Pin drop! Obama lawyer stuns Supreme justice

WND ^ | 3/25/2014 | GREG COROMBOS

[Beave Meister]

In a dramatic moment at the Supreme Court Tuesday, Solicitor General Donald Verrilli told justices that U.S. business owners have no religious freedom to reject government mandates forcing them to cover abortions.

Justices and lawyers also sparred over whether businesses actually have religious freedom and whether striking down the Obamacare mandate makes women second-class citizens.

The notable abortion exchange between Verrilli and Justice Anthony Kennedy came during oral arguments in Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties v. Sebelius, two cases linked by the companies’ owners objecting to the Department of Health and Human Services requirement that businesses fully cover the contraception costs for their employees. That mandate includes coverage of abortafacient drugs, also known as the “morning-after pill.”

Family Research Council Senior Fellow for Legal Studies Cathy Ruse was in the gallery during oral arguments and said that was the most remarkable moment in the court session Tuesday.

“This was actually the most exciting part of the oral argument this morning, when Justice Kennedy asked the government’s lawyer, ‘So under your argument, corporations could be forced to pay for abortions, that there would be no religious claim against that on the part of the corporation. Is that right?’ And the government’s attorney said yes,” Ruse said.

“You could hear a pin drop, and I think that stunned Justice Kennedy. Since he’s always the swing vote, you want to stun him in a way that pushes him over to your side of the column,” she said.

[Talisker]

It was decided in Citizens United that one of these pseudopersons still had the 1st amendment right of free speech. So why can’t it practice a religion?

The ONLY basis of corporate court decisions is to what best benefits the State. And the word "rights' is grossly misused - corporations have only privileges. The media screws this up all the time, and lawyers and even judges do it too, because there's no law that prevents them from SAYING it - it still doesn't change the privilege into a right. even then, they are very careful to codify it, such as saying they are "determining" a right, or the "limits" to a right. Well, in REAL rights, they have no such powers. So by using these terms, they are indicating that they are talking about privileges - because that's the only thing they COULD talk about like this. And why do they do this? So people won't catch on!

So given that, privileges cannot be compared to rights. Privileges are whatever combinations of freedom to act that the government grants - ANY combination, or none at all. So speech and not religion is fine for privileges. Not for rights - but this isn't about rights, otherwise ALL the rights would have to be acknowledged as pre-existing and unlimited - and they certainly are not!

[Talisker]

“Chief Justice Roberts raised the point that corporations can actually file racial discrimination claims. So he said if a corporation can have a race, why can’t it have a religious claim? The government’s attorney didn’t really have an answer for that,” Ruse said."

He had an answer - he just didn't say it. The answer is that corporations can have any privilege that best serves the needs of the State. So if it serves the needs of the State for corporations to have a "race" - then bingo, they have a race. And if the State decides someday corporations cannot have a race - then bingo, they can't. That's corporate law. It is EXACTLY the same as a person running a business, and deciding some division will sell cars one day, then sell soap the next, and then go back to cars later. Exactly the same.

So given this definition of terms, Roberts was basically asking the government lawyer if he could think of a reason that would benefit the State to extend religious privileges to corporations, similiar to the way race privileges were extended to corporations - and the government lawyer couldn't think of a reason.

[OneWingedShark]

No, the decision is crap; I read half of it and gave up in disgust — and I've read some bad decisions like Roe, Wickard, Schenick, Raich... the ACA decision read worse than some bad fanfiction in logical construction (granted, without the horrible grammar and spelling).

No, that is just shit.
Don't go around telling people it's not.

[MacMattico]

Simply put, Hobby Lobby doesn't even have to provide insurance.

Yes, there’d be a huge fine, a tax, leveled by the government, But by the government sticking their nose in, they may take all insurance away from all Hobby Lobby employees, which the owners of Hobby Lobby say they have always wanted to provide, even before the ACA. Yet the dems are so pig headed and stuck on abortion, a few murdering drugs MUST be covered at all costs. Obama doesn't care about women or the employees at hobby lobby. He cares about control. My daughter needed braces for medical (jaw) reasons not for vanity reasons. Our plan covered $1900 of the $6,000 cost. She's a female that had a pressing health concern. But it wasn't in our plan and isn't a right so we paid.

[Wuli]

a corporation is owned by people

it is an entity based on that ownership

ownership is property

an owner whose property can be turned against his religious principles is an owner whose “private property” is a fiction

no private property and you can kiss most your other rights goodbye as well

controlling private property is the road to total control

[OneWingedShark]

And the word "rights' is grossly misused - corporations have only privileges.

You are wrong — if a corporation files a patent then it has certain legal rights — it has exactly those same rights of a person who had filed a patent.

What you are doing is conflating natural rights and rights in general; it is the natural right which a person has by virtue of being a person.

[OneWingedShark]

For forty years, the Left has been working to undermine the Constitution. This effort has been pursued on many fronts, but some of the most subtle attacks have been against the freedoms spelled out in the Bill of Rights.

The biggest subversion of the Bill of Rights has been pursued by Republicans, to wit the War on Drugs.
As I posted on another thread about the supreme court when Scaila came up:

Revel: It is time to understand the USSC is a lawless bunch who rule for political and devilish reasons.
Theoria: That was Scalia and crew with Heller. They helped put limitations on gun ‘rights’.

Despite what some people think, Scalia is not a Constitutionalist; support of the War on Drugs and Constitutionalism are mutually exclusive, as the War on Drugs has damaged 90% of the Bill of Rights:

Amendment 10 — Destroyed by combining “necessary and proper” with the intrastate/interstate regulation of Wickard.
Amendment  9 — Everything. Seriously, EVERYTHING about the War on Drugs is about the federal government exercising powers not expressly delegated by the Constitution.
From Justice Thomas’s Dissent in Raich:

“If the Federal Government can regulate growing a half-dozen cannabis plants for personal consumption (not because it is interstate commerce, but because it is inextricably bound up with interstate commerce), then Congress’ Article I powers – as expanded by the Necessary and Proper Clause – have no meaningful limits.”

Amendment  8 — Mandatory minimums and zero tolerance combine to make the punishments outweigh many of the “crimes”, even is you accept the crime as valid.
Amendment  7 — In [civil] asset forfeiture, the victims are routinely denied jury-trials even though the amount in controversy exceeds $20.
Amendment  6 — The clogging of the courts with drug-related cases erodes the notion of a “speedy trial” to a joke. Often drug charges are added on to the list of crimes, which can “taint” the jury w/ prejudices. Often police act on informants whose identities are “protected”, which impairs the ability to confront the accuser.
Amendment  5 — How does “Comprehensive Forfeiture Act of 1984” comply with “No person shall [...] be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law”?
Amendment  4 — Kentucky v King

”The Fourth Amendment expressly imposes two requirements: All searches and seizures must be reasonable; and a warrant may not be issued unless probable cause is properly established and the scope of the authorized search is set out with particularity. [...] The proper test follows from the principle that permits warrantless searches: warrantless searches are allowed when the circumstances make it reasonable, within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment , to dispense with the warrant requirement.”

In other words: Yes, the fourth amendment requires warrants for searches, but… fuck that!

Amendment  3 — [Nope, nothing here... yet.]
Amendment  2 — Arguably, the “prohibited persons” from the `68 GCA.
Amendment  1 — Religious freedom is denied via the war on drugs ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employment_Division_v._Smith ), there are stories of “legalization”-advocacy publishers being raided/harassed.

Or, to put it into a picture format that describes the political situation:

[OneWingedShark]

All corporations exist for the needs of the State, because legally they are extensions of the State and find their creation in the State - that's why they can be taxed and regulated BY the State.

Ah, but the people are taxed by the state, are they not?
And if they were to assemble, armed as if to war, then would they not be militia (and arguably regulated by the state)?

Does this mean that the people are creations of the State?

[OneWingedShark]

The Constitution is fine as is.

Actually it could use some amending; here's what I propose:

Tax Reform Amendment	Fiscal Responsibility Amendment
Section I No tax, federal or state, shall ever be withheld from the wages of a worker of any citizen of either. Section II No property shall be seized for failure to pay taxes until after conviction in a jury trial; the right of the jury to nullify (and thereby forgive) this debt shall never be questioned or denied. Section III The second amendment is hereby recognized as restricting the power of taxation, both federal and state, therefore no tax (or fine) shall be laid upon munitions or the sale thereof. Section IV The seventh amendment is also hereby recognized, and nothing in this amendment shall restrict the right of a citizen to seek civil redress. Section V No income tax levied by the federal government, the several States, or any subdivision of either shall ever exceed 10%. Section VI No income tax levied by the federal government, the several States, or any subdivision of either shall ever apply varying rates to those in its jurisdiction. Section VII No retroactive or ex post facto tax (or fee) shall ever be valid. Section VIII The congress may not delegate the creation of any tax or fine in any way. Section IX No federal employee, representative, senator, judge, justice or agent shall ever be exempt from any tax, fine, or fee by virtue of their position. Section X Any federal employee, representative, senator, judge, justice or agent applying, attempting to apply, or otherwise causing the application of an ex post facto or retroactive law shall, upon conviction, be evicted from office and all retirement benefits forfeit.	Section I The power of Congress to regulate the value of the dollar is hereby repealed. Section II The value of the Dollar shall be one fifteen-hundredth avoirdupois ounce of gold of which impurities do not exceed one part per thousand. Section III To guard against Congress using its authority over weights and measures to bypass Section I, the ounce in Section II is approximately 28.3495 grams (SI). Section IV The Secretary of the Treasury shall annually report the gold physically in its possession; this report shall be publicly available. Section V The power of the Congress to assume debt is hereby restricted: the congress shall assume no debt that shall cause the total obligations of the United States to exceed one hundred ten percent of the amount last reported by the Secretary of the Treasury. Section VI Any government agent, officer, judge, justice, employee, representative, or congressman causing gold to be confiscated from a private citizen shall be tried for theft and upon conviction shall:    a. be removed from office (and fired, if an employee),    b. forfeit all pension and retirement benefits,    c. pay all legal costs, and    d. restore to the bereaved twice the amount in controversy. Section VII The federal government shall assume no obligation lacking funding, neither shall it lay such obligation on any of the several States, any subdivision thereof, or any place under the jurisdiction of the United States. All unfunded liabilities heretofore assumed by the United States are void. Section VIII The federal government shall make all payments to its employees or the several states in physical gold. Misappropriation, malfeasance and/or misfeasance of funds shall be considered confiscation.
Commerce Clause Amendment	Senate Reform Amendment
Section I The federal government shall directly subsidize no product or industry whatsoever, saving the promotion the progress of Science and useful Arts. Section II The federal government shall never prescribe nor proscribe what the Several States teach. Neither the federal government nor the several states shall ever deny the right of parents to teach and instruct their children as they see fit. Section III The congress may impose tariffs, excise taxes, and customs duties on anything imported or exported, provided that they are applied uniformly and in no manner restrict, subvert, or circumvent the second amendment. Section IV No law may impose prohibitions of any sort on the commerce between the several states due to the item itself.	Section I The seventeenth amendment is hereby repealed. Section II The several states may provide by law the means by which their senators may be removed or replaced.

[pallis]

It sure seems that the Obama regime is doing what it can to prohibit the “free exercise” of religion by business owners. I’m just as sure that business owners didn’t realize they were giving up their 1st Amendment rights when they chose to conduct business with the public. Government is treating private business like it is an entity owned by government.

When free people are denied the right to act responsibly in accordance with good conscience and long established moral values, government has failed.

[OneWingedShark]

an owner whose property can be turned against his religious principles is an owner whose “private property” is a fiction
no private property and you can kiss most your other rights goodbye as well
controlling private property is the road to total control

We're already more than halfway there.

[Born to Conserve]

The purpose of incorporation is to facilitate economic vitality in the interaction of companies. The idea that the purpose of corporate law is to give the government some sort of authority over companies is simply tyrannical.

[OneWingedShark]

When free people are denied the right to act responsibly in accordance with good conscience and long established moral values, government has failed.

This eventuality was covered, and described, in one of our founding documents:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Given that those in power are disinclined to relinquish it, it is a good bet that such a prospect will quickly become a bloody one. Nevertheless, the tree of liberty ought to be watered soon.

[Sequoyah101]

Bought, bribed, blackmailed and paid for.

[HiTech RedNeck]

So you serve up a verbal stew and still don’t explain how the Court actually DID confirm a right.

To me this says you’re lost in the wonderland of theory.

[antceecee]

Wow... just cannot believe you continue to defend this POS decision.

[antceecee]

Well stated. Thank you.

[HiTech RedNeck]

Interesting to see the anti-freedom sides of some unexpected parties come out.

[HiTech RedNeck]

Certainly the law is not an end in itself. It serves a philosophy and in America at least in principle the philosophy isn’t supposed to be a tyranny (though it is rapidly slouching in that direction).

[antceecee]

There are far too many of the anti-freedom, anti-liberty beings on both sides of the aisle.