AZ to consider mandatory church on Sunday bill?

 
AZ to consider mandatory church on Sunday bill?

ThreeSonorans

Mar 26, 2015

State Senator Sylvia Allen, Republican of course, in her defense of a guns-in-public-buildings bill, states that Arizona should require church attendance on Sundays for a moral rebirth.

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AZ Sen Sylvia Allen Wants a Bill to Consider Implementing Sunday Worship

A plea for Unity sent to the John 17 Movement of Phoenix, AZ

It's no secret that division in a family brings harm and pain on many levels. The church which is described as the family of God remains divided. The attitudes and harsh judgements amongst professing Christians have caused deep wounds and centuries of conflicts.

"Father I pray that those who believe in me will be one so the world will know you sent me." That prayer of Jesus in the 17th chapter of the Gospel according to John is the reason Roman Catholics and a variety of Protestant Christians met together on May 23rd, 2105 in Phoenix, Arizona.

There was a declaration made that day by those in attendance to see the Church in Phoenix becoming relationally unified in a way that would make the claims of Jesus visibly seen and felt by those within and outside of the church.

My impression of our day but even more of the effort and working together of so many leading up to Saturday's meeting gives me hope that the church in all of its rich diversity can live and work as one family in the unity of the Holy Spirit.

Joe Tosini


Founder, John 17 Movement

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Sen. Allen would make church mandatory. God help us.

EJ Montini, The Republic | azcentral.com11 a.m. MST March 26, 2015




EJ Montini: Our Father who art in heaven ... could you please take a moment and come down here?

(Photo: Rob Schumacher / The Republic)




Our Father who art in heaven ... could you take a moment out of your busy schedule and come down here, please?

We need You to explain a few things to Arizona state State Sen. Sylvia Allen.

(I know. You're shaking your head, aren't you? This might be too daunting a task even for YOU.)

Allen, as You know, is a Republican from Snowflake, a Tea Party favorite who wants to pretend Arizona is an independent country rather than a state, and who believes government should stay completely out of people lives -- unless she can use her position to help out a son-in-law who got into some hot water over behavior with some of the inmates he was guarding at a women's prison.

But that's another story.

Anyway, Big Guy, they were debating a gun bill at a legislative committee meeting at the State Capitol this week so, naturally, Allen brought up religion.

(In Arizona, complete lack of logic is natural. But, you know that, too)

This was one of those crazy bills in which lawmakers want people to be able to bring concealed weapons into public buildings. Allen got upset because a few people expressed common sense opposition to the idea. Lawmakers here cannot abide common sense.

Allen said, "Probably we should be debating a bill requiring every American to attend a church of their choice on Sunday to see if we can get back to having a moral rebirth," adding "that would never be allowed."

She hinted that guns in public buildings might be necessary until there is a moral rebirth.

(I couldn't find anything about that in the New Testament, but I'm no biblical scholar.)

"I believe what's happening to our country is that there's a moral erosion of the soul of America," she said.

Allen later told the Arizona Capitol Times that she wished things were more like they were in the 1950s.

(Again, I know what you're thinking: Civil rights problems. Women's rights problems. Voting rights problems. Segregated schools.)

Allen told the Times, "People prayed, people went to church. I remember on Sundays the stores were closed. The biggest thing is religion was kicked out of our public places, out of our schools."

I'm not sure that even a Supreme Being such as yourself could get through to the lesser beings in the Arizona Legislature, but perhaps You could take a moment and explain to them the Constitutional reason for a separation between church and state. And perhaps explain as well that religion and morality are not something that comes from public schools, but from our faiths, our families and, ultimately, ourselves.

I'm not one for mixing religious faith with newspaper work, but I say this with both exasperation and solicitation:

God help us.



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Arizona Lawmaker Who Floated Mandatory Church Attendance Has A History Of Extremism

SUBMITTED BY Brian Tashman on Friday, 3/27/2015 12:20 pm


The Arizona state senator receiving widespread attention as a result of her call for mandatory church attendance is, surprise surprise, an ardent Religious Right lawmaker.

While debating a bill on allowing people to bring concealed weapons into public buildings, State Sen. Sylvia Allen criticized the legislation’s opponents by maintaining that individual souls — not guns — are the real source of gun violence. “Probably we should be debating a bill requiring every American to attend a church of their choice on Sunday,” she said.

She later insisted that her remarks didn’t amount to a serious proposal, asserting that she wishes America would just return to the 1950s, which she said was a much more moral time in the country.

Allen is the very same lawmaker who defended uranium mining in her state by insisting that the earth is a mere 6,000-years-old:



She also proposed that the state enable the creation of a volunteer border militia and pushed for a state constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage, warning that gay marriage would harm children and destroy Social Security:

Since the beginning of recorded history the foundation and continuation of all societies has been the family; father, mother, and children. When the Pilgrims stepped off the Mayflower they were in family unites. Even the Native Americans formed their society around a father, mother and children.

Over 1,049 federal laws in many categories, including Social Security, welfare, veterans, taxation, etc are based on the man-woman marriage relationship. Society has set up our laws to protect the children and to provide in the case of a spouse dying. All of that would change if same sex marriage gets its foot hold and demands are then placed upon government and businesses for benefits. Our already overburdened Social Security system could not survive.

This is not about mere tolerance, allowing people their sexual preference and living with who they want, they can already do that, but same sex marriage is about forcing all within our society regardless of religious or traditional beliefs to accept radical changes which will have far reaching consequences. Consequences that change the very core of our society and how it functions. The loser will be the children who must endure the selfish desires of adults.

Activist judges and a small percentage of Americans have forced the people to use the Constitution to protect marriage and all that it means to the continuation of our society. If ever the family is to be restored and protected it must start with the very definition of what marriage is.

Allen even offered a bill to protect her son-in-law who was under investigation for harassing female inmates while working in a country prison:

Last year, then-Navajo County Supervisor Allen tried to interfere with an internal investigation into her son-in-law's conduct with female inmates in the Navajo County jail.

This year, Allen has moved on to the state Senate where she sponsored a bill aimed at ensuring that others don't have to endure what she sees as a witch hunt against her son-in-law.

…

"She was interfering in the investigation," Navajo County Sheriff K.C. Clark told me this week. "At one point, I had to go to the county attorney and say if she gets in my way, I'm going to book her for interfering in the criminal investigation."

Allen's son-in-law, Timothy Hunt, was working as a detention officer in Navajo County jail in April 2014, when a former inmate alerted authorities to possible questionable conduct with female inmates while working nights, according to county records.

Hunt was reassigned to a desk job while an investigation was launched – a point that didn't please Supervisor Allen, who immediately texted Sheriff Clark.

"I need to talk to you about what is going on in the jail," she texted on April 29. "The commander put up a note in the control room telling EVERYONE that Tim Hunt was not allowed into the jail this was before he got to work then they made him sit out front all day not telling him why he was being investigated. He was humiliated and no one said WHY."

Hunt would soon find out why, if he didn't already know.

As part of an independent investigation into his activities, six women claimed that he made sexually suggestive remarks and gestures to female inmates and passed along cigarettes and matches to one female inmate in exchange for oral sex.

…

Several weeks later, the independent investigator sustained four of the five allegations against Hunt, finding that "the preponderance of evidence" suggests among other things that he provided cigarettes to an inmate after she performed a sex act on him in a shower.

"Despite Hunt's denial of wrongdoing, there was significant consistency between the accounts of the witness female inmates, and there is no credible evidence of any conspiracy," the investigator wrote, in a June 25, 2014, report to the Navajo County Sheriff's Office.

In July, Hunt took a polygraph test and was deemed "not truthful" when he denied engaging in oral sex with a female inmate, according to the polygraph report.

He later resigned and the file was sent to the Yavapai County Attorney's Office, to determine whether criminal charges are warranted.

Allen, meanwhile, ran for the state Senate, to replace the late Sen. Chester Crandell, and in January became a member of the Arizona Legislature and the Senate pro tempore no less.

Enter Senate Bill 1467. Allen's bill would strengthen the rights of law enforcement officials who face disciplinary proceedings. It was a surprise to many in the law enforcement community, given that the Peace Officers Bill of Rights was just passed last year and didn't take effect until Jan. 1.

Among Allen's proposals: to allow full-blown appeals trials rather than summary reviews if an officer is disciplined and to get rid of polygraph examinations.

Like the one her son-in-law failed.


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Sonntag muss Kirchtag sein [Sunday must be (a) feast day]

Sonntag muss Kirchtag sein

Martin Kilian aus Washington am Samstag den 4. April 2015

Kleine Geschichte

In den 50er-Jahren war der Gottesdienst für die ganze Familie noch Pflicht. Foto: Getty

«Der amerikanische Sonntag ist eine runde Sache: Man steht auf, frühstückt im Bademantel Eier mit Speck und Bratkartoffeln («House Fries»), dazu Waffeln mit Ahornsirup und Butter mitsamt Kaffee sowie einem Mimosa-Cocktail aus Champagner und frischgepresstem Orangensaft. Eine Bloody Mary tut es natürlich auch. Danach geht der echte Amerikaner zurück ins Bett zum Workout-Sex oder zum Jagen, Fischen und Sammeln. Er ist ein passionierter Jäger und Sammler.

Wer einen ruhigeren Ablauf seines freien Tages vorzieht, platziert sich schon morgens vor den TV und sieht fern. Es gibt Shows mit Celebrity-Köchen oder Werbefernsehen und auf CNN sogar Krisen aus aller Welt. Da der Aktienmarkt ruht, sind sonntags weder Gewinne noch Verluste zu verzeichnen. Die Kreditkarten hingegen ruhen nicht, denn bereits um zehn Uhr öffnen die Einkaufszentren und laden zu hemmungslosem Shopping am Tag des Herrn ein. Für alle, die arbeiten müssen – und das sind viele Amerikaner! – , findet der Sonntag am Dienstag oder sonstwann statt.

Dieser lässige Umgang mit dem Sonntag erregt den Unmut von Leuten, die den sittlichen wie moralischen Niedergang Amerikas beklagen und allerorten Teufelswerk wie die Homoehe wittern. Dass die Amerikaner immer weniger in die Kirchen strömen, obschon auf ihren Geldscheinen ausdrücklich vermerkt wird, sie vertrauten «auf Gott», erregt zudem seit geraumer Zeit den Unmut der Gegner einer allzu saloppen Interpretation des Sonntags.

Sie will die Moral in die Gesellschaft zurückbringen: Staatssenatorin Sylvia Allen. Foto: Gage Skidmore/Flickr

Was sie wirklich denken, enthüllte kürzlich eine gewisse Sylvia Allen, von BerufRepublikanerin im Staatssenat von Arizona. Frau Sylvia repräsentiert die Kleinstadt Snowflake, was auf deutsch «Schneeflocke» bedeutet, jedoch weniger herzig ist, als man denkt. Denn Snowflake wurde 1878 von Erastus Snow und William Jordan Flake gegründet. Snow und Flake - alles klar? Synapsen okay? Die Gründerväter waren Mormonen, auch Frau Sylvia bekennt sich zu diesem Glauben.

Nun begab es sich unlängst, dass der Senat in Arizona mal wieder die Erlaubnis zumTragen verdeckter Schusswaffen in öffentlichen Gebäuden debattierte. Eine derartige Erlaubnis ist nicht ohne: Leute mit versteckten Ballermännern könnten durch die Korridore von Gerichten und Finanzämtern streifen und andere Leute massakrieren, wie dies leider dann und wann in Amerika geschieht. Frau Sylvia freilich suchte die Schuld nicht bei den Schusswaffen, sondern in den «verdorbenen Seelen» der Menschen.

Und deshalb verlangte sie eine «moralische Wiedergeburt» Amerikas sowie ein Ende der Erosion von Religion. «Wahrscheinlich», entfuhr es ihr, «sollten wir ein Gesetz debattieren, das jeden Amerikaner dazu verpflichtet, am Sonntag die Kirche seiner Wahl zu besuchen». Moment mal! Das ist extrem heavy! Vor allem, da Frau Sylvia sich wehmütig an die fünfziger Jahre erinnerte, als alle Läden am Sonntag geschlossen waren und die Leute in die Kirche gingen, statt sich sonntags mit Mimosas und Sex zu vergnügen. Oder eben jagen und sammeln zu gehen.

Beten statt gamen: Kinder vor einem Altar. Foto: Getty

Einmal davon abgesehen, dass Afroamerikaner in den fünfziger Jahren hinten im Bus sitzen und Homosexuelle um ihr Leben fürchten mussten und Frauen insgesamt weniger als ihre Haustiere zu sagen hatten und Richard Nixon Vizepräsident war: Wie bitte soll der Zwangsbesuch in der Kirche «meiner Wahl» administrativ vonstatten gehen? Was ist mit Atheisten und Agnostikern? Mit Theisten und Heiden? Zorastergläubigen? Punks? Santeria? Und wer soll den Transport Widerstrebender in die Kirchen bezahlen? Gibt es eine spezielle Polizeitruppe?

Fragen über Fragen werden laut. Es scheint, als habe Frau Sylvia ihre «moralische Wiedergeburt» eher nachlässig durchdacht. Das Konzept hat offenkundig profunde Lücken. Da gilt es nochmals nachzufassen! Frau Sylvia?

Martin Kilian, Washington

Er ist Amerikaner und Reisender durchs amerikanische Hinterland. Ihn interessiert ziemlich alles zwischen Boston und Seattle, San Diego und Miami. Er lebte unter anderem in Athens, Georgia, und Washington DC und wohnt derzeit in Charlottesville, Virginia. Gelegentlich fliegt er nach Europa und bewundert die Putzigkeit des Alten Kontinents.

Quelle

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Below is a bing Traslator, translation of the German article: 

(I do not speak German, still I wanted to share this article; So, I tried several online translators, and this seems like the best I could find. Please forgive the bad grammar, it's a computer generated translation.)


Sunday must be (a) feast day

Martin Kilian from Washington on Saturday the 4 April 2015

little story Church Thanksgiving

In the 1950s, the church service for the family was still required. Photo: Getty

«The American Sunday is a round thing: one stands up, in a bathrobe, breakfast eggswith Bacon and fried potatoes («House fries»), to waffles with maple syrup and butteralong with coffee and a Mimosa cocktail of champagne and fresh squeezed orange juice.» Of course, it is a Bloody Mary. Then the real Americans goes back to bed to the workout sex or hunting, fishing and gathering. He is a passionate Hunter and collector.

If you prefer a quieter end of his free day, placed already in the morning before the TVand watch TV. There are shows with celebrity chefs or commercial television and CNN even crises around the world. Since the stock market are neither gains nor losses recorded on Sunday. The credit cards, however, does not rest, because already at teno'clock the malls open and invite to uninhibited shopping on the day of the Lord. Forall those who work have to - and that many Americans! -takes place the Sunday to Tuesday or sonstwann.

This casual handling of Sunday aroused the resentment of people who complain about the moral as moral decline of America and everywhere smell Devil's work such as the gay marriage. That Americans always less in the churches flock, although on their money explicitly, stated they trusted «God», also aroused the displeasure of theopponents of a too popular interpretation of the Sunday for quite some time.

She wants to bring back the morality in the society: State Senator Sylvia all. Photo:Gage Skidmore/Flickr

What they really think, revealed a certain Sylvia Allen, of professional recently Republican in the State Senate of Arizona. Mrs Sylvia represents the town snowflake,what means, but less herzig on german «snowflake», than one might think. Snowflake was founded in 1878 by Erastus snow and William Jordan Flake? Snow and Flake - allright? Synapses okay? The founding fathers were Mormon, also wife Sylvia is committed to this belief.

Now it came recently, that the Arizona Senate again debated the permission to carry concealed weapons in public buildings. Such permission is not without: people with hidden shooting men could through the corridors of courts and tax offices and massacring people, like this unfortunately then and when happens in America. Mrs. Sylvia however sought blaming not the guns, but in the «corrupted souls».

And that's why she demanded a «moral rebirth» America's, as well as an end to the erosion of religion. «Likely», it said, «should we are debating a law that required every American to attend the Church of his choice on Sunday» Wait a minute! This is extremely heavy! Especially, since Mrs. Sylvia wistfully remembered the fifties, as all the stores on Sunday were closed and the people in the church went instead to enjoy Sunday with Mimosas and sex. Or just hunt and gather to go.

Praying instead of reading: Children before an altar. Photo: Getty

Even apart from African-Americans back had to sit in the 1950s in the bus and fear homosexuals for their lives and women had a total to say less than their pets, and Richard Nixon was Vice President: how should please the compulsory visit to the Church of «my choice» take administratively place? What about atheists and agnostics? With theists and pagans? Zorastergläubigen? Punks? Santería? And who should pay for transporting resistive in the churches? There is a special police force?

Questions about questions be loud. It seems rather carelessly, wife Sylvia have thought through their "moral rebirth". The concept has evidently profound gaps. There it is again to cover up! Mrs Sylvia?

Martin Kilian, Washington

He is American and Traveler through the American hinterland. Interested in pretty much everything between Boston and Seattle, San Diego and Miami. He lived in Athens, Georgia, and Washington DC and currently resides in Charlottesville, Virginia. Occasionally, he flies to Europe and admired the Putzigkeit (quaintness) of the old continent. 

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Sprechen die Deutsch? 

Bitte übersetze diesen Artikel für mich. 

Danke.

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LRLTV Special Report: April 3rd, 2015

DavidEMould

Published on Apr 3, 2015


Where is this debate about homosexual marriage going? David Mould believes it is going beyond the Supreme Court to a Constitutional Convention in which mandatory church services on Sunday will be debated.

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Senator Allen would like to mandate (Sunday) church attendance

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Senator Allen would like to mandate church attendance

Scott Berlin

Published on Mar 25, 2015

Senator Sylvia Allen, while discussing a gun bill, proposed the idea of mandating church attendance on Sundays to "bring back the soul of the country".
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Mormon Arizona State Senator Sylvia Allen Suggests (Sunday) Church Attendance for Corrupt Souls

By SHAWN SCHUSTER (NEWS@GOSPELHERALD.COM) 

Mar 31, 2015 01:41 AM EDT

State Senator Sylvia Allen joked about a mandatory church attendance law last week during a concealed gun permit meeting in Arizona. Photo: Kylee Gauna




While the moral code of the country is in unquestionable decline in recent years, one Arizona state senator suggests mandatory church attendance as the solution.


State Sen. Sylvia Allen (R) made the comment while debating concealed weapons permits at the Senate Appropriations Committee meeting last Tuesday. Allen was making the point that gun violence has less to do with carry permits and more to do with currupted souls.


"It's the soul that is corrupt. And how we get back to a moral rebirth in this country, I don't know since we are slowly eroding religion at every opportunity that we have," she said. "Probably we should be debating a bill requiring every American to attend a church of their choice on Sunday to see if we can get back to having a moral rebirth."


While Allen later called her words a "flippant comment," she went on to explain that the statement stems from the way she was raised in the 1950s in relation to how things are now.


"I remember on Sundays the stores were closed," Allen said in an interview with the Arizona Capitol Times. "The biggest thing is religion was kicked out of our public places, out of our schools."


As expected, news of Allen's comment spread like wildfire with many upset that a non-existent "separation of church and state" definition in the First Amendment means that Allen should apologize or resign. "This woman, Sylvia Allen, is a total idiot," one commenter on the Arizona Capitol Times interview said. "Can you imagine how she would handle a real crisis in government now? Get her out of office, people!!!"


And despite Allen saying that people should "attend the church of their choice," many are targeting Christianity for their rebuttals. "What a vile human being. Morality? With christians the highest in prisons and atheists less than 1%, I'd say churches need to be converted to homes for the homeless but religion is a disease that needs eradicated," another commenter said.


Steve Farley, the Democratic state senator at the meeting who first highlighted Allen's comments on his Twitter page, suggested that Allen's comment was misguided. "Even if you believe that would stem the moral decay, I think the Constitution makes it very clear that our country is founded on the pillar of separation of church and state."


In reality, the separation of church and state is not something expressly written in the First Amendment, as any career government official should probably know. Thomas Jefferson coined the phrase "wall of separation between church and state" in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association in 1802 where he was reassuring the committee that the government would not interfere in the church's manner of worship. But the phrase has been misconstrued in recent years to mean the opposite of what Jefferson intended in his letter and in the First Amendment.


And although Allen suggested the "new law" in a mocking tone while chuckling, State Senator Farley told his Twitter followers that the mandatory church attendance law was something that Allen "calls for."


Sylvia Allen is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and she has served in the Arizona State Senate since 2008. Her current term is due to end on January 1, 2017.


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Supreme Court overturns driving law targeting noncitizens

Acadiana bureau

LAFAYETTE — The state Supreme Court has ruled that a Louisiana law that makes it a felony for noncitizens to drive without proof they are legally in the United States cannot be enforced.

The opinion, released Wednesday, came in a group of cases out of Lafayette Parish, where the law was challenged.

At issue is Louisiana’s “operating a vehicle without lawful presence” statute, which carries a penalty of up to one year in prison and a fine of up to $1,000.

In the court ruling, the justices cited a recent decision by the U.S. Supreme Court on a similar law in Arizona.

The federal justices had ruled Arizona was improperly trying to enforce immigration laws, the realm of the federal government.

The challenge to the Louisiana law had attracted the support of several civil rights and immigrant rights groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, National Immigration Law Center and Southern Poverty Law Center, and group of foreign governments that included Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua.

They argued, among other things, that the Louisiana law allows officers to pull people over for “driving while Latino.”


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Guillermo Jimenez on Constitution-Free Border Zones

15 Aug 2013

Interview 721 – Guillermo Jimenez on Constitution-Free Border Zones

Posted by Corbett
 

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

 

 

 

Today we’re joined by Guillermo Jimenez of TracesofReality.com to discuss the issue of the “constitution-free zones” that the ACLU have identified as existing anywhere within 100 air miles of any US border. We talk about Guillermo’s extensive coverage of this subject, including his recent article “Another Man Arrested at a Checkpoint for Doing Absolutely Nothing Illegal.” We also explore the background of the problem and what concerned US citizens can and should be doing to confront this growing tyranny.


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Family of Christians lost at sea goes home

By The Associated Press

Published: Sunday, August 11, 2013, 7:12 p.m.
Updated 7 hours ago



PHOENIX — The Christian family who fled the country because they were fed up with government interference in religion and became lost at sea, flew back home on Sunday as more details of their arduous journey emerged.

The Gastonguays — Hannah, 26; her 30-year-old husband, Sean; his father, Mike; and the couple's daughters, 3-year-old Ardith and 8-month-old Rahab — set sail from San Diego for Kiribati in May.

They wouldn't touch land again for 91 days.

At first, “we were cruising,” Hannah Gastonguay said. But within a couple of weeks “when we came out there, storm, storm, storm.”

The boat had taken a beating, and they decided to set course for the Marquesas Islands. Instead, they found themselves in a “twilight zone,” taking more damage.

After about two months at sea, they were down to “some juice and some honey.” She said they were able to catch fish. Still, we “didn't feel like we were going to die or anything. We believed God would see us through.”

A Canadian cargo ship came along and offered supplies, but when they pulled up alongside, the vessels bumped, and the smaller ship sustained even more damage.

They were getting hit by “squall after squall after squall.”

“We were in the thick of it, but we prayed,” she said. “Being out on that boat, I just knew I was going to see some miracles.”

Eventually, their boat was spotted by a helicopter that had taken off from a nearby Venezuelan fishing vessel, which ended up saving them.

“The captain said, ‘Do you know where you're at? You're in the middle of nowhere.' ”

They were transferred to a Japanese cargo ship and arrived in Chile on Friday.

Their flights home were arranged by U.S. Embassy officials, Gastonguay said.

Hannah Gastonguay said the family will now “go back to Arizona” and “come up with a new plan.”

The Gastonguays are not members of any church; they read the Bible. Among other things, they didn't want to be “forced to pay these taxes that pay for abortions.”



Source: http://triblive.com/usworld/nation/4515612-74/gastonguay-hannah-boat#ixzz2bjZa8Yij
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Supreme Court Strikes Down Arizona Voter Registration Citizenship Requirement

Another example of logic defying rationale:




By JESSE J. HOLLAND 06/17/13 11:42 AM ET EDT



WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Monday that states cannot on their own require would-be voters to prove they are U.S. citizens before using a federal registration system designed to make signing up easier.

The justices voted 7-2 to throw out Arizona's voter-approved requirement that prospective voters document their U.S. citizenship in order to use a registration form produced under the federal "Motor Voter" voter registration law.

Federal law "precludes Arizona from requiring a federal form applicant to submit information beyond that required by the form itself," Justice Antonia Scalia wrote for the court's majority.

The court was considering the legality of Arizona's requirement that prospective voters document their U.S. citizenship in order to use a registration form produced under the federal "motor voter" registration law. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said that the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, which doesn't require such documentation, trumps Arizona's Proposition 200 passed in 2004.

Arizona appealed that decision to the Supreme Court.

"Today's decision sends a strong message that states cannot block their citizens from registering to vote by superimposing burdensome paperwork requirements on top of federal law," said Nina Perales, vice president of litigation for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund and lead counsel for the voters who challenged Proposition 200.

"The Supreme Court has affirmed that all U.S. citizens have the right to register to vote using the national postcard, regardless of the state in which they live," she said.

The case focuses on Arizona, which has tangled frequently with the federal government over immigration issues involving the Mexican border. But it has broader implications because four other states – Alabama, Georgia, Kansas and Tennessee – have similar requirements, and 12 other states are contemplating such legislation.

Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented from the court's ruling.

The Constitution "authorizes states to determine the qualifications of voters in federal elections, which necessarily includes the related power to determine whether those qualifications are satisfied," Thomas said in his dissent.

Opponents of Arizona's law see it as an attack on vulnerable voter groups such as minorities, immigrants and the elderly. They say they've counted more than 31,000 potentially legal voters in Arizona who easily could have registered before Proposition 200 but were blocked initially by the law in the 20 months after it passed in 2004. They say about 20 percent of those thwarted were Latino.

Barbara Arnwine, president and executive director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, called the decision a victory. "The court has reaffirmed the essential American right to register to vote for federal election without the burdens of state voter suppression measures," she said.

But Arizona officials say they should be able to pass laws to stop illegal immigrants and other noncitizens from getting on their voting rolls. The Arizona voting law was part of a package that also denied some government benefits to illegal immigrants and required Arizonans to show identification before voting.

The federal "motor voter" law, enacted in 1993 to expand voter registration, requires states to offer voter registration when a resident applies for a driver's license or certain benefits. Another provision of that law – the one at issue before the court – requires states to allow would-be voters to fill out mail-in registration cards and swear they are citizens under penalty of perjury, but it doesn't require them to show proof. Under Proposition 200, Arizona officials require an Arizona driver's license issued after 1996, a U.S. birth certificate, a passport or other similar document, or the state will reject the federal registration application form.

While the court was clear in stating that states cannot add additional identification requirements to the federal forms on their own, it was also clear that the same actions can be taken by state governments if they get the approval of the federal government and the federal courts.

Arizona can ask the federal government to include the extra documents as a state-specific requirement, Scalia said, and take any decision made by the government on that request back to court. Other states have already done so, Scalia said.

The Election Assistance Commission "recently approved a state-specific instruction for Louisiana requiring applicants who lack a Louisiana driver's license, ID card or Social Security number to attach additional documentation to the completed federal form," Scalia said.

The case is 12-71, Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Arizona, Inc.

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Exo-Vaticana, Part 1

By Thomas R. Horn

January 1, 2013

NewsWithViews.com

Petrus Romanus, PROJECT LUCIFER, and the Vatican's astonishing exo-theological plan for the arrival of an alien savior. You only think you know what's coming...

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SEARCHING FOR LUCIFER FROM ATOP THE HOLY MOUNTAIN

It was approximately 11: AM (PST) as we rounded the final bend and saw just ahead the towering edifices housing the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT), an optical telescope for astronomy and currently one of the world’s most advanced systems. Near it was the Submillimeter Telescope (SMT) or as it is also known, the Heinrich Hertz Submillimeter Telescope building, a “state-of-the-art single-dish radio telescope for observations in the sub-millimeter wavelength range… the most accurate radio telescope ever built.” [2] And last but not least about a block away from them we observed our primary reason for trudging to the top of this peak—the Vatican Advanced Technology Telescope or VATT.

Read more: http://www.newswithviews.com/Horn/thomas185.htm

2 US Border agents shot, 1 killed, near major drug corridor in Arizona

Published October 02, 2012

FoxNews.com

DEVELOPING: Two U.S. Border Patrol agents were shot, one fatally, Tuesday morning in an area in south Arizona known as a major drug-smuggling corridor, authorities said.

The identities of the agents were not immediately released, but the shooting occurred at the Brian Terry Station near Naco, Ariz., which is just south of Tucson. The station was named after an agent who was killed in the line of duty in December 2010. The area is considered a remote part of the state and sources tell Fox News that the shooting occurred about 8 miles from the border.

The injured agent was airlifted to a hospital with nonlife-threatening injuries.

The search for the killer is being led by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Cochise County Sheriff's Office.

Two weeks ago, the station was named after Brian Terry, who died in a shootout in December 2010 not far from Tuesday's shooting.

In Terry's shooting, two guns found at the scene were bought by a member of a gun-smuggling ring that was being monitored in the Fast and Furious investigation. Critics have knocked U.S. federal authorities for allowing informants to walk away from Phoenix-area gun shops with weapons, rather than immediately arresting suspects.

Source: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/10/02/2-us-border-agents-shot-1-killed-near-major-drug-cooridor-in-arizona/#ixzz289AcJqFW

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Jesuits respond to Supreme Court decision on immigration law

Jesuits respond to Supreme Court decision on immigration law
June 26, 2012 — JRS/USA

The U.S. Jesuit Conference, the Jesuit Refugee Service/USA and the Kino Border Initiative welcome the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down three key provisions of Arizona’s controversial immigration law, S.B.1070. In doing so, the Court correctly recognized the federal government’s constitutional authority to regulate immigration.

We are disappointed however that the decision left standing a final provision of the Arizona law, requiring Arizona law enforcement officers to stop and detain without warrant individuals on the sole basis of “reasonable suspicion” of irregular status. We fear this provision places Arizona law enforcement officers at odds with the communities they seek to protect. This decision not only affects all Hispanics in the state of Arizona, but anyone deemed “foreign looking” is subject to detention and interrogation by law enforcement officers of the state. Such laws endanger all residents of Arizona by creating a fear and mistrust of law enforcement and drive immigrant communities further into the shadows by discouraging them from contacting the police when they are victims of crimes.

The Supreme Court’s decision on this provision of the Arizona law acknowledges the potential for future legal challenges, and we are hopeful that the provision will be overturned once the problems associated with it are further documented.

Through the Kino Border Initiative (a cooperative endeavor between six religious organizations, including JRS/USA and two provinces of the Society of Jesus, operating in the twin cities of Nogales, Arizona and Nogales, Sonora, Mexico) we have borne daily witness to the harsh realities of the current broken immigration system. The Jesuit Conference, JRS/USA, and the Kino Border Initiative have long been committed to a humane and comprehensive approach to immigration reform.

In this spirit, we welcome the words of Archbishop José H. Gomez of Los Angeles, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops Committee on Migration, who has said, in response to the Supreme Court’s decision, “The U.S. Catholic bishops across the nation will urge their state governments to not pursue laws such as in Arizona, but rather to pursue humane reform on the federal level. Humane enforcement of our nation’s laws are part of any solution, but enforcement by itself, unjustly administered, only leads to abuses and family breakdown.”

Source

Lawmakers accuse Obama of 'declaring war on Arizona'

Jun 27, 2012- 4:11 -

New immigration memo criticized as pandering to Hispanic voters

Midair helicopter collision kills 7 Marines

From Barbara Starr, CNN Pentagon Correspondent

updated 12:46 PM EST, Thu February 23, 2012

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• NEW: Six of the Marines who died were from Camp Pendleton
• The Marine Corps says the collision occurred during routine training
• A UH-1Y helicopter and an AH-1W helicopter crash midair
• Spokeswoman: Marines onboard were preparing to deploy to Afghanistan

(CNN) -- Seven U.S. Marines were killed in the midair collision of two U.S. military helicopters in southern Arizona, officials said Thursday.

The crash occurred during routine training operations Wednesday night along the California-Arizona border, the Marine Corps said in a statement.

The collision, which occurred near the Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, involved an AH-1W "Super Cobra" attack helicopter and a UH-1Y "Huey" utility chopper.

The aircraft were part of the 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing and based in Camp Pendleton in California.

Six of the Marines killed in the crash were from Camp Pendleton, and one was from Yuma, the Marine Corps said.

Authorities were investigating the collision.

"We won't know exactly what happened until the investigation is complete, and we can't make any assumptions right now," said 1st Lt. Maureen Dooley, a Marine Corps spokeswoman.

The Marines onboard were preparing for deployment to Afghanistan, she said.

This UH-1Y Huey is on the flight line at Camp Bastion, Afghanistan.

"We have aircraft going out to Yuma training ranges on a weekly basis, and they go out there primarily because the aircraft mimics what they will see in Afghanistan," Dooley said.

Authorities did not plan to release the names of the Marines involved until their families were notified.

Marine Corps Air Station Yuma is home to about 4,000 active duty Marines and sailors. It supports 80% of the Marine Corps air-to-ground aviation training and covers five square miles in southeastern Yuma.

The air station "hosts approximately 70 aviation units, bringing an average of 600 aircraft and 14,000 personnel for ongoing training that takes place throughout the year," utilizing U.S. and NATO forces, the station's website said.

The military has long used the AH-1W and UH-1 Huey for a variety of tasks. The military describes the AH-1W as "the backbone of the United States Marine Corps' attack helicopter fleet." The UH-1Y is a twin-engine, medium-size helicopter, according to the military.

CNN's Ashley Hayes and Moni Basu contributed to this report.

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