Supreme Court Rules on Ten Commandments displays

WASHINGTON (AP) - A split Supreme Court struck down Ten Commandments displays in courthouses Monday, ruling that two exhibits in Kentucky cross the line between separation of church and state because they promote a religious message.

The 5-4 decision was the first of two seeking to mediate the bitter culture war over religion's place in public life. In it, the court declined to prohibit all displays in court buildings or on government property. Justices left legal wiggle room, saying that some displays - like their own courtroom frieze - would be permissible if they're portrayed neutrally in order to honor the nation's legal history.

But framed copies in two Kentucky courthouses went too far in endorsing religion, the court held.

"The touchstone for our analysis is the principle that the First Amendment mandates government neutrality between religion and religion, and between religion and nonreligion," Justice David H. Souter wrote for the majority.

"When the government acts with the ostensible and predominant purpose of advancing religion, it violates tha central Establishment clause value of official religious neutrality," he said.

Souter was joined in his opinion by other members of the liberal bloc - Justices John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer, as well as Reagan appointee Sandra Day O'Connor, who provided the swing vote.

Bush to WTC rescue workers: Screw you

New York lawmakers made a last-ditch appeal yesterday to stop the feds from taking back $125 million in unspent 9/11 relief money meant for workers injured at Ground Zero.

Standing with a delegation of disabled workers, they implored President Bush to honor the promise he made to help the city after the terror attack.

"To attempt a takeback of promised 9/11 aid shows how quickly Ground Zero workers are becoming forgotten heroes," said Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan), who sounded the alarm last week over the vanishing money.

John Feal of Nesconset, L.I., who lost half a foot while supervising construction workers in The Pit, said he doesn't have the money to cover his medical bills. "The White House is wrong, the Bush administration is wrong, and shame on the President for letting this go on," Feal said.

"Abandoning our wounded responders is no different from leaving the wounded behind in combat," added Mike McCormick, a medic from Ridge, N.Y., who suffers from respiratory problems.

The House Appropriations Committee last night moved to cut the $125 million earmarked for workers' compensation and retraining - because it had not been spent. But the measure must still pass the House and Senate before the money would be lost.

Noting that disability claims of workers who toiled at Ground Zero were being denied at a rate 10 times higher than regular workers' claims, Sen. Hillary Clinton suggested that the money be "held in trust" until the claims can be sorted out.

Lesbian parent awarded custody of her child

Click on the post title to read the entire article

The West Virginia Supreme Court on Friday gave the lesbian partner of a deceased woman the parental rights over a 5-year-old child the two had been raising together.

The court recognized 39-year-old Tina Burch of Clay County, the lesbian partner of the late Christina Smarr, as the “psychological parent” of the boy, then ruled it would be in the best interest of the child to stay with Burch.

The court noted that the Legislature consistently has said, “public policy of this state is to assure that the best interest of children is the court’s primary concern in allocating custodial and decision-making responsibilities between parents who do not live together,” Davis wrote.

The child’s biological father, identified in court records as “Clifford K.,” had filed for custody on behalf of Burch and supported her in the effort to maintain custody of the child.

Attorney Jim Douglas of Sutton, who represents Tina Burch, hailed the decision.

“This court has gone probably farther than any other court in the country ... in defining what constitutes a psychological parent,” he said. “The great irony of this thing is my client was really a private person. She didn’t seek publicity. It has really been a long haul for her.

State members of the American Civil Liberties Union applauded the action, noting the ACLU had filed a friend of the court brief in support of Burch. “Today West Virginia’s Supreme Court of Appeals has recognized the most basic tenets of family law — serving the best interest of the child and preserving family stability and unity,” Terri Baur, staff attorney for the ACLU of West Virginia Foundation, said in a press release.

Downing Street Memo

Interesting reading from Democracy Now: a transcript of a piece they ran on the Downing Street Memo and about how many congressman are saying "if I'd only known..."

You can also listen to the piece at their website. A sample:

JOHN BONIFAZ: The Downing Street minutes shed new and important light on a document the President himself submitted to the United States Congress within 48 hours after having launched the invasion of Iraq. This is the document, and I have distributed it to all of you, and I ask that it be put into the record of these proceedings.

REP. JOHN CONYERS: Without objection.

JOHN BONIFAZ: In the letter, dated March 18, 2003, the President makes a formal determination as required by the joint resolution on Iraq passed by the United States Congress in October, 2002, that military action against Iraq was necessary to, (quote), “protect the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq.” He also states in this letter to Congress that military action was consistent with the United States and other countries' continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations or persons who planned, authorized, committed or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001.

If the evidence revealed by the Downing Street minutes is true, then the President's submission of his March 18, 2003 letter to the United States Congress would violate federal criminal law, including the Federal Anti-Conspiracy Statute which makes it a felony, (quote), “to commit any offense against the United States or to defraud the United States or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose,” and the False Statements Accountability Act of 1996, which makes it a felony to issue knowingly and willfully false statements to the United States Congress.

The United States House of Representatives has a constitutional duty to investigate fully and comprehensively the evidence revealed by the Downing Street minutes and other related evidence and to determine whether there are sufficient grounds to impeach George W. Bush, the President of the United States. A resolution of inquiry is the appropriate first step in launching this investigation.

The Iraq war has led to the deaths of more than 1,700 United States soldiers, and tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians. Thousands more have been permanently and severely injured on both sides. More than two years after the invasion, Iraq remains unstable and its future unclear. The war has already cost the American people tens of billions of taxpayer dollars at the expense of basic human needs here at home. More than 135,000 United States soldiers remain in Iraq without any stated exit plan. If the President has committed high crimes in connection with this war, he must be held accountable. The United States Constitution demands no less.

Texas Gov says he can legislate morality

"One of the great myths of our time is that you can't legislate morality," the governor (Rick Perry) told the ministers, according to a transcript provided to The Associated Press by his campaign.

"If you can't legislate morality, then you can neither lock criminals up nor let them go free. If you can't legislate morality, you can neither recognize gay marriage nor prohibit it. If you can't legislate morality, you can neither allow for prayer in school nor prevent it," he said. "It is a ridiculous notion to say you can't legislate morality. I say you can't NOT legislate morality."

Perry, a United Methodist, did not refer to the death penalty, which his denomination says devalues life and should be eliminated from criminal codes. The governor, a capital punishment proponent, presides over the nation's most active death penalty state.

Public Broadcasting Targeted By House

This is a long selection of the article but worthwhile. The accompanying photo at The Washington Post is of Laura Bush on "Sesame Street."

A House subcommittee voted yesterday to sharply reduce the federal government's financial support for public broadcasting, including eliminating taxpayer funds that help underwrite such popular children's educational programs as "Sesame Street," "Reading Rainbow," "Arthur" and "Postcards From Buster."

In addition, the subcommittee acted to eliminate within two years all federal money for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting -- which passes federal funds to public broadcasters -- starting with a 25 percent reduction in CPB's budget for next year, from $400 million to $300 million.

In all, the cuts would represent the most drastic cutback of public broadcasting since Congress created the nonprofit CPB in 1967. The CPB funds are particularly important for small TV and radio stations and account for about 15 percent of the public broadcasting industry's total revenue.

Expressing alarm, public broadcasters and their supporters in Congress interpreted the move as an escalation of a Republican-led campaign against a perceived liberal bias in their programming. That effort was initiated by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's own chairman, Kenneth Y. Tomlinson.

"Americans overwhelmingly see public broadcasting as an unbiased information source," Rep. David Obey (Wis.), the ranking Democrat on the subcommittee, said in a statement. "Perhaps that's what the GOP finds so offensive about it. Republican leaders are trying to bring every facet of the federal government under their control. . . . Now they are trying to put their ideological stamp on public broadcasting."

But the Republican chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee on labor, health and human services, and education asserted that the panel was simply making choices among various worthy government programs, and that no political message was intended.
...

The cuts nevertheless surprised people in public broadcasting. In his budget sent to Congress in February, President Bush had recommended reducing CPB's budget only slightly.

Several denounced the decision by the panel, which has 10 Republicans and seven Democrats, as payback by a Republican-dominated House after years of complaints from conservatives who see liberal bias in programs carried by the Public Broadcasting Service and National Public Radio. Broadcasters noted, for example, that the 25 percent cutback in next year's CPB budget was a rollback of money that Congress had promised in 2004.

PBS, in particular, drew harsh criticism in December from the Bush administration for a "Postcards From Buster" episode in which Buster, an animated rabbit, "visited" two families in Vermont headed by lesbians. And programming on both PBS and NPR has come under fire in recent months from Tomlinson, the Republican chairman of the CPB, who has pushed for greater "balance" on the public airwaves.

A spokeswoman for NPR, Andi Sporkin, directly blamed Tomlinson for yesterday's action, saying, "We've never been sure of Mr. Tomlinson's intent but, with this news, we might be seeing his effect."

Tomlinson did not return calls seeking comment. In a statement, he said, "Obviously, we are concerned [by the cuts], and we will be joining with our colleagues in the public broadcasting community to make the case for a higher level of funding as the appropriations measure makes its way through Congress."

John Lawson, the president of the Association of Public Television Stations, a Washington-based group that lobbies for public broadcasters, called the subcommittee's action "at least malicious wounding, if not outright attempted murder, of public broadcasting in America." He added, "This action could deprive tens of millions of American children of commercial-free educational programming."
...

Regula suggested public stations could "make do" without federal money by getting more funding from private sources, such as contributions from corporations, foundations, and listeners and viewers.

But the loss of $23.4 million in federal funds for children's educational shows -- which PBS calls its "Ready to Learn" programs -- could mean the elimination of these programs, said an official at Alexandria-based PBS who asked not to be named because the network still hopes to regain the funding. PBS's revenue totaled $333 million in fiscal year 2004.

The Ready to Learn group includes "Sesame Street," "Dragontales," "Clifford" and "Arthur," among others.

Small public radio stations, particularly those in rural areas and those serving minority audiences, may be the most vulnerable to federal cuts because they currently operate on shoestring budgets.

"This could literally put us out of business," said Paul Stankavich, president and general manager of the Alaska Public Radio Network, an alliance of 26 stations in the state that create and share news programming. "Almost all of us are down to the bone right now. If we lost 5 or 10 percent of our budgets in one fell swoop, we could end up being just a repeater service" for national news, with no funds to produce local content.

Stankavich, who also runs a public radio and TV station in Anchorage, said public radio is "an important source of news in urban areas, but it's life-critical in rural areas," especially in far-flung parts of Alaska unserved by any other broadcast medium.