Slovenia!

Slovenia has approved same-sex marriage! The bill was hotly contested, but passed by a wide margin. An anti-gay group will push for a referendum on the law. That already happened back in 2012, when voters rejected an earlier marriage law. But getting to a referendum won't be easy because in 2013 the referendum law was changed so referendums on human rights issues are no longer allowed. (What a great idea! Wish we had done that here.)



I had written about Arkansas enacting a law that prevents cities from passing non-discrimination laws. Cities are now responding. (1) North Little Rock stated their commitment to fair and equal opportunities regardless of sexual orientation. (2) Businesses in Little Rock have started displaying stickers showing a rainbow hued state outline and the words "We serve and hire equally."



For a while there has been a Prayer Station inside the City Hall of Warren, Michigan. An atheist proposed putting up a Reason Station as well. The city refused. The cit said it wanted to avoid conflict and disruption in City Hall. Besides, the city didn't want an anti-religion presence, depriving religious groups of their constitutional freedoms. The ACLU sued, and won. So a Reason Station should appear in Warren's City Hall soon.



A recent poll found that more that 2/3 of Americans think the wealthy pay too little in federal tax and more that 60% say the middle class pays too much.



As the Latino population in some cities, such as Yakima, Washington, grows, local politicians have a way of keeping them out of government. Yakima is one-third Latino but there are no Latinos on the city council. The reason is all city council representatives are "at large." That means 50% of the voters can control 100% of the seats. That's even better than Gerrymandering and similar to what was (and is again) done to prevent blacks from serving in city gov't. Lawsuits can be effective in solving this problem. Alas, they're also expensive and take lots of time.