PoliticsNY.net: Open
Congratulations to Michael Caputo and Pete Herr for today’s inauguration of the new, libel-free PoliticsNY.net. Check out this first post, wherein Caputo explains why he bought the URL and then decided to resurrect the site.
Author: buffalopundit
Fuck Your Gun
Let’s limit gun ownership to what Heston is holding here.
Yesterday, in something of a whirlwind session of the oft-feckless New York State legislature, Senate Majority leader Dean Skelos, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, and Governor Andrew Cuomo agreed to the key provisions of what is called the “NY SAFE” act, or “Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement” Act. It passed the state senate late Monday, and will be taken up by the Assembly today.
The law will do the following:
– limit gun magazines to hold a maximum of 7 bullets;
– universal background checks for every single gun transfer, including private ones that are person-to-person; and
– a “Webster provision” mandating life without parole for anyone who murders a first responder.
Here’s what at least one 2nd Amendment purist had to say about it on Twitter:
Goodbye, Second Amendment.m.usatoday.com/article/news/1…
— Kathryn DeLong (@kathryndelong) January 14, 2013
The second amendment. The one that helps enshrine perpetual violence and revolution. Its purpose – clearly stated – was to make sure that our new country, which at the time had no standing army, could protect itself from attacks by Britons, Frenchmen, Spaniards, and whatever Indian tribe or nation from which we were trying wrest control of land.
You want a gun for hunting? Target practice? Skeet? To ward off robbers or burglars? That’s fine. You don’t, however, get to keep a military arsenal.
Those on the deepest fringes of the right wing – the people who think lunatic Alex Jones is an influential and sane voice about guns – love to bring up the notion that the 2nd Amendment exists to protect you from “tyranny”. No one gets too worked up trying to define what “tyranny” is, or who gets to decide when “tyranny” becomes a clear and present danger. This crowd loves to cite the Declaration of Independence – a document that was a declaration of war against a monarch who brutally exploited his American colonies. The Declaration, however, ceased to have any legal effect the moment that Britain lost the war and recognized American Independence.
So, no, proud patriot, you don’t have a right to take up arms against the government. Indeed, Article III, section 3 of the U.S. Constitution makes that sort of thing a very serious crime.
One more gun control effort, one more gun fetishist makes some broken, semi-informed analogy about how if the Jews were armed in the 30s, they could have somehow halted their own genocide in the face of a German war machine. One more gun debate, one more person suggesting that our representative democracy – flawed though it might be – is or could oh-so-easily-be the equivalent of Pol Pot’s Cambodia. One more effort to limit the firepower we so casually make available to lunatics, one more person expressing their idiot fever-dream of single-handedly taking on the FBI or One World Government or ZOG, notwithstanding the fact that the government could – if it wanted to – easily take out your entire neighborhood with an unmanned drone operated by a teenager nursing a Monster Energy Drink in a dank, smelly basement in Northern Virginia.
One more gun fetishist, one more clumsy analogy made to some other object with a large capacity or capability of doing harm that we are allowed to own, but the primary purpose for which is not “putting holes in things at breakneck speed”. Gas tanks, fast cars, pencils.
And what of tyranny? We’ve had plenty of tyranny in this country, but when the Black Panthers agitated for blacks to arm themselves during the civil rights struggles of the 60s, the NRA was happy to support the Mulford Act, which limited the Panthers’ ability to carry arms and inform black citizens of their Constitutional rights. The NRA supports your right to bear arms, so long as you’re of European descent and not too uppity.
Some have taken to social media to criticize the limit on magazines. I don’t understand why it’s ok for someone to have a semiautomatic pistol that can fire 7 bullets in 7 seconds and extinguish 7 lives in that period of time, but I suppose it’s exponentially better than the 33-round clip that Gabby Giffords’ would-be assassin had in his possession. He was subdued only as he tried to reload; by that time, six people had been killed.
I get that violence is an integral part of American society and history. But I also recognize that you don’t get to own an F-15 or a nuclear missile just because it makes you feel safe or helps you ward off “tyranny”.
I know that the rhetoric on this issue is going to get much worse before it gets any better. After all, we have a Kenyan communist President, against whom any facile lie is routinely thrown. I also think that insane lunatics shouldn’t have access to military weapons and equipment; shouldn’t be able to waltz around your town with enough firepower to put 11 holes in a first grader. Shouldn’t be able to get so many rounds off in so little time that the first grader’s jaw and hand are disappeared.
If you like guns, good for you. If you’re a Glenn Beck / Alex Jones type, I sincerely hope that you get Galt’s Gulch going – that you divest yourself completely from American society and go off and start your post-hippie, penis envy-laden republic of gunnutistan – a place that is not on American soil and is free from American law and jurisdiction, so you can carry out your secessionist fever dreams away from us normal people.
Because our easy access to guns and our gun culture make our society a particularly violent one; not video games or TV shows – those are safe avenues of expressing the reality of warfare. We love war and conflict. We can’t get enough of it. Somehow, other societies are able to function without it.
New York is going to limit your ability to transfer your guns to the angry and insane, and it’s going to make you have to reload more frequently while you’re shooting up your neighborhood or a schoolroom. This isn’t the end of the 2nd Amendment – it’s a first step to protecting those of us who don’t run around living in perpetual fear, armed to the teeth.
Failed City Opposes Bridge to Canada
Remember how Matty Moroun wanted to build a truck-only bridge to Fort Erie up by the rail crossing? Anyone else notice that anti-Peace Bridge expansion is right there on the front page of his Buffalo bridge website? I did. Has Mr. Moroun’s organization been seeding groups in town with money? Good question. Any way to find out? Please; this is Buffalo, not Detroit.
I wonder why Canadians think it’s important to maintain better road links with the United States? I know there are a lot of very vocal Buffalonians who agree with the people in this video who think easier travel to Canada is unimportant, and rather than expand the Peace Bridge, argue strenuously for its removal. Here’s your ghost of bridges future:
Long Live Cuomoism and our People’s Socialist Government!
Equal pay for equal work for females. Clearly, the notion that female labor be subject to the same remuneration as male labor is a wild socialist plot that will soon see the Bolsheviks come for your land and goats.
Tax breaks for startups and money for high-tech clusters. Entreprenueriat of the world, unite!
Confiscation of guns possessed by the mentally infirm. Stalin. Hitler*.
Three upstate casinos. Under a proper socialist regime, those casinos would only be able to be patronized by foreigners in order for the regime to earn some needed hard currency. At last check, New Yorkers will not only be permitted, but encouraged, to hit the tables and slots.
Expanding school years or days. Socialist indoctrination takes time.
$1.50 hike in minimum wage to $8.75. Else the red banner be raised and the Spartacists take to the streets of Albany.
Pairing community colleges with employers. Smash the kolkhozniki.
“Civilian Emergency Response Corps” to help with natural disasters. AKA “Komsomol“.
A “bar exam” for teachers to pass before certification. Comrade teacher, you will educate the vanguard of the entreprenueriat.
Longer prison sentences for gun crimes. The upstate gulag archipelago demands warm bodies.
Reforming & liberalizing marijuana possession laws. Pot is the opiate of the masses.
I, for one, welcome our new communard overlords.
*I add Hitler to be extra-facetious. Despite what ignoramuses may tell you, Hitler was by no means a “socialist” despite the presence of that word within “National Socialism”. Naziism is about as far removed from Marxism-Leninism and Stalinism as a political ideology can be.
Donald Trump Releases Forged “Birth Certificate”
Several months ago, billionaire lunatic and horrible person Donald J. Trump tried to influence the presidential election by hyping a “big announcement” only to have no announcement at all – except that he’d give $5 million to a charity if the President released his grades from schools he attended.
During an appearance on the allegedly comedic “Tonight Show with Jay Leno”, comedian Bill Maher jokingly challenged Trump to release his birth certificate to prove he wasn’t the “spawn of his mother having sex with an orangutan.” Trump, naturally, took this semi-seriously; I fully expect there to be litigation over this, and Trump will lose.
According to Yahoo.com, this is what Trump’s people sent to Maher:
January 8, 2013
Mr. Bill Maher
Real Time with Bill Maher
CBS Studios
7800 Beverly Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90036Dear Mr. Maher:
I represent Mr. Donald J. Trump. I write on his behalf to accept your offer (made during the Jay Leno Show on January 7, 2013) that Mr. Trump prove he is not the “spawn of his mother having sex with an orangutan.”
Attached hereto is a copy of Mr. Trump’s birth certificate, demonstrating that he is the son of Fred Trump, not an orangutan. Please remit the $5 million to Mr. Trump immediately and he will ensure that the money be donated to the following five charities in equal amounts: Hurricane Sandy Victims, The Police Athletic League, The American Cancer Society, The March of Dimes, and The Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.
Regards,
Scott S. Balber
Astonishingly, however, this is the “birth certificate” that Trump’s lawyer attached:
Clearly, this is a cheap forgery. First of all, it is not a birth certificate, but a certification of birth. There were no dot-matrix printers available to New York City bureaucrats in 1946, much less bar codes. This is a clear forgery and/or an obvious attempt to manufacture something that does not exist. Where is the long-form birth certificate?
Furthermore, this clear forgery merely purports to establish that the father’s name is “Fred”. Nowhere on that document is it noted whether “Fred” is homo sapiens or pongo pygmaeus.
As an American and a patriot, I demand that Donald Trump release a long-form birth certificate, proving that “Fred Trump” was not an orangutan living in New York City in 1946. Until that moment, this is irrefutable proof that Trump is not a natural-born toxic billionaire, but clearly a orangutan-man with wispy orange hair and a nasty disposition.
Trader Joe’s in a Wegmans World
Trader Joe’s is coming to that huge shopping center in Amherst on Niagara Falls Boulevard where everything new to WNY always goes. Best Buy, Christmas Tree Shops, Carrabba’s, Panera Bread, and Chipotle all help to make that place impossible to navigate. It will be located near Barnes & Noble and Famous Footwear.
Trader Joe’s started in California as a convenience store competitor to 7-11. To differentiate its stores from the national chain’s, it adopted a South Seas motif and started selling specialty items.
Two brothers, Theo and Karl Albrecht, created the discount supermarket chain “Aldi” in West Germany after WW2, and were instrumental in its European – and later worldwide – expansion. Theo and Karl had a disagreement in the 1960s over selling cigarettes, so they split Aldi geographically in Germany, with Theo running Aldi Nord. In 1979, a family trust of which Theo was a member bought – and still owns – Trader Joe’s. And if you think about it, Trader Joe’s is Aldi with better frozen foods, higher quality groceries, and a cute concept.
I saw lots of commentary yesterday about how we don’t need Trader Joe’s because we’re so blessed to have Wegmans, the best grocery store in the universe. Not taking away from Wegmans at all, but Trader Joe’s is different, just like Aldi is different. I don’t see Aldi struggling to make do in a Wegmans-heavy market; neither will TJ’s.
Although Trader Joe’s won’t be able to sell wine in its New York stores, thanks to our idiotic, protectionist liquor laws, it sells a nice variety of craft beers, has a great coffee section, one of the best frozen sections you’ll ever see, fantastic chocolates, and plenty of healthy and organic items that are different or cheaper than what you’re used to. It’s fun to browse around and check out the many good-quality, cheap private-label items they carry.
I used to go to TJ’s all the time when I lived in Massachusetts and recently stopped in to the new location outside Rochester, which is coincidentally located in the shopping center immediately adjacent to the Wegmans mothership in Henrietta. I didn’t leave empty-handed.
Welcome Trader Joe’s. We like good food and we like bargains. It would seem to me that you’re a perfect fit for WNY. My only question is – what took so long?
This Place Mattered
With news of a new Bills head coach and an end to the NHL lockout yesterday, anything I write here will just get lost in the clutter.
So instead, this; on Friday, demolition commenced on a 100 year-old church on Colvin near Tacoma in North Buffalo.
The site is completely surrounded by residential properties. Local preservationists are in full building-mourning over it.
Another church is being demolished in the Queen City. This one was special, it graced a strong neighborhood with stable property values. It lived in an area that could have supported a creative reuse project.
No longer does this neighborhood have this historic gem to provide quality community space, jobs and cultural events. What is sad is, this one isn’t caving in like others still standing across the city. This one is stable, it is strong and reusable. Yet, it gets demolished because the owner neglected it’s property and the City gave in. Surprise!The owner was given a golden demolition ticket from the City of Buffalo, despite the fact that it qualifies to be a local landmark.
The problem with this is that the building wasn’t a “historic gem” anymore. It was vacant – had been vacant since 2006 when a Korean methodist congregation last used what had once been a Baptist church. That’s six (6) years during which the building didn’t act as an historic gem, but as a public nuisance – attracting kids hanging out and, in April, an arsonist. That’s six, going on seven, years during which nothing happened with this building. Right? Well, not so fast.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: January 5, 2013
In April of 2012, the former North Park Baptist Church on Colvin Avenue was damaged by a three-alarm arson fire. No one was harmed during the incident, thankfully, since the North Buffalo church had been vacant for a number of years after the owner, the Korean United Methodist Church, vacated the property for unknown reasons. Late last November, the owner applied for a demolition permit from the City of Buffalo citing, in large part, the damage caused by that fire.
Earlier this week, the City of Buffalo Preservation Board announced their intention to nominate the former church for local landmark designation, given the property’s high architecturally design, rich history, and physical presence in the neighborhood. The demolition of the former North Park Baptist Church began yesterday (Friday) afternoon at 3pm. The now-familiar manner in which we neglect and sequentially dispose of our city has, unfortunately, begun to define the City of Good Neighbors as much as our actual architecture does.
As we begin to debate the true culprit of yet another Friday-afternoon demolition, whether it is an irresponsible property owner, an utter lack of vision from elected officials, or a general absence of appreciation of our unique architectural gems like this former Italian Renaissance Revival church — or a combination of all of the above — we can’t help but share a critical piece of dialogue that is missing from this familiar conversation. This piece is the incompatibility of the otherwise overwhelmingly successful Historic Tax Credit program, and the economic and design realities related to rehabilitating and repurposing a vacant religious space.
The decline of the neighborhood church building type during the last 40-plus years is very similar to that of the decline of the industrial and commercial buildings in the downtown cores of our cities — as well as the decline of our cities’ neighborhoods themselves. This trend was caused in large part by the movement patterns of our country’s population from established, urban neighborhoods to newly formed communities in the suburbs surrounding our cities. Unfortunately, the recent sequential story of the gradual renaissance of our cities rarely includes the successful repurposing of neighborhood religious spaces. With the aid of the Historic Tax Credit program, once-idle manufacturing buildings are being converted into trendy downtown living lofts, and homeowners in at-risk neighborhoods are provided incentives for renovation work on their historic homes. But almost all vacant churches and other religious spaces are left vacant — many neglected to the point of demolition.
The primary reason why more religious spaces aren’t repurposed as part of the Historic Tax Credit program is that the majority of the prospective buyers’ rehabilitation plans are currently incompatible with the design standards which govern the incentive program. These Standards (known as the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards) mandate that the congregation space or sanctuary, typically a large, rectangular basilica space, which is often two-stories or more in height, cannot be easily subdivided into smaller spaces. The Standards applied in these cases expect those congregation spaces to be reused in a way that respects and reflects the original historic use. This presents an obvious problem for potential developers and owners of these properties, because, typically, every available square foot needs to be leveraged in order for the project to be financially feasible.
The former North Park Baptist Church is an example of such a failed attempt to use Historic Tax Credits in a proposed rehabilitation project. In 2010, while working at Preservation Studios (a local historic preservation consulting firm), we [Tom Yots and Jason Wilson] participated in a walkthrough of this property with local architect and developer Karl Frizlen of the Frizlen Group. We ultimately partnered with The Frizlen Group in proposing a design that would have placed residential units into the congregation space. The proposed design called for keeping the original interior wall surfaces and stained glass windows, and inserted an independent structure within the open space of the sanctuary (see renderings below).
The New York State Historic Preservation Office was supportive, and presented the project for informal review to the National Park Service who oversees the historic tax credit program. But the National Park Service eventually rejected the design, primarily because the openness of the congregation space would be lost. With their proposed project being ruled ineligible for the Historic Tax Credit program, the Frizlen Group decided to not move forward with purchasing and repurposing the church. It was determined that Historic Tax Credits were essential in making the proposed project financially feasible.The former North Park Baptist Church is an example of such a failed attempt to use Historic Tax Credits in a proposed rehabilitation project. In 2010, while working at Preservation Studios (a local historic preservation consulting firm), we [Tom Yots and Jason Wilson] participated in a walkthrough of this property with local architect and developer Karl Frizlen of the Frizlen Group. We ultimately partnered with The Frizlen Group in proposing a design that would have placed residential units into the congregation space. The proposed design called for keeping the original interior wall surfaces and stained glass windows, and inserted an independent structure within the open space of the sanctuary (see renderings below).The New York State Historic Preservation Office was supportive, and presented the project for informal review to the National Park Service who oversees the historic tax credit program. But the National Park Service eventually rejected the design, primarily because the openness of the congregation space would be lost. With their proposed project being ruled ineligible for the Historic Tax Credit program, the Frizlen Group decided to not move forward with purchasing and repurposing the church. It was determined that Historic Tax Credits were essential in making the proposed project financially feasible.Like many religious buildings in our communities, the former North Park Baptist Church was located in a residential neighborhood, and anchored the blocks that surrounded it. The character of a neighborhood is often highlighted by the religious buildings that serve as these anchors. The “village” feel of the Elmwood Village comes not just from the small shops and supporting residential blocks, but also from churches like Lafayette Presbyterian on Elmwood at Lafayette, and the Unitarian-Universalist Church on Elmwood at West Ferry. These beautiful and imposing buildings are integral to the neighborhood they serve, and that integration goes well beyond their religious and social activities to include an important physical presence of architecture and landscape.North Buffalo has lost an important neighborhood landmark today, and it is PBN’s intent to pursue every available avenue to making the rehabilitation of our communities’ vacant religious spaces more of a reality than it was today.
See, this would usually be the point at which I criticize the reactionary nature of Buffalo’s preservationist community, and how its distaste for quickly-approved, Friday afternoon demolition permits is matched only bit its 11th hour efforts to prevent the inevitable, usually with emotional pleas about how much a place matters.
But we can’t do that here – with this property, there was a proactive effort by members of the PBN to promote this building for an adaptive reuse project, but the public money and incentives that make these sorts of projects economically possible in Buffalo can’t be used effectively with former churches. Of course, there are several former churches in town that have been turned into apartments or an art space, so the question I have is, if the project was so great, why didn’t Frizlen go ahead with it without applying for the tax credit program.
Note this: when rattling off the list of “culprits” for this demolition, the PBN omitted a critical actor.
As we begin to debate the true culprit of yet another Friday-afternoon demolition, whether it is an irresponsible property owner, an utter lack of vision from elected officials, or a general absence of appreciation of our unique architectural gems like this former Italian Renaissance Revival church — or a combination of all of the above…
…or a reactive, too-late, preservationist community. But here, at least, Buffalo’s preservationists have identified a specific legislative problem and called for action on it. But calling for action ≠ action, nor does standing around with placards about love and how much a place matters. Good luck.
£1 Fish
Fish, Nazir, a Pound
Forget Gangnam Style.
Muhammad Shahaid Nazir is a Pakistani man who until recently worked as a fishmonger at Queen’s Market at Upton Park in London. A gastarbeiter, his wife and kids still live in Pakistan, where YouTube is blocked. His boss wanted him to come up with a way to attract customers to their £1 fish special; £1 each, 6 for £5. Nazir didn’t want to shout at people, so like many market stall workers before him, he sang a song; a catchy, funny one. This made him something of a minor celebrity in London, and when a passerby shot a video of Nazir’s song and posted it to YouTube, he became a sensation in the UK and Europe.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETSl8gWsFZ0]
Of course, this got Nazir a record deal, and he’s left his stall to sell records. He recently had to leave the UK and return to Pakistan to apply for a French visa. He received a hero’s welcome.
Here’s your earbug for today, Buffalo. Have-a have-a look.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_miGclPFGs]
Things for Thursday
A few things I found online in the last few days:
1. Remember a few weeks ago, when NRA CEO and infamous goon Wayne LaPierre blamed everything but guns on the massacre of teachers and first graders at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT? LaPierre didn’t just stumble on being a hateful lunatic – this is something that is apparently part of his job qualifications. Back in 1995, after the Oklahoma City bombing perpetrated by WNY native Timothy McVeigh, LaPierre said things so horrible and conscious-shocking that former President George H.W. Bush publicly rebuked him and resigned his NRA membership. Bush wrote,
I was outraged when, even in the wake of the Oklahoma City tragedy, Mr. Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president of N.R.A., defended his attack on federal agents as “jack-booted thugs.” To attack Secret Service agents or A.T.F. people or any government law enforcement people as “wearing Nazi bucket helmets and black storm trooper uniforms” wanting to “attack law abiding citizens” is a vicious slander on good people.
Al Whicher, who served on my [ United States Secret Service ] detail when I was Vice President and President, was killed in Oklahoma City. He was no Nazi. He was a kind man, a loving parent, a man dedicated to serving his country — and serve it well he did.
In 1993, I attended the wake for A.T.F. agent Steve Willis, another dedicated officer who did his duty. I can assure you that this honorable man, killed by weird cultists, was no Nazi.
We can have a debate and discussion about guns, gun rights, and limitations on both – but calling people Nazis isn’t part of it.
2. When it came to slavery, Thomas Jefferson was kind of a jerk. He was kind to some (especially if there were rapes to be had), and particularly cruel to others. He was happy to take out mortgages against his slaves, to have them flogged, and even refused to carry out a request contained in Polish General Kosciusco’s will, wherein money was set aside for Jefferson to buy out and free his slaves.
The critical turning point in Jefferson’s thinking may well have come in 1792. As Jefferson was counting up the agricultural profits and losses of his plantation in a letter to President Washington that year, it occurred to him that there was a phenomenon he had perceived at Monticello but never actually measured. He proceeded to calculate it in a barely legible, scribbled note in the middle of a page, enclosed in brackets. What Jefferson set out clearly for the first time was that he was making a 4 percent profit every year on the birth of black children. The enslaved were yielding him a bonanza, a perpetual human dividend at compound interest. Jefferson wrote, “I allow nothing for losses by death, but, on the contrary, shall presently take credit four per cent. per annum, for their increase over and above keeping up their own numbers.” His plantation was producing inexhaustible human assets. The percentage was predictable.
In another communication from the early 1790s, Jefferson takes the 4 percent formula further and quite bluntly advances the notion that slavery presented an investment strategy for the future. He writes that an acquaintance who had suffered financial reverses “should have been invested in negroes.” He advises that if the friend’s family had any cash left, “every farthing of it [should be] laid out in land and negroes, which besides a present support bring a silent profit of from 5. to 10. per cent in
this country by the increase in their value.”
The irony is that Jefferson sent his 4 percent formula to George Washington, who freed his slaves, precisely because slavery had made human beings into money, like “Cattle in the market,” and this disgusted him. Yet Jefferson was right, prescient, about the investment value of slaves. A startling statistic emerged in the 1970s, when economists taking a hardheaded look at slavery found that on the eve of the Civil War, enslaved black people, in the aggregate, formed the second most valuable capital asset in the United States. David Brion Davis sums up their findings: “In 1860, the value of Southern slaves was about three times the amount invested in manufacturing or railroads nationwide.” The only asset more valuable than the black people was the land itself. The formula Jefferson had stumbled upon became the engine not only of Monticello but of the entire slaveholding South and the Northern industries, shippers, banks, insurers and investors who weighed risk against returns and bet on slavery. The words Jefferson used—“their increase”—became magic words.
Jefferson’s 4 percent theorem threatens the comforting notion that he had no real awareness of what he was doing, that he was “stuck” with or “trapped” in slavery, an obsolete, unprofitable, burdensome legacy. The date of Jefferson’s calculation aligns with the waning of his emancipationist fervor. Jefferson began to back away from antislavery just around the time he computed the silent profit of the “peculiar institution.”
And this world was crueler than we have been led to believe. A letter has recently come to light describing how Monticello’s young black boys, “the small ones,” age 10, 11 or 12, were whipped to get them to work in Jefferson’s nail factory, whose profits paid the mansion’s grocery bills.
Much of the information in this Smithsonian story has been carefully excised from our Jefferson hagiography because 150 years later, we still can’t come to terms as a country with our history of slavery and racial animus and discrimination.
3. Just because you employ someone doesn’t mean you have the right to inject your own opinions on their healthcare decisions. Hobby Lobby, which has two outlets in western New York, has gone to the Supreme Court to seek injunctive relief so that it would not have to provide health insurance coverage for contraception for its employees under Obamacare. Why their employees’ sex lives are any of Hobby Lobby’s business is a mystery for sure, but Obamacare doesn’t force Hobby Lobby to hand out the morning after pill with every paycheck – it merely requires the health insurers to offer contraceptive coverage. Aside from the fact that the employees affected work for Hobby Lobby, the company has no further mandate set upon it. If it doesn’t agree with contraception, it is free to hold that belief, but should not be free to impose it on its employees, or to have its employees’ rights become less than those of workers elsewhere. Justice Sotomayor rejected Hobby Lobby’s request for injunctive relief. As a shopper for crafty things and toys for grownups, you may choose to use this information to direct your hobby dollars accordingly.
Eating, Drinking, Being Merry
The 400 or so of you who also happen to be my friend on Facebook might be expecting a post about restaurants this morning. Suffice it to say that some of the best inexplicable back-stabbing is perpetrated by portly weathermen – (to be a meteorologist, one needs to have credentials).
I will write about food today, (something I usually reserve for my gig with the Spree, but I will make an exception here), but only to present to you two “year in review” food posts from different Buffalo-based food writers.
Andrew Galarneau, the Buffalo News’ restaurant critic, gives a year-end assessment here.
Jeremy Horwitz, the author of Buffalo Chow, exits hiatus to present a year-in-review of restaurants he’s visited elsewhere in the US and how he sees those experiences in comparison to what’s going on in Buffalo and western New York. He considers that the domestic food scene is undergoing a revolution, and that it’s largely passing Buffalo by. There’s a lot of food for thought there, pun intended.
Also, consider that it was a year ago that we all helped to unravel the lies and cons of the fake Iron Chef who briefly ran “Valenti’s” in North Tonawanda, where a Mighty Taco now stands. Look for a “where are they now” post in the coming days.