Have I ever told you that I like you Kimmy?
Maybe. But they still have a right to do so. To ban flag-burning, in my mind, makes a mockery of everything said flag stands for.
Agreed.
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Not so much. The police do many things simply because they want to.
I see this sort of behaviour constantly, since I’m the organizer for the local copwatch program. When we stop to witness police doing illegal searches of people they’ve stopped for being poor, black, or (worse yet) poor and black, their first reaction is always, “Move along or I’ll arrest you for obstruct.” To which my response is always to hold out my wrists and invite them to do so. Not even the stupidest meathead steroid-case has taken me up on my offer.
To quote Frederick Douglass, “Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted.”
Yes, please tell us more about how what happens in Canada bears on an American citizen flying his American Flag upside down on the American Independence Day Celebration in an American City under the Constitution of the United States of America. I’m sure any anecdote you tell us will be highly relevant because, after all, Canada has the exact same laws as America.
I’ve participated in copwatch before, and what he says applies equally in the United States.
Soooo…the ACLU is a bastion of freedom representation in your mind?
And way to parse the rest of my post avoiding to get at the root of the problem, which is the reason this guy’s liquour license was denied in the first place. He may have a valid and litigatory gripe, or maybe he’s a fucking loon. Do we know? No. Get your facts straight.
Your FOX NEWS accusations are laughable. Yes, I linked to a Fox news story in this instance. It was the only one I could find.
Well, obviously, yes. I love it when conservatives ask this kind of question, thinking liberals are like unicorns and never actually encountered in real life or on internet message boards. Then, the liberal to whom this question is put answers, as I have answered, in the affirmative. The conservative, taken aback to be in the presence of such an exotic creature, then lamely counters with “Awwww, what do you know anyhow?” So, coming up in three… two… one…
This isn’t the issue at all. I don’t care whether the city is tyrannically withholding the license, or if the homeowner was just out to ruin somebody’s Fourth of July, or if he believes Gozer told him to do it. You don’t lose your speech rights just because you are using them to advance baseless arguments or to foment social or political dissatisfaction or to witness for ancient Sumerian cults. Indeed, if free speech rights could be lost because you had to use them to advance well-reasoned, factually-supported arguments without incendiary rhetoric, your Fox news network would have been yanked off the air long ago.
Well, not entirely. A diligent police officer would have to consider the impact of the conduct on those nearby. In exceedingly rare cases, a flag-burning protest might cause a breach of the peace by provoking onlookers. In those uncommon cases, the officer would be acting properly to arrest the flag-burner and extinguish the flag. No ceremonial flag-burning by the American Legion, Boy Scouts, Elks, etc. has ever caused a riot, to my knowledge.
Both forms of flag destruction are constitutionally protected, I agree. No legislature may prohibit them. But only one might realistically lead to a breach of the peace and justify police intervention, which the Supreme Court noted in Spence v. Washington, a 1974 case very similar to that in the OP: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=case&court=US&vol=418&invol=405
Allow me to translate: I’ve participated in Copwatch before, so his experience under the Canadian Constitution is informative of how things operate under the American Constitution.
Why do you keep calling me a conservative? Because I hold an opinion about the ACLU? Only conservatives distrust them? I’m not saying they are inherently bad as an institution. But I think that sometimes they overstep their bounds within the context of what they are trying to accomplish.
Look Gibbler, I agree with you, I think this guy’s rights were violated. Is it a huge deal in the grand scheme of things? I suppose not, and in this particular instance I have no problem with the ACLU representing this guy. Maybe I wasn’t clear about that.
But the underlying issue beyond that (the REASON this guy was flying the flag upside down in the first place) is WHY he wasn’t issued his liquour license. He had to have been operating under the assumption that he was given assurances by the local govt that he would receive one, otherwise, why bother with borrowing all that money in the first place? Restaurants with liquour licenses generally are far more profitable than those without, as the markup on alcohol is much higher than on food.
The whole business seems shady and unclear.
“Distrust” them? Distrust them to do what? What do you think they’re going to do to you?
Examples? What are their “bounds?” How do they overstep them, and how does that hurt you?
I find that most people who bitch about the ACLU have very little idea of what it actually does. What do you actually know about it?
It was founded in the early 20th century, it has a lobbying arm and a litiguous arm, it has taken controversial positions on some issues.
They were against the sex offender reporting law, I disagree with them on that.
More recently, they defended the “right” of the Westboro Church and the loathsome Phelps family to be present at military funerals with their “God Hates Fags” message of love, which REALLY chaps my hide.
The are actively trying to denude Christmas of all it’s religious context, which I am in opposition to.
They don’t support capital punishment and support their argument that it’s somehow unfair to minorities, which I think is bullshit.
I’m sure there’s more, if I bothered to look it up.
Again, as an instituition, they aren’t reprehensible. In fact, I think the institution is inherently good.
On what legal basis?
Do you have a problem with the 1st Amendment? As loathsome as the Phleps clan may be, does that mean they should not be allowed free speech?
Cite?
That the DP is unfairly applied to minorities is pretty much irrefutable. You disagree?
So what you’re saying is that you don’t trust them because sometimes they take positions you don’t agree with or defend civil rights that you don’t think should be defended?
Can you name a way in which the ACLU has ever harmed you?
And really – you buy into the “war on Christmas” bullshit? I thought you were a little brighter than that.
I think the problem here is that there is no effective remedy for the police violating a person’s rights. There is no doubt in my mind that the mayor said, “Look, I don’t care about this guy’s rights, take the damn flag down so it doesn’t mess with our parade. We’ll give it back to him tomorrow and worry about the ACLU then”.
I think we need criminal penalties against law enforcement who violate the 1st and 4th amendments.
I don’t think it’s so much a “war” on Christmas a gradual erosion of what are to many, cherished principles behind the meaning of Christmas. You know, shit like WalMart telling it’s employees not to say “Merry Christmas” and all that.
I honestly don’t know for certain what the ACLU’s position is on religious freedom other than to suggest that if it “offends someone’s sensibilities” then it must be wrong.
No, the ACLU has never harmed me personally, and again, I am glad they exist. Maybe I will need their protection someday.
How is the DP unfairly applied to minorites? People that committ extremely heinous crimes in a state where the DP is applicable risk being put to death, regardless of their color.
If you’re going to talk about the past and how black people were regularly railroaded into convictions for crimes they didn’t commit just because they were black, I’m not denying that. We’ve come a long way in that regard, and institutions like the ACLU, NAACP have ensured that progression.
As far as the Phelps family goes, I don’t think they have the right to protest at someone’s funeral in the disrespectful way that they do. I think them exercising their Constitutional rights as funeral protesters infringes on the constitutional rights of the dead servicemember’s family to have a respectful service for their loved one.
Well, just note that as societies progress, they inevitably get rid of their superstitions (gods and what not). Christmas is an amalgam of plenty of pagan rituals wrapped up in the bible. As the knowledge of mankind progresses, it’s natural that such fantasies will fade away. If they hasten the death of this nonsense, I’ll consider donating.
What principles is the ACLU eroding?
What does the ACLU have to do with how Wal-Mart tells its employees to greet customers?
Do you think that Wal-Mart doesn’t have a right to tell its employees how to greet customers? Do you think Wal-Mart should be forced by law to allow its employees to spout religious messages at customers?
This is exactly what I was talking about when I said that most people who bash the ACLU have no idea what they’re talking about. Can you support your contention at all? The ACLU works to defend religious liberties against the government (and that includes defending a lot of Christians against infringements in public schools and the like). What confuses people is that they also work to defend the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment and preserve the separation of church and state. The stuff that invariably gets people riled up is when they’re trying to stop the government from endorsing specific religious mesages. The ACLU never tries to stop citizens from doing it.
Minorities are far more likely to be convicted, and are far more likely to be wrongfully convicted.
The Constitution says otherwise (as long as the protest is being done in a public space).
Where does the Constution say you ever have the right not to hear speech you don’t like on public property?
Peter Pace begs to disagree with you.