Posted on 02/22/2012 8:52:43 PM PST by SmithL
an Francisco (AP) --
A federal judge in San Francisco ruled Wednesday that the U.S. government cannot deny health benefits to the wife of a lesbian court employee by relying on the 1996 law that bars government recognition of same-sex unions.
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White said that because the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutionally discriminates against same-sex married couples, the government's refusal to furnish health insurance to Karen Golinski's wife is unjustified.
"The Court finds that DOMA, as applied to Ms. Golinski, violates her right to equal protection of the law ... by, without substantial justification or rational basis, refusing to recognize her lawful marriage to prevent provision of health insurance coverage to her spouse," White wrote in a 43-page decision that marks the third time in less than two years a federal court has declared the act unconstitutional.
Golinski, a staff lawyer for the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, has been trying to secure spousal benefits for her wife, Amy Cunninghis,
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
Why shouldn’t I be able to get benefits for my pet cats as though they were sons and daughters? This is unconstitutional speciesism! WAAAAAAH!
Amy Cunninghis! The jokes write themselves.
I live way up here in Alaska and work with a lot of Yup’ik and Inupiaq people, sometimes called Eskimos. A friend of mine recently told me that there’s an Inupiaq word for lesbian. The word is “ilickulick.”
God, that’s crude. Hope I don’t get the zot for that.
“Amy Cunninghis”
Wait... wait. HAHAHAHA
NO, NO... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
I had to take a second look at that last name also. With this “marriage”, I think Amy would have a good reason to change her name.
Pulling our legs?
The Eskimos actually did borrow the word from English?
A very weird coinkydink?
Amazing how DOMA has suddenly become unconstitutional.
I don’t know where the Inupiaq got the joke from, other than a lot of Eskimoan words tend to end with that “ick” sound - although it is usually spelled “iq” or “aq.” I gotta admit that I love living with folks from those cultures - fun, mellow, and many of the ladies are among the most beautiful I’ve ever seen anywhere.
So since you didn’t ask...
Did you hear about the Eskimo who used to sneak around and look in windows to catch a peek at girls? You must mean Tommy Tookalook.
Interesting. But the Bush family is hardly opposed ,to homosexual marriage. Indeed, they have sent out the women publicly to announce their approval. Pure cynicism.
Everything you knew in your younger days has been toppled; marriage has been destroyed, “white” men are completely marginalized, we press buttons to hear English on phone menus, our fast food places have Latino items on the menus, and our country bears no resemblance to what it was 30 years ago.
Less than a mile from me they buried a 20 year-old Marine on Monday who died in Afghanistan; for the life of me I have no idea what he died for. I know what he thought he was dying for, but he didn’t die for “our country” (whatever that means now). He died after having perverts forced on the military, and just weeks after Obama’s sweeping attack on religion. What a shame...
Destroying the budget, one lesbian parasite fraud of a desperate retarded government worker at a time.
I know I’ll draw fire for this, but govt should get out of the marriage business, and let insurance companies cover people as they wish without the threat of the damn govt. There’s no reason for this kind of commie crap.
One’s sacrifice will always depend on how America views and meets the future...even more than the past.
It doesn’t look good right now.
It’s a federal worker, arguing about federal benefits. How exactly is the government supposed to stay out of it?
Is the govt self-insured?
The government is what it wants to be unless you don't let it. Remember, they got organization; they got guns. Stuff you don't have.
Amy Cunninghis ???
Is this a pun?
“With this “marriage”, I think Amy would have a good reason to change her name.”
So, may I propose that the happy lesbian couple henceforth be known as:
Amy and Karen Cunnilingski
It’s not government money paying for these health insurance policies, it’s taxpayer money (i.e., *our* money). Members of Congress, as our representatives, approved a law in 1996 so that same-sex “marriages” from one state would not have to be recognized by other states or by the federal government, which law was needed that we wouldn’t be forced to subsidize health insurance for same-sex “spouses” of federal employees.
The federal government isn’t acting as a regulator when it purchases health insurance for federal employees and their legal spouses; it is acting as an employer and a market participant. What do you suggest, that the insurance companies who provide employer-paid health insurance to federal employees cover whatever they want and whoever they want and just pass the bill to the taxpayers? So long as we have employer-paid health insurance, the employer has to agree to who and what is covered, and in the case of federal workers, U.S. taxpayers, acting through our elected representatives, are the employers. I don’t want to pay for someone’s health insurance just because she entered into a same-sex “marriage” with a federal employee. Do you?
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