Author Archives: sreg2

Wall Street Investors Take Aim at Farmland

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

In a couple of posts last fall (here and here), I showed that corporations don’t do much actual farming in the US. True, agrichemical companies like Monsanto and Syngenta mint fortunes by selling seeds and chemicals to farmers, and grain processors like Archer Daniels Midland and Cargill reap billions from buying crops cheap and turning them into pricey stuff like livestock feed, sweetener, cooking oil, and ethanol. But the great bulk of US farms—enterprises that generally have razor-thin profit margins—are run by independent operators.

That may be on the verge of changing. A recent report by the Oakland Institute documents a fledgling, little-studied trend: Corporations are starting to buy up US farmland, especially in areas dominated by industrial-scale agriculture, like Iowa and California’s Central Valley. But the land-grabbing companies aren’t agribusinesses like Monsanto and Cargill. Instead, they’re financial firms: investment arms of insurance companies, banks, pension funds, and the like. In short, Wall Street spies gold in those fields of greens and grains.

Continue Reading »

Source article: 

Wall Street Investors Take Aim at Farmland

Posted in Anchor, ATTRA, FF, GE, LAI, LG, ONA, Radius, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Wall Street Investors Take Aim at Farmland

FDA Reviewing Evidence That Morning-After Pill Doesn’t Work in Women Weighing Over 176 Pounds

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

Monday morning, Mother Jones reported that the European manufacturer of an emergency contraceptive pill identical to Plan B, also known as the morning-after pill, will warn women that the drug is completely ineffective in women weighing more than 176 pounds, and begins to lose effectiveness in women weighing more than 165 pounds. HRA Pharma, which makes the European drug, Norlevo, asked European regulators for permission to change the drug’s labeling after reviewing its own clinical data and scientific research from 2011 which showed emergency contraceptives are prone to fail in women with higher body mass indexes.

Now the Food and Drug Administration has responded to this story, telling Mother Jones that FDA officials are weighing whether pharmaceutical companies that sell similar emergency contraceptive pills in the US must change their labeling. Many popular morning-after pills sold in the US—including one-pill emergency contraceptives Plan B One-Step, Next Choice One Dose, and My Way, as well as a number of generic two-pill emergency contraceptives—are chemically identical to Norlevo, which also uses the chemical compound levonorgestrel to prevent pregnancy after sex.

“The FDA is currently reviewing the available and related scientific information on this issue, including the publication upon which the Norlevo labeling change was based,” FDA spokeswoman Erica Jefferson writes in an email. “The agency will then determine what, if any, labeling changes to approved emergency contraceptives are warranted.”

Jefferson declined to say when the FDA began its review. If FDA officials feel they have sufficient data to justify a change to product information, the FDA can order companies to update their labels. Jefferson adds that US drug companies have a legal obligation to alert the FDA if new information makes their existing labeling inaccurate.

Continue Reading »

See original:

FDA Reviewing Evidence That Morning-After Pill Doesn’t Work in Women Weighing Over 176 Pounds

Posted in FF, GE, LG, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on FDA Reviewing Evidence That Morning-After Pill Doesn’t Work in Women Weighing Over 176 Pounds

Meet the 32 Senate Republicans Who Voted to Continue LGBT Discrimination in the Workplace

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

On Thursday afternoon, the Senate passed the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), a landmark bill that would end decades of employment discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Americans. The bill moved forward with support of 54 senators who caucus with the Democrats (Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania didn’t vote because he was attending to his wife’s surgery) as well as votes from 10 Republicans, only a few months after the Supreme Court ruled that the government must recognize same-sex marriages. But most GOP Senators came out against it, and House Speaker John Boehner has promised to oppose the bill, which means it will likely be killed in the House.

“One party in one house of Congress should not stand in the way of millions of Americans who want to go to work each day and simply be judged by the job they do,” President Barack Obama said in a statement. “I urge the House Republican leadership to bring this bill to the floor for a vote and send it to my desk so I can sign it into law.”

It’s already illegal for companies to discriminate against Americans on the basis of age, disability, gender, race and religion. ENDA would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the list, protecting LGBT workers from being fired or denied benefits and promotions based on their sexual identity. (An amendment pushed by Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.)â&#128;&#139; makes it so that religious entities that don’t comply can’t be penalized.) Various incarnations of this non-discrimination bill have been brought forward since the 1970s, but this is the first time the Senate has passed one. In 1996, it missed the mark by one vote, and in 2009 and 2010, the bill was held up over the inclusion of transgender employees.

Even though Boehner has opposed the bill, citing that it would lead to “frivolous litigation“—the Government Accountability Office found there’s no evidence that would happen—there are still some Republicans who’d like to see it brought for a House vote, including Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.), who told The Washington Post that he expected it would get the support of at least three dozen House Republicans, which was enough to pass the bill in the House in 2007. He noted, “Younger voters would be much more accepting of the Republican Party if we were to adopt legislation of this type.”

That’s a sentiment that GOP Senators Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), Susan Collins (R-Maine), Dean Heller (R-Nev.), John McCain (R-Ariz.), Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.), Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Rob Portman (R-Ohio), and Patrick Toomey (R-Pa.)—all of whom voted for the bill—got behind. Thirty-two Republican Senators did not agree (three others didn’t vote). Here’s a list of everyone who voted against it:

Republicans Who Voted Against the Employment Non Discrimination Act:
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.)

Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.)

Sen. John Boozman (R-Ark.)

Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.)

Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.)

Sen. Daniel Coats (R-Ind.)

Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.)

Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.)

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas)

Sen. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho)

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas)

Sen. Michael Enzi (R-Wyo.)

Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.)

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.)

Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa)

Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.)

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.)

Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.)

Sen. Mike Johanns (R-Neb.)

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.)

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah)

Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)

Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.)

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.)

Sen. James Risch (R-Idaho)

Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.)

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.)

Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.)

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.)

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.)

Sen. David Vitter (R-La.)

Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.)

Republican Who Didn’t Vote:

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.)

Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wy.)

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.)

See the article here: 

Meet the 32 Senate Republicans Who Voted to Continue LGBT Discrimination in the Workplace

Posted in FF, GE, Landmark, LG, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments Off on Meet the 32 Senate Republicans Who Voted to Continue LGBT Discrimination in the Workplace

5 Plants That Don’t Need Much Water (Slideshow)

Sue H.

on

Can The Pill Protect You from Ovarian Cancer?

3 minutes ago

customize your newsletter

causes & news
animal welfare
global warming
environment & wildlife
human rights
women’s rights
news
submit news story
healthy living
food & recipes
health & wellness
healthy home
family life
true beauty
pets
shopping
take action
browse petitions
create a petition
daily action
volunteer
jobfinder
click to donate
community & sharing
people
groups
singles
photos
blogs
polls
ecards
my care2
my account
my groups
my page
my friends
my petitionsite
my messages
join care2
about us
advertise
partnerships
careers
press
contact us
terms of service
privacy
subscription center
help
rss feeds

Copyright © 2013 Care2.com, inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved

healthy living
food
health
love + sex
nature
pets
spirit
home
life
family
green
do good
all recipes
appetizers & snacks
basics
desserts
drinks
eating for health
entrees
green kitchen tips
raw
side dishes
soups & salads
vegan
vegetarian
videos
ALTERNATIVE THERAPIES
AYURVEDA
CONDITIONS
DIET & NUTRITION
FITNESS
GENERAL HEALTH
HEALTHY AGING
Mental Wellness
MEN’S HEALTH
NATURAL REMEDIES
WOMEN’S HEALTH
VIDEOS
dating
friendship
relationships
sex
videos
environment
lawns & gardens
natural pest control
outdoor activities
wildlife
videos
Adoptable Pets
Animal Rights
Behavior & Communication
Cats
Dogs
Everyday Pet Care
Humor & Inspiration
Less Common Pets
Pet Health
Cute Pet Photos
Safety
Wildlife
Remedies and Treatments
Videos
Biorhythms
Deepak Chopra’s Tips
Exercises
Global Healing
Guidance
Inspiration
Peace
Self-Help
Spirituality & Technology
Videos
home
life
family
beauty
green
do good
crafts & designs
news
videos
conscious consumer
blogs
astrology
my favorites
my Care2 main
my account
my butterfly rewards
my click to donate
my eCards
my friends
my groups
my kudos
my messages
my news
my page
my petitionsite
my photos
my sharebook
my subscriptions
my thank you notes

Link:

5 Plants That Don’t Need Much Water (Slideshow)

Posted in FF, GE, ONA, Uncategorized | Comments Off on 5 Plants That Don’t Need Much Water (Slideshow)

Gulf Coast refineries accidentally belch out a lot of chemical pollution

Gulf Coast refineries accidentally belch out a lot of chemical pollution

Mike Smail

ExxonMobil’s accident-prone complex in Baton Rouge.

“Oops.”

Gulf Coast oil refiners and chemical processors say that a lot, but regulators are doing precious little to rein in what the industry euphemistically calls “upset” emissions.

Upset emissions are inadvertent releases of chemicals by industrial operations when something goes awry. And things seem to go awry awfully frequently. An ExxonMobil refinery in Baton Rouge, La., was averaging two accidental releases every week during one grim stretch.

That’s according to an analysis by The Center for Public Integrity, which found that upset emissions are more prevalent than industry admits or government knows. Some highlights from the center’s investigative report:

[A 411-barrel chemical leak last year] has played out again and again at the sprawling, 2,400-acre ExxonMobil Baton Rouge complex, which encompasses an oil refinery and a chemical plant, and dwarfs the Standard Heights community. The leak marks the 1,068th upset emissions event at the compound in the last eight years, according to a database of incident reports compiled by the Bucket Brigade. Of these events, 172 involved benzene, a carcinogen that can trigger headaches, dizziness and rapid heart rate.

Exxon’s chemical plant had 265 of all incidents. At the refinery, the data show 803 accidental releases over these years; at its height, the facility averaged two a week. …

The steady hazards extend far beyond Baton Rouge. In the Gulf states of Texas and Louisiana, the vast number of plastics, power and gas plants provide an on-the-ground case study of a national problem.

“Non-routine” upset emissions have become regular occurrences at oil refineries, chemical plants and manufacturing facilities.

The upset emissions can pose serious health risks, but the oil and chemical companies say there’s nothing to worry about.

Dr. Mark D’Andrea, at the University of Texas Cancer Center, began tracking 4,000 residents exposed to the poster child of all upsets — the “40-day Release” at the BP refinery, in Texas City, which belched 514,795 pounds of benzene and 20 other pollutants throughout the spring of 2010. Earlier this year, D’Andrea unveiled preliminary data showing the residents have “significantly higher” white-blood cell and platelet counts than their Houston counterparts. The data suggests BP’s release may have increased their risk of developing such cancers as leukemia, the doctor says.

In a statement, BP says it does “not believe any negative health impacts resulted from” its 40-day release. “To our knowledge, the University Cancer Centers’ pilot study does not support a claim for any plaintiff alleging injury from that flaring and has no relevance to those claims,” the company wrote, referring to pending litigation filed by 47,830 residents and workers against BP alleging health ailments caused by the release. D’Andrea has not been hired as an expert witness for either side in the case, but has testified in pre-trial discovery.

For more, read the full report in all its grotesque glory.

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who

tweets

, posts articles to

Facebook

, and

blogs about ecology

. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants:

johnupton@gmail.com

.

Find this article interesting? Donate now to support our work.Read more: Business & Technology

,

Climate & Energy

Also in Grist

Please enable JavaScript to see recommended stories

Taken from – 

Gulf Coast refineries accidentally belch out a lot of chemical pollution

Posted in Anchor, FF, G & F, GE, LG, ONA, solar, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Gulf Coast refineries accidentally belch out a lot of chemical pollution

BP, Shell, Statoil accused of fixing oil prices

BP, Shell, Statoil accused of fixing oil prices

Shutterstock /

Rob Wilson

Have we been paying too much for gas?

The good folks at BP, Shell, and Statoil would never break the law and screw over their customers in a quest for inflated profits, surely.

Yet that is the very accusation coming out of Europe, where the industry giants are suspected of colluding to fix prices for crude, biofuel, and refined oil products at artificially high levels, allowing them to reap greater profits than the laws of supply and demand would dictate in a truly competitive economy.

Offices of the companies were raided last week by European Commission officials, and the Justice Department is being urged to investigate whether the alleged price fixing spilled over onto American shores.

From The Hill:

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman aired his concerns about the recent probe by EU officials into potential oil price manipulation in a Friday letter to Attorney General Eric Holder.

[Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.)] said price fixing in commodity markets “has been an area of abuse within the U.S. in the past,” noting the Enron power market scandal.

“It is critically important to determine whether or not similar efforts have been made to manipulate U.S. oil indices by these firms or others,” he added.

EU investigators raided the European offices of Statoil, BP and Shell earlier this week. The officials are looking into whether the firms submitted false information to Platts, a price-reporting organization owned by McGraw-Hill Financial.

The Economist puts the scale of the growing scandal in some perspective:

The volumes of oil and products linked to these benchmark prices [submitted to Platts] are vast. Futures and derivatives markets are also built on the price of the underlying physical commodity. At least 200 billion barrels a year, worth in the order of $20 trillion, are priced off the Brent benchmark, the world’s biggest, according to Liz Bossley, chief executive of Consilience, an energy-markets consultancy. The commission has said that even small price distortions could have a “huge impact” on energy prices. Statoil has said that the commission’s interest goes all the way back to 2002. If it is right, then the sums involved could be huge, too.

If true, the accusations wouldn’t just mean that motorists have been paying too much at the pump. Energy prices affect everything from food to consumer goods. From The Telegraph:

Ed Davey, the [U.K.] Energy Secretary, has promised companies will face the “full force of the law” if their behaviour is found to have “driven up” petrol prices.

However, his Department of Energy and Climate Change also acknowledged the impact of oil market rigging could be bigger than simply affecting petrol prices.

It said manipulation of the oil price could have driven inflation and pointed out that the market is an important benchmark for many financial transactions.

High oil prices also feeds through to bigger bills for food, clothes and other essentials because it pushes up the cost of transport and manufacturing.

A high oil price will also fuel inflation, which erodes the value of people’s savings, and can stifle economic growth, by pushing up businesses’ costs.

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who

tweets

, posts articles to

Facebook

, and

blogs about ecology

. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants:

johnupton@gmail.com

.

Find this article interesting? Donate now to support our work.Read more: Business & Technology

,

Climate & Energy

,

Politics

Also in Grist

Please enable JavaScript to see recommended stories

See more here – 

BP, Shell, Statoil accused of fixing oil prices

Posted in Anchor, FF, G & F, GE, LG, ONA, solar, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on BP, Shell, Statoil accused of fixing oil prices

Judge says EPA’s lax guidelines on dispersants can stand

Judge says EPA’s lax guidelines on dispersants can stand

NOAAA worker spraying Corexit in the Gulf.

Should the federal government regulate where oil dispersants can be used and how much can be dumped into waterways following oil spills?

“Nah,” says the EPA.

Environmental groups filed suit last year seeking to force the agency to improve its oversight of the use of dispersants. But a federal judge this week tossed out the lawsuit after oil industry attorneys helped EPA win on a technicality.

Americans woke up to the dangers of oil dispersants after BP poured more than 1.8 million gallons of Corexit EC9500A and Corexit EC9527A into the Gulf of Mexico following the Deepwater Horizon blowout. The toxic dispersants helped the crude oil mix with water, forcing it down from the surface and into the water column, out of sight of humans and television crews but into the habitat of a lot of marine wildlife. The chemicals also made cleanup workers and local residents horrifically sick.

It was nearly 30 years ago, in 1984, that the EPA finalized its rules for dealing with dispersants and began compiling a schedule of chemicals that may be used to control oil spills. The Sierra Club and the seven other environmental groups behind the suit called for the agency to expand its plans to include details on the places and the quantities in which the chemicals can be used. The EPA said it prefers giving the oil industry flexibility to battle spills based on local conditions.

From Courthouse News Service:

The groups claimed the EPA’s failure to include information about water bodies and safe chemical quantities violated its statutory duties under the Clean Water Act.

They claimed the EPA “acted arbitrarily and capriciously” each time it added a new chemical to the product schedule in the past 6 years.

The EPA and intervenor-defendant American Petroleum Institute (API) sought dismissal, arguing that the groups’ claims were untimely because they sued 30 years after the EPA published the contingency plan and product schedule.

[U.S. District Judge John] Bates sided with the EPA, agreeing that the environmental groups did not present their claims by the statutory deadline.

“… the court concludes that the time for bringing suit has long since passed and hence plaintiffs’ claims must be dismissed.”

Congratulations on the victory, EPA. If only you focused as hard on protecting Americans from dispersant-spraying oil companies as you do on crafting legal arguments.

John Upton is a science aficionado and green news junkie who

tweets

, posts articles to

Facebook

, and

blogs about ecology

. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants:

johnupton@gmail.com

.

Find this article interesting? Donate now to support our work.Read more: Business & Technology

,

Climate & Energy

,

Politics

Also in Grist

Please enable JavaScript to see recommended stories

Credit – 

Judge says EPA’s lax guidelines on dispersants can stand

Posted in Anchor, FF, G & F, GE, LG, ONA, Pines, solar, solar panels, solar power, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Judge says EPA’s lax guidelines on dispersants can stand

The Price of Healthcare Success: Losing Your Funding

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

This came out over the weekend, but Ezra Klein has an interesting long piece up about the next frontier in health management. Just as control of infectious diseases was the story of the 20th century, control of chronic diseases may be the story of the 21st:

With chronic illnesses like diabetes and heart disease you don’t get better, or at least not quickly. They don’t require cures so much as management….Kenneth Thorpe, chairman of the health policy and management school at Emory University, estimates that 95 percent of spending in Medicare goes to patients with one or more chronic conditions — with enrollees suffering five or more chronic conditions accounting for 78 percent of its spending.

….Health Quality Partners is all about going there. The program enrolls Medicare patients with at least one chronic illness and one hospitalization in the past year. It then sends a trained nurse to see them every week, or every month, whether they’re healthy or sick….Health Quality Partners’ results have been extraordinary. According to an independent analysis by the consulting firm Mathematica, HQP has reduced hospitalizations by 33 percent and cut Medicare costs by 22 percent.

Others in the profession have taken notice. “It’s like they’ve discovered the fountain of youth in Doylestown, Pa.,” marvels Jeffrey Brenner, founder of the Camden Coalition of Healthcare Providers.

Now Medicare is thinking of shutting it off.

Read the rest to learn why nurse visits work, and why Medicare may be shutting them down.

Read More:  

The Price of Healthcare Success: Losing Your Funding

Posted in FF, GE, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , | Comments Off on The Price of Healthcare Success: Losing Your Funding

Eurogroup Head Warns Big Depositors Their Money Isn’t Safe

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

Now that big depositors in Cyprus’s banks have been told they’re going to lose a huge chunk of their money, what’s next? Dutch Finance Minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem, who heads the Eurogroup of eurozone finance ministers, says this might be the right template for dealing with future bank failures:

“If there is a risk in a bank, our first question should be ‘Okay, what are you in the bank going to do about that? What can you do to recapitalise yourself?’. If the bank can’t do it, then we’ll talk to the shareholders and the bondholders, we’ll ask them to contribute in recapitalising the bank, and if necessary the uninsured deposit holders,” he said

….”If we want to have a healthy, sound financial sector, the only way is to say, ‘Look, there where you take on the risks, you must deal with them, and if you can’t deal with them, then you shouldn’t have taken them on,'” he said.

In one sense, Dijsselbloem is just saying the obvious: uninsured deposits are uninsured deposits. If a bank fails, you might lose some or all of the money you’ve deposited there.

In a way, this is a laudable reminder that you should be careful about where you put your money. On the other hand, telling everyone that, hey, what happened in Cyprus might happen again in Spain, or Portugal, or Greece, seems almost deliberately designed to create a huge bank run. At least, that’s how everyone took it. As a result, Dijsselbloem quickly released a very brief statement: “Macro-economic adjustment programmes are tailor-made to the situation of the country concerned and no models or templates are used.”

We’ll see if that helps. The problem is that Dijsselbloem pretty obviously meant what he said, and no one has rushed out to say otherwise. What’s more, as we all know, banking crises and sovereign debt crises are inextricably connected. Bank runs from big depositors would almost certainly lead to further sovereign debt crises, which obviously couldn’t be solved by going after big bank deposits. At its heart, then, this is just a reminder that Europe’s problems are far from over because it has so far refused to deal with its core issues of capital flows in a fixed exchange rate area. There’s no telling which trouble spot will erupt next—there are too many to choose from—but erupt it will. One of these days, Angela Merkel is going to have to level with her constituents about exactly what this means.

Mother Jones
Taken from: 

Eurogroup Head Warns Big Depositors Their Money Isn’t Safe

Posted in FF, GE, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , | Comments Off on Eurogroup Head Warns Big Depositors Their Money Isn’t Safe

Anti-Marriage Equality Leader Says America Cannot Remain "Half Slave and Half Free"

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

Brian Brown, president of the National Organization for Marriage, which since 2007 has successfully fought to ban same-sex marriage in several states and fought to punish legislators and judges who have supported it, offered interesting analogy on the eve of Supreme Court arguments over the constitutionality of California’s Proposition 8 and the Defense of Marriage Act. Friday, appearing on the show of conservative radio host Steve Deace, Brown argued for a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, saying “We need a solution in this country, we cannot be, as Lincoln said, half slave, half free.”

Here’s the transcript from Miranda Blue at Right Wing Watch (emphasis mine):

I think we’re going to win these cases. But say the worst happens and we lose in a broad way—that means that the Court somehow does a Roe, a Roe v. Wade, on marriage and says that all these state constitutional amendments are overturned, gay marriage is now a constitutional right – well, we’re going to press forward on a Federal Marriage Amendment. We’ve always supported a Federal Marriage Amendment, and there’s a lot of misconceptions about it. Some people try and argue, ‘Well, this is against federalism.’ No, our founders gave us a system where we can amend the Constitution. We shouldn’t have to do this, we shouldn’t have to worry about activist judges, you know, making up out of thin air a constitutional right that obviously none of our founders found there and no one found there until quite recently. But if we do, for us, the Federal Marriage Amendment is a way that people can stand up and say, ‘Enough is enough.’ We need a solution in this country, we cannot be, as Lincoln said, half slave, half free. We can’t have a country on key moral questions where we’re just, where we don’t have a solution. And if the Court forces a solution, the way we’ll amend that is through the Federal Marriage Amendment.

Brown is referencing Abraham Lincoln’s famous “House Divided” speech, which was about the inevitability of conflict within the Union over the issue of slavery. In Brown’s analogy, presumably, the states where relationships between same-sex couples are legally recognized are the “slave states.”

The issue of same-sex marriage will most likely be resolved with less bloodshed than the abolition of required. But judging by the evolution in public opinion on the issue, the marriage equality “solution” won’t be the one Brown is hoping for.

Mother Jones
Link to original:  

Anti-Marriage Equality Leader Says America Cannot Remain "Half Slave and Half Free"

Posted in alo, FF, GE, ONA, Uncategorized, Venta | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments Off on Anti-Marriage Equality Leader Says America Cannot Remain "Half Slave and Half Free"