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Breast Cancer Gene Lawsuit Argues Patents Invalid
bkuhn writes "The ACLU and the Public Patent Foundation have filed a lawsuit
charging that patents on two human genes associated with breast and
ovarian cancer are unconstitutional and invalid. The
lawsuit (PDF) was filed
on behalf of four scientific organizations representing more than
150,000 geneticists, pathologists, and laboratory professionals, as well
as individual researchers, breast cancer and women's health groups, and
individual women. Individuals with certain mutations along these two
genes, known as BRCA1 and BRCA2, are at a significantly higher risk for
developing hereditary breast and ovarian cancers."
And a good example of why I DON'T donate money to the ACLU
http://www.stoptheaclu.com/archives/2006/02/11/aclu-and-lesbians-attack-boyscouts-in-9th-circuit/
They have an agenda, fine, that doesn't mean everyone has to preach it for them also.
Wow. What a hate-filled, ignorant propaganda piece. I mean, seriously...
Judge Napoleon Jones said in his 2003 ruling the Boy Scouts are a religious organization with a "religious purpose" because adult leaders and youth members are required to believe in a "formal deity" and to swear duty to God.
Sounds reasonable to me. You don't need to back a specific domination to be a religious organization; any organization that would exclude atheists and/or polytheists clearly has its own religious agenda, and government support of such an organization is clearly unconstitutional, and rightly so[1].
The ACLU want to force the BSA to welcome professing homosexuals and even to recruit gay Scout leaders.
Yes. Practicing discrimination against homosexuals is unlawful, not to mention morally repugnant. I'm not surprised the ACLU wants to stop this.
They'd also like to erase the mention of "duty to God".
Yep. Right there with them on that one. If this organisation wants to receive any form of state support, it has to openly accept people of all religious beliefs, including atheists and polytheists for whom this statement would be a violation of their own religious beliefs. If it doesn't want to do that, the ACLU see it as their job to stop it from receiving any form of state support, as is their legal right.
But then, it's not surprising that a group that embraces NAMBLA would be tied up in knots by the Boy Scouts, an organization grounded in a traditional morality, promoting faith, family, and self-reliance. Such old-fashioned American "bigotry" seems infinitely more repulsive to the ACLU that the depravities of child sexual abuse.
NAMBLA is a political, campaigning organisation. We may find what they are campaigning for repugnant, and I'm sure most ACLU members do to. But we also believe that NAMBLA's members right to _say_ whatever they want to say is critical. The "bigotry" referred to above is discrimination against homosexuals ("traditional morality" in the words of the article) and discrimination against those whose religious beliefs contradict those of Christianity ("promoting faith"). This bigotry is actively pursued by the BSA. NAMBLA, as an organisation, does not sexually abuse children. Many of its members, AIUI, while they would _like_ to do so, have never done so either. The organisation exists only to spread the word about how these people want to change the law, a perfectly legal activity, and one that is protected by the US constitution.
This is why ACLU attorneys and their allies are working furiously to force the Boy Scouts to accept scoutmasters who engage in homosexual behavior
That'll be because homosexuals have a right not to be discriminated against on the basis of their sexuality. It's a basic civil liberty, which the Boy Scouts have repeatedly attempted to subvert.
despite studies showing that those who engage in such behavior are more likely to become pedophiles than those who don't.
Studies say that black people are more likely to commit crime than white people. Perhaps we should send them all away somewhere they can't get access to us law-abiding people to make sure we're safe from them. This is the same logic that this article is using.
Behind the blitzkrieg against the Boy Scouts is an essential conflict of interest: The ACLU is paving the legal way for an atheistic, libertine society, which puts them at cross-purposes with the God-fearing, self-disciplined kids who help old ladies across the street.
No, the ACLU is working to protect the constitutional rights of Ame