process. The named defendants are Secretary of State John Gale in his official capacity, Aimee Melton, Bob Evnen, Judy Glasburner, and Nebraskans for the Death Penalty, Inc. Click here to view a copy of the initial filing: http://nebraskansforpublicsafety.org/uploads/Complaint_FILE_STAMPED.pdf
The legal team representing the Hargesheimers include some of Nebraska’s leading and experienced attorneys: Alan Peterson, Jerry Soucie, Amy Miller, and Christopher Eickholt.
“All Nebraskans support our robust tradition of direct democracy-including referendum campaigns. However, all Nebraskans also want a fair process where everyone plays by the rules. In the case of the death penalty referendum it is clear that Governor Ricketts and his supporters failed to do their due diligence and appeared to have cut corners. That undermines the integrity of the referendum process and that has legal consequences,” said Alan Peterson, lead counsel.
“We look forward to having our day in court and defending a fair process for everyone. Nebraskans know the death penalty is broken beyond repair and belongs in our past. Powerful interests like the Governor are not entitled to their own set of rules to pursue their own political objectives. We are looking forward to having these issues decided outside of the political arena and before an impartial judiciary,” said Christy Hargesheimer.
Nebraskans for Public Safety is a campaign committee organized to oppose the death penalty referendum. It is a statewide coalition conducting public education on smart alternatives to the death penalty -- such as life in prison without parole -- that put public safety first. Members include fiscal conservatives, faith leaders, victims’ families, and traditional death penalty opponents. Visit our website or follow us on Facebook and Twitter.
Many downtown employees, such as wait staff at restaurants, are likely to be less than thrilled about the changes. Asked about that Wednesday, Smith predicted that the changes will benefit restaurant workers, because easier parking would generate more customers.Hi! We're Republicans from the
This photo will do nothing to throw cold water on persistent rumors about Uncle Walt's supposed bi- or homosexuality. The picture was taken during a cartoonist's strike in 1941 during which Disney took out a full page ad in Variety attributing the malcontentedness on the Disney plantation to "communistic" influences and not the fact that some Disney artists made $12 a week with no overtime while others made hundreds. In his absence, Walt left union negotiations to his brother Roy, who gave the union commies nearly everything they asked for. When Walt returned, he had his secretary separate the strikers' files from those who didn't picket, for future retribution. The screencap is from this week's American Experience two-part bio on Disney.
It would do many things, but one thing it would not do is defend the First Amendment. To the contrary, it would deliberately warp the bedrock principle of religious freedom under the Constitution.
The bill, versions of which have been circulating since 2013, gained a sudden wave of support after the Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage nationwide. It is being hawked with the specter of clergy members being forced to officiate such marriages. This is a ploy, as the bill’s backers surely know: There has never been any doubt that the First Amendment protects members of the clergy from performing weddings against their will.
In reality, the act would bar the federal government from taking “any discriminatory action” — including the denial of tax benefits, grants, contracts or licenses — against those who oppose same-sex marriage for religious or moral reasons. In other words, it would use taxpayers’ money to negate federal anti-discrimination measures protecting gays and lesbians, using the idea of religious freedom as cover.
Attacking LGBTs in House:
Rep. Jeff Fortenberry
For example, a religiously affiliated college that receives federal grants could fire a professor simply for being gay and still receive those grants. Or federal workers could refuse to process the tax returns of same-sex couples simply because of bigotry against their marriages...
...Millions of Swifties and KatyCats—as well as Beliebers, Barbz, and Selenators, and the Rihanna Navy—would be stunned by the revelation that a handful of people, a crazily high percentage of them middle-aged Scandinavian men, write most of America’s pop hits....A short-attention-span culture demands short-attention-span songs. The writers of Tin Pan Alley and Motown had to write only one killer hook to get a hit. Now you need a new high every seven seconds—the average length of time a listener will give a radio station before changing the channel. “It’s not enough to have one hook anymore,” Jay Brown, a co-founder of Jay Z’s Roc Nation label, tells Seabrook. “You’ve got to have a hook in the intro, a hook in the pre, a hook in the chorus, and a hook in the bridge, too.”
Couples who sued in many states are now pursuing further orders, including an award of lawyers’ fees. In response, Nebraska’s lawyers have now gone further than other states have, seeking en banc review of the dispute by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.Nevertheless, Peterson now wants an en banc review of the three-judge, Eighth Circuit panel's rejection of his arguments, meaning that he wants to waste the time of eight judges, not just three.
A three-judge panel of the Eighth Circuit on August 11 rejected Nebraska’s argument that the Nebraska case, Waters v. Ricketts, was now moot and should be dismissed without a final order in the couples’ favor. The panel said that the Supreme Court had only struck down four states’ bans specifically — not including Nebraska’s — and did not rule on any couples’ right to state benefits that go with marriage. Like other couples, the seven couples in that state had sued not only to get the chance to marry, but to gain its benefits.
While noting that state officials had assured the Eighth Circuit that they stopped enforcing that state’s ban as soon as the Supreme Court had ruled, the panel said the state had not yet “repealed or amended” its ban. “Nebraska’s assurances of compliance…do not moot the case,” it declared...
You can read Pride At Work's anti-HRC resolution at the Advocate by clicking on the top link. We were unable find it Wednesday on Pride At Work's website, if it exists there at all.
Although Pride at Work leaders tell The Advocate that several companies with anti-union practices and demonstrated hostility toward LGBT employees continue to receive high scores on HRC’s CEI, the resolution calls out one particularly egregious example: Walmart, which received a score of 90 (out of a possible 100) on the most recent CEI, the same year the retail chain’s policies were ruled unlawfully discriminatory in a case filed by a lesbian employee after Walmart refused to allow her to add her cancer-stricken wife to her company insurance plan. That suit, initially filed by Jacqueline Cote, has now become a class-action lawsuit alleging that Walmart systematically discriminated against its employees in same-sex relationships.
...Pride at Work executive director Jerame Davis explains to The Advocate. “Union contracts that include LGBT nondiscrimination policies not only require a company to have a policy on the books, but they also force a company to adhere to those policies in a real way. A union collective bargaining agreement gives workers a process by which they can address discrimination and unfair work practices with their employer that other workers simply don’t have. When more than half of the states in the union do not protect workers on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity or expression, union-busting is very much an LGBT issue, but HRC apparently doesn’t see it that way.”
...“What’s more, the CEI doesn’t account for a corporation’s compliance with their own policies,” continues Davis. “HRC will readily admit they have no ability to verify that the policies they grade in the CEI are actually followed by the company. So, not only do they not grade employers on their willingness to let workers organize a union, they have no actual means of ensuring these companies they give high marks are actually treating their LGBT workers with the dignity and respect they deserve.”
Over at Slate, Mark Joseph Stern wonders if the well-heeled Liberty Counsel isn't hanging Kim Davis out to dry while milking her case for publicity and donations.To quote Justice Antonin Scalia in a recent case involving another First Amendment claim of religious freedom, “This is really easy.”In short, Ms. Davis has no right, constitutional or otherwise, to refuse to do the job Kentucky pays her to do. As a municipal official, she is required to issue marriage licenses to anyone who may legally get married. Since June 26, when the Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution forbids states to ban same-sex marriage, that population includes April Miller, Karen Roberts, David Ermold and David Moore — the two couples she rebuffed on Tuesday.The Davises don’t seem to understand the two-sided game they’re playing, appealing to the Constitution even as they violate it. Perhaps they forgot that the First Amendment protects the people from the government, not the other way around... it’s worth repeating once again: No one is telling Ms. Davis what she may or may not believe, or how to live her own life in accord with the dictates of her conscience and her God. What they are saying is that as an employee and representative of the government, she lives under the law, not above it.
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| KY Atty Gen. Jack Conway, who said in 2013:“I know where history is going on this...From a legal standpoint I draw the line at discrimination." |
A motion was filed Tuesday, asking U.S. District Judge David Bunning to hold Davis in contempt. Bunning scheduled a contempt hearing for 11 a.m. Thursday in Ashland. At that time, the gay couples will have to present evidence, which could include testimony from Davis herself. Bunning would then decide on punishment. That could include fines, jail time or both, but the motion asks the judgeBelow, a second couple, David Moore and David Ermold, whose marriage license application also was rejected a fourth time this morning by Kim Davis' office, demand that Davis issue them a marriage license.
Public
opinion, according to WKYT's nonscientific poll, is not running in
favor of County Clerk Kim Davis, the devout traditional marriage advocate who has
been married four times.
