Considering the steak the Supreme Court has been on lately, I would be surprised not one bit if they ruled in favor of Hobby Lobby.
Talk about your slippery slope.
Oh thatâs adorable. You think this SCOTUS will actually go by established law to determine their ruling?
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NCSteve, your legal acumen is always appreciated. I wonder what you mean by:
âAnd I must say I have a bad feeling about this . . .â
What are your concerns? Please advise. Thanks.
I agree. I think itâs going to be a 5-4 decision against Hobby Lobby. Sure, it could go the other way, but I donât see SCOTUS wanting to open this enormous can of worms.
SUPREMES??? My GAWD, isnât it time for one of these people to retireâŚthereâs a couple of them thatâs scarcely alive.
I can totally see Roberts doing that, actually. The only reason he voted with the majority on the ACA case was to preserve the store of institutional legitimacy necessary to allow the Court to open cans of worms like this.
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So why exactly canât people purchase their own birth control? They still sell condoms at the local corner store, right?
Given the relatively cheap cost of birth control this requirement comes across as more of a thumbing of the nose to people who oppose birth control rather than denying someone the ability to attain it.
Iâm guessing theyâll say privately owned companies like Hobby Lobby can do whatever they want and the birth control insurance mandate can only be enforced at publicly traded companies. Hope Iâm wrong, but thatâs the best outcome I see with this court.
You get that preventing unplanned pregnancies actually has something to do with womenâs health, right? That, for a woman, pregnancy isnât just an economic and social matter, but rather is a thing that that entails taking on a measurable risk of death or severe health problems? And you get that pregnancy is a medical condition and that prenatal care even in problem-free pregnancies are health care costs that will be borne by the all of the people who pay premiums regardless of whether theyâve got a penis?
No? Could it be that the reason you didnât really think of it that way is that is that the health problems of those who actually have to do the childbearing arenât really real to you?
If the Court rules for Hobby Lobby, itâs game on for âreligious-basedâ discrimination. I live in Utah, but if my religious beliefs say I shouldnât do business with Mormons, so be it.
Also on my list, because of my âreligious beliefsâ:
Registered Republicans.
People who wear plaid.
People with barbed wire tattoos.
People who name their daughters âMadisonâ.
Pastafarians. Just because.
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My concern, not to put too find a point on it, is that a majority of the judges on the Court are ageing male extremely conservative Catholics, not one of whom makes the least effort to look at issues from the perspective of people who arenât conservative white males. Oh, once a decade or so, when an issue relates to racially motivated violence against a black male, Thomas does remember heâs black, but this isnât that case.
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I wish it werenât so, but I have a very bad feeling about this. If youâre going to extend corportate personhood to include first amendment protections of free speech, itâs not that big a jump to include first amendment protections of religious freedom too. Frankly, I think the fact that the court is seriously considering the latter brings into stark relief the incredible stupidity of the ruling on the former.
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Steve, I have two children and a wife. Iâm quite familiar with the costs and responsibilities of pregnancy.
My comments had nothing to do with prenatal care. It simply asked the question about why we are forcing people whose beliefs oppose birth control, pay for something that is easily acquired at any drugstore? As far as who pays, that is between the consenting adults. If they are mature enough to have sex they can decide who is buying the condoms. Or they could go halfsies.
BTW, implying that the âmeasurable risk of death or severe health problemsâ, would be alleviated because the company pays for it is a little disingenuous. If people are that concerned about the âmeasurable risk of death or severe health problemsâ, I would refer them once again to the local drugstore.
Not all birth control is a condom, and many people do not have readily available in their area. For example, I live in a town of about 900 people over two hours from the nearest store that sells condoms. However, at the local medical clinic, a woman can get a prescription for birth control that works best for her - pills, diaphragms, whatever - and even though she has to go that same two hours, it is readily available to her at a moments notice if she needs it. But this portion of the law does not deal with just regular usage birth control - it deals with the kind of birth control that is used in emergencies, such as after a rape or when someone commits incest on a young girl to prevent her from getting pregnant. These Hobby Lobby people feel that they should not have to pay for this kind of emergency care product, so no, this law is not about opposing someoneâs beliefs just to âthumbing of the noseâ, but rather about preventing unplanned and unwanted pregnancies in a manner that prevents pregnancy, rather than having to have an abortion. There is a huge difference and it is reasonable and the decent thing to do.
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I could be quite wrong, but if this decision were to be in Hobby Lobbyâs favor, it would likely ave been announced already.
The fact that the Supremes are waiting until Monday makes it seem like it will be 5-4 against the religious nuts.
I agree that Hobby Lobby absolutely doesnât care about birth control. I read in Mother Jones that Hobby Lobby holds $73 million in mutual funds for its 401(K) including investments in companies that produce emergency contraceptives (Plan B, Ella), abortion inducing medication, copper IUD and hormonal IUD - all of which Hobby Lobby claims they have a religious objection to providing their employees. And yet theyâre not only willing to have these pharmaceutical companies in their 401(K) plan, they also offer company matching. So they are willing to pay for stock in companies that produce these health products in order to help their employees make money for retirement but wonât pay for these health products when their employees need them for their actual health.
No, Hobby Lobby doesnât care about emergency contraception one bit. They only care about the image theyâve cultivated as a good Christian store.
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The result is predictable. Corporations will be able to express religious beliefs. Just like they have âspeechâ. The only thing a Corporation will have separate from their owners is limited legal liability. Monday will be a very sad day for jurisprudence.
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OK, thanks.
We know how the K_RATS are gonna decideâŚ
Roberts got the word on his KochKoalition âdecider textâ thingy.
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