Daily Archives: February 9, 2017

Columbus

Civil and gay rights groups are raising the alarm over the Ohio Pastor Protection Act, a bill pending in the Ohio House that makes it explicit that ministers or religious groups arent required to perform same sex marriages.

When asked if House Bill 36 would be good or bad for Ohios reputation and business, Gov. John Kasich said on Wednesday: If they want to pass something that says my minister doesnt have to perform a marriage, Im okay with that. And I think the constitution of the state already provides thatId have to see what the bill does but I dont think its going to be some sweeping Indiana or North Carolina bill, is my understanding.

Kasich says clergy shouldn't be forced to perform gay marriages

The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio, Equality Ohio, TransOhio and Human Rights Campaign issued statements that describe House Bill 36 as a solution in search for a problem.

The groups said clergy in Ohio arent being forced to perform same sex marriages nor are they facing lawsuits when they decline to do so.

The bill was introduced Tuesday by state Rep. Nino Vitale, R-Urbana, one of the most politically conservative members of the Ohio House. On Wednesday, a dozen proponents testified in favor of the bill.

It protects pastors and church property from being forced to perform wedding ceremonies, which are against their religious beliefs. There is really nothing more to it than this. My reason for writing this bill is to stop a litigation war in Ohio, Vitale said in written testimony.

Faith Baptist Church Senior Pastor Paul Norton said in written testimony that he wants his community to be able to enjoy the freedom of speech and practice of religion without fear of legal retribution.

ACLU of Ohio Policy Manager Lisa Wurm said in a written statement: House Bill 36 opens a Pandoras box of problems that could significantly roll back marriage equality in Ohio. It may allow businesses or other officials to discriminate against same-sex couples. The U.S. Supreme Court was clear that people should not be treated unfairly because of who they love, yet politicians continue to try and undermine this basic right.

In 2015, protests erupted in Indiana over passage of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. And there were protests last year over North Carolinas bathroom bill that mandates individuals use public restrooms that match the sex on their birth certificates an effort to block transgendered individuals from using different bathrooms.

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Religious freedom bill moving in Ohio - Dayton Daily News - Dayton Daily News

Do you struggle to stay focused online?

There's an app for that, and its designers hope it can help social media addicts be more productive.

Fred Stutzman said he came up with the idea for Freedom while in graduate school.

"There's always information coming at you, information that could gab your attention," he said of the distracting nature of the internet. "But the reality is, we need to get work done."

Freedom allows users to select sites and apps they want to block and for how long. When users attempt to open them, they'll get a quick reminder that they could be doing other things.

Durham-based Freedom now has about 350,000 users around the world, and the service is growing.

To those who scoff at the idea of needing an app to control the urges to check social media, Stutzman says it's not that easy.

Big tech companies are hard at work designing better ways to get website users hooked.

"It's really not a fair battle, for you to expect to turn on and turn off when you want," he said. "It just doesn't work that way."

Raleigh-based productivity expert Marcey Rader teaches clients both individuals and businesses how to de-clutter their mind, body and inbox, one bad habit at a time.

Online time wasting is just one of the habits she battles against each day.

"And I don't even like social media, but it gets you sucked in," Rader said.

Rader recommends site-blocking options to her clients and she believes taking time to eliminate distractions can pay off.

"Having something like that, like Freedom, sets you up for success," Rader said. "It saves you from yourself."

Freedom starts at about $2 per month, and it works on computers, tablets and smartphones.

Excerpt from:

Find 'Freedom' from online distraction with Durham-made app - WRAL.com

Most conservativesare masters of the bad-faith argument, but none so more than anti-choice activists. For decades now, anti-choicers have perfected the art of concealingtheir hostility to abortion and contraception with terms like pro-life and theirsupposed concern with protecting womens health.

This disingenuous approach characterized the conservative response to a Department of Health and Human Services requirement, created under the Affordable Care Act, that requires insurance plans to cover contraception without a co-payment.

Until recently Republicans have framed their objections to mandatory contraception coverage witha religious freedom argument, arguing that the mandate offended the sensibilities of religious employers.Efforts to chip away at insurance coverage of contraception were largely focused on carving out broad exemptions for employers who claimed a religious objection to the mandate, instead of ending the regulation itself.

But now were living under President Donald Trump in an America shaped by Breitbart News, and right-wingers opposed to womens reproductive freedom can zoom right past the euphemism and into the territory of belligerent misogyny.

Trumps chief strategic advisor, Steve Bannon, used to run Breitbart and under his leadership, the arguments against contraception were a bit less genteel whatanti-choice activiststypically prefer.

The rightsmore openly misogynist direction may go a long way in explaining the reaction ofRep. Diane Black, one of the most outspokenly anti-choice members of Congress, to questions she was asked about contraception at apress conferencelast week.

It started when a reporter asked Black whether House Republicans intended to preserve the contraception benefit, if and when they finally got around to repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act.

Black at first answered a question about the birth control benefit byinaccurately stating that people could simply obtain care elsewhere, the GOPs long-touted but misleading alternative to Planned Parenthood affiliates, Christine Grimaldi of Rewire wrote.

Yep, Black mixed up two separate anti-contraception cover stories:When objecting to insurance coverage for contraception, the standard right-wing script calls forcomplaining thatit offends the religious sensibilities of Christian employers to lettheir employees have thatcoverage.

Black apparently got confused, however, and started reciting the script that conservativesuse for another purpose forjustifying slashing the federally funded contraception that millions of womenobtain throughPlanned Parenthood.Thatswhen conservatives claim that women can simply go to other publicly funded clinics for contraception, even though repeated investigations have demonstrated thisis simply not true.

But in the age of a Breitbart White House,theres no need to bother with nuanced distinctions between differentbad-faith arguments for undermining contraception access.

After a reporter clarified that the birth control benefit applies to insurance, not clinics, Grimaldi continued, Black said that a comparable benefit isnt on the table, quickly turning again to other facilities as the catchall solution.

Its unfortunate that Rep. Black continues to misrepresent Planned Parenthood as she simultaneously threatens to rip affordable birth control access from 55 million women all while apparently failing to understand how the birth control insurance benefit works, Mary Alice Carter, vice president of communications for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, wrote by email.

Blacks planto slash both insurance coverage for contraception and contraception funding atPlanned Parenthoodwould derail the family-planningstrategies of many women who now use birth control probably most of them. This doesnt just concern lower-income women, either. Middle-class women will suffer if they suddenly have to pay hundreds or even thousands a year for coverage thats currently available for free.

The congresswomans simply invoking the existence of public clinics(which cant possibly take onPlanned Parenthoods patients, much less all the women nowreceivingcontraception through private insurance) shows that shedoes not actuallycare how many women she cuts off from birth control.

Of course, this is Breitbarts America, where women who use contraception which is more than99 percent of sexually active women at some point in their lives are accused of being ugly, crazy and a threat to national security. In that environment, theres little need for Black to keep up the pretense that this is anything but a war on birth control.

Contraception is expensive, Dr. Shanti Ramesh, a fellow of family planning at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, explained over the phone.

She argued that women should be able to choose contraception based on effectiveness and lifestyle fit, instead of thinking, How much is this going to cost me out of pocket?'

There is no lack of evidence that women faced barriers to accessing birth control before the enactment of the ACA, wrote Dr. Diana Greene Foster, director of research atAdvancing New Standards in Reproductive Health, in an email.A study of over 500 women seeking abortions before the ACA from five clinics across the country showed that 12 percent had unprotected sex because they could not afford birth control or their insurance wouldnt cover it. Another 20 percent reported that they ran out of supplies, a problem greatly alleviated by insurance coverage and a one-year supply.

Beyond citing the practical issues, Ramesh also objected to the inherent sexism of the arguments against contraception coverage. She pointedout that a wide range of preventive services, such as vaccines and cancer screenings, are covered by ACA guidelines andinclude men and children as well as women.

Contraception, she said, shouldnt be this additional service that gets flagged separately and highlighted as different. Its a part of being a healthy, productive member of our country, and we really owe it to women to provide them the service.

Ather press conference, Black was accompanied by Lila Rose,who runs the anti-choice organization Live Action and has along history of scare-mongering about the evils of contraception and premarital sex. In 2012 Roseparticipated in an anti-contraception documentary Birth Control: How Did We Get Here? where she took a stance against all forms of non-procreative sex, saying, There was a time when birth control was unthinkable,when contraception was unthinkable, because people who got married a beautiful part of marriage was the hope for children together. She also decried contraception for encouraging sexual activity and experimentation in unmarried people.

When I asked Ramesh about the value of sexual abstinence, the rights preferred method of contraception for someonenot ready to become pregnant, she was skeptical. She noted that she advises women of all their options, including abstinence, but its very few and far between that would like to rely on abstinence as their primary form of contraception, she said.

Of course, this battleis about the largerstrugglebetween what women want for themselves and what right-wing zealots want for them.Its just that in Trumps America, conservatives who oppose reproductive freedom are feeling a lot less shy about their desire to drive women back into subservience.

See the article here:

A new front in the assault on women's freedom: Anti-choice activists now going after birth control - Salon

Surely there can be little doubt by now that using a cellphone while driving isnt safe no matter how much we try to convince ourselves were different.

The brain has a hard time doing two things at once and this was true even when cellphones were just phones.

So our eyebrows were raised when we read MPR News Brian Baksts description of a bipartisan effort at the Capitol to limit phone use to hands-free operation.

In terms of a message we want to send through this bill to Minnesota, its simply this: Put this down. Put it away when youre driving, he said.

OK, but why not just ban their use outright if thats the ultimate goal?

Maybe that idea wont go over so well, judging by the reaction of Sen. Warren Limmer who seemed to speak for the likely opponents.

They like their freedom, Limmer said of the people who almost killed you recently.

And nothing says let freedom ring! like driving into a ditch.

So this video from the Wall St. Journal today caught our interest and sparked our questions.

It shows, for example, a woman using a GPS to get to work. Who needs a GPS to get to work?

She added brush my teeth to her to do list via Alexa. Youre driving, maam. Start brushing. Because: freedom!

Bob Collins has been with Minnesota Public Radio since 1992, emigrating to Minnesota from Massachusetts. He was senior editor of news in the 90s, ran MPRs political unit, created the MPR News regional website, invented the popular Select A Candidate, started the two most popular blogs in the history of MPR and every day laments that his Minnesota Fantasy Legislature project never caught on.

NewsCut is a blog featuring observations about the news. It provides a forum for an online discussion and debate about events that might not typically make the front page. NewsCut posts are not news stories but reflections , observations, and debate.

Go here to read the rest:

The freedom to drive poorly - Minnesota Public Radio News (blog)

A few years ago, Chestnut Ridge coach Greg Lazor decided that he needed to challenge his wrestlers more during the regular season if he wanted them to perform well in the postseason.

The strategy has turned out remarkably well, with the five-time District 5 dual-meet champion now regarded as one of the states powerhouse programs.

On Thursday, when the PIAA Class AA Team Wrestling Championships begin in Hershey, the Lions will face a Freedom Area team that is hoping to follow the same blueprint.

Freedom coach Jim Covert added the prestigious POWERade and Thomas tournaments both of which Chestnut Ridge participates in to the Bulldogs schedule, plus he scheduled a number of dual meets against AAA schools.

I upped the ante, Covert said Wednesday, as the team headed for Hershey. I didnt know how they were going to respond. I think that will help them this weekend, that theyre used to bigger tournaments and that kind of competition. You can see the dividends.

Freedom (15-4) finished second in District 7 to Burrell, a team that Chestnut Ridge beat in the Brookville Ultimate Duals last month. The Lions (13-2), who are ranked fifth in the state by PA Power Wrestling, lost to top-ranked Reynolds and No. 2 Brookville in that competition.

I think Reynolds is, right now, favored, Lazor said on Wednesday as his team prepared to leave for Hershey a day earlier than planned in an effort to beat a snowstorm that could bring more than 6 inches of snow to central Pennsylvania. Theyve shown to be a very strong team. Brookville, Southern Columbia Id say those are your three front runners. I think there are four or five after that that can push the group, and Id put us in that group.

The Lions are led by a trio of highly ranked wrestlers. Justin McCoy is ranked No. 1 at 145 pounds, Jared McGill is No. 2 at 170 and Morgan Deremer is No. 4 at 160, but they also have depth especially in the lower and middle weights that can make life difficult for the opposition.

Theyre obviously well-coached, Covert said. Theyve got a contingent over there that reminds me of Burrell. A lot of guys. They all wrestle pretty tough. They all wrestle the same I think its a Young Guns style coming at you.

Freedom heavyweight Evan Sweesy is ranked second while Kody Komara is No. 8 at 145. Z.J. Ward is ranked ninth at 113.

McCoy beat Komara at the POWERade tournament while Ward topped Chestnut Ridges Dylan Williams, who is ranked 15th, 4-3 at the Thomas tournament.

Its going to be tough, Covert said.

There are some nice matchups before. We had that one before and it went our way. The same score with McCoy and Komara went the other way.

Lazor has seen enough of Freedom to know that the Lions wont be able to ease into the state tournament.

Theyre an athletic team, Lazor said.

They have some decent guys. Its going to be a good match. Like a lot of matches down there, its going to be who is wrestling better that day and who is hungrier.

The Lions, who were the PIAA runners-up two years ago, enjoy the tournament because its their last big event competing as a team.

Its always an exciting time, Lazor said. Its probably one of the most enjoyable times of the year. To go down as a team is so much fun. To get your beginning and lesser guys a chance to wrestle on that stage where their match means as much as every other guys, its an exciting time.

While Lions seniors such as Deremer and Williams will be competing in the event for the fourth time, many of the Bulldogs aside from those who qualified for the individual state tournament have never before wrestled in the Giant Center.

Im hoping theyll step up, Covert said.

See the article here:

Wrestling: Chestnut Ridge to face Freedom in state duals - TribDem.com

Freedom High Schools boys basketball team is on fire at the moment.

And the Patriots scorched Eastons postseason aspirations on Wednesday night.

Freedom scored the games first 16 points and came away with a 54-39 Eastern Pennsylvania Conference Steel Division victory over the Red Rovers at Easton Area Middle School.

Its the fifth straight victory for the Patriots (12-10 overall, 8-8 EPC), who clinched a spot in the District 11 tournament with a win over Pleasant Valley on Monday, but were denied the last spot in the league postseason when East Stroudsburg North defeated Stroudsburg on Wednesday night.

Easton (10-12, 6-10) ends the season on a four-game slide and falls one win short of automatically qualifying for the district playoffs.

We came out with a lot of confidence, Freedom coach Joe Stellato said. Weve just been playing that kind of basketball the last four-five games, so we carried it over into this game.

Patriots senior Tyler Muniz hit a trio of 3-pointers out of the gate to get his team rolling. Classmate Justin Benton drained another long ball to stretch the visitors advantage to 16-0 with 1:26 left in the first quarter.

We were just moving the ball, executing the game plan and doing what we were told, Muniz said. Whenever you can hit early shots, itll just give you confidence no matter what It was a road game big crowd we had to get it going.

Freedom guard Nick King, another senior, knocked down an off-balance 3 at the first-quarter buzzer to make the score 19-2 after one.

To Freedoms credit, they came out on fire, hitting shots against our zone and getting us out of our zone, Red Rovers coach Ben Childs said. We couldnt score. I dont know if we got wrapped up in senior night; I dont know if we werent focused and ready to play There were a lot of emotions. We had five seniors on the floor. I was hoping they would use that as fuel and come out on fire. Obviously, the opposite happened.

The Patriots took a 30-17 lead into halftime.

It was their senior night, so we wanted to come out with energy, said Freedom senior Lewis Hargett, who had 12 points.

Red Rovers guard Arnel Lewis cut the Patriots advantage to 37-30 on a layup with 20 seconds remaining in the third quarter. Freedom, however, went on an eight-point run that ended with a drive and bucket from Muniz to press the score out to 45-30.

Im proud of the guys effort, Childs said. Freedom just had a little bit too much tonight.

Easton, which shot 8-for-17 from the foul line, rallied within 47-38 on a Ben Nimeh putback with 3:30 remaining. Thats as close as the Rovers came, though, as the Patriots took care of the ball and converted from the charity stripe in the closing minutes.

We just had to weather the storm, Stellato said of Eastons runs. Rebounding was the key. They werent hitting their shots, but we needed to continue to rebound. If we were going to give them second and third shots, then we were going to be in trouble We did the right things at the end. Thats what I expect from seniors.

Wednesday marked the end of the line for Eastons starters: Lewis, Nimeh, Logan Koch, Connor Fahie and Mohamed Dumbuya and fellow seniors Chaquor Manley and Sean Boylan.

Its a special group because we took over the program four years ago when these guys were freshmen, Childs said. This coaching staff has been lucky enough to see them mature as ninth-graders all the way up to seniors Its going to be weird without these guys next year Theyre a hard-working group and theyre going to be missed.

Lewis finished with a team-high 14 points and Nimeh contributed 11 for the Rovers. Muniz tallied 15 points for Freedom and King notched 14.

The Patriots, who lost seven in a row before their recent winning streak, hope to continue their momentum when districts arrive.

Were clicking at the right time, Muniz said.

I think were playing great, Hargett said. Were on a five-game winning streak and were just keeping it rolling.

Kyle Craig may be reached atkcraig@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter@KyleCraigSports. Find Lehigh Valley high school sports on Facebook.

Read more here:

Red-hot Freedom boys basketball burns Easton's D-11 playoff hopes - lehighvalleylive.com