Marriage News Watch: March 24, 2014

Marriage News Watch: March 11, 2013

Marriage News Watch: February 17, 2014

Marriage News Watch: November 11, 2013

Jailing Atheists For Being Atheists

Marriage News Watch: October 7, 2013

How Gays Are Destroying America

In all seriousness, great for Vicco, Kentucky. Breaking stereotypes and spreading equality; two birds, one stone.

Blue New Jersey Vs. Red Kentucky & Federal Spending

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)

From Politifact: 

The past week’s political sandbox match between Gov. Chris Christie and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul kicked up a lot of dust.

But after a week of increasingly insulting barbs between the two possible Republican presidential contenders for 2016, fueled by a disagreement about national security matters, there’s one claim that caught the Truth-O-Meter’s attention – and it’s not whether Christie is the "King of Bacon" when it comes to government spending, as Paul claimed July 30 during an interview on CNN. 

"In fact New Jersey is a donor state, we get 61 cents back on every dollar we send to Washington," Christie said July 30 in response to Rand’s claim that New Jersey has a ‘gimme, gimme, gimme’ attitude about federal spending. "And interestingly Kentucky gets $1.51 on every dollar they send to Washington." 

Kentucky receives more than double what New Jersey gets in federal funding? For this claim, Christie’s got the numbers on his side.

Studies have shown that many classically blue states are net donors while many classically conservative states are net takers. Of course on both sides of this there are exceptions. many conservatives would have you think that liberal/Democratic-led states are the ones who are spending all of the federal dollars (granted in the case of the article quoted above both politicians are Republicans, new Jersey is definitely a tried-and-true blue state). Yet again, the conservative stance is not backed by fact. If there is one thing that we can say about conservatives, it is that they never let the facts stand in their way.

Mitch McConnell's Primary Problem

From Huffington Post: 

It looks like things are about to get pretty interesting for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) in his 2014 re-election bid. Kentucky businessman Matt Bevin has decided to offer himself up as a primary challenger in the Bluegrass State, and it looks like McConnell is about to get a pretty undiluted taste of what's been making House Speaker John Boehner's (R-Ohio) life a "living hell" lately. 

Yesterday, the National Review's Katrina Trinko reported that Bevin -- then "on the cusp" of announcing his run -- had been the target of much cajoling, and later, threats, from the McConnell camp:

“Mitch McConnell’s people reached out to Matt for several months through all different avenues trying to convince him not to run,” the adviser close to Bevin tells National Review Online. “They can pretend like they’re not afraid, they can call him a nuisance, but they were desperate not to have him. Because they are scared.”

“First they tried to threaten him,” the source added, “and then they tried to dangle shiny political prizes.”

McConnell, through campaign manager Jesse Benton, issued the standard denials, telling Trinko that no one from his camp had ever said anything to Bevin. He went on to allege that if anyone had cautioned Bevin against a run, it was "people from Matt's life" who were "desperately trying to prevent Matt from making a serious mistake." The McConnell campaign, Benton told Trinko, had a wealth of opposition material to use on Bevin. 

It was this sort of scenario that cost the Republican Party control of the Senate in the 2010 midterm elections. the GOP could have picked up another couple of seats, perhaps even that of Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), were it not for some really far right and "not ready for primetime" candidates in nevada, Deleware, Connecticut, and elsewhere. The "establishment" Republican faced a primary challenge from a farther right candidate, the farther right candidate won the primary only to be defeated by a Democrat. It appears that the party (or at least the Tea Party sect thereof) has not learned from recent mistakes. Having said all of that, it is unlikely for the Democrats to win this particular Senate seat in conservative Kentucky. the potential candidate with the greatest shot was actor Ashley judd, but she decided months ago not to run. Regardless of that however, the details of this story paints McConnell in an even more unflattering light, compounding other recent goings-on he has had challenging his leadership. These are not good times to be Senator Mitch McConnell.

Kentucky Dumps Private Prisons

Five Year Olds Owning Guns

From the L.A. Times: 

A 2-year-old Kentucky girl was accidentally killed by her 5-year-old brother who fired a rifle he had been given as a gift, officials said Wednesday. 

Cumberland County Coroner Gary L. White said an autopsy of Caroline Starks showed the toddler had died from a single shot from the .22-caliber rifle. The death has been ruled accidental and no charges will be filed, he said in a telephone interview with the Los Angeles Times. 

“Most everybody in town is pretty devastated by this,” White said. “Nobody wants to take anyone’s guns away, but you’ve got to keep them out of harm’s way for the kids. It’s a safety issue.”

~

The rifle used in the accident is a Crickett designed for children and sold under the slogan “My First Rifle,” according to the company's website. It is a smaller weapon designed for children and comes with a shoulder stock in child-like colors including pink and swirls.

You can't drive until you are 16, you can't vote or join the military until you are 18, you can't drink alcohol until you are 21, you can't rent a car until you are 25, but you can own a gun at 5.

Small Kentucky Town Passes LGBT Protections

From the ACLU:

(Vicco, KY) Today the Fairness Coalition joined the Appalachian town of Vicco, Kentucky as they approved the state's first lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) anti-discrimination Fairness ordinance in a decade. The measure, which prohibits discrimination in employment, housing, and public accommodations based upon a person's actual or perceived sexual orientation and gender identity, received support from three of the city's four-member commission and Mayor Johnny Cummings. 

~

Situated in the southern tip of Perry County in the Appalachian mountain region, Vicco was incorporated in 1964 and currently boasts a population of 334 residents, according to 2010 U.S. Census data. It is nestled in the heart of coal country and was originally named for Virginia Iron Coal and Coke Company, a large land business still operating in the region.

 

"Vicco is a community that believes all folks should be treated fairly," shared Vicco City Attorney Eric Ashley. "We believe everyone deserves the opportunity for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Fairness is a Kentucky value, a Vicco value, and one of our most American values."

 

Vicco's passage of a Fairness law comes on the heels of several other Kentucky communities' movements towards anti-discrimination protections through work with the Fairness Coalition of the American Civil Liberties Union of Kentucky (ACLU-KY), Fairness Campaign, Kentucky Commission on Human Rights, Kentucky Fairness Alliance, and Lexington Fairness. In November, grassroots movements for Fairness began in Bowling Green, Elizabethtown, and Shelbyville, joining those already under way in Berea and Richmond.

Believe In God Or Go To Jail

From AlterNet:

In Kentucky, a homeland security law requires the state’s citizens to acknowledge the security provided by the Almighty God--or risk 12 months in prison. 

The law and its sponsor, state representative Tom Riner, have been the subject of controversy since the law first surfaced in 2006, yet the Kentucky state Supreme Court has refused to review its constitutionality, despite clearly violating the First Amendment’s separation of church and state.

"This is one of the most egregiously and breathtakingly unconstitutional actions by a state legislature that I've ever seen," said Edwin Kagin, the legal director of American Atheists', a national organization focused defending the civil rights of atheists. American Atheists’ launched a lawsuit against the law in 2008, which won at the Circuit Court level, but was then overturned by the state Court of Appeals. 

The law states, "The safety and security of the Commonwealth cannot be achieved apart from reliance upon Almighty God as set forth in the public speeches and proclamations of American Presidents, including Abraham Lincoln's historic March 30, 1863, presidential proclamation urging Americans to pray and fast during one of the most dangerous hours in American history, and the text of President John F. Kennedy's November 22, 1963, national security speech which concluded: "For as was written long ago: 'Except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.'"

The law requires that plaques celebrating the power of the Almighty God be installed outside the state Homeland Security building--and carries a criminal penalty of up to 12 months in jail if one fails to comply. The plaque’s inscription begins with the assertion, “The safety and security of the Commonwealth cannot be achieved apart from reliance upon Almighty God.”