The Hobby Lobby case is wrong for America

The current case before the U.S. Supreme Court involving Hobby Lobby's claim that the owners' religious beliefs trumps federal law about providing comprehensive health insurance to cover ALL women’s needs (read, contraceptives) raises some ugly questions and even uglier opportunities in America.

If the court rules in favor of Hobby Lobby, a precedent is set for business to discriminate in any manner and base it on their religious beliefs.  Image that a business is started in Mississippi or Alabama and the owner says that his religion finds black people subservient and therefore he doesn’t have to hire them. In fact he can exclude them from even being considered based on his religion and their race. Fair?  Of course not.  And not equal under the law.  But the court could make it so with this ruling.

Here's another case.  Let's say I decide that women is inferior to men and base it on verses in the Bible.  It is part of my religious understandings and teaching and therefore I can lower a woman's pay; in fact, I can even discriminate against her in any form I wish. The Bible says so to my mind, therefore the government can do nothing about it — if the court rules in favor of Hobby Lobby this would become the law of the land.

So you see, this case is about a whole lot more than Obamacare. It covers a whole lot more than contraception, abortion and all the things what have to do with a woman's reproductive cycle that Hobby Lobby doesn't want to cover. (Funny that they didn't mind paying for Viagra for men.) The point is, with the wrong ruling here, the court can open the door to discrimination based solely on a person's religious beliefs.

Unheard of a few years ago, but we have swung so far back to the right as to allow a vocal minority in our country to create a religious oligarchy that drives our courts and our laws.  It doesn't matter which side of contraception you stand on...this case is wrong for America because it opens the door for allowing religion to trump the law of the land.  It opens the door for discrimination based solely on what a person says they believe.

I for one don’t want to see more government in our hair, but in this case, the law says if you offer insurance to a employees, you can't discriminate against a class of those employees based on their race, creed or gender. Besides, what a woman and her doctor agree is the best path for her health, is really none of the company's business.  None. They are merely providing the insurance for health coverage, not the control of an employee's life.

I hope the court gets this one right.  They missed terribly in Citizen's United. This would be equally dangerous to our democracy and fair play.