Headlines For Today: Headlines - Saturday February 18

Virginia 'Personhood' Bill Includes Hypocritical Exemption For Infertility Treatments

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NH's Rep. Notter Claims Birth Control Causes Prostate Cancer

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Jesus' General: The Day I Gave God's Secret Handshake at a Campaign Rally

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As the nation is deluged in an avalanche of bills restricting abortion access, Tea Party freshman state Rep. Kim Pearson has introduced an Iowa bill that some are calling the most radical of them all.

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Among other things, the bill makes it so a doctor that performs and abortion commits "feticide" — a Class A felony, which is punishable by life imprisonment without the chance for parole. The bill makes "attempted feticide," where the fetus does not die, a Class B felony, punishable by 25 years in prison. Iowans can even be punished for helping someone else perform an abortion, as, "joint criminal conduct shall apply to persons knowingly participating or concerned in the commission of feticide or attempted feticide under this section."

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Hungary Destroys All Monsanto GMO Corn Fields

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The Rude Pundit: A Bishop and His Pork: An Exegesis on Fuck This Guy:

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Margaret and Helen: 100,000 Gay Kids Secretly Watch Ellen

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Paging the U.S.....

And this is only touching a small fraction of their wealth, so consider it pocket change for the church. Their property holdings are substantial so why shouldn't they be taxed like everyone else? The Independent:

After several years of scandal in which the Catholic Church has faced allegations of financial impropriety, paedophile priests and rumours of plots to kill the Pope, the Vatican is now facing a new €600m-a-year tax bill as Rome seeks to head off European Commission censure over controversial property tax breaks enjoyed by the Church.

As the EC heads closer to officially condemning the fiscal perks enjoyed by the Catholic Church and introduced by the Berlusconi administration, Prime Minister Mario Monti has written to the Competition Commissioner, Joaquin Almunia, saying that the Vatican will resume property tax, or Ici, payments.

Mr Almunia said in 2010 that the exemption amounted to state aid that might breach EU competition law. A parliamentary proposal by the Italian Radicals party last August to repeal the exemption, with a successful petition on Facebook, upped the pressure. A spokesman for Mr Almunia appeared to give the thumbs-up yesterday: "It is a proposal that constitutes a significant progress on the issue and I hope will be implemented," he said.

As much as the church gets involved in politics in the US, it's unclear why they don't get taxed here as well. If they want to keep their tax free status they really need to shut up and get back to focusing on issues like helping the poor instead of amassing wealth and power.

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