By Faith Chatham - July 1, 2014
Hobby Lobby may have "won" their Appeal to the United States Supreme Court by a 5-4 decision, but they are losing customers over their claiming religious rights of the owner to refuse to cover birth control on employee insurance. In a 35 page dissent Minority Report, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Burwell v.s. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. decision,
In a copyrighted story Reuters reported:
White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the court's decision "jeopardizes the health of women who are employed by these companies. She stated:
"The exemption sought by Hobby Lobby and Conestoga would...deny legions of women who do not hold their employers’ beliefs access to contraceptive coverage."
"Religious organizations exist to foster the interests of persons subscribing to the same religious faith. Not so of for-profit corporations. Workers who sustain the operations of those corporations commonly are not drawn from one religious community."
"Any decision to use contraceptives made by a woman covered under Hobby Lobby’s or Conestoga’s plan will not be propelled by the Government, it will be the woman’s autonomous choice, informed by the physician she consults."
"It bears note in this regard that the cost of an IUD is nearly equivalent to a month’s full-time pay for workers earning the minimum wage."
"Would the exemption...extend to employers with religiously grounded objections to blood transfusions (Jehovah’s Witnesses); antidepressants (Scientologists); medications derived from pigs, including anesthesia, intravenous fluids, and pills coated with gelatin (certain Muslims, Jews, and Hindus); and vaccinations[?]...Not much help there for the lower courts bound by today’s decision."
"Approving some religious claims while deeming others unworthy of accommodation could be 'perceived as favoring one religion over another,' the very 'risk the [Constitution's] Establishment Clause was designed to preclude."
"The court, I fear, has ventured into a minefield."
Outrage at Hobby Lobby and its owners was expressed on the firm's Facebook Page. Those declaring intentions of "never shopping there again" outnumbered those who supported the company's position 9 to 1.
The Great Divide:
All 5 justices who voted for Hobby Lobby to be allowed to claim the right to refuse to offer birth control in employees health plans based on the First Amendment Right of the owner to exercise religious freedom are men. Three of the four Justices who dissented and voted against Hobby Lobby are women!
This decision, viewed as a bad thing for women, may be a good thing for Democrats in November. I concur with Emma Roller in her story: Why the Supreme Court’s Hobby Lobby Decision Could Be Good News for DemocratsIt could help fire up a hard-to-reach voter demographic.
Roller wrote:
A recent Stan Greenberg poll posits that unmarried women can "make or break" the 2014 elections. And, as Mara Liasson wrote in May, they are firmly in Democrats' camp. But Democrats have a problem: Like most everyone else in the electorate, young women are less likely to turn out to vote in midterm elections. A Supreme Court case doesn't necessarily change that: Getting young female voters fired up about a decision is one thing; getting them to vote is another.
Luckily, contraception coverage is an issue young women care about. A March poll conducted by Hart Research Associates (and commissioned by Planned Parenthood) found that a large majority of female voters—81 percent—believe prescription birth control should be covered as a preventive health service, at no additional cost to prescribers.
For single women, birth-control coverage presents a trinity of issues they care about—health care, reproductive issues, and pay equity (after all, this is an issue that men don't really have to worry about). The Hobby Lobby decision may not be a silver bullet, but it could be enough to energize support among female voters who are suddenly worried that their employers could stop covering their birth control.
http://www.nationaljournal.com/politics/why-the-supreme-court-s-hobby-lobby-decision-could-be-good-news-for-democrats-20140630
It has been reported that the company owns stock in the corporation which manufacturers the Morning After Pill. Jessica Neubauer posted on the Hobby Lobby Facebook page:
Great, now that you don't have to pay for birth control because of your "religion", maybe you'll sell all your stock in TEVA and DANCO. You know, the companies that make Plan B and the morning after pills?Because you aren't hypocrites or anything.
Corporate Investment in Morning After Pill Manufacturer:
Jessica Neubauer posted on Hobby Lobby's Facebook page: "Great, now that you don't have to pay for birth control because of your "religion", maybe you'll sell all your stock in TEVA and DANCO. You know, the companies that make Plan B and the morning after pills?
Because you aren't hypocrites or anything."
Some defended the company claiming that they could not control what companies their mutual fund bought. Others went on record to show that was not true.
Joyce Kirkham: "There are mutual funds available that are tailor made for just about any philosophy. Your defense of the hypocritical investment practices of HL rings very hollow."
Deborah Morris: "I won’t be buying at Hobby Lobby AND my investment professional does allow me to select industries that I do not want to invest in. No tobacco or guns in my portfolio. . I am pretty sure Hobby Lobby has a lot bigger portfolio than I do and could exercise the same controls if they chose to."
Alisha Deck Niehaus Joan T, So the fact that TEVA makes other drugs aside from the ones that HL disagrees with negates the hypocrisy of denying coverage for employees, but using them to turn a profit for the 401k? That's the kind of circuitous logic that makes robots heads explode. Also, my sister is getting married in August. Everything I bought from HL for the reception just got returned this afternoon. And then re-bought from the Michaels up the road.
Jacki Ristich Documents filed with the Department of Labor and dated December 2012 (see above)—three months after the company’s owners filed their lawsuit—show that the Hobby Lobby 401(k) employee retirement plan held more than $73 million in mutual funds with investments in companies that produce emergency contraceptive pills, intrauterine devices, and drugs commonly used in abortions. Hobby Lobby makes large matching contributions to this company-sponsored 401(k)."
Sandra: "SV Hobby Lobby's 401(k) employee retirement plan holds $73 million in mutual funds that invest in multiple pharmaceutical companies that produce emergency contraceptive pills, intrauterine devices, and abortion-inducing medications.
"The companies Hobby Lobby invests in include Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, which makes the Plan B morning-after pill and ParaGard, a copper IUD, as well as Pfizer, the maker of the abortion-inducing drugs Cytotec and Prostin E2. Hobby Lobby's mutual funds also invest in two health insurance companies that cover surgical abortions, abortion drugs, and emergency contraception in their health care policies."
Some defended Hobby Lobby's investment i TEVA citing that the company manufactured more than just abortion drugs. This did not justify the double standard in the eyes of the majorities reading the page.
Alisha Deck Niehaus: "Joan T, So the fact that TEVA makes other drugs aside from the ones that HL disagrees with negates the hypocrisy of denying coverage for employees, but using them to turn a profit for the 401k? That's the kind of circuitous logic that makes robots heads explode. Also, my sister is getting married in August. Everything I bought from HL for the reception just got returned this afternoon. And then re-bought from the Michaels up the road."
Jacki Ristich: "Documents filed with the Department of Labor and dated December 2012 (see above)—three months after the company’s owners filed their lawsuit—show that the Hobby Lobby 401(k) employee retirement plan held more than $73 million in mutual funds with investments in companies that produce emergency contraceptive pills, intrauterine devices, and drugs commonly used in abortions. Hobby Lobby makes large matching contributions to this company-sponsored 401(k).
Sandra SV Hobby Lobby's 401(k) employee retirement plan holds $73 million in mutual funds that invest in multiple pharmaceutical companies that produce emergency contraceptive pills, intrauterine devices, and abortion-inducing medications.
John Smith
"Hobby Lobby I am still waiting for an explanation on why you have over 73 million invested in the companies that make the same IUDs and morning after pills you religiously object to. According to the Green family, interfering with an already fertilized egg is tantamount to abortion—an act unacceptable to the family and one they refuse to participate in no matter what the Affordable Care Act may require .
However, it turns out that the owners of Hobby Lobby do not appear to have any problem with profiting from the companies that manufacture the very products that so grievously offend their religious principles."
The following is a summation of the companies manufacturing these products that are held by the Hobby Lobby employee retirement plan, as set forth by Ms. Redden’s remarkable reporting:
These companies include Teva Pharmaceutical Industries, which makes Plan B and ParaGard, a copper IUD, and Actavis, which makes a generic version of Plan B and distributes Ella. Other holdings in the mutual funds selected by Hobby Lobby include Pfizer, the maker of Cytotec and Prostin E2, which are used to induce abortions; Bayer, which manufactures the hormonal IUDs Skyla and Mirena; AstraZeneca, which has an Indian subsidiary that manufactures Prostodin, Cerviprime, and Partocin, three drugs commonly used in abortions; and Forest Laboratories, which makes Cervidil, a drug used to induce abortions. Several funds in the Hobby Lobby retirement plan also invested in Aetna and Humana, two health insurance companies that cover surgical abortions, abortion drugs, and emergency contraception in many of the health care policies they sell.
When added up, the nine funds holding the stated investments involve three-quarters of Hobby Lobby’s 401(k) assets."
Many others expressed outrage at the Company claiming providing birth control infringes on their religious freedo while most of the merchandise the company sells is manufactured in China.
Thousands of Americans have gone to the Hobby Lobby Facebook page in the past 24 hours and posted questions about why their "religion" extends to denying women employees insurance coverage for the very medication that the company's matches 401K donations in the stock of the manufacturer! They ask how come Hobby Lobby claims a "moral" "religious" position on birth control for their employees yet have no problem in supporting a Communist Chinese government which forces women to abort all but the first child!
My comment "Religious freedom should extend to the employees! A manager should not determine the religious decisions of the employees! Hobby Lobby is a Corporation! I hope many of the women find much better positions with much better employers. The customers are finding better places to shop!" In less than 24 hours 562 readers clicked that they "liked" my comment!
Darcy Baxter rebuked Justyna, declaring "this is a victory FOR government overreach. It grants more natural rights to a corporate entity, a homunculous, a soul-less creation of the state. All is not as as it seems. This is a HUGE step in favor of the corporatocracy, the plutocratic government system we live under and the subversion of individual rights. Do you know, for example that now EVERY taxpayer, regardless of religious beliefs, will have to foot the bill for HL's religious freedom, and that, in fact, HL asked the US government to do that, in the first place?"
