Keith Cressman of Oklahoma City filed litigation in 2011 objecting to the state’s standard license plate, adopted in 2008, which appears on three million vehicles statewide, claiming the image on it promotes Native American spiritual beliefs and thus endorses a religion. Federal Judge Joe Heaton dismissed the lawsuit last year, but a panel of the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals voted 2-1 to reinstate it on June 11.   Read More

Demographers attribute the early arrival of Caucasian natural decrease to several factors, especially the Great Recession and sluggish aftermath, which depressed both birth rates and immigration; and the much higher average age of whites compared to other groups (the median age of whites is 42, of Asians-34, of blacks-32, of Hispanics-28), which translates into lower rates of population growth.   Read More

The bookless library will have 100 e-readers for people to borrow in order to read any of the 10,000 digital titles that will be available. Residents also will have access to dozens of computers to browse, study, and learn digital skills. One of the inspirations for the Bexar paperless public library was the bookless engineering school library at the University of Texas San Antonio, which has been open for three years.   Read More

As of Friday, Dingell had served 20,997 days (or 57 years, 5 months and 26 days) as a representative from southeast Michigan. He first joined Congress in 1955. He had already broken the record for the longest time served in the House of Representatives in February 2009. Now he has broken the overall Congressional record, previously held by Robert Byrd of West Virginia, who served in the House of Representatives from 1953 to 1959 and in the Senate from 1959 until his death on June 28, 2010.   Read More

Madden summarizes the beginning of the story of The Silver Collar, the book that preceded The Silver Crown thus: “The plot of The Silver Collar is almost traditional. Iris and Alfie are lovers. Deeply besotted until one night a werewolf attacks them and Iris’s twin brother, Matthew. Matthew is killed and Alfie is bitten. Alfie becomes a werewolf as Iris becomes a werewolf killer. Suddenly their relationship isn’t going so well….”   Read More

The two researchers conjured up a two-dimensional graph that measures the “ideological distance between the median of the Democratic and Republican parties in the state legislative chambers.” The congressional median is around 1.2. Louisiana is the least divisive state at 0.5. California is literally off the grid, which only goes up to 2.5. California’s score looks to be around 3.0. The next closest to California is Colorado at 2.2.   Read More

Logs were placed across the road on April 1, along with a “closed” sign, according to the civil complaint. Cheng says the road closure was “unauthorized” and goes against the doctrine of “love your neighbor.” Cheng accused Father George Belgarde, the Jesuit shrine’s director, of taking “an openly hostile stance toward our temple and our members, and refused to discuss or consider a compromise like his predecessors.” Belgarde became director of the Shrine in 2011.   Read More

The group plans to display a monument bench that will feature quotes from Madalyn Murray O’Hair, a renowned atheist activist, an excerpt from the Treaty of Tripoli signed by President John Adams, and quotes from founders Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson.   Read More

The plaintiffs from High Times Magazine, The Daily Doobie and The Hemp Connoisseur insist they “do not sell or promote obscenity,” and demand the court throw out HB 13-1317. They pointed out that alcohol is banned for Americans younger than 21, but that alcohol-related magazines are allowed to be sold openly.   Read More

As for young Mr. Mahankali, he has never even eaten a knaidel, a culinary lapse likely soon to be remedied, given the many offers he has already received. But will it be kosher or kashrut? And here’s a tip for aspiring spelling champions: the plural of knaidel is knaidlach. Or is it knaidelach?   Read More

Drug-resistant superbugs are invading hospitals, killing about 100,000 patients and costing $30 billion a year. One way to combat them is for nurses, doctors and other hospital personnel to wash their hands regularly. Yet, without encouragement, hospital workers clean their hands as little as 30% of the time they interact with patients.   Read More

The Association of German Breweries says fracking’s potential impact on groundwater supplies could jeopardize the country’s 497-year-old legal tradition of producing pure beer. German beer is allowed to be made only from malt, hops, yeast and water. Chancellor Angela Merkel is backing legislation in her coalition that would outlaw fracking in some areas of the country.   Read More

federal energy statistics show Alabamans and Tennesseans pay considerably less for power than the national average—earning TVA “the ‘mother love’ of a politically conservative region,” according to former TVA Chairman S. David Freeman. That would explain why free-marketers like Senator Lamar Alexander (R-Tennessee) called Obama’s proposal “one more bad idea in a budget full of bad ideas,” saying privatization could lead to higher energy costs for his constituents.   Read More

In what’s being called the “Rear Window” case, Arne Svenson used a telephoto camera to photograph his neighbors from his studio across the way, snapping pictures of the Foster family as they went about their daily lives. Svenson admits he never informed the Fosters about what he was doing.   Read More

It is estimated that there will be more than 72 million Americans over the age of 65 by 2030, according to the Department of Health and Human Services, which is nearly twice as many currently. Meanwhile, the U.S. will need 70% more home aide jobs in the next seven years, and people are not beating down the door for these positions that pay an average of about $20,000 a year.   Read More

Residents of Center Point, Alabama, who received citations as a result of a new traffic-camera system were told they could appeal their tickets in court. But there was a catch: it turned out there was no court to hear such cases. That’s the contention of two women, Rhonda Lashon Stubbs and Celeita Snow, who are suing the city and Redflex Traffic Systems, which was hired to install the cameras to catch speeders and other moving violations.   Read More