Portside

While you were sleeping, Hobby Lobby just got so much worse.

The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Hobby Lobby Monday, allowing "closely held" businesses to claim religious rights and avoid federal healthcare regulations that require employers to include birth control in insurance plans.

In the liberal political imagination, the Supreme Court is an institution that must vindicate principles rather than practice politics. As the philosopher Richard Rorty once acknowledged, liberals “turn to the judiciary as the only political institution for which we can still feel something like awe.

Today, the Supreme Court handed down a decision striking a Massachusetts law that protects patient access to abortion clinics. The Court, upheld the historically broad interpretation of the president's recess appointments power, and opened the door to new forms of Senate obstruction by ruling that the president's recess appointments were invalid because the Senate had used "pro forma sessions" - sessions in name only - to avoid going into recess.

The vulture funds that secured a ruling in their favor are not original lenders to Argentina. They purchased bonds in default at obscenely low prices for the sole purposes of engaging in litigation against Argentina and making an enormous profit.

Supreme Court refusal to hear appeal spells 'terrible news for all of the developing world'

Reader Comments - Politics and Post-Capitalism; Gabriel Kolko; Shondes - Blacklisted by the `Jewish Community; Yuri Kochiyama; Guantanamo: Bowe Bergdahl; Jewish Day School vs. Teachers Union; Blood Type; Europe post Elections; Supreme Court Ruling on Teacher Tenure; US Foreign Policy. Announcements - Dialogue with Leaders of Mexican Labor Movement - June 26 - New York: 45th contingent Venceremos Brigade; Peoples Climate March - New York - Sept. 20-21

The vision of the 2002 movie “Minority Report,” based on a short story by Philip K. Dick, of “pre-crime” squads identifying people likely to commit crimes is getting less fantastic all the time.

NSA collects faces; SCOTUS refuses Risen; Data brokering; EU refuses Google; Dissent's media roundtable