http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/03/27/conservative-media-darling-hobby-lobbys-discrim/198648
Right-wing media have been Hobby Lobby's biggest fans in the Supreme Court showdown between the federal government and the company over the health care law's contraception coverage mandate, championing Hobby Lobby as only interested in protecting its religious liberties. But according to new documents obtained by Salon, the company is an active partner to activist groups pushing their Christian agenda into American law.
This week the Supreme Court took on the Affordable Care Act's contraception coverage mandate, hearing arguments in Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby, a case which could allow secular, for-profit corporations an unprecedented religious exemption from the requirement that all health insurance cover preventive services like birth control. The conservative plaintiff, Hobby Lobby, is arguing that some emergency contraceptives covered by the mandate amount to abortion -- even though they don't.
In the process, Hobby Lobby has become a darling of right-wing media, who have championed its cause and framed the company as a family-owned, Christian, small business victimized by the ACA.
The conservative media sphere has repeatedly characterized Hobby Lobby as merely seeking "religious freedom." As Fox News host Eric Bolling described the case, "your religious freedom, guaranteed to you by the constitution, hangs in the balance." He added that the mandate "feels like political ideology trumping small business." The network has even given Hobby Lobby's attorney the platform to champion the company's small town virtues.
It turns out that the company right-wing media have worked so hard to champion has a significant hidden political agenda. On March 27 Salon broke the story that it had obtained a document revealing Hobby Lobby's political funding ties to a network of activist groups "deeply engaged in pushing a Christian agenda into American law."
According to Salon, a 2009 Tax Filing Form revealed that Crafts Etc., a Hobby Lobby affiliate company, and Jon Cargill, the CFO of Hobby Lobby, contributed a total of nearly $65 million in 2009 alone to the National Christian Charitable Foundation -- one of the biggest contributors to the Alliance Defending Freedom and the Center for Arizona Policy.
These organizations pushed SB 1062 -- the anti-gay legislation recently vetoed by AZ Governor Jan Brewer -- to the AZ Statehouse, and their agendas include many other discriminatory and dangerous policies including legislation that forces women to have invasive ultrasounds before abortions.have you noticed everyone and thing and org. the republicans have championed against the Pres. have all turned out to be not as advertised but extreme right wing IMO zealots from Cliven Bundy to Hobby Lobby guess we should have picked up on their name lobby. makes sense that a crooked party would support crook interest in common. playing the religion card for the right wing is just using God to manipulate others not exactly a God like thing to do, but they way they do business
this kind of thing is why the IRS investigating conservative groups claiming 501 exemption status were IMO doing the same thing breaking the law and supporting politics as their real intent in direct violation of that criteria for 501 and yes some Progressive groups too. when you have unscrupulous people like Karl Rove and Koch's et al you know it's not as advertised.
