Trigger Alert: Violence in Syria
 

BBC World News tonight:

French newscaster Laurent Fabius reported "independent tests showed the Syrian government used Sarin gas on protesters".

Test results were given to the UN. The UN stated that they can't verify the results because they have not been given visa's to enter Syria.

The United States reportedly stated that "they need more evidence" (per the BBC).

Additionally, the BBC reported that children are possibly being used by the Syrian government to "get their parents to talk and also as executioners".

I truly hope this isn't accurate.....
 

Report: Secret court order forces Verizon to turn over telephone records of millions

http://edition.cnn.com/2013/06/05/politics/nsa-verizon-records/index.html?hpt=hp_t2

"The U.S. government has obtained a top secret court order that requires Verizon to turn over the telephone records of millions of Americans to the National Security Agency on an "ongoing daily basis," the UK-based Guardian newspaper reported Wednesday."

Prescription Drugs Now Kill More People In The US Than Heroin And Cocaine Combined

http://www.businessinsider.com/painkillers-kill-more-americans-than-heroin-and-cocaine-2012-9

"Prescription opioid painkillers are responsible for more fatal overdoses in the U.S. than heroin and cocaine combined, according to a new study out of Brandeis University."

Baby's life saved with groundbreaking 3D printed device
 

FDA works Fast-3-D Printed Tracheal Splint

Researchers at the University of Michigan used 3-D printing technology to create bioresorbable device that proved to be lifesaving for Kaiba Gionfriddo, a 20-month old baby. The scientists received emergency permission from the FDA to create and implant the tracheal splint pictured here, which was made from polycaprolacton.

Health Alert: Health Alert: Frozen Berries Linked to Hepatitis A Outbreak
 

FDA Investigates Multistate Outbreak of Hepatitis A Illnesses Potentially Associated with a Frozen Fruit Blend
Posted June 6, 2013
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and state and local officials are investigating a multi-state outbreak of Hepatitis A illnesses potentially associated with a frozen food blend. We are moving quickly to learn as much as possible and prevent additional people from becoming ill. We recognize that people will be concerned about this outbreak, and we will continue to provide updates and advice.

http://www.fda.gov/Food/RecallsOutbr.../ucm354698.htm

Nearly 50 reported cases of Hepatitis A in California and other states may be linked to contaminated Townsend Farmers Organic Anti-Oxidant frozen berries sold at Costco markets, according to the CDC. If you have consumed this product, or if you experience any signs or symptoms of Hepatitis, contact your personal physician immediately for treatment. Read the latest information from the CDC as well as what you should do if you've eaten these berries.

Similar to you, Andrea, I wonder about things of this nature: For example, I read the article as the media characterizing the subject (secret court order) as information being withheld from the general American populace in American media. I wonder about the decision making behind this type of 'court order' and why it was leaked in the British press, rather than the American press.

During my graduate studies, I did a six month long intense study of such things because there's a methadone clinic in my neighborhood, which the clinic has been a controversial chess piece in neighborhood wars, county funding wars or city project wars. What I learned by in-dept field interviews with constituents recieving services at the particular methadone clinic in my neighborhood was that doctors of patients were prescribing pain remedies (oxycontin, et al) and the vast majority of people I interviewed said that although they followed their doctors orders to a 'T' - when their pain remedy trajectory outweighed the expected outcome percieved by doctor treatment plans, they were catagorized as not having followed their doctors treatment plan; which landed them in outpatient programs, such as the methadone clinic, to address the unexpected outcome of a pain remedy treatment (a causation of dependency outcome, an not-expected/unanticipated outcome). My heart went out to a good number of people I interviewed because people relegated to a methadone clinic were not the type of people expected to be visiting a methadone clinic and I would say that most of the people I interviewed were very upset with the outcome of having explicity followed their doctors advice and treatment plan to the 'T', only to suffer a more compounded, unfortunate outcome. But I can totally understand the study results in the aformentioned study that you linked us to in your post, due to the results of the study I conducted at a graduate level.

Thank you for posting about the Hepatitis A outbreak, Tommi.
I wonder if epidemiology experts will soon be working toward narrowing in on other factors pertinent to this case.

Is Big Data turning government into 'Big Brother?'
 

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — With every phone call they make and every Web excursion they take, people are leaving a digital trail of revealing data that can be tracked by profit-seeking companies and terrorist-hunting government officials.

The revelations that the National Security Agency is perusing millions of U.S. customer phone records at Verizon Communications and snooping on the digital communications stored by nine major Internet services illustrate how aggressively personal data is being collected and analyzed.

Former NSA employee William Binney told The Associated Press that he estimates the agency collects records on 3 billion phone calls each day.

The NSA and FBI appear to be casting an even wider net under a clandestine program code-named "PRISM" that came to light in a story posted late Thursday by The Washington Post. PRISM gives the U.S. government access to email, documents, audio, video, photographs and other data belonging to foreigners on foreign soil who are under investigation, according to The Washington Post. The newspaper said it reviewed a confidential roster of companies and services participating in PRISM. The companies included AOL Inc., Apple Inc., Facebook Inc., Google Inc., Microsoft Corp., Yahoo Inc., Skype, YouTube and Paltalk.

Like pieces of a puzzle, the bits and bytes left behind from citizens' electronic interactions can be cobbled together to draw conclusions about their habits, friendships and preferences using data-mining formulas and increasingly powerful computers.

It's all part of a phenomenon known as a "Big Data," a catchphrase increasingly used to describe the science of analyzing the vast amount of information collected through mobile devices, Web browsers and check-out stands. Analysts use powerful computers to detect trends and create digital dossiers about people.

The Obama administration and lawmakers privy to the NSA's surveillance aren't saying anything about the collection of the Verizon customers' records beyond that it's in the interest of national security. The sweeping court order covers the Verizon records of every mobile and landline phone call from April 25 through July 19, according to The Guardian.

The location information is particularly valuable for cloak-and-dagger operations like the one the NSA is running, said Cindy Cohn, a legal director for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights group that has been fighting the government's collection of personal phone records since 2006. The foundation is currently suing over the government's collection of U.S. citizens' communications in a case that dates back to the administration of President George W. Bush.

"It's incredibly invasive," Cohn said. "This is a consequence of the fact that we have so many third parties that have accumulated significant information about our everyday lives."

It's such a rich vein of information that U.S. companies and other organizations now spend more than $2 billion each year to obtain third-party data about individuals, according to Forrester Research. The data helps businesses target potential customers. Much of this information is sold by so-called data brokers such as Acxiom Corp., a Little Rock, Ark. company that maintains extensive files about the online and offline activities of more than 500 million consumers worldwide.

In a sign of the NSA's determination to vacuum up as much data as possible, the agency has built a data center in Bluffdale, Utah that is five times larger than the U.S. Capitol —all to sift through Big Data. The $2 billion center has fed perceptions that some factions of the U.S. government are determined to build a database of all phone calls, Internet searches and emails under the guise of national security. The Washington Post's disclosure that both the NSA and FBI have the ability to burrow into computers of major Internet services will likely heighten fears that U.S. government's Big Data is creating something akin to the ever-watchful Big Brother in George Orwell's "1984" novel.

"The fact that the government can tell all the phone carriers and Internet service providers to hand over all this data sort of gives them carte blanche to build profiles of people they are targeting in a very different way than any company can," Khatibloo said.

Full Story
--------

Speechless.

There are some remarkably foresighted people behind this with a plan, and that plan has an end/goal/aim that is gaining control of people and resources. I believe a one world government with a one world currency is on it's way.

Nike’s Pro-LGBT #BeTrue Shoes And The Fashion Of Acceptance In Sports

By Travis Waldron on Jun 11, 2013 at 2:34 pm

The world’s foremost name in sporting apparel isn’t just dipping its toe in the waters of expression and acceptance. It’s diving in headfirst. After signing the WNBA’s Brittney Griner to a contract that has her market and wear men’s clothing as well as women’s apparel, and makes her the company’s first openly gay athlete.....

Griner and other female athletes are donning men’s suits and jeans, bow ties and button-downs. All this experimentation is pushing and redefining traditional gender norms, and while that’s still drawing negative responses from some, it’s drawing admiration and enjoyment from most. It’s also causing fans and admirers to experiment alongside them, giving Nike and other companies further incentive to ignore the norms to which they once felt they had to adhere.

http://thinkprogress.org/sports/2013...nce-in-sports/

Pope confirms 'gay lobby' at work at Vatican
 

VATICAN CITY (AP) — In private remarks to the leadership of a key Latin American church group, Pope Francis lamented that a "gay lobby" was at work at the Vatican.

It was an apparent reference to allegations in the Italian media that blackmail was taking place within the Vatican against high-ranking prelates who are gay.

The Latin American and Caribbean Confederation of Religious — the regional organization for priests and nuns of religious orders — confirmed Tuesday that its leaders had written a synthesis of Francis' remarks after their June 6 audience. The group, known by its Spanish acronym CLAR, said it was greatly distressed that the document had been published and apologized to the pope.

In the document, Francis is quoted as saying that while there were many holy people in the Vatican, there was also a current of corruption. "The 'gay lobby' is mentioned, and it is true, it is there ... We need to see what we can do ..." the synthesis reads.

The Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said Tuesday the audience was private and that as a result he had nothing to say.

In the days leading up to Pope Benedict XVI's Feb. 28 resignation, Italian media were rife with reports of a "gay lobby" influencing papal decision-making and Vatican policy through blackmail, and suggestions that the scandal had led in part to Benedict's decision to resign.

The unsourced reports, in the Rome daily La Repubblica and the news magazine Panorama, said details of the scandal were laid out in the secret dossier prepared for Benedict by three trusted cardinals who investigated the leaks of papal documents last year. Benedict left the dossier for Francis.

At the time, the Vatican denounced the reporting as defamatory, "unverified, unverifiable or completely false."

The initial reporting has never been precise on what exactly was meant by a "gay lobby," but Repubblica and Panorama went beyond saying there was merely a homosexual subculture at the Vatican. Rather, they raised allegations that high-ranking prelates were being blackmailed because they were gay.

On Wednesday, Italian gay rights groups denounced the reporting of the entire affair as insensitive and homophobic.

"That priests have sex with other men doesn't authorize anyone to speak about a gay lobby, because we're not talking about a group that represents the interests of the homosexual community but rather a group that is an integral part of a power structure — the Vatican — which is violently homophobic," said Franco Grillini, president of Gaynet rights group.

Francis' remarks on the matter, as reported by the CLAR leadership, were published Tuesday in Spanish on the progressive Chilean-based website "Reflection and Liberation" and picked up and translated by the blog Rorate Caeli, which is read in Vatican circles.

In the synthesis, Francis was quoted as being remarkably forthcoming about his administrative shortcomings, saying he was relying on the group of eight cardinals he appointed to lead a reform of the Vatican bureaucracy.

The document quoted him as saying: "I am very disorganized, I have never been good at this. But the cardinals of the commission will move it forward."

In its statement, CLAR said no recording had been made of Francis' remarks but that the members of its leadership team — a half-dozen men and women — together wrote a synthesis of the points he had made for their own personal use.

"It's clear that based on this one cannot attribute with certainty to the Holy Father singular expressions in the text, but just the general sense," the statement said.

___

Text of the CLAR synthesis is at http://www.reflexionyliberacion.cl/a...n-la-clar.html

Text of the CLAR apology is at http://www.clar.org/clar/index.php?m...&tid=2&pid=659

Well that's a relief!
 

Hell yeah. Finally something that isn't just kowtowing to wealthy corporate interests.

Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Demographics
 

UCD Health System to include sexual orientation, gender identity in e-records

By Mark Glover
mglover@sacbee.com

The UC Davis Health System said today that it will become the first academic health system in the nation to incorporate sexual orientation and gender identity as standard demographic elements within the electronic health records of its patients.

Officials said the move was prompted in part by a 2011 Institute of Medicine report that noted a meager amount of research data about the health of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender patients.

http://www.sacbee.com/2013/06/13/549...de-sexual.html

It was 9-0......unanimous decision......

They did rule that the company can patent a piece of DNA (like the BRAC) if they change it enough that it does not occur in nature and is being used for other purposes.

I cannot remember when there was a unanimous decision on the Court.....and with this Court, which is so divided, it borders on a miracle..

Governor Terry Branstad, Iowa’s New Abortion Decider-In-Chief

http://thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/governor-terry-branstad-iowas-new-abortion-decider-in-chief/news/2013/06/13/68582

"Iowa is about to become a one-of-a-kind state – the only state with it’s own abortion arbiter. From here on out, Iowa Governor Terry Branstad will be personally signing off on each and every request for a Medicaid-covered abortion in his state. In Iowa, that means victims of rape. Victims of incest. Women whose lives are endangered by a pregnancy. Women who are carrying a fetus so malformed it won’t survive. The Governor says he plans “to be thoughtful.”

Student kicked out of college for being a lesbian, now must repay over $6K for her revoked academic scholarship.

Danielle Powell was close to getting her bachelor's degree when she was kicked out of her university for being gay in 2012, and now says the only way the school will transfer her credits to another school is if she agrees to pay $6,300. In response, Powell has launched an online petition to pressure the school to forgive the debt.

Powell was a student at Grace University in early 2011 when she began her first same-sex relationship. Up until that point, neither she nor her then-girlfriend identified as lesbian. When Grace, a religious university in Omaha, Neb., found out about the relationship through a spiritual adviser at the school, they brought Powell before a judiciary board to decide whether she should be allowed to stay enrolled.

"At that time, my family had no idea, so I had to come out to my family sooner than I would've wanted," Powell told The Huffington Post.

Michael James, executive vice president at Grace, told The Huffington Post that the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act prevents them from discussing any student's particular case. But he did confirm the student handbook states that "Any student involved in sexually immoral behavior, including premarital sex, adultery, and homosexual acts, is at minimum placed on University probation and may be subject to a Judiciary Hearing."

Powell said the board asked her why she did what she did and whether she was remorseful, treating her, in her words, "like a sexual predator." The university ultimately decided in March 2011 to suspend her and not allow her to finish the semester. Powell said she was also told she now owed Grace just over $6,000 after an academic scholarship she'd been awarded was revoked.

Powell said that the university told her she could participate in a restoration program, involving counseling and regular church attendance, to get readmitted, but she would have to live off campus and could not stay overnight in the dorms. She began the restoration process in the summer of 2011, so as not to jeopardize work that she was afraid she might lose by transferring to another institution.

But shortly before the start of the spring 2012 semester, Grace decided not to readmit her because she was still dating women.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...ef=mostpopular

Girl, 5, takes on Westboro Baptist
 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...ef=mostpopular



http://i.huffpost.com/gen/1193174/th...arge570.jpg?10

S. 744
Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act
As reported by the Senate Committee on the Judiciary on May 28, 2013,
including the amendments made in the star print of June 6, 2013

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/s744.pdf

"The report estimates that in the first decade after the immigration bill is carried out, the net effect of adding millions of additional taxpayers would decrease the federal budget deficit by $197 billion. Over the next decade, the report found, the deficit reduction would be even greater -- an estimated $700 billion, from 2024 to 2033."

Bolding mine....

This is less than a mile from my home, and I could not be happier. This little girl is awesome, and she has raised nearly 20,000 dollars! Way to Go Jayden!

Another Perspective of a Republican Alaskan Woman
 

WEDNESDAY JUNE 19 2013

OP-ED: Murkowski Shares Thoughts on Marriage Equality with Alaskans
The Pursuit of Happiness – Without Government Interference

Not too long ago, I had the honor of nominating an Alaskan family as “Angels in Adoption,” a celebration of the selflessness shown by foster care families and those who adopt children. They arrived in Washington, DC, a military family who had opened their doors to not one child but four siblings to make sure that these sisters and brother had the simplest gift you can give a child: a home together. We had lunch together, and they shared their stories with me. All the while, the children politely ate lunch and giggled as content youngsters do. Given my daily hectic Senate schedule, it’s not often that I get to sit down with such a happy family during a workday – and I think of them often, as everything our nation should encourage.

I bring them up because the partners were two women who had first made the decision to open their home to provide foster care to the eldest child in 2007. Years later – and after a deployment abroad with the Alaska National Guard for one of them – they embraced the joy and sacrifice of four adopted children living under the same roof, with smiles, laughter, movie nights, parent-teacher conferences and runny noses.

Yet despite signing up and volunteering to give themselves fully to these four adorable children, our government does not meet this family halfway and allow them to be legally recognized as spouses. After their years of sleepless nights, after-school pickups and birthday cakes, if one of them gets sick or injured and needs critical care, the other would not be allowed to visit them in the emergency room – and the children could possibly be taken away from the healthy partner. They do not get considered for household health care benefit coverage like spouses nationwide. This first-class Alaskan family still lives a second-class existence.

The Supreme Court is set to make a pair of decisions on the topic of marriage equality shortly, and the national conversation on this issue is picking back up. This is a significant moment for our nation when it comes to rethinking our society’s priorities and the role of government in Americans’ private lives and decisions, so I want to be absolutely clear with Alaskans. I am a life-long Republican because I believe in promoting freedom and limiting the reach of government. When government does act, I believe it should encourage family values. I support the right of all Americans to marry the person they love and choose because I believe doing so promotes both values: it keeps politicians out of the most private and personal aspects of peoples’ lives – while also encouraging more families to form and more adults to make a lifetime commitment to one another. While my support for same sex civil marriage is something I believe in, I am equally committed to guaranteeing that religious freedoms remain inviolate, so that churches and other religious institutions can continue to determine and practice their own definition of marriage.

With the notion of marriage – an exclusive, emotional, binding ‘til death do you part’ tie – becoming more and more an exception to the rule given a rise in cohabitation and high rates of divorce, why should the federal government be telling adults who love one another that they cannot get married, simply because they happen to be gay? I believe when there are so many forces pulling our society apart, we need more commitment to marriage, not less.

This thinking is consistent with what I hear from more and more Alaskans especially our younger generations. Like the majority of Alaskans, I supported a constitutional amendment in 1998 defining marriage as only between a man and a woman, but my thinking has evolved as America has witnessed a clear cultural shift. Fifteen years after that vote, I find that when one looks closer at the issue, you quickly realize that same sex unions or civil marriages are consistent with the independent mindset of our state – and they deserve a hands-off approach from our federal policies.

First, this is a personal liberty issue and has to do with the most important personal decision that any human makes. I believe that, as Americans, our freedoms come from God and not government, and include the rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. What could be more important to the pursuit of happiness than the right to choose your spouse without asking a Washington politician for permission? If there is one belief that unifies most Alaskans – our true north – it is less government and more freedom. We don’t want the government in our pockets or our bedrooms; we certainly don’t need it in our families.

Secondly, civil marriage also touches the foundation of our national culture: safe, healthy families and robust community life. In so many ways, sound families are the foundation of our society. Any efforts or opportunity to expand the civil bonds and rights to anyone that wants to build a stable, happy household should be promoted.

Thirdly, by focusing on civil marriage -- but also reserving to religious institutions the right to define marriage as they see fit -- this approach respects religious liberty by stopping at the church door. As a Catholic, I see marriage as a valued sacrament that exists exclusively between a man and a woman. Other faiths and belief systems feel differently about this issue – and they have every right to. Churches must be allowed to define marriage and conduct ceremonies according to their rules, but the government should not tell people who they have a right to marry through a civil ceremony.

I recently read an interview where Ronald Reagan’s daughter said that she believes he would have supported same-sex marriage, that he would think “What difference does it make to anybody else’s life? I also think because he wanted government out of peoples’ lives, he would not understand the intrusion of government banning such a thing. This is not what he would have thought government should be doing.”

Like Reagan, Alaskans believe that government works best when it gets out of the way. Countless Alaskans and Americans want to give themselves to one another and create a home together. I support marriage equality and support the government getting out of the way to let that happen.

http://www.murkowski.senate.gov/publ...5-354b3aef41dc

Secrets piling up faster than government can declassify some

By Anita Kumar
McClatchy Washington Bureau
Last Modified: Wednesday, Jun. 19, 2013 - 8:00 pm

COLLEGE PARK, Md. -- In the darkened stacks of a nondescript building in the suburbs outside Washington, dozens of federal employees wearing protective gloves spend day after day sifting through millions of pages of secret documents, some of them nearly a century old.

The 70 staffers of the National Declassification Center are charged with deciding – anonymously and quietly – which of the nation’s old secrets can be laid bare for the world to see.

“We’re treading water,” said Sheryl Shenberger, a former CIA officer who’s the center’s director.

She later added that there’s some confusion about the exact parameters of the president’s goal but that she thinks that examining all the documents once – but not necessarily releasing them – would meet the goal, though she knows other people do not.

Obama acted on several longtime recommendations when he created the declassification center in December 2009 to conduct “automatic” reviews while implementing revised rules for classifying and declassifying documents.
But an automatic review is anything but automatic.

http://www.sacbee.com/2013/06/19/550...ster-than.html

__________________________________________________ _____________

I encourage you to read the entire article. It gets "better" and more in depth.
I had never heard of the "National Declassification Center." In all fairness some of these recommendations were created before Obama was elected president. However, in my opinion Obama is tepid when it comes to transparency. FYI, I did vote for Obama, twice. My first choice was Hillary Clinton.

CLOSING TIME: "EX-GAY" GROUP REALIZES THEY'RE WRONG

Wednesday, June 19, 2013 - 11:55pm by Ross Murray, Director of News and Faith Initiatives at GLAAD

The leadership of Exodus International has announced that they are shutting their doors after 3 decades of practicing so-called ‘ex-gay’ ministry.

According to a statement on the group’s web site, the board of directors was finding ‘ex-gay’ work more and more difficult, given their anti-gay words and actions.

“Exodus is an institution in the conservative Christian world, but we’ve ceased to be a living, breathing organism,” said Alan Chambers, President of Exodus. “For quite some time we’ve been imprisoned in a worldview that’s neither honoring toward our fellow human beings, nor biblical.”

The president of Exodus, Alan Chambers, was a well-documented figure on GLAAD’s Commentator Accountability Project for previous anti-gay statements. However, his tone and words began shifting over the course of the past two years. Today, Chambers posted an apology on the Exodus web site for the harm that he had caused LGBT people and their families in his quest to make them match an anti-gay view of God.

"I am sorry for the pain and hurt that many of you have experienced. I am sorry some of you spent years working through the shame and guilt when your attractions didn’t change. I am sorry we promoted sexual orientation change efforts and reparative theories about sexual orientation that stigmatized parents.

I am sorry I didn’t stand up to people publicly ‘on my side’ who called you names like sodomite—or worse. I am sorry that I, knowing some of you so well, failed to share publicly that the gay and lesbian people I know were every bit as capable of being amazing parents as the straight people that I know. I am sorry that when I celebrated a person coming to Christ and surrendering their sexuality to Him, I callously celebrated the end of relationships that broke your heart. I am sorry I have communicated that you and your families are less than me and mine."

The timing comes as Exodus opened what is now to be their last conference. It also comes just one day before an episode of Our America with Lisa Ling, in which Chambers offers an apology (part of which is printed above) to a group of ex-gay survivors. This is a follow-up for Ling, who two years ago did an episode on so-called ‘ex-gay’ programs that featured Chambers and other ‘ex-gay’ practitioners.

"Alan Chambers, and the rest of the Exodus leadership, has fully and completely come to the realization that their so-called 'ministry' has done harm to thousands of people,” said Ross Murray, Director of News and Faith Initiatives. “They are coming to the right decision to end that harm now."

http://www.glaad.org/blog/closing-ti...s-theyre-wrong

http://www.thejimani.com/thehistoryo...irslounge.html *WARNING* Graphic pictures

I'd never heard of this tragedy before now. I was 10 when it happened, so this wasn't in some dim pages of history. It feels like a different world, though.

I know we have a lot farther to go and a lot of work to do yet, but how far we have come in 40 years since. The Supreme Court is deciding on a case about gay marriage, which will have the same ramifications as the Loving decision of 1967. And instead of a tiny club hidden upstairs and sneaking around in shame, over 100 of us are about to descend on a fancy hotel in the heart of a Deep South city and get our groove on (fairly) openly in that ballroom.

Defense of Marriage Act struck down
 

BREAKING: Supreme Court strikes down federal provision requiring benefits to legally married gay couples.

Defense of Marriage Act struck down by Supreme Court OTUS
Breaking news

Updated: Wednesday, 26 Jun 2013, 10:05 AM EDT
Published : Wednesday, 26 Jun 2013, 7:11 AM EDT


WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court is meeting to deliver opinions in two cases that could dramatically alter the rights of gay people across the United States.

The justices are expected to decide their first-ever cases about gay marriage Wednesday in their last session before the court's summer break. Hours before the court was to issue its rulings, crowds began lining up outside the Supreme Court building in hopes of getting a seat inside the courtroom.

The issues before the court are California's constitutional ban on same-sex marriage and the federal Defense of Marriage Act, which denies legally married gay Americans a range of tax, health and pension benefits otherwise available to married couples.

The broadest possible ruling would give gay Americans the same constitutional right to marry as heterosexuals. But several narrower paths also are available, including technical legal outcomes in which the court could end up saying very little about same-sex marriage.

If the court overturns California's Proposition 8 or allows lower court rulings that struck down the ban to stand, it will take about a month for same-sex weddings to resume for the first time since 2008, San Francisco officials have said.

http://www.wwlp.com/dpps/news/politi...13-jos_6309251

Supreme Court Won't Take Up Prop 8 Case
 

The U.S. Supreme Court decided Wednesday it will not take up a challenge to California's voter-approved Prop 8 -- a ban on same-sex marriage that landed before the Justices after years of legal battles.

The ruling states the people who brought this case had no legal standing to bring the case to the Supreme Court

Same-sex marriages resume in California after court gives go-ahead


By CNN Staff

updated 7:16 PM EDT, Fri June 28, 2013







California lifts same-sex marriage ban



STORY HIGHLIGHTS
A federal appeals court lifts an order banning same-sex marriages
It takes effect "immediately," according to the court order
The U.S. Supreme Court paved the way for the move with a ruling Wednesday

(CNN) -- The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday that same-sex marriages can resume in California, a move that the Supreme Court paved the way for on Wednesday.

Three judges on the appeals court made it possible for local governments to issue marriage certificates for gay and lesbian couples with a few words: "The stay in the above matter is dissolved effective immediately."

Very soon after, California Attorney General Kamala Harris was already at San Francisco's city hall marrying couples, according to her office.

"I am thrilled that the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals lifted its stay to allow same-sex couples to legally marry in California," Harris said in a statement. "Gay and lesbian couples have waited so long for this day and for their fundamental right to marry. Finally, their loving relationships are as legitimate and legal as any other."

California's Supreme Court struck down the state's ban on same-sex marriage in May 2008, ruling that the state's constitution gives "this basic civil right to (marry to) all Californians, whether gay or heterosexual, and to same-sex couples as well as to opposite-sex couples."

But months later, 52% of voters backed Proposition 8 to once again restrict marriages so that they can only be between a man and a woman.

The measure put gay and lesbian marriages on hold in the state, but a federal appeals court later rule Proposition 8 was unconstitutional.

In a 5-4 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court dismissed an appeal of that federal court ruling on jurisdictional grounds. That meant that Friday's news -- and the resumption of same-sex marriages in the Golden State -- was expected, even if the timing wasn't fully known

Economic Progress?
 

Is the U.S. Turning Into a Nation of Temps? Depends on Where You Live

RICHARD FLORIDA

JUN 27, 2013

Our new dependence on temp jobs is much greater in some metro areas than others. The table below, based on EMSI data, shows the 10 large metros (those with more than one million people) where temp jobs have made up the largest share and smallest share of total employment growth since 2009.



Large Metros with Where Temp Jobs Make Up
the Largest and Smallest Shares of Job Gains, 2009-2013
Metros with the Largest Increases Percent of all job growth
(2009-2013)

Memphis, Tennessee-Mississippi-Arkansas* 116%
Birmingham-Hoover, Alabama 66%
Cincinnati-Middletown, Ohio-Kentucky-Indiana 65%
Hartford-West Hartford-East Hartford, Connecticut 58%
Milwaukee-Waukesha-West Allis, Wisconsin 51%
Kansas City, Missouri-Kansas 46%
Cleveland-Elyria-Mentor, Ohio 44%
Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, Pennsylvania-New Jersey-Delaware 41%
Chicago-Joliet-Naperville, Illinois-Indiana-Wisconsin 40%
Tucson, Arizona 37%

Metros with Smallest Increases Percent of all job growth
(2009-2013)

Washington, D.C. 2%
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 3%
San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, California 4%
Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, Texas 5%
Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, California 6%
Salt Lake City, Utah 6%
Buffalo-Niagara Falls, New York 6%
San Diego-Carlsbad-San Marcos, California 6%
San Antonio-New Braunfels, Texas 7%
Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, Washington 7%


Read More:
http://www.theatlanticcities.com/job...you-live/5997/

NY TIMES TODAY 7/1/13

By JULIA PRESTON
An American man in Florida and his husband, who is from Bulgaria, have become the first same-sex married couple to be approved for a permanent resident visa, an immigration milestone that comes after the Supreme Court struck down a federal law against same-sex marriage.

The notice of approval of a permanent visa, known as a green card, was issued by e-mail late Friday to Traian Popov, a Bulgarian immigrant who lives with his American spouse, Julian Marsh, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. The approval was evidence that the Obama administration was acting swiftly to change its visa policies in the wake of the court’s decision on Wednesday invalidating the Defense of Marriage Act, or DOMA.

The approval came so fast that it took the couple’s immigration lawyer, Lavi Soloway, by surprise. Mr. Soloway, who represents many same-sex couples, said he received the official message while he was attending the annual conference in San Francisco of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.

“I thought, ‘Am I reading this wrong?’ ” Mr. Soloway said in an interview on Saturday. Although it was a professional setting, he said, he began to weep with emotion when he realized the significance of the notice.

Speaking by telephone on Sunday from the couple’s home, Mr. Marsh said that he turned 55 on Friday and that he and Mr. Popov were celebrating with dinner at a Red Lobster restaurant when they received news of the unprecedented green card.
“It was just kind of a shock, like winning the lottery,” said Mr. Marsh, a music producer. “The amazing overwhelming fact is that the government said yes, and my husband and I can live in the country we chose and we love and want to stay in.”

Mr. Popov, 41, said he had been living legally in the United States for 15 years with a series of student visas. He has completed three master’s degrees, he said, and is working on a doctorate in social science at Nova Southeastern University in Florida. The couple married in New York last year, and they applied for a green card in February.

Immigration officials said the visa agency, United States Immigration and Citizenship Services, would announce new procedures early this week for same-sex binational couples seeking green cards. The first approval was also supposed to be issued this week, officials acknowledged, but eager officers at the agency pressed the button on the notice on Friday.

Employment Non-Discrimination Act Passes Senate Committee

http://i.huffpost.com/gadgets/slides...50648_free.jpg

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...p_ref=politics

Women pinned against a car, taunted and beaten by 10 men, for being gay in a westside Chicago neighborhood.


You know I feel pretty free walking around here. We have 1 large predominantly gay neighborhood with another growing (Boystown & Andersonville) quickly. We have a Pride that drew more than 1 million people this year. Andi and I live in the Bridgeport neighborhood. While I wouldn't term this as gay friendly nobody bothers us or treats us badly. We're just one of the neighbors.

Then something like this happens and it jerks me back into reality.

Funny, Illinois just passed concealed carry (it is lawful to carry a gun(s) in public on your person) this week. Andi and I talked about it a lot and pretty much had decided that we didn't need these permits. They are $150 each and really that's $300 that we didn't need to spend. I've lived here all my life and never needed to carry a gun around before so why would I now just because it's legal? I had just said last night that anything that might happen to cause us to need to carry a gun was pretty bad and if it got to that point nobody would be looking at permits anyway. Should we be re-thinking this? I've yapped long and hard about not buying a gun out of fear......and now I'm talking about carrying one for that very reason. It's just wrong.

This really isn't about carrying or not carrying guns anyway (although it would have likely changed the outcome of this interaction). This is about two of us that got beat up simply for existing. This is about the bravery of one woman stepping between real danger and her lover, this is about the anguish of not being able to protect your loved one, this is about hate and fear and frustration. We as a community ought to be able to do something about this. Many of us are much stronger than 2 alone on the street surrounded by angry men. Aren't we?

Spread of DNA databases sparks ethical concerns
 

LONDON (AP) — You can ditch your computer and leave your cellphone at home, but you can't escape your DNA.

It belongs uniquely to you — and, increasingly, to the authorities.

Countries around the world are collecting genetic material from millions of citizens in the name of fighting crime and terrorism — and, according to critics, heading into uncharted ethical terrain.

Leaders include the United States — where the Supreme Court recently backed the collection of DNA swabs from suspects on arrest — and Britain, where police held samples of almost 7 million people, more than 10 percent of the population, until a court-ordered about-face saw the incineration of a chunk of the database.

The expanding trove of DNA in official hands has alarmed privacy campaigners, and some scientists. Recent leaks about U.S. surveillance programs by former NSA systems analyst Edward Snowden have made people realize their online information and electronic communications may not be as secure as they thought. Could the same be true of the information we hold within our genes? DNA samples that can help solve robberies and murders could also, in theory, be used to track down our relatives, scan us for susceptibility to disease, or monitor our movements.

Earlier this year Yaniv Erlich, who runs a lab at MIT's Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, published a paper in the journal Science describing how he was able to identify individuals, and their families, from anonymous DNA data in a research project. All it took was a computer algorithm, a genetic genealogy website and searches of publicly available Internet records.

"It was a very weird feeling — a 'wow' feeling," Erlich told The Associated Press. "I had to take a walk outside just to think about this process."

Erlich says DNA databases have enormous positive power, both for fighting crime and in scientific research. But, he said, "our work shows there are privacy limitations."

Ethical qualms have done little to stop the growth of genetic databases around the world.

The international police agency Interpol listed 54 nations with national police DNA databases in 2009, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany and China. Brazil and India have since announced plans to join the club, and the United Arab Emirates intends to build the world's first database of an entire national population.

The biggest database is in the United States — the FBI's Combined DNA Index System, or CODIS, which holds information on more than 11 million people suspected of or convicted of crimes.

It is set to grow following a May Supreme Court ruling that upheld the right of police forces to take DNA swabs without a warrant from people who are arrested, not just those who are convicted. (Policies on DNA collection vary by state; more than half of the states and the federal government currently take DNA swabs after arrests.)

The court's justices were divided about implications for individuals' rights. Justice Anthony Kennedy, for the five-judge majority, called the taking of DNA a legitimate and reasonable police booking procedure akin to fingerprinting.

But dissenting Justice Antonin Scalia argued that it marked a major change in police powers. "Because of today's decision, your DNA can be taken and entered into a national database if you are ever arrested, rightly or wrongly, and for whatever reason," he said.

A similar note of caution has been struck by Alec Jeffreys, the British geneticist whose 1984 discovery of DNA fingerprinting revolutionized criminal investigations. He has warned that "mission creep" could see authorities use DNA to accumulate information on people's racial origins, medical history and psychological profile.

Erlich agreed that scenario was possible, if not likely.

"If it's not regulated and the police can do whatever they want ... they can use your DNA to infer things about your health, your ancestry, whether your kids are your kids," he said.

Police forces have already tracked down criminals through the DNA of their innocent relatives, a practice that is both a goldmine for investigators and, according to skeptics, an ethical minefield. Charles Tumosa, a clinical assistant professor in forensic studies at the University of Baltimore who is wary of the potential for genetic surveillance, says relatives of suspects could be identified through DNA and leaned on for information about their family members.

And yet familial DNA searches have helped solve terrible crimes. In Britain, a sex attacker known as the "shoe rapist" was caught after 20 years through DNA from his sister, who was in the database due to a drunken-driving arrest. In Kansas in 2005, police identified Dennis Rader as a serial killer known as "BTK" through his daughter's DNA obtained, without her knowledge, from a pap smear in her medical records.

"There's got to be a debate," said Tumosa. "Nobody has talked this out.

"At what point do you say, enough is enough? Do we want to have a society where 5 percent of the crime is unsolved, or do we want to have a society where 100 percent of the crime is solved" but privacy is compromised. "What's the trade-off?"

Both supporters and critics of DNA databases point to Britain, where until recently, police could take the DNA of anyone 10 or older arrested for even the most minor offense — and keep it forever, even if the suspect was later acquitted or released without charge.

Police say the database has helped solve thousands of crimes, including murders and rapes. On the other side of the coin are hundreds of thousands of innocent people, including children, who feel shamed and tainted by inclusion on a database of criminal suspects — a status some legal experts say undermines the presumption of innocence.

"A lot of British people were very shocked to find themselves or their children ending up on the database for minor alleged offenses such as throwing a snowball at a car," said Helen Wallace, director of the privacy group GeneWatch, which campaigns for restrictions on collection of DNA and other personal information.

After a long legal battle — waged in part by a youth who was arrested at 11 on suspicion of attempted robbery and had his DNA retained despite being acquitted — the European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2008 that Britain's "blanket and indiscriminate" storage of DNA violated the right to a private life.

The U.K. was forced to trim its huge database. Under a law passed last year known as the Protection of Freedoms Act, the government is destroying the DNA profiles — strings of numbers derived from DNA samples that are used to identify individuals — of a million people who were arrested for minor offenses but not convicted. People acquitted of serious crimes have their DNA profiles kept for up to five years.

Britain also has incinerated more than 6 million physical DNA samples — mostly swabs of saliva — taken from suspects. Samples, which could previously be kept indefinitely, must now be destroyed after six months.

Destroying the samples is seen as key to limiting DNA databases to crime-fighting rather than snooping, because it means stored DNA cannot be used to trace relatives or susceptibility to disease.

The U.K. government says the curbs have restored a sense of proportion to Britain's database, but some aspects of the country's genetic monitoring remain murky.

The U.K. DNA ethics watchdog has expressed concerns about a secret counterterrorism database, which, according to the Metropolitan Police Authority, contains "DNA obtained through searches, crime scenes and arrests in relation to counterterrorism" — including samples from people stopped and questioned at ports and borders, even if they are not arrested.

The Home Office, which oversees police and the DNA database, said there was a "robust regulatory framework" for the counterterrorism database. But it would not disclose how large it is, who has access to it or whether the information is shared with other countries.

Some authorities on DNA say fears of genetic intrusion are misplaced.

Chris Asplen, a former assistant U.S. attorney who now heads the Global Alliance for Rapid DNA Testing, argues that DNA is not dramatically different from other information the authorities already hold about millions of people, such as fingerprints, social security numbers or automobile registrations.

But he does see avenues for abuse.

"There is an argument to be made that because that biological sample exists, the government could go back and do other things with it that are not authorized by the law," he said. "It's a constant tension between government and people, particularly when technology is applied."

http://news.yahoo.com/spread-dna-dat...072535306.html

Driving somewhere? There's a gov't record of that
 

WASHINGTON (AP) — Chances are, your local or state police departments have photographs of your car in their files, noting where you were driving on a particular day, even if you never did anything wrong.

Using automated scanners, law enforcement agencies across the country have amassed millions of digital records on the location and movement of every vehicle with a license plate, according to a study published Wednesday by the American Civil Liberties Union. Affixed to police cars, bridges or buildings, the scanners capture images of passing or parked vehicles and note their location, uploading that information into police databases. Departments keep the records for weeks or years, sometimes indefinitely.

As the technology becomes cheaper and more ubiquitous, and federal grants focus on aiding local terrorist detection, even small police agencies are able to deploy more sophisticated surveillance systems. While the Supreme Court ruled in 2012 that a judge's approval is needed to track a car with GPS, networks of plate scanners allow police effectively to track a driver's location, sometimes several times every day, with few legal restrictions. The ACLU says the scanners assemble what it calls a "single, high-resolution image of our lives."

"There's just a fundamental question of whether we're going to live in a society where these dragnet surveillance systems become routine," said Catherine Crump, a staff attorney with the ACLU. The civil rights group is proposing that police departments immediately delete any records of cars not linked to a crime.

Law enforcement officials said the scanners can be crucial to tracking suspicious cars, aiding drug busts and finding abducted children. License plate scanners also can be efficient. The state of Maryland told the ACLU that troopers could "maintain a normal patrol stance" while capturing up to 7,000 license plate images in a single eight hour shift.

"At a time of fiscal and budget constraints, we need better assistance for law enforcement," said Harvey Eisenberg, chief of the national security section and assistant U.S. attorney in Maryland.

Law enforcement officials also point out that the technology is legal in most cases, automating a practice that's been done for years. The ACLU found that only five states have laws governing license plate readers. New Hampshire, for example, bans the technology except in narrow circumstances, while Maine and Arkansas limit how long plate information can be stored.

"There's no expectation of privacy" for a vehicle driving on a public road or parked in a public place, said Lt. Bill Hedgpeth, a spokesman for the Mesquite Police Department in Texas, which has records stretching back to 2008, although the city plans next month to begin deleting files older than two years. "It's just a vehicle. It's just a license plate."

In Yonkers, N.Y., just north of the Bronx, police said retaining the information indefinitely helps detectives solve future crimes. In a statement, the department said it uses license plate readers as a "reactive investigative tool" that is only accessed if detectives are looking for a particular vehicle in connection to a crime.

"These plate readers are not intended nor used to follow the movements of members of the public," the department's statement said.

But even if law enforcement officials say they don't want a public location tracking system, the records add up quickly. In Jersey City, N.J., for example, the population is only 250,000 but the city collected more than 2 million plate images on file. Because the city keeps records for five years, the ACLU estimates that it has some 10 million on file, making it possible for police to plot the movements of most residents depending upon the number and location of the scanners, according to the ACLU.

The ACLU study, based on 26,000 pages of responses from 293 police departments and state agencies across the country, also found that license plate scanners produced a small fraction of "hits," or alerts to police that a suspicious vehicle has been found. In Maryland, for example, the state reported reading about 29 million plates between January and May of last year. Of that amount, about 60,000 — or roughly 1 in every 500 license plates — were suspicious. The No. 1 crime? A suspended or revoked registration, or a violation of the state's emissions inspection program accounted for 97 percent of all alerts.

Eisenberg, the assistant U.S. attorney, said the numbers "fail to show the real qualitative assistance to public safety and law enforcement." He points to the 132 wanted suspects the program helped track. They were a small fraction of the 29 million plates read, but he said tracking those suspects can be critical to keeping an area safe.

Also, he said, Maryland has rules in place restricting access for criminal investigations only. Most records are retained for one year in Maryland, and the state's privacy policies are reviewed by an independent board, Eisenberg noted.

At least in Maryland, "there are checks, and there are balances," he said.

http://news.yahoo.com/driving-somewh...140052644.html

http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2013/07/17...nd-is-now-law/


The equal marriage bill for England and Wales was today given Royal Assent, and is now officially law.

:cheerleader:

Groups Condemn Threats Against Haiti’s Gay Society

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: July 17, 2013 at 3:49 PM ET


PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti — Watchdog groups in Haiti on Wednesday condemned what they say has been a series of threats targeting the Caribbean nation's small gay community.

Attorney Mario Joseph and gay rights advocate Charlot Jeudy told a news conference that people who are gay or lesbian should be able to live freely without being harassed or attacked.

Jeudy, president of a gay rights group named Kouraj, Haitian Creole for courage, said he recently received several threats, including a call from someone who told him to shut his mouth, or have it shut for him. The same caller threatened to burn down his home and office.

The news conference came three weeks after several Protestant leaders from a group calling itself the Haitian Coalition of Religious and Moral Organizations said on national television that they disagreed with recent laws in other countries supporting gay marriage. The group announced it would hold an anti-gay demonstration in the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince on Friday, a gathering that worries rights leaders.

"Haitian society needs tolerance," said Joseph, the lawyer. "Whatever sexual orientation you are, you have rights."

Haiti's small gay and lesbian community has long remained largely underground because of a strong social stigma that sparks fears of physical violence and loss of employment.

Gay rights groups in Haiti say that members of the country's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community often don't report rights violations to authorities out of fear of reprisal. Those people also have suffered overt discrimination from law enforcement and judicial authorities, particularly in Port-au-Prince, the U.S. State Department said in a 2012 report on human rights in Haiti.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2013...html?ref=world

Catholic colleges to Catholic members of Congress: Pass immigration reform
 

The presidents of 93 Catholic colleges and universities are calling on Catholic members of the House of Representatives to pass immigration reform that would put most of the 11 million unauthorized immigrants in the country on a path to citizenship.

“Catholic teaching values the human dignity and worth of all immigrants, regardless of legal status,” the Catholic leaders say in a letter sent to all 163 Catholic member of Congress, including Rep. Nancy Pelosi and House Speaker John Boehner. “We remind you that no human being made in the image of God is illegal.”

The Senate passed a comprehensive bill last month but, so far, the Republican-controlled House has not touched it.

The presidents represent 290,000 students at Catholic colleges and universities. They noted that 10 percent of House and Senate members graduated from Jesuit colleges.

“One thing immigrants do for the American Catholic Church is they enrich the church,” said John Garvey, president of the Catholic University of America. “They’re keeping the Catholic Church fresh and the churches full. More and more they're the backbone of parish life.”

“It would be a failure if we miss the opportunity to make the nation more welcoming,” said Father John Jenkins, president of the University of Notre Dame.

Garvey joked that the only way to influence members of Congress to vote for the legislation would be “revoking their degrees.” He said that “apart from that we don't have a lot of authority over them” and acknowledged that presidents' advocacy might not sway representatives opposed to the bill. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has also backed reform legislation.

Religious leaders from some evangelical churches — including conservatives such as Liberty University Law School Dean Mat Staver — have joined their Catholic colleagues in advocating for reform. Evangelical and Catholic churches are increasingly filled with immigrants and their children, and Christian doctrine commands followers to “welcome the stranger,” these leaders argue. It remains to be seen if they can mobilize their followers — about half of Americans self identify as Catholic or evangelical — to pressure lawmakers to pass reform.

Some lawmakers have objected to the Christian argument for reform. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., has argued that the immigration reform boosters play “fast and loose” with Scripture, which frequently emphasizes the importance of following the law.

Garvey addressed these concerns on a conference call with reporters. He said that even though unauthorized immigrants have broken civil immigration laws, they do not deserve to be punished their whole lives.

“We don't pursue people for all of their lives for something they may have done to find a better life for their families,” Garvey said. “At some point we have to let those transgressions go in our search for working things out.”

http://news.yahoo.com/religious-coll...191440814.html

----------------------------------------------

Hey, church people, how about we apply those same rules and values to the queer community? Queers can fill your failing churches too.

SMH.

Same-sex couples can get Social Security benefits
 

Social Security and Medicare benefits — two cornerstones of retirement planning long enjoyed by most married Americans — will be a bonanza for couples in the 13 states that recognize gay marriage. Gay and lesbian couples will be eligible for valuable spousal and survivor benefits that could be worth tens, maybe hundreds, of thousands of dollars to each household.

President Barack Obama has promised that all relevant federal benefits and obligations will be implemented "swiftly and smoothly," including retirement and health benefits, according to the Social Security Administration.

Once they are, gay couples married in California, Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Vermont, Washington and Washington, D.C., will be able to incorporate Social Security and Medicare benefits into their post-career planning. Minnesota and Rhode Island join that roster Aug. 1.

Men (or women) married to each other, even if divorced, for example, will be able to collect up to half of each other's Social Security benefits if certain conditions are met. If one is widowed, even if divorced, he can receive up to 100% of the deceased spouse's benefit if it's less than his own benefit, and a spouse or divorced spouse may qualify for half of a worker's disability benefits. Medicare benefits also are available to spouses who haven't contributed.

For those living in states that accept only same-sex civil unions, the federal benefits will not be so generous. The Obama administration will not extend federal-worker benefits to domestic partners who are not legally married.

That applies to civil unions in Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois and New Jersey. Oregon, Nevada and Wisconsin have domestic-partnership laws on the books. Activists hope to eke out a legislative or court victory for gay-marriage laws in Illinois and New Jersey by the end of the year. Other pivotal states in the near term include Hawaii, Nevada, New Mexico and Oregon.

The first known legal test to overturn bans on gay marriage emerged last week when civil-rights lawyers, representing 23 men, women and children, challenged Pennsylvania's law.

The Supreme Court did not touch a DOMA provision that states need not recognize same-sex marriages performed by other states. Because the Social Security Act relies on where you were "domiciled when you filed for benefits," Congress will have to address changing the law to apply to couples who get married in states where gay marriages are legal but move to states where they're not. Thirty states outlaw same-sex unions.

"States have all kinds of rules about what is marriage, but at this point if your state of residence says you're not married, you're not married," says John Olivieri, a partner at White & Case law firm.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/sam...its-2013-07-18