Suit contesting Nevada marriage standards to go forward

By J. DeVoy

District of Nevada Judge Philip Pro declined to dismiss Clark County from a lawsuit brought by the ACLU to challenge Nevada’s “religious test” for whom may solemnize a marriage as implemented by the County.  Clark County handles marriage matters in the Las Vegas metro area, ranging from issuing marriage certificates to authorizing officials to perform religious ceremonies.

Under Nevada law, a marriage may be officiated only by those affiliated with established religious organizations and government officials including judges and civil marriage commissioners (including, true to Las Vegas form, those dressed as Elvis).  The ACLU’s lawsuit, filed in March 2011, seeks to challenge this practice in the wake of an atheist and members of the American Humanist Association whom Clark County has denied certification to solemnize marriage.

Allowing the suit to go forward, the central issue is now whether Clark County’s broad discretion essentially allows its employees to determine whether a religious organization is a bona fide religious institution.  This raises the question as to whether Clark County employees are assessing the validity of various religions when their practitioners seek authority to solemnize marriages from the County.  Such a practice is not merely unlawful, but unconstitutional – if successful, the ACLU’s suit will force Clark County to change its practices, and effectively change Nevada law, so that a larger class of people are entitled to solemnize marriage.

From Judge Pro’s order:

“Were the county clerk deemed to have unfettered discretion to decide if a particular religious organization is a bona fide religion, that would likely constitute a significant entanglement,”

“The Nevada statute appears to give unfettered discretion to the county clerk to decide whether a particular organization qualifies as a religious organization to trigger eligibility for the applicant seeking a certificate,”

While this seems like an esoteric issue, it is a question that has been confronted in Mississippi, and even created significant questions in New York for a couple I personally knew who wished to marry there.  Given Nevada’s position against gay marriage, it is unsurprising for the question of who may solemnize marriages to be unresolved even at this late date.  With the ACLU’s suit surviving a motion to dismiss, more activity likely will be forthcoming.

What happened to Cohen v. California?

A man was arrested for wearing a jacket with a political message on it while in the history exhibit at the United States Supreme Court.

Yes, the same United States Supreme Court that said it was Paul Robert Cohen’s right to wear a jacket in a courthouse emblazoned with the message “fuck the draft.” Cohen v. California, 403 U.S. 15 (1971).

H/T: Paul Levy

Let’s Be “Newtly” Open

by Tatiana von Tauber

Would you find your spouse immoral if s/he asked you for an open marriage? If you’re like the general population, probably so and that’s because monogamy in marriage is so entrenched in our Judeo-Christian culture as the best way that it’s very difficult to pull out of such a norm; however, I believe Newt Gingrich showed a higher level of moral character than his current judgment dictates with respect to his second ex-wife, Marianne Gingrich’s disclosure he asked her for an open marriage.

In politics as in marriage a lot of things happen in the background that aren’t always in plain view. Mixing the desires of more than one individual requires compromises otherwise you’re left with lies for solutions. Just look at history for evidence.

By Newt Gingrich asking his second wife – now the ex – for an open marriage he actually proved his moral character via his ability to simply be honest about his feelings and desires and ask in spite of the backlash from what would traditionally be considered immoral (from their camp anyway).

This honesty is honorable. While the request may or may not be, there cannot be confusion between the difference of the request and the honesty which manifested it.

I suppose Marianne Gingrich would have preferred her ex husband to exhibit typical politician behavior and pin a little twinkie behind closed doors, then lie about it to his wife only for her to discover later he was a sperm donor too. Poleeze.

Some people prefer truth and others like the illusion. For me, a president who likes truth based on the situation at hand is a better choice than the cowardly liar – though at press time he’s denying the open marriage allegation but then that just shows you lies are the skin of politics.  Strip the skin and kill the beast.

And in other copyright news … some bad news

The supreme court has ruled in Golan v. Holder that works that enter the public domain may be pushed back under the cover of copyright protection. (source)

This is an absolute abomination. No surprise that our “wise latina” on the Court went with the majority.

The Megaupload Indictment

The indictment is here.

The indictment tells the story of cyberlockers in a perfect narrative — how the owners of the site knew that their site was a massive clearinghouse of stolen content, they profited from it, and they did whatever they could to mask it.

The charges include Racketeering, conspiracy to commit copyright infringement, and money laundering.

It looks like the Department of Justice cooperated with foreign law enforcement to actually take the owners of the site into custody. (source)

Megaupload Shut Down!

Reported here.

Ha ha.

Why we need fair use

In this video, the author uses the entirety of Maurice Sendak’s “Where the Wild Things Are.” But, Christopher Walken breathes new life into it, and gives it a life of its own. That’s really what fair use is all about.

And no, you fucking hippies, SOPA would not make this illegal.

Jackass Letters for hire!

What is more awesome than Jackass Letters?

Being able to hire the genius behind the site to commission your very own Jackass Letter! (here)

Awww…. does somebody need a hug?

Nevada Supreme Court expands open records law to include e-mails

The public and the media won another battle recently in Nevada, when the state’s Supreme Court ruled that the Nevada open records law should be expanded to allow the public access to logs of e-mails.

The Nevada Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Reno Gazette-Journal, which previously had been denied a request pursuant to the Nevada Public Records Act that asked for former Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons to turn over 100 e-mails that spanned a six-month period during his tenure in office. The e-mails were sent from a state-issued account. The opinion overturned a U.S. District Court opinion that had granted the newspaper access to just six of the e-mails.

Chief Justice Nancy Saitta, who wrote the opinion, stated that under NPRA, the requester is at the very least entitled to a log that should contain “a general factual description of each withheld record and a specific explanation for nondisclosure.” The Nevada Supreme Court concluded that the log was required and that the district court judge erred in denying the request for the log.

The Nevada Legislature enacted the NPRA in order to ensure that all public books and records would remain open unless specifically declared by law to be confidential. Judge Saitta explained that the Legislature amended NRPA in 2007 to “provide that its provisions must be liberally construed to maximize the public’s right of access,” and “conversely, any limitations or restrictions on the public’s right of access must be narrowly construed.” Additionally, the burden fell on Gibbons to show that the records were confidential.

Nevada’s defining open records law case, Donrey of Nevada v. Bradshaw, 106 Nev. 630, 798 P.2d 144 (1990), established a “balancing test” for analyzing claims of confidentiality. The balancing test measures the public’s right to know against the individual’s right to privacy.

The test has been both a boon and a burden to Nevada media. Although the courts generally have applied the test liberally and overturned many denials for requests, some public entities employ the balancing test in an effort to push media outlets to litigate (and spend significant financial resources doing so) rather than give up the information without a fight.

This recent opinion is just one more victory for those seeking more transparent government in Nevada. This year the Nevada Legislature created an Open Meeting Law Task Force to make changes to the state’s Open Meeting Law.  In addition to creating steeper penalties for those who violate the Open Meeting Law, the task force also sought to expand the definite of “reporter” to include citizen journalists and bloggers.

Read the Nevada Supreme Court’s complete opinion here.

Pissing on the Taliban — I’m with the Marines

A group of United States Marines stood around some dead Taliban fighters and pissed on them. They videotaped it and the footage wound up on Youtube. Now, everyone is rushing to condemn the marines’ behavior. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said:

“I have seen the footage, and I find the behavior depicted in it utterly deplorable. I condemn it in the strongest possible terms. Those found to have engaged in such conduct will be held accountable to the fullest extent.”

Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James Amos commented similarly:

“I want to be clear and unambiguous, the behavior depicted in the video is wholly inconsistent with the high standards of conduct and warrior ethos that we have demonstrated throughout our history,” Amos said in a statement.

“Rest assured that the institution of the Marine Corps will not rest until the allegations and the events surrounding them have been resolved. We remain fully committed to upholding the Geneva Convention, the Laws of War, and our own core values.” (source)

Lets think about this: Our policymakers decide to bring us into two wars, one of which was entirely unsupportable (Iraq) and the other was just plain stupid (Afghanistan). We torture live prisoners. We keep the illegal Guantanamo Bay gulag open. All of this done at the behest of our so-called elected leaders.

Those at the top piss on the rule of law, piss on justice, and piss on reason, and they get nice big pay checks for it. Four guys who are living in a hole in a shit hole of a country, getting shot at by these guys every day, who are doing it all for nothing — they relieve their stress by relieving themselves on some dead bodies, and all of a sudden THEY are being judged by their so-called “superiors?”

Piss away, Leathernecks. You’ve earned it.

First Amendment trumps Equal Opportunity Employment

Today, the Supreme Court in Hosanna-Tabor Church v. EEOC  issued a unanimous ruling on the First Amendment.  While this blog regularly celebrates the Freedom of Speech clause, the decision focuses primarily on the Free Exercise Clause and, to a lesser extent, the Establishment Clause.

In a nutshell:

1. Church had 2 types of teacher–lay and ministerial.
2. Ministerial teacher develops disability and takes leave of absense; replaced by lay teacher.
3. Church rules normally prioritize ministerial teachers, but when this teacher tries to get her job back, she is denied.
4. She becomes insubordinate and complains of an ADA violation.
5. She is terminated.
6. Teacher sues the church for retaliation against her for making an ADA claim.
7. Supreme Court says church wins.

Assuming there was blatant retaliation, the church still wins.  Why?  Because if the government were to tell a church they couldn’t fire a particular minister, that would prevent a church from freely deciding who gets to spread the gospel and who doesn’t.  To its extreme, though excepted specifically in Title VII, if the government had the power to dictate who a church could fire, it could prevent the Pope from defrocking an American Bishop who pronounces the Shahada and converts to Islam.  Basically, the 1st Amendment lets a religion freely decide who gets to be a minister, even if the reasons for hiring or firing are otherwise abhorrent to society.  If you don’t like it, you are free to change religions.  Or declare the person who did the firing a heretic and stone them.  Either way.

“We discourage penile tattooing”

A guy in Iran gets his penis tattooed with “borow be salaamat” (good luck on your journeys), and his girlfriend’s initials. Unfortunately, he went to a “traditional” tattoo artist, whose method caused the guy to get a permanent boner.

The tattooist punctured too-deep holes that damaged vessels in the penis, resulting in fistulas, and then a pseudoaneurysm, a pooling of blood outside a vessel wall. They recommended he see a specialist to have the blood removed, but he rejected that idea and saw another doctor to have a shunt procedure performed. It didn’t work. (source)

He seems pleased with the outcome, so he is rejecting treatment. Iranian doctors were quoted as saying “based on our unique case, we discourage penile tattooing.”

Why do you hate America?

I get that question a lot — as do most people who think and express opinions. Of course the answer is that we don’t “hate America.” In fact, it is precisely because we love America that we don’t like seeing shitheads ruin it, and we feel compelled to say something about it.

Well, until now.

If you’re ever asked “why do you hate America,” you can go into a diatribe about the Constitution and ideas and shit like that… or you can just say THIS IS WHY!

And if you want to know why I support forced sterilization…. same answer.

I finally found a candidate worth voting for