Hard to name two people whose minds I respect more than Rick Garnett and Stephen Schneck. They each have articles up about the HHS mandates that are worth reading. Here is the link to Garnett's and here is the link to Schneck's.
Contra Garnett, I do not think we have to see the President's move as cynical, except and only insofar as we see all politicians as drinking at the well of cynicism as part of their daily duties. Certainly, Republican presidential aspirants that fret about religious liberty concerning contraception are strangely silent about the religious liberty issues raised by Alabama's GOP-endorsed anti-immigrant law.
Contra Schneck, I still do not think that the accommodaton the President announced last week goes far enough. It helps, and the change it proposes is not insignificant. But, while I understand that the President, for political reasons and, probably, because he really believes in it, can't compromise more than he has, I think we should seek a legislative or judicial remedy to the dangerous distinction between freedom of worship and freedom of religion that is, and remains, embodied in the exemption from the mandate.
But, as I say, these men both have formidable minds and present cogent arguments worth considering by all.
