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The 99th edition of PWN started out with some discussion of the long awaited Supreme Court decision on two cases involving marriage equality. Hollingsworth v Perry and United States v Windsor. These land mark cases are the end all be all on the issue of marriage equality, but they do have some heavy sway over the issue.  A pro-marriage equality ruling in the Hollingsworth case could make same-sex marriage legal in the state of California. A pro-marriage equality ruling in the Windsor case could make it so that all states, regardless of their standing on same-sex marriage, would have to honor a same-sex marriage from states that do recognize them. Both favorable rulings would pave the way for the United States to legally recognize same-sex marriage on a Federal level. The rulings/opinions are scheduled to be announced Wednesday the 26th, you can go to the SCOTUS blog and read/hear the announcements live starting at 10am ET.

Zaracon and RevKess both feel strongly about the marriage equality issue. As a gay man, RevKess would love to see it possible for him to at some point to be legally married to a man he loves. Zaracon has always been a strong proponent of LGBT rights.

Links

• The significant global loss of millions of honeybees is a topic that worries many in the Pagan world. Albert Einstein is attributed with the quote “If the bee disappears from the surface of the Earth, man would have no more than four years to live. No more bees, no more pollination….no more men!” Last fall when 12 million bees dropped dead in Florida in a 1 and half mile radius, everyone was at a loss. Research seems to indicate that their deaths were due to pesticide spraying.
• Ironically, one of those pesticide manufactures, along with two other GMO scientists, have been awarded the World Food Prize, the Nobel Prize of food.
• The BBC, and many other news agencies and Pagan media sources, have reported on the Blue Plaque commemoration in honor of Doreen Valiente. Ms. Valiente is called by many “the Mother of Modern Witchcraft.” The block of flats she grew up in Brighton, UK, is the home of this Blue Plaque.
• BBC Radio 4 story on Modern Witchcraft from 2009.
• Coy Mathis, a transgender girl in Colorado, has won a case against the public school she attended last year. In this ruling the school must allow her to use the girls’ room.
• In related transgender news, the OutServe-SLDN leader, Allyson Robinson, has been forced to resign by the board of OutServe-SLDN. Many others in the administration of the military LGBT organization have also resigned in protest of her ouster.
• Related to both LGBT issues and the military, the interim civilian Secretary of the Air Force is the highest ranking gay man in the United States government. Eric Fanning has been the undersecretary of the Air Force since his confirmation in April and served as deputy undersecretary and deputy chief management officer for the Navy since 2009.
• Our friend the Mead Muse reports on her experience at the first Summer Solstice festival at Lake Ockeechobee in Florida. As many of you may recall, there was some controversy surrounding this festival because of the evangelical ministers in Pahokee, FL. Peter Dybing of the Lady Liberty League met with those ministers and helped convince them to no stage protests during the festival. By next week we will have more news and information on this festival and other recent festivals.
• Mama Gina was in attendance at the Ockeechobee festival and played this new song she wrote for the occasion.
• the Association of Catholic Priests in the United Kingdom are bemoaning that the Irish people seem to be go back to their Pagan ways. They don’t mean Pagan in the sense that most of us mean Pagan. They are saying that the Irish people have become lazy in their faith and in their humanity.
• Edward Snowden has been charged with espionage over the NSA leaks.
• Snowden admits that he sought the work with Booz Allen to probe and reveal the information he gained while working the government contract.

Music

1. Omnia – Teachers – Wolf Love 
2. Frenchy and the Punk (recorded as Gypsy Nomads) – Vaudeville Voodoo – Happy Madness 

Additional Links

• The Bay Area in California has been building a Pagan research library. The Adocentyn Research Library is well under way.
• State of California will honor Hindu Americans during the month of October.
• Caroline Kenner reports on the Free Spirit Gathering in Maryland.
• The Friendly Atheist writes about New Jersey’s plan to award tax payer dollars to two religious based schools.
• The state of Georgia was requiring a woman to submit to a vaginal exam to prove she was female before renewing her driver’s license.
• The US Supreme Court makes a ruling in the voting rights case before them this session. Read their opinion.
  • For more information: http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2013/06/supreme-court-voting-rights-act-ruling.php?ref=fpblg
  • In plain English, from the SCOTUSblog.com.
• Obama unveils his plans on environmental controls, this plan may go around Congress.
• A root cause for the debilitating disorder fibromyalgia may have finally be discovered.
• The EPA, which is strongly influenced by Monsanto, has approved higher concentrations of certain pesticides in food crops.