Important developments in Utah same-sex marriage case

After the US District Court judge Robert Shelby declared on Friday that the Utah ban on same-sex marriage was unconstitutional, marriage licenses started being issued while the government filed a motion with him asking him to stay his order pending appeal. The government, perhaps fearing that many more same-sex couples would get married while the judge considered their motion for a stay, also filed an emergency motion with the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals asking them to immediately impose a stay. [Read more…]

The Duck Dynasty flap

It is a measure of how out of touch I am with popular culture that I often learn about a media phenomenon only long after it has been around or if it goes down in flames. Sometimes the names associated with the phenomenon (Honey Boo Boo, Miley Cyrus, the Kardashians) lurk in the fringes of my consciousness because the news headlines feature them but I know next to nothing about them. [Read more…]

Three antidiscrimination cases

I wrote recently about the Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties case that is pending before the US Supreme Court that will test the limits of the Free Exercise of religion clause of the First Amendment and the reach of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 that says that any government action that impinges on a person’s religious freedom must have ‘compelling interest’ and no other less restrictive choice of action to achieve its ends. [Read more…]

My recommendations for the holidays

Blogging will be more sporadic over the holidays as I will be together with my children and their significant others. Now that they are older and living independent lives elsewhere, these times together are few and far between and to be savored. I thought that I would pass on a couple of personal recommendations. Others should feel free to add their own in the comments. [Read more…]

Medicaid expansion in Ohio survives court challenge

The good news out of Ohio is that the Medicaid expansion program has been upheld by the courts. This was part of the Affordable Care Act that was meant to take care of the people who fell into a gap, who earned too much (although still poor) to be eligible for Medicaid but did not earn enough to get affordable insurance through the new health exchanges. [Read more…]

Two more states declare ban on same-sex marriages to be unconstitutional

The New Mexico Supreme Court ruled on Thursday in a unanimous that the ban on same-sex marriage in unconstitutional, making it the 17th state to do so. This was not such a big surprise. The same court had ruled in August 22 of this year that a photographer could not deny services to a same-sex couple. (I will write more about this case later because it offers some interesting features.) [Read more…]

The NSA enters the world of make believe

Stephen Colbert takes a look at what the NSA is up to in the virtual worlds of World of Warcraft and Second Life, while the FBI spies on people through their computer webcams. It is easy to see how the people doing this might have started out justifying it as a way of fighting terrorism but that it acquired a life of its own and became an addiction. Like World of Warcraft and Second Life, in fact. [Read more…]