Civil & Human Rights

Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s New Year’s Eve

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

For those of you who still watch the ball drop in Times Square on New Year's Eve, you saw U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor start the ball drop.

Sotomayor
Pearl Gabel/New York Daily News

But before Justice Sotomayor joined revelers at Times Square, she had a busy evening issuing orders in appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Several groups of Roman Catholic universities, schools, and charity organizations on Tuesday afternoon began filing a series of requests for the Supreme Court to delay enforcement of the contraceptive mandate in the new federal health care law. Lyle Denniston at SCOTUSblog reports, New challenges to birth-control mandate (UPDATED):

UPDATE 11:21 p.m.  In a case from the Tenth Circuit Court, Justice Sonia Sotomayor temporarily blocked enforcement of the mandate against the institutions in that case, while she awaits a response from the federal government, due by 10 a.m. on Friday.  Four separate applications were filed from different federal Circuits, but not all sought immediate relief.

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The Court has already agreed to hear constitutional challenges to the Affordable Care Act’s mandate on birth control and other pregnancy-related services, in the cases of Sebelius v.  Hobby Lobby Stores (docket 13-354) and Conestoga Wood Specialties v. Sebelius (13-356). The Court has not yet scheduled those cases for oral argument.  Briefing in those two is now in progress.

Advanced directive? Maybe not, if you’re a lady with a Holy Fetus inside her

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I had not planned to do any blogging over the holidays but then there was this whitehot-rage-inducing item in the news today:

Marlise Munoz, 33, is in serious condition in the intensive care unit at John Peter Smith Hospital in Fort Worth, Texas, hospital officials said. She is unconscious and on a ventilator, her husband told CNN affiliate WFAA, but she wouldn't have wanted her life sustained by a machine.

"We talked about it. We're both paramedics," he told WFAA. "We've seen things out in the field. We both knew that we both didn't want to be on life support."

Complicating an already difficult situation is that Munoz is also pregnant, about 18 weeks along, WFAA reported. Texas state law prohibits withdrawing or withholding life-sustaining treatment from a pregnant patient, regardless of her wishes.

Fruity or Oaky? Rambling Thoughts on White People Problems

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by Pamela Powers Hannley

My coffee table book is too large for my coffee table.

My Internet connection is too slow.

My dishwasher doesn’t really get the dishes clean.

iPads should have a USB connection.

I can’t remember all of my passwords.

Will Wall Street gambling hurt by 401K’s performance?

My car is annoying. The on-board computer tells me when to add air to the tires, when someone’s seatbelt is undone, and when it needs to go to the shop for service.

I hate it when I find a good recipe on the Internet and then can’t find it again.

Cable TV is too expensive for what your get. NetFlix is the way to go– or just plug the laptop into the flat screen TV.

I give my dog a daily dab of Greek yogurt with her dog food because she farts too much.

National Youth Summit ‘Freedom Summer’ Free Webcast

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

2014 is the 50th Anniversary of the "Freedom Summer" Mississippi voter registration project. I am old enough to remember the news reports each evening about this voting rights effort. I have had the privilege and honor of meeting several participants in Freedom Summer.

For those of you not old enough to have lived during this era, I wonder whether the Civil Rights Movement is even taught in schools at all.

There are far too many people who take their "right to vote" for granted, and choose to forget that people had to fight for your right. They risked their lives and went to prison, were beaten, and were killed for the right to vote that so many take for granted today.

The Smithsonian National Musueum of American History has an educational program on Freedom Summer scheduled for February 5, 2014, during Black History Month. O Say Can You See? Blog: Freedom Summer:

Remembering the civil rights movement at the grassroots

Joy Lyman, one of the museum's Freedom School Scholars, will moderate the National Youth Summit on Freedom Summer on February 5, 2014. Joy hosts the latest episode of the History Explorer podcast series, featuring the experiences of activist Zoharah Simmons from a presentation by the museum's Program in African American Culture in 2000 called "Fighting for My Rights." Joy reflects on how the Civil Rights Movement can be better taught to encompass the complexity of the story.

FreedomSummer

The National Youth Summit on Freedom Summer will be held February 5, 2014 and webcast live from Jackson, Mississippi

Arizona needs a ‘Moral Mondays’ movement

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The most fascinating political development of 2013 to observe was the rise of the progressive "Moral Mondays" movement in North Carolina in response to the radicalized extremist Tea-Publican controlled state legislature.

"Moral Mondays" engages in civil disobedience protests, organized in part by local religious leaders including William Barber, head of the North Carolina chapter of the NAACP. Members of the protest movement meet every Monday to protest an action by the North Carolina legislature and then enter the legislature building. Once they enter, a number are peacefully arrested each Monday.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution recently reported that a Moral Mondays organization was being established in Georgia. Your daily jolt: Moral Monday protests coming to state Capitol:

The Moral Monday protests that rocked North Carolina (and led to hundreds of arrests each Monday) last year may be coming to Georgia.

A group called Moral Monday Georgia (moralmondayga.org) has quietly begun gathering supporters and planning organizing meetings this month. They plan one of the first actions on the Jan. 13, the first Monday of the session, and the platform focuses on a call to expand Medicaid, restore funding to public schools and raising the minimum wage.

On Christmas Day, the AP reported that the "Moral Mondays" movement will spread to other Southern States (i.e., Red States). Moral Mondays to continue, spread to other states:

The Moral Monday movement to protest changes in North Carolina public policy that organizers believe are extreme and hurt the state won’t abate in 2014 and will spread to other states, its leader said.

Activists from a dozen states attended a meeting in Raleigh earlier this month to learn how to hold similar protests in their states.