For all the fuss around the latest news about Iran, the spin-meistering about the ACA ("Obamacare") "roll-out" and, God help us, the 2016 election (!!!),a very disturbing issue is getting "inside the paper" treatment in the New York Times and little mention on the other media.
Hobby Lobby, a for-profit corporation, claims that the corporation, as a "person," is being denied its (his/her?) right to religious freedom by being coerced to offer health insurance to employees which includes contraception coverage it (he/she?) objects to on religious grounds. The corporation has already won at the Appeals Court level and is likely to be brought to the SCOTUS. Given the already demonstrated tendency to put corporate "persons" above corporeal people and the attitude of the four legs of one pantomime horse (four bodies of one mind?) toward reproductive choice, the chances are, at best, even that a five-to-four decision may be in the offing against the ACA and reproductive choice in one fell swoop. Once a fiction is declared a legal "person" the mischief it can cause knows no bounds. If a legal fiction has the right of free speech, why not freedom of religion?
Even worse, underlying the suit is the assumption that certain methods of contraception (e. g. birth-control pills and "Plan B") are designed to prevent the development of fertilized eggs, and therefore are tantamount to abortion. It also slips into the "fetal personhood" realm of lunacy.
Whatever happens in Iran, what is happening here at home is less exciting but much more profound in its impact on daily life in the U. S. A. It is also why judicial appointments are one of the most vital (and least appreciated) duties of the President.