Pam Spaulding's Blog, page 17

The HHS To Now Collect Data On Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, And Trans People

During the month of June, I had two root canals, a filling, and a tooth extraction. Only the first root canal was planned -- the rest were either emergency events (the tooth extraction for a broken canine tooth) or urgent events (the filling and the second root canal). (These are on top of the tooth extraction I had of a few months ago -- the one where I had that incredibly tough case of dry socket.)

In August, I'm currently scheduled to receive two crowns and a bridge the a bridge for tooth extraction of a few months ago) -- still to be scheduled is a dental implant for the latest tooth extraction.

My first comment: "Ouch!" My dental problems have left me in pain, and painkiller haze, for much of the past month. For me, it doesn't take much external stress (such as physical pain) to combine with my cyclothymia -- something Dr. Akiskal, the psychiatrist who developed the bipolar spectrum (as well as my diagnosing psychiatrist), as bipolar type II ½ -- to limit my ability to fully function in society. So for me, my dental issues triggered issues with my chronic, underlying, healthcare condition.

The Veterans Healthcare Administration (VHA) -- part of the Veterans Administration (VA) -- is my dental care provider. This is because I'm a Navy, 20-year retiree and disabled veteran. I fell into a huge safety net. The VA is my dental provider because I'm a disabled Persian Gulf War veteran; this is because when my service connected disabilities were evaluated by the VA in 2004, I was awarded a 100% VA Disability Rating.

In other words, I'm lucky. As the health impact of my bipolar condition, diagnosed while I was in the U.S. Navy, has progressed, I fell into a huge safety net. You can't imagine how thankful -- how grateful -- I am for that huge safety net.

I'm certainly not unique in being a transgender veteran accessing healthcare through the VHA. But when I talk to people about being a transgender veteran, accessing healthcare from the VA, questions that frequently comes up are "How many transgender veterans accessing the VA healthcare system?" and  "What kind of healthcare are transgender veterans receiving?"

Nobody really knows at this point. There has been no systematic, mandated collection of healthcare assessment data related to gender identity, or the sexual orientation either for that matter, of patients accessing the VA's healthcare system.

Or for that matter, any U.S. department. No federal agency had been collecting data on lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community as a matter of agency policy.

Well, that just recently changed. On Wednesday, June 29, 2011, the Secretary of the Department of Health And Human Services (HHS), Kathleen Sibelius announced that it's going to begin collecting data on lesbian, gay, bisexual, and trans people.

That's right, the HHS is going to begin counting and collecting data on trans people. This is in accordance with SEC. 4302. (Understanding Health Disparities: Data Collection And Analysis) of the Affordable Healthcare Act.

The National Center for Transgender Equality (NCTE) described how this is going to impact transgender people in this way:

[More below the fold.]
Public health data has never really been collected by the federal government.





Federal public health data is the gold standard in public health data.




Without such data, getting the federal government to focus on a public health problem is extremely difficult or impossible.





Soon (or at least in a few years), we will have good public health data we can use to advocate with the federal government for programmatic focus on trans health disparities.

Mara Keisling, the executive director of NCTE, added:

"In other words, if there is no federal population-based study data identifying and quantifying a public health issue, there will be no governmental focus to solve it. Because of the HHS announcement [on June 29, 2011], there will soon be federal population-based public health data on a variety of trans public health issues."

NCTE reports that the timeline, as it currently stands, to collect data related to gender identity and sexual orientation:

June - December 2011: Continue cognitive testing and begin field testing of sexual orientation data collection.





Summer 2011: Conduct first roundtable on gender identity data collection. development. Complete initial development of sexual orientation data collection questionnaire.





Winter 2011: Conduct follow-up roundtable on gender identity data collection.





Spring 2012 Conduct and complete initial field testing of sexual orientation data collection. HHS Data Council presents a strategy to include gender identity data collection in HHS surveys.





Winter 2012: Conduct and complete large scale field test of sexual orientation data collection.





2013: If the field test is successful, implement new data collection on sexual orientation into the full NHIS data collection.

The full plan for how the HHS is going to implement this policy is outlined in the HHS factsheet, entitled Improving Data Collection for the LGBT Community.

NCTE identified who was instrumental in getting this initiative started in their blog post

.

Mitt Romney's Independence Day GOP Clown Car flip/flop/flip

The heads of his fellow 2012 GOP Clown Car occupants are probably spinning as Mitt Romney again cannot decide whether the President has destroyed the economy. Today he's at it again. As Think Progress noted, in a tweet, "4 days after saying Obama didn't make the recession worse, Romney says Obama made the recession worse." Watch it:

 

David Pakman Show Exclusive: Pastor Damon Thompson Anti-Gay Preaching, Outing Exposed

David Pakman will broadcast a special guest on his show that has stories to tell that will curl your hair - Ashton Elijah Pittman, who was an audience member during Hamilton, Alabama- based Pastor Damon Thompson's outing of gay teens during sermons. From Pittman's post on the subject, 'Deliverance from homosexuality:' How an anti-gay ministry changed my life:

I knew that there were people in that sanctuary that very night who were gay. I knew that there were people there that very night who were lesbian. I knew that there was at least one person in the church that night who was hurting from self-loathing.

But Damon didn't, or if he did, he didn't seem to care. There was no love in his heart for the 'homosexual' (as he otherwise called them). In some ways, hearing preachers like him constantly talk about 'homosexuals' was even worse than hearing him use the word 'queer;' while his enunciation of the word 'queer' truly dripped with disgust and revulsion, 'homosexual' just sounded cold. Scientific. Devoid of humanity.

And that's exactly how preachers like Damon make gay youth feel - less than human.

The YouTube below is a clip is from tomorrow's show/podcast of The David Pakman Show.

Thompson is ignoring David's repeated requests for interviews.

The David Pakman Show is an internationally syndicated talk radio and television program -

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The Tears Of Unfathomable Sadness

My friend Rich Murray, activist with Queer Rising happened to be in the galley of the New York Senate during the vote for marriage equality. He got the opportunity to snap this photo of Bryan Brown of National Organization for Marriage weeping as the gays were rejoicing.

Don't you just feel awful? The gay and lesbian people of New York were just put on legal parity with Brown. What an awful day for him.

 

Dave Holmes on Twitter had a very popular tweet the night of the vote with a message to Bryan and Maggie Gallagher of NOM:

Hey, @nomtweets: looks like you and us gays are equals in New York now. We will celebrate by being kinder and more honest than you've been.

I admire Dave's high road.

 

I am considerably less kind and considerably more petty, and Daily Kos' Exotrip's message from the South Park episode, Scott Tenorman Must Die, resonated for me:

Oh, the tears of unfathomable sadness! Yummy!!!

DOJ Argues Against Motion To Dismiss DOMA Challenge

Chris Geidner at Metro Weekly has a report about a move the Obama Department of Justice made yesterday. The DOJ filed a brief arguing against the House Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group's request to dismiss the constitutional challenge of the Defense of Marirage Act, brought by Karen Golinski and Lambda Legal in the Golinski v. United States Office of Personnel Management.

The brief is an expansive 31-page piece of fierce advocacy arguing that heighten scrutiny should apply to DOMA and it fails to meet the criteria necessary to survive. From Geidner's piece:

In describing why heightened scrutiny applies to classifications based on sexual orientation, the DOJ's lawyers -- in describing how "gays and lesbians have been subject to a history of discrimination" -- write, "The federal government has played a significant and regrettable role in the history of discrimination against gay and lesbian individuals." The filing then goes on to detail the 1950 Senate resolution seeking an "investigation" into "homosexuals and other sexual perverts" in government employement, President Dwight Eisenhower's executive order adding "sexual perversion" as a ground for "possible dismissal from government service," in the brief's words. It details the role of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Postal Service in investigations seeking information about government employees suspected of such "perversion."

This is a welcome and rarely seen mea culp from our Federal Government in its role in perpetuating and validating discrimination against any Americans.

It's notable, too, that this language choice is entirely discretionary. The Department of Justice could filed a perfunctory brief and let the BLAG and Lambda Legal slug it out alone. Many presumed that was the course these cases might take.

That they have chosen to very actively, affirmatively engage in the fight for equality under the law is a very welcome turn around from the DOJ's unfortunate stance of 2009.

This is a BFD. 

Joe Solomnese of Human Right Campaign has this to say:

“The Administration's decision to call DOMA what it is -- a law that serves no purpose but to single out a group of people for second-class status -- was a watershed moment in the fight for LGBT equality.  Now the federal government has taken that historic stand a step further and put real meat on the bones of why there is no basis for DOMA to stand.  This step represents real leadership from the Obama administration and further hastens the day in which we will leave this odious law in the dustbin of history."

And he's right. Cheers to President Obama and Attorney General Holder for this move.

I encourage you to read Chris Geidner's article in it's entirety. And stay tuned. These DOMA fight is about to get real interesting.

Calling all clowns to the 2012 GOP Clown Car: Bachmann, Cain providing endless entertainment

More hilarity from the GOP Clown Car...

1) Michele Bachmann's Husband Calls Homosexuals 'Barbarians' Who 'Need To Be Educated' And 'Disciplined. Via Think Progress:

Just last summer, Dr. Bachmann explained his position on homosexuality while offering theoretical advice to parents concerned that one of their children was gay.

BACHMANN: We have to understand: barbarians need to be educated. They need to be disciplined. Just because someone feels it or thinks it doesn't mean that we are supposed to go down that road. That's what is called the sinful nature. We have a responsibility as parents and as authority figures not to encourage such thoughts and feelings from moving into the action steps...

And let's face it: what is our culture, what is our public education system doing today? They are giving full, wide-open doors to children, not only giving encouragement to think it but to encourage action steps. That's why when we understand what truly is the percentage of homosexuals in this country, it is small. But by these open doors, I can see and we are experiencing, that it is starting to increase.

Man, he needs to keep up this line of bloviating; Marcus will guarantee TEH LOONY FAMILY will continue to be applied to the Missus.

2) Herman Cain's pizza dough isn't enough to keep staff tossing it in the air. Cain Loses Iowa Director and Straw Poll Coordinator.

Herman Cain's Iowa Director, Tina Goff, told TheIowaRepublican.com that she has submitted her resignation and is no longer working for the campaign.  In addition to Goff's resignation, TheIowaRepublican.com can confirm that Kevin Hall has also left the campaign.  Hall served as Cain's Straw Poll coordinator.

...With just 43 days to the Iowa Straw Poll, Cain's campaign here in Iowa and nationally seems to be unraveling.  Cain lost his New Hampshire director, Matt Murphy, who was his only staffer in that state, earlier this week.  Jim Zeiler, a Cain regional director who had been to Iowa and was helping with the campaign's Straw Poll plans, has also left the campaign.

Dallas Morning News will publish same-sex marriages in Weddings section

Progress re: equality can seem slow in Red states, but change is occurring. Take this example in oh-so-sanctimonious Rick Perry's Texas. (Dallas Voice):

Dallas Morning News Publisher James M. Moroney III confirmed today that the newspaper will begin publishing same-sex marriage announcements under Weddings. The DMN has published same-sex marriage announcements for several years, under a separate header that's currently called Commitments. But until now the newspaper has refused to publish the announcements, which are paid advertisements, under Weddings.

Mark Reed-Walkup and Dante Walkup of Irving, who were legally married in Washington, D.C., last year, filed a discrimination complaint against The DMN in December, alleging that the policy violates a Dallas city ordinance prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation in public accommodations. The DMN initially indicated through its attorneys that it planned to defend the policy, based partly on Texas' ban on same-sex marriage. But in a meeting with the couple on Thursday, Moroney and DMN Editor Bob Mong informed them of the policy change.

Moroney told Instant Tea today that the newspaper made the change, which takes effect immediately, because it was "the right thing to do," adding that he isn't worried about backlash from conservative readers.

Equality NC Responds to N.C. House Speaker's Statements on the Proposed Anti-LGBT Amendment

The Advocate is now covering this story: "North Carolina Is in for a Fight on Marriage."

I blogged earlier about the preposterous and offensive statement by the Republican Speaker of the NC House about same-sex committed relationships (claiming "data" show that same-sex marriages are not as 'stable and nurturing' as "traditional marriages." I actually emailed my post to Speaker Thom Tillis (R-Mecklenburg; his contact page here; Twitter handle: @thomtillis).

Equality NC responded to Tillis's comments and his support for an anti-gay discrimination amendment that the GOP-controlled General Assembly would like to bring to a vote and place on the ballot in 2012 (our governor Bev Perdue has no veto power).

N.C. Speaker of the House Thom Tillis (R-Mecklenburg) told the Asheville's Citizen-Times that he expects a constitutional amendment that would prohibit recognition of same-gender couples' relationships to be "brought up in a special fall [legislative] session." He added that he predicts the amendment, legislation effectively writing discrimination directly into the state's founding document, would pass by the required majority needed to place it on the 2012 ballot and place the state's LGBT marriage ban up for popular vote.

Tillis told the Asheville paper that a constitutional ban on marriage for same-gender couples is something "a number of folks in our base feel very strongly about." Tillis added, "Generally speaking, it polls fairly high across the voter base. It's not a particularly partisan thing."

The Reality of Support for Marriage Equality & Legal Relationship Recognition for Same-Gender Couples

Tillis himself cites broad voter support for marriage discrimination legislation. As Qnotes' Matt Comer reported, the Speaker's comments come as "social conservatives in the legislature have circulated an opinion poll that showed as many as 70 percent of North Carolinians supporting the amendment, though an Elon University poll also showed a majority of Tar Heel residents supporting some sort of official recognition for same-sex relationships."

In reality, even before the recent victory for marriage equality in New York, the Elon poll referenced is but one of a series of local and national polls in recent months showing seismic shifts in support for relationship recognition and marriage equality, including:

Gallup (May 2011) For the first time in Gallup polling of the issue, a majority of Americans believe gay marriage should be recognized by the law as valid.

CNN (April 2011) CNN opinion poll shows a majority of Americans in favor of marriage equality, with more than half saying that marriages between gay and lesbian couples "should be recognized by the law as valid."

Public Policy Polling (March 2011)

The PPP survey showed 52% of North Carolina voters supporting marriage or another form of legal recognition.

Elon Poll (Ferbuary 2011)

A majority of North Carolinians support marriage or civil unions for same-sex couples, with 57% support for marriage, civil union, or partnerships for same-sex couples.

Despite this support for the legal relationship recognition in North Carolina and beyond, a version of the anti-LGBT amendment would be used to prohibit marriage, civil unions and domestic partnerships. Tillis said he expects the measure to pass the House by 72 votes, the minimum three-fifths majority necessary for the amendment to become a voter referendum.

More below the fold.

"Recent local and national polling and data, not to mention the bipartisan victory for NY marriage equality, clearly shows that attitudes are changing on the side of marriage equality, and not in favor of blatant marriage discrimination legislation like the anti-LGBT amendment," said Alex Miller, Equality NC's interim executive director. "When you combine these polls with the recent census data showing that same-sex couples are among the fastest-growing demographics in our state, we believe there are a great many legislators who realize that support for such an amendment could ultimately hurt them."

Up to this point, Tillis has not taken a formal position on whether the amendment should also ban civil unions and domestic partner benefits offered by private businesses or local governments, such as those approved last year for same-sex domestic partners of City of Asheville employees. "We're doing our homework. We do need to understand that and have that factor in to what will ultimately be put into the language," he told the Asheville paper.



Support for Marriage Equality is not a Partisan Issue

Homework on this issue would reveal that support for marriage equality is far from a partisan issue, as a poll released in May by Public Policy Polling (PPP) shows a majority of Republicans from all across the country now support some form of legal recognition for gay couples.The PPP poll, drawing from opinions of over 1,000 GOP voters nationwide, was particularly revealing when broken out by age and income levels, both of which suggest a political and economic cost for attacking LGBT families.

Tactics Employed to Reinforce Marriage Discrimination

While Tillis declined to tell the Asheville Citizen Times how he personally feels about marriage equality, he did reinforce the move for an anti-LGBT amendment by saying that "data" shows that "traditional marriages between men and women are more stable and nurturing."

In truth, every major organization devoted to child health and welfare in this country agrees that the children of same-gender couples are just as likely to be healthy and well-adjusted as the children of opposite-gender couples. The American Psychological Association found that "There is no scientific evidence that parenting effectiveness is related to parental sexual orientation: Lesbian and gay parents are just as likely as heterosexual parents to provide supportive and healthy environments for their children." Period.The APA also said that those children will benefit if their parents are able to marry.

Just this week, the American Medical Association also weighed in, adopting a policy position declaring that excluding same-sex couples from marriage is "discriminatory" and reaffirming existing AMA policy to support relationship recognition of same-gender couples as a means of addressing health disparities faced by those couples and their children.

ENC's Miller added, "Instead of somehow defending marriage, the anti-LGBT amendment will hurt the tens of thousands of children being raised by same-gender parents in North Carolina. And so, legislators need to be aware that these families will be voting in 2012, and be joined by friends, family, neighbors and co-workers who are unwilling to support a measure that enshrines discrimination against them into our state's constitution."

Click here to find out more about the proposed anti-LGBT constitutional amendment and how you can join our campaign to stop it.

Social, Fiscal Conservatives In GOP Split On New York's Marriage Equality

While the conservative faction of the Republican Party is busy rending its garments over the four GOP turncoats in the New York Senate that made marriage equality possible, some in the GOP have adopted a wholly different attitude.

A top GOP operative in Neveda has suggested Nevada Republican party should throw in the towel on the marriage equality as well.

Not to do what's just, right or in line with our Constitution. Oh no. It's all about the money.

Las Vegas blog The Strip relays these comments from Chuck Muth. The Strip describes Muth as an "outspoken conservative activist whose wrath is feared by most Republican elected officials in Nevada." Muth wrote this in his daily email blast that goes to GOPers and journalists:

Many, if not most of you won't like this but gay marriage is coming. Nationwide. It's inevitable. It's only a matter of time. It can and will be delayed, but not stopped. And eventually, it will be as acceptable as black/white marriages. The problem isn't letting gays into marriage, but having already let the government into marriage.

As an economy based almost solely on tourism and entertainment, Nevada -- and especially Las Vegas -- should accept reality, embrace the inevitable, repeal the state's ban on gay marriage, and scarf up on the tourism bonanza that would result rather than suck hind teat behind the likes of Hawaii and New York.

 Hat tip to AmericaBlog.

Moth's biography from his own blog, Muth Truths:

Chuck Muth is President of Citizen Outreach and a professional political communications consultant.

He is a former executive director of the American Conservative Union, a National Chairman of the Republican Liberty Caucus, a Clark County GOP chairman and former Nevada Republican Party executive director.

Chuck is also a professional campaign trainer who volunteers as a national field instructor for numerous groups, campaigns and organizations.

Many of us in the LGBT activist community fight for the right to marry so our families will not have to endure what Janice Langbehn and Lisa Marie Pond did in Florida in 2007. The lesbian couple were celebrating their 20th anniversary in the Sunshine State with their children when Pond suffered an aneurysm and was rushed to Ryder Trauma Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami.

Thence began the nightmare for Langbehn and the children, as they were at first treated as virtual strangers to Pond, denied access and information as she was struggling for her life in the trauma center. Langbehn claims that a hospital social worker said to her they she should not expect any information or access because they were in an "anti-gay city and state."

Hospital administrators ignored the power of attorney Langbehn had faxed over and continued to deny her requests for information or the chance to see her partner. Pond died alone, denied the comforting presence of her wife and children. A lawsuit filed by Langbehn and Lambda Legal was subsequently dismissed.

No, injustices like this seems unpersuasive to many in the Republican party. Instead, it looks like this is the genesis of Muth's change of heart came from this initiative reported by from Bloomberg News:

New York City Plans Campaign to Woo Gay Weddings

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg plans to unveil a campaign to sell the most populous U.S. city as a gay-wedding destination after thousands marched to celebrate the state’s legalization of such marriages.

The “NYC I Do” campaign “will create millions of dollars in additional economic impact to the city’s $31 billion tourism industry,” Kimberly Spell, a spokeswoman for NYC & Company, the city’s marketing office, said yesterday in an e-mail. Bloomberg will unveil more details in coming days, she said.

A report by marriage equality advocates suggested New York stood to reap $391 million in from areas including economic activity and tax revenue within three years.

The report predicted about 3,300 couples from surrounding states without such laws would choose to marry in New York, and that almost 42,000 other out-of-state gay and lesbian couples would go there for a “destination wedding.”

[...]
The benefit to Massachusetts’ economy was worth more than $100 million over five years after legalizing same-sex marriage, according to the [Los Angeles-based Williams] institute.

Well, whatever gets them from point A to point B, I guess I'll take it. If the conclusion is correct, who am I to quibble with the reasoning that gets them there?

It is interesting that they are willing to usher in End Times and anarchy for the sake of a few bucks.

Social conservatives see the writing on the wall and are furiously rending their garments. The American Families Association's Bryan Fischer had a meltdown via Twitter yesterday.

Fischer was responding to news that Clarke Cooper of the LGBT group Log Cabin Republicans had secured a high-level position as

Wow. Fischer is so apoplectic he skipped right over Godwin and went straight to slavery.

Appointing Cooper to such a high-profile position within the Republican establishment is an interesting move for the party to have made. Recall that not long ago CPAC conference "endured" the boycotting of social conservatives to protest the presence of the LGBT group GOProud.

The battle for the GOP's priorities is heating up and the American Taliban is enduring some hits. Think Progress reports that internal polling by New York's state Republican party have given them no cause to be concerned about reelection prospects for their four Republicans who voted yes to equality. Top GOP Albany insider John McArdle says:

They can win. There were polls that were done throughout this whole effort and what we’ve seen consistently is that while this issue is important, that are a lot of issues that are probably more important on the minds of most people.

To conservative threats to his own seat, Republican Senator Mark Grisanti has a flippant response, "Go ahead and do what you’ve got to do.”

Sounds like "Bring it on!" to me.

Robert George's Reaction to NY Marriage Decision Tips His Hand

Cross-posted from  Bold Faith Type In addition to the conservative Catholic outcry in response to the New York marriage decision we highlighted earlier this week, Adam Serwer had a But Lopez's rant pales in comparison with that of the interviewee on her blog earlier this week, Robert George. The Princeton politics professor is one of the leading thinkers in the conservative Catholic world, and has been involved with political activism on this issue as chairman emeritus of the National Organization for Marriage (NOM).
In a long interview with Lopez, George makes very clear that he sees the marriage issue, and the New York decision in particular, as only a symptom of a much larger cultural degradation. In his mind, the real problem is, ultimately, about sex:

The vote in New York to redefine marriage advances the cause of loosening norms of sexual ethics, and promoting as innocent -- and even "liberating" -- forms of sexual conduct that were traditionally regarded in the West and many other places as beneath the dignity of human beings as free and rational creatures...For people who have absorbed the central premises of sexual liberation...marriage simply cannot function as the central principle or standard of rectitude in sexual conduct, as it has in Western philosophy, theology, and law for centuries.

This view is in line with George's opposition to Lawrence v. Texas, the Supreme Court decision striking down state sodomy laws and helping solidify the idea that there's no compelling state interest in regulating sex between consenting adults within the privacy of one's own home:

As a result, to the extent that one is in the grip of sexual-liberationist ideology, one will find no reason of moral principle why people oughtn't to engage in sexual relations prior to marriage, cohabit in non-marital sexual partnerships, form same-sex sexual partnerships, or confine their sexual partnerships to two persons, rather than three or more in polyamorous sexual ensembles.

George, of course, is well within his rights to hold whatever moral beliefs he wants about these topics. But "we need to ban same-sex marriage because I'm still upset about the 1960s" isn't a very good legal argument -- nor do I imagine it's very popular. That's why NOM and other opponents of gay marriage have taken great care to deflect and deny any such motivation, sticking to talking points specifically focused on the definition of marriage.  From NOM's "Frequently Asked Questions" page:

Extensive and repeated polling agrees that the single most effective message is: "Gays and Lesbians have a right to live as they choose, they don't have the right to redefine marriage for all of us." This allows people to express support for tolerance while opposing gay marriage

To give George credit, he is fully honest about the implications of his views. For him, the marriage debate is just the latest flashpoint in a long battle to stem the tide of social change. 
George doesn't necessarily represent the views of NOM or anyone other organization, but he is widely respected as one of the intellectual drivers of the anti-same-sex marriage movement, particularly for his use of underlying moral arguments and philosophies.
Political organizations like NOM tend to employ language that sidesteps or contradicts the more extreme positions George articulates, in an attempt to rebut the belief that opponents of gay marriage operate out of an animus towards LGBT people or are trying to 'legislate morality.'  I'd be very interested to hear whether NOM disagrees with George's more comprehensive case, and if so, why.