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Texas Legislature Wants To Reward Companies That Deny Employees Contraception
A bill recently introduced in the Texas state house aims to reward employers who violate Obamacare, offering subsidies to any company that uses religious objection as an excuse for denying its employees copay-free contraception.
House Bill 649, introduced by state Rep. Jonathan Stickland (R), was apparently inspired by the controversy over craft chain store Hobby Lobby. That store sued to deny its employees contraception coverage, citing its male president’s religious objections. But since Hobby Lobby, and companies like it, will be forced to pay a fine for violating the law, Strickland wants to compensate them with tax breaks:
The tax credit would be limited to the amount of a federal fine that the company pays or the amount of state tax the company owes.
“When a business is being stressed nearly to the point of bankruptcy by punitive federal taxes, of course the state should give them relief,” Stickland said in the news release.[…]
“The Obama administration’s mandate and their threats to bury Hobby Lobby with $1.3 million per day Read more…
Charges dismissed against woman arrested while videotaping traffic stop from her front yard

The case against a 28-year-old woman charged with obstructing governmental administration after refusing a police officer’s order to leave her front yard while she was videotaping a traffic stop has been dismissed.
WHEC reported a judge dismissed the case against Emily Good of Rochester, New York on Monday because there was insufficient evidence of a crime.
Good was arrested while she filmed police officers conducting a traffic stop in front of her home. Good’s recording shows the officers saying that they feel threatened by her standing behind them because she seemed “very anti-police.”
The arrest added to the already heated debate over videotaping police officers.
In a joint statement, Mayor Tom Richards, City Council President Lovely Warren and Rochester Police Chief James Sheppard said they agreed that the case should be dismissed.
“We believe that the incident that led to Ms. Good’s arrest and the subsequent ticketing for parking violations of vehicles belonging to members of an organization associated with Ms. Good raise issues with Read more…
Cops Use Mobile Scanner To Steal Cellphone Data From Innocent Americans
Americans are living in a predatory police state, then this story completely eviscerates it. Michigan state police have been using a handheld mobile forensics device to steal information from cell phones belonging to motorists stopped for minor traffic violations.
ACLU slams Chicago’s pervasive surveillance system
CHICAGO — A vast network of high-tech surveillance cameras that allows Chicago police to zoom in on a crime in progress and track suspects across the city is raising privacy concerns.
Chicago’s path to becoming the most-watched US city began in 2003 when police began installing cameras with flashing blue lights at high-crime intersections.
The city has now linked more than 10,000 public and privately owned surveillance cameras in a system dubbed Operation Virtual Shield, according to a report published Tuesday by the American Civil Liberties Union.
At least 1,250 of them are powerful enough to zoom in and read the text of a book.
The sophisticated system is also capable of automatically tracking people and vehicles out of the range of one camera and into another and searching for images of interest like an unattended package or a particular license plate.
“Given Chicago’s history of unlawful political surveillance, including the notorious ‘Red Squad,’ it is critical that appropriate controls be put in place to rein in these powerful and pervasive surveillance cameras now available to law enforcement throughout the City,” said Harvey Grossman, legal director of the ACLU of Illinois.
The Chicago police “Red Squad” program from the 1920s through the 1970s spied on Read more…
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