I am writing today to announce the closure of the Michigan Messenger. After four years of operation in Michigan, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news into a single site, The American Independent at Americanindependent.com. This is part of a shift in strategy, towards new forms [...]
An abstinence-only presentation provided to numerous school districts in Calhoun and Eaton Counties in October of this year provided false and misleading information to students about HIV, experts allege.
Two county registers of deeds filed a class action lawsuit Monday on behalf of Michigan’s 83 counties alleging that the Mortgage Electronic Registration Services owes millions of dollars in property title transfer taxes.
Despite evidence of the impact of mercury on children and public health, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette last month joined with 24 other state attorneys general in filing a lawsuit to scuttle new EPA regulations that would reduce mercury emissions from power plants.
Those are two issues we’ve written about a great deal over the last few months and they could hardly seem to be more different. But there’s a connection between them, believe it or not. The House bill to restore and extend federal unemployment benefits to working Americans — HR 5618 — contains a provision that says no unemployment insurance benefits can be given to “any individual convicted of a sex offense against a minor.”
The same provision is also in HR 5297, which provides loans to small businesses, and HR 5072, which governs FHA loans.
The advocacy group Reform Sex Offender Laws of Virginia points out the indiscriminate nature of such provisions in a press release:
As they stand today HR5618, HR5297 and HR5072 excludes anyone who has been convicted of a sex offense against a minor. It doesn’t matter if it was a misdemeanor or a felony, it doesn’t matter if their state requires them to register or not and it doesn’t matter if they did their required time on the registry and have since been released of the stigma Sex Offender…
These three bills will include any 16 year old boyfriend or girlfriend who had consensual sex with a 15 year old boyfriend or girlfriend?
Or any 17 year old boyfriend or girlfriend who had consensual sex with a 16 year old boyfriend or girlfriend?
Or any 18 year old boyfriend or girlfriend who had consensual sex with a 17 year old boyfriend or girlfriend?
It all depends on that state’s age of consent. It doesn’t matter if today they are married and they have children together, you will now be refusing to allow them to have a home to raise their family in.
As usual, this points back to the need to reform the sex offender registries themselves to distinguish between those who are truly predatory and a danger to society and those who are clearly not.
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