In a landmark opinion, the Supreme Court ruled Friday that states cannot ban same-sex marriage, establishing a new civil right and handing gay rights advocates a victory that until very recently would have seemed unthinkable.
The 5-4 ruling had Justice Anthony Kennedy writing for the majority with the four liberal justices. Each of the four conservative justices wrote their own dissent.
The far-reaching decision settles one of the major civil rights fights of this era — one that has rapidly evolved in the minds of the American pubic and its leaders, including President Barack Obama. He struggled publicly with the issue and ultimately embraced same-sex marriage in the months before his 2012 re-election.
“No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice and family,” Kennedy wrote. “In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than they once were.”
In a dissent, Justice Antonin Scalia blasted the Court’s “threat to American democracy.”
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-06-26 07:05:062016-04-11 10:59:35STATES MUST BOW TO HOMOSEXUAL MARRIAGE; SCALIA SAYS SCOTUS A “THREAT TO AMERICAN DEMOCRACY”
Photo Credit: Washington Times In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court handed President Barack Obama his second major win on his signature health care law, upholding nationwide tax subsidies for millions of Americans.
Chief Justice John Roberts, again siding with the court’s liberal wing, said in the majority opinion that Obamacare allows for residents of states that did not set up their own insurance exchanges to still receive subsidies to pay for their health coverage.
“Congress passed the Affordable Care Act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them,” Roberts wrote.
Section 1311 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act says customers should receive subsidies through an exchange “established by a state,” leaving the Supreme Court to decide how literal those words are: whether tax credits are restricted to customers in state-run exchanges, or if the federally run marketplace counts as well.
The plaintiffs had contended that the legislative language clearly means that tax subsidies to buy health insurance may only be available to states that established their own health exchanges, excluding residents in 37 states that didn’t set up an Obamcare marketplace, while the Obama administration argued the language broadly meant that all exchanges were eligible for federal tax subsidies. (Read more from “Chief Justice Roberts Leads Court Toward Tyranny in SCOTUScare Decision” HERE)
Words no longer have meaning if an Exchange that is not established by a State is “established by the State.” It is hard to come up with a clearer way to limit tax credits to state Exchanges than to use the words “established by the State.” And it is hard to come up with a reason to include the words “by the State” other than the purpose of limiting credits to state Exchanges. “[T]he plain, obvious, and rational meaning of a statute is always to be preferred to any curious, narrow, hidden sense that nothing but the exigency of a hard case and the ingenuity and study of an acute and powerful intellect would discover.” Lynch v. Alworth-Stephens Co., 267 U. S. 364, 370 (1925) (internal quotation marks omitted). Under all the usual rules of interpretation, in short, the Government should lose this case. But normal rules of interpretation seem always to yield to the overriding principle of the present Court: The Affordable Care Act must be saved.
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Today’s interpretation is not merely unnatural; it is unheard of. Who would ever have dreamt that “Exchange established by the State” means “Exchange established by the State or the Federal Government”?
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Making matters worse, the reader of the whole Act will come across a number of provisions beyond §36B that refer to the establishment of Exchanges by States. Adopting the Court’s interpretation means nullifying the term “by the State” not just once, but again and again throughout the Act. . . It is bad enough for a court to cross out “by the State” once. But seven times?
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The Court claims that the Act must equate federal and state establishment of Exchanges . . . Pure applesauce. Imagine that a university sends around a bulletin reminding every professor to take the “interests of graduate students” into account when setting office hours, but that some professors teach only undergraduates. Would anybody reason that the bulletin implicitly presupposes that every professor has “graduate students,” so that “graduate students” must really mean “graduate or undergraduate students”? Surely not. Just as one naturally reads instructions about graduate students to be inapplicable to the extent a particular professor has no such students, so too would one naturally read instructions about qualified individuals to be inapplicable to the extent a particular Exchange has no such individuals.
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The Court has not come close to presenting the compelling contextual case necessary to justify departing from the ordinary meaning of the terms of the law. Quite the contrary, context only underscores the outlandishness of the Court’s interpretation. Reading the Act as a whole leaves no doubt about the matter: “Exchange established by the State” means what it looks like it means. . .For its next defense of the indefensible, the Court turns to the Affordable Care Act’s design and purposes. . .
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The Court’s decision reflects the philosophy that judges should endure whatever interpretive distortions it takes in order to correct a supposed flaw in the statutory machinery. That philosophy ignores the American people’s decision to give Congress “[a]ll legislative Powers” enumerated in the Constitution. Art. I, §1. They made Congress, not this Court, responsible for both making laws and mending them. This Court holds only the judicial power—the power to pronounce the law as Congress has enacted it. We lack the prerogative to repair laws that do not work out in practice, just as the people lack the ability to throw us out of office if they dislike the solutions we concoct. We must always remember, therefore, that “[o]ur task is to apply the text, not to improve upon it.” Pavelic & LeFlore v. Marvel Entertainment Group, Div. of Cadence Industries Corp., 493 U. S. 120, 126 (1989).
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Even less defensible, if possible, is the Court’s claim that its interpretive approach is justified because this Act “does not reflect the type of care and deliberation that one might expect of such significant legislation.” Ante, at 14–15. It is not our place to judge the quality of the care and deliberation that went into this or any other law. A law enacted by voice vote with no deliberation whatever is fully as binding upon us as one enacted after years of study, months of committee hearings, and weeks of debate. Much less is it our place to make everything come out right when Congress does not do its job properly. It is up to Congress to design its laws with care, and it is up to the people to hold them to account if they fail to carry out that responsibility.
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Having transformed two major parts of the law, the Court today has turned its attention to a third. The Act that Congress passed makes tax credits available only on an “Exchange established by the State.” This Court, however, concludes that this limitation would prevent the rest of the Act from working as well as hoped. So it rewrites the law to make tax credits available everywhere. We should start calling this law SCOTUScare.
Perhaps the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will attain the enduring status of the Social Security Act or the Taft-Hartley Act; perhaps not. But this Court’s two decisions on the Act will surely be remembered through the years. The somersaults of statutory interpretation they have performed (“penalty” means tax, “further [Medicaid] payments to the State” means only incremental Medicaid payments to the State, “established by the State” means not established by the State) will be cited by litigants endlessly, to the confusion of honest jurisprudence. And the cases will publish forever the discouraging truth that the Supreme Court of the United States favors some laws over others, and is prepared to do whatever it takes to uphold and assist its favorites.
I dissent.
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-06-26 03:35:242016-04-11 10:59:36Chief Justice Roberts Moves Court Closer to Tyranny with SCOTUScare Decision: Laws No Longer Mean What They Say
Racial and ethnic minorities children under the age of five are now the majority as non-Hispanic white children make up an ever-smaller slice of the population, according to the Census Bureau.
New population estimates released Thursday reveal a striking shift in the composition of America’s population as racial and ethnic minority births are also outpacing minority deaths.
Meanwhile non-Hispanic whites are experiencing negative population growth, seeing 61,841 more deaths than births between 2013 and 2014.
The Census reports that in the past decade, the population has become more diverse, with the percentage of ethic and racial minorities growing from 32.9 percent to 37.9 percent over the last decade.
Indeed, the report notes that Millennials — now representing more than a quarter of the population, more than the 75.4 million Baby Boomers — are more diverse than earlier generations as 44.2 percent belong to a minority group. (Read more from “Historical First: Minority Births Outstrip Whites; Whites Hit Negative Population Growth in U.S.” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-06-26 03:33:152016-04-11 10:59:36Historical First: Minority Births Outstrip Whites; Whites Hit Negative Population Growth in U.S.
By Michael Dorstewitz. Just as conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh predicted, the American flag is now under attack, and it’s coming from the radical, race-baiting head of the Nation of Islam, Louis Farrakhan.
And while attacking the flag, Farrakhan denounced the demonstrations of racial unity that followed last week’s murder of nine black worshippers at a church Bible study in Charleston, S.C.
“White folks march with you because they don’t want you upsetting the city, they don’t give a damn about them nine,” he said . . .
He also claimed — without evidence — that police officers praised Dylann Storm Roof, the accused shooter in last week’s mass murder, telling him when they took him to Burger King after arresting him that, “You did a good job. Kill all them [bleep]” . . .
Conservatives took to social media to express their disgust over Farrakhan’s assault on Old Glory. (Read more from “Nation of Islam Leader Screams, ‘Put the AMERICAN Flag Down!’; Social Media SLAMS Back” HERE)
@Ps5725@DRUDGE_REPORT he needs to go back to the "mother ship" asap!& they call the teaparty racists! patriots have had enough. IMPEACHthem
By Bob Unruh. The New Black Panther leader whose party at one point offered a $10,000 reward for George Zimmerman, “dead or alive,” before Zimmerman was acquitted of all charges in Trayvon Martin’s death now is rhapsodizing about the possibility of violence against “slave masters” in connection with the murders of nine people at a church in Charleston, South Carolina.
At a rally there on Tuesday, Malik Zulu Shabazz called for the completion of the mission of Denmark Vesey, a slave who strategized to kill slave masters nearly two centuries ago when the church where the nine were murdered was being founded.
Breitbart reported that Shabazz also played a “prominent role in the Baltimore and Ferguson uprisings,” and now heads a group called Black Lawyers for Justice.
It was a “Save the Black Church” rally Tuesday, not far from Mother Emanuel AME Church, the scene of an attack at a prayer meeting allegedly perpetrated by Dylann Roof, now under arrest and facing nine counts of murder, as well as possible hate-crime counts from the federal government.
It was also just one of two recent incidents where black activists made suggestive comments. In fact, the promotion by Louis Farrakhan, a Nation of Islam leader, of his coming “Justice … or else!” event was being called out by another black activist over the threatening nature. (Read more from “‘Finish the Mission, Kill the Slave Masters'” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-06-26 03:32:182016-04-11 10:59:36Nation of Islam Leader Screams, ‘Put the AMERICAN Flag Down!’; Social Media SLAMS Back
Today, news and social outlets are consumed with the topic of the Confederate flag. But a question no one is tackling is what about the Hezbollah flag flying over American tanks in Iraq?
Anyone who visits the Walter Reed Hospital will immediately see the irrevocable destruction of Hezbollah. Thousands of our troops have been incapacitated and mangled by IEDs from Hezbollah and other Shiite groups in Iraq, all funded by Obama’s ally, Iran. Anyone who was around in 1983 will remember the 241 American servicemen who were killed in the Hezbollah terror attack in Beirut.
Guess what Obama is doing with them?
Eli Lake reports at Bloomberg News that our troops are sharing a base with Hezbollah-controlled Shiite forces and we are bailing them out of their humiliating loss to the Islamic State:
This collaboration with terrorist groups that have killed Americans was seen as unavoidable as the U.S. marshaled Iraqis against the Islamic State, but could prove counterproductive to U.S. interests in the long term, this official said. The militias comprise largely Shiite volunteers and are headed by the leader of the Iraqi Hezbollah, Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis. He was sanctioned in 2009 by the Treasury Department for destabilizing Iraq. Al-Muhandis is a close associate of Qassem Suleimani, the Iranian Quds Force commander, who has snapped selfies with the militia leader at key battles. Other militias that have participated in the fighting against the Islamic State include the League of the Righteous, which in 2007 carried out a brutal roadside execution of five U.S. soldiers near Karbala. The group to this day boasts of its killing of U.S. soldiers. In an interview in February, a spokesman for the militia defended the killings and said his militia had killed many more American soldiers.
Obama is risking the lives of our troops to get involved in an Islamic civil war between the two worst actors in the Middle East instead of letting them kill each other. What’s worse is that we are running air campaigns and funneling weapons to the Iranian-backed terrorists who killed and mangled thousands of America’s finest.
This report comes on the heels of the revelation that Obama has been sending Hellfire Missiles and Howitzers to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Sadly, this has been going on for months. In January, American M1 Abrams Tanks were spotted with the local version of the Hezbollah flag flying high.
If you don’t remember a national conversation about this don’t feel uninformed. It wasn’t exactly a Politico or CNN breaking news alert.
One could not possibly conjure up a more dyslexic and immoral strategy in the Middle East. On one hand, Obama is siding with Iran and Hezbollah in the theaters where they are fighting the Islamic State, instead of rooting for casualties on both sides. On the other hand, he is refusing to arm our allies, the Kurds, in the theaters where they are successfully battling IS. Instead of sending the weapons to the Kurds, the Obama administration is directing the arms to the “Iraqi army,” which is nothing but a proxy for Iran and Hezbollah.
Ash Carter, Obama’s Defense Secretary, told the Senate Armed Services Committee last week that he didn’t want to arm the Kurds because it would jeopardize the “unity” of Iraq. In other words, it would risk offending the Iranians. Congressional Democrats also blocked an amendment to the NDAA that would have provided for the direct arming of Kurdish forces.
What could be more dangerous, offensive, and immoral than sending 3,500 ground forces and our air force to arm and protect Hezbollah in an Islamic civil war?
Where is the clamoring from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH), Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC), and Reince Preibus with letters to the president demanding that we “take down the Hezbollah flag” from the base in Anbar province? Within 24 hours they were able to mobilize against the Confederate Flag; certainly they can muster the courage to stop Obama’s support of Hezbollah and endangerment of our troops.
Oh, and in case anyone forgot, the deadline for the Iran deal is a week from today. It’s clearly not as important as the Confederate flag, passing Obamatrade, and strengthening Obamacare, but can GOP leaders at least feign some degree of concern for our national security?
One can always gauge the values of a political movement by its priorities. And when it comes to the D.C. oligarchy, their priorities have hit rock bottom. (“Here’s One Flag No One Is Talking About”, originally posted HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-06-26 03:31:182016-04-11 10:59:37Here’s One Flag No One Is Talking About [+videos]
A one-digit correction to President Obama’s directive on hostage policy Wednesday had the effect of disclosing the existence of a previously unknown — and still-secret — Obama order on national security.
The hostage policy was originally released Wednesday as a presidential policy directive numbered PPD-29. When the White House corrected that number to PPD-30, it meant Obama had issued a secret directive as PPD-29 sometime in the past 17 months . . .
So what is PPD-29? No one’s talking. A spokesman for the National Security Council declined to comment of the existence of classified PPDs Wednesday.
“The only reason we know about it is the sequential numbering of the directives, and realizing they skipped a few,” said Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists, which tracks the directives.
PPD-29 isn’t the first to be tacitly acknowledged only by a missing number. Of the 30 PPDs issued by Obama, 19 have not been released. And for 11 of those, the White House has not disclosed even the subject of the order. (Read more from “Obama Has Issued 19 Secret Directives” HERE)
Speaker Boehner is doling out new punishments to conservatives. The Hill reports Boehner has defended his “tough love” actions saying, “We are in the majority. Part of being in the majority is advancing an agenda — a conservative agenda.”
Conservative agenda? This has to make one wonder what Boehner’s version of a “conservative agenda” really is.
With this article is a graphical review of the Republican-dominated House of Representatives’ accomplishments from this “conservative agenda” Boehner defends.
Those are only the accomplishments achieved during the past 6 months. There are 18 more months left of this “conservative agenda.”
Everything is backwards with GOP leadership, when Republicans dissent from the Obama agenda that Boehner is trying to rubber stamp, that is when the screws come out. Almost as if a transsexual party we have a transpolitical party, voters elected the Republican Party and what they got was a bunch of politicians that self-identify as Democrats that punish Republicans for not supporting the Obama agenda.
Now go back to The Hill article to see the hubris of the Washington Establishment on full display.
Here are some favorite quotes:
“The fact is we’ve got more than 200 rank-and-file members who are royally pissed off at those guys for voting to turn the House floor over to Nancy Pelosi,” said a senior GOP leadership aide.
See accomplishments listed above. Who is running the House floor again?
Also, what the GOP Establishment is not fessing up to is that the Obamatrade rule that governed its floor consideration contained several self-executing provisions that were intended to pass legislation without the majority of Republicans being forced to affirmatively vote for the provisions. Plain and simple: cowardice.
Here is another quote from a GOP Leadership aide:
“Taxpayer-funded travel is a privilege and not a right.”
Just to be clear, your tax dollars are being used as leverage to buy votes for liberal accomplishments to advance Boehner’s “conservative agenda.” Members are being denied those taxpayer funds to take critical national security-related trips because they disagree with….Obama’s agenda!
Apparently it’s now fair game to oust conservatives from positions of influence, hence Congressman Mark Meadows (R- NC) getting removed from his subcommittee and threats against freshman Congressmen Ken Buck (R-CO) of being pushed out as freshmen class president.
So now that the ground rules have been established that it is fine and dandy to target positions of influence, liberal Republicans won’t mind if conservatives fight fire with fire. It’s time for House conservatives to wake up to the reality of the war leadership has waged against them and decide their course of action. Will it be to sit by while more of this so-called “conservative agenda” is forced down the throats of voters? Or will it be to fight back even harder, regardless of the consequences? (“What Is Boehner’s Definition of a Conservative Agenda?”, originally posted HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-06-26 03:30:562016-04-11 10:59:37What Is RINO Boehner’s Definition of a Conservative Agenda?
The FBI has been rounding up more potential “lone wolf” terrorists, Congressional leaders and the Justice Department say, in response to the perception of a mounting threat of domestic attacks inspired by the Islamic State.
Since the thwarted attack on a “Draw Muhammad” conference in Garland, Texas, on May 3, the Justice Department has announced the arrests of 10 individuals it says were inspired by and supporting the Islamic State. The lawmakers say there have been more arrests that have not yet been announced.
They say the FBI has shifted its approach toward arrests rather than keeping suspects under surveillance, and is also targeting individuals thought to be planning attacks in the U.S., unlike the bureau’s past focus on volunteers preparing to join ISIS’s fight abroad.
“Lately, we have seen an uptick in the number of arrests of ISIL followers who were planning violent acts in our homeland,” said John Carlin, the assistant attorney general for national security. “ISIL, differing from some other foreign terrorist organizations, has demonstrated that they see value in mobilizing sympathizers anywhere in the world.”
The spate of arrests comes in response to what Congressional leaders and the Justice Department say is a mounting threat that radicalized Americans will attempt low-tech, lone wolf attacks in the near future. Lawmakers see the changes as necessary because the Islamic State uses social media so effectively to radicalize Americans and because the group is getting better at using encryption to shield its communications with new recruits. (Read more from “FBI Rounding up Islamic State Suspects” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-06-26 03:30:432016-04-11 10:59:37FBI Rounding up Islamic State Suspects
In a not totally unexpected move, Senators Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) are exploring ways to reintroduce and pass legislation similar to their bill that was rejected by the Senate by 54 to 46 (60 votes were needed for passage) back in 2013. That rejected bill— which was described as a “compromise” measure — would have expanded background checks to include sales made at guns shows and online in addition to the already-required checks for buyers purchasing firearms made from licensed commercial gun dealers.
The senators’ attempt to revive their 2013 bill is not unexpected in the wake of the recent tragic shooting in Charleston because their original legislation was created as a response to the December 2012 shooting spree by a lone gunman that killed 20 school children and six adults at the Sandy Hook elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut. After such highly publicized mass shootings occur, gun control advocates routinely capitalize on the natural horror resulting from such tragic events to pin the blame on the weapons, themselves, rather than on the unbalanced individuals who wielded them.
Before the Sandy Hook shootings, the same reaction resulted from the Columbine High School massacre in 1999, the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007, and the Fort Hood shooting in 2009. Lost amidst all the grief and emotions is the realization that each of these shootings occurred among a group of unarmed, defenseless people, who might have defended themselves had the personal possession of firearms not been so heavily restricted.
Once again, while emotions over the Charleston shooting still run high, Manchin and Toomey are dusting off their repertoire. However, they are proceeding with caution.
Toomey told the Washington Post he was trying to figure out if there was “something that could get the support of the 60 votes that we would need in the Senate.” Elizabeth Anderson, a spokesperson for Toomey, said that it would be erroneous to describe the senator’s efforts as “revisiting” his 2013 bill, but he “is open to exploring” legislative options. (Read more from “Senators Manchin and Toomey Consider Reviving Failed Gun Control Legislation” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2015-06-26 03:30:122016-04-11 10:59:38GOP Senator Pat Toomey Trying to Revive Failed Gun Control Legislation
Carl Icahn warned investors on Wednesday that he believes the market is “extremely overheated—especially high-yield bonds.” ( Tweet This)
“I think the public is walking into a trap again as they did in 2007,” the activist investor told CNBC’s “Fast Money Halftime Report.” “I think it’s almost the duty of well-respected investors, like myself I hope, to warn people, to tell people, that really you are making errors.”
Icahn compared the current market situation to the prerecession days, when mortgage-backed securities were being widely sold. “It’s almost deja vu,” he said. Many companies are selling at huge multiples and reporting earnings that are “sort of fudged” due to various accounting methods, he said.
“I do think you are going to have a dramatic pullback, certain things may happen,” he said. To remedy this, Icahn would like to see the government and regulators look at the way earnings and guidance are reported by companies. (Read more from “Investor: Markets ‘Extremely Overheated,’ Especially in Junk Bonds” HERE)
