Fire Hydrant of Freedom

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2023/jun/30/supreme-court-rules-designer-who-doesnt-want-make-/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=newsalert&utm_content=newsalert&utm_term=newsalert&bt_ee=fd%2B7Jl3QGIjo%2BPDRjKaz9AQsSwRE1ftPLcQBB0AJV%2Fu%2ByoaDWEuFM%2BoJXC%2BnfFDD&bt_ts=1688135048043

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NRO

Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Designer Who Refuses to Make Same-Sex Wedding Websites
By JEFF ZYMERI
June 30, 2023 10:12 AM

The Supreme Court ruled Friday that an evangelical Christian web designer cannot be compelled to create a wedding website for a gay couple.

Lorie Smith, a graphic designer who wanted to expand into wedding websites, sought a ruling that Colorado could not enforce its anti-discrimination law against her. Smith opposes same-sex marriage on religious grounds and wanted to post a message on her page indicating that she would not design websites for same-sex couples.

“The First Amendment prohibits Colorado from forcing a website designer to create expressive designs speaking messages with which the designer disagrees,” Justice Gorsuch wrote for the 6-3 majority in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis.

The Court held that the web designer’s work constitutes speech and the state of Colorado cannot force her to express herself in a way that violates her deeply held beliefs.

“Colorado seeks to force an individual to speak in ways that align with its views but defy her conscience,” Gorsuch wrote.


“Colorado is trying to force me to promote ideas inconsistent with my faith and the core of who I am,” Smith said on the steps of the Supreme Court following Friday’s announcement.

Meanwhile, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, writing for the dissent, strongly disagreed with the majority opinion arguing that the ruling was part of a broader pattern witnessed undermining minority rights.

“Around the country, there has been a backlash to the movement for liberty and equality for gender and sexual minorities.”

“New forms of inclusion have been met with reactionary exclusion. This is heartbreaking. Sadly, it is also familiar. When the civil rights and women’s rights movements sought equality in public life, some public establishments refused. Some even claimed, based on sincere religious beliefs, constitutional rights to discriminate. The brave Justices who once sat on this Court decisively rejected those claims,” Sotomayor wrote.

The glaring gap between the majority and dissenting opinions was even highlighted by Justice Gorsuch in his closing remarks.

“It is difficult to read the dissent and conclude we are looking at the same case. Much of it focuses on the evolution of public accommodations laws,” Gorsuch writes, “and the strides gay Americans have made towards securing equal justice.”

“And, no doubt, there is much to applaud here. But none of this answers the question we face today: Can a State force someone who provides her own expressive services to abandon her conscience and speak its preferred message instead?”

“When the dissent finally gets around to that question— more than halfway into its opinion—it reimagines the facts of this case from top to bottom,” Gorsuch wrote.

The website designer lost in both district and circuit court before petitioning the Supreme Court. While the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals found that Smith’s craft was “pure speech” and that Colorado was compelling speech through its anti-discrimination law, the judges in the majority argued that granting Smith an exemption “would necessarily relegate LGBT consumers to an inferior market because Appellants’ unique services are, by definition, unavailable elsewhere.”

While Smith asked the justices to consider both a free speech claim and a free exercise claim, only the former was reviewed by the high court. The Biden administration sided with Colorado in an amicus brief, arguing Smith’s case does not belong in the same category as other cases involving compelled speech.

The facts of the case bear a close resemblance to Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, in which the Supreme Court ruled in favor of a baker, Jack Phillips, who had objected to making custom cakes for same-sex couples.

In a 7-2 opinion penned by then-justice Anthony Kennedy, the Court held that by punishing Phillips, Colorado had violated his free exercise of religion. Kennedy explained that the commission had engaged in overt hostility towards Phillips’s religious beliefs in the process. The narrow ruling left major free-speech questions unanswered.

Quote from: ccp on June 29, 2023, 02:47:22 PM

the "rev":

https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2023/06/29/sharpton-on-scotus-affirmative-action-decision-sticking-a-dagger-in-our-back/

Hey Rev:
I got some news for you ->
it isn't race
it is socioeconomics


The Dems :
start the ballot harvesting

get them to sign up while this is hot !

    

Ultimately, it is about race. Intelligence and group behavior matters.

But we are not allowed to even think such things for even a moment.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/06/here-we-go-again-former-cia-agent-promoted/

Fortified, for their protection!

Quote from: G M on June 29, 2023, 04:04:13 PM

https://thefederalist.com/2023/06/28/doj-rot-goes-so-much-deeper-than-merrick-garland/

https://booty.substack.com/p/prior-contact-between-mass-shooters

https://thefederalist.com/2023/06/28/doj-rot-goes-so-much-deeper-than-merrick-garland/

VR had a segment on Martha MacCallum today.  A bit brief, but as usual he was good.

I very much liked his thinking on Ukraine.

Cut a deal with an offer he can't refuse?

What would that be?

He gets the Russian speaking part of Ukraine and a promise that the remainder of Ukraine does not join NATO and in return Russia gives up alliance with Russia.   

As you guys here know, I have been pounding the table on the significance of driving Russia into China's arms so the fact that he gets it appeals to me quite a bit.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/bravado-trump-says-wasn-t-225942128.html

 

I would prefer our side to also not make a farce out of our laws
as well as the LEFT

Hunter could also state the email was BS phony just kidding defense as well
 

"Hey Rev:
I got some news for you ->
it isn't race
it is socioeconomics "


Isn't that the truth.  Plenty of whites and others are in the welfare state socioeconomic trap and plenty of blacks have sprung free from that trap - so (to them) STOP CALLING IT RACE.

Even if you haven't sprung free from it yet, the best path to prosperity is the (disappearing) free enterprise system.  Why wouldn't you use it.

The focus on race for victimhood is self defeating.  Maybe your race or neighborhood makes it harder.  Lots of things make it harder.  Do your best.  You are lucky to live in a time and place where you can escape poverty in one generation, and even faster.

One last(?) try at this...
Previously:
Doug: "(You) drag in "UNIPARTY" when it is clear as day that one party gets away with this shit and the other does not."
(see Byron York post)

Response (non-response) :
"Why isn’t Biden being impeached right now?"
--------------------

Your question is easy to answer but the point is, that response is a non answer to my point. 

That you can always post a shortcoming of the R party does not make the parties equal, same, "uniparty".  It is the absence of logic, and it is self defeating unless your aim is to lose more elections and prove the all-is-lost outlook right.

Possible reasons to not impeach could be many (I actually answer your question),

1. Republicans have a four vote majority in the House and likely more than four members don't support that action as the best remedy.

*Endless excuses. The republican't are always going to fight tomorrow, never today. What's the other options available?*


2. Maybe impeachments ARE coming.

*Maybe. Tick-tock, the time until the next sElection is running out. People actually trying to accomplish something move with purpose. All we get foot-dragging and excuse making.*

3.  Impeachment works when the official's own party turns against him or her.  While we fight amongst ourselves no one pressures Democrats to turn against this failure and corruption.

*What pressure? Dems NEVER turn on each other. They know exactly how corrupt the party is. They don't care. As long as they get their beak wet, it's all good.*

4. Impeachment vote is part of the removal from office process and with fewer than 50 Senators, we also have fewer than the 67 needed to convict and remove, making the action, in a way, moot.

*Did that stop the dems with Trump? Of course not. Why? They play to win. Republican't just give us endless excuses and failure theater. "Gosh guys, we tried" should be the official motto of the RNC.*

5. Impeach, convict, remove Biden gets us Kamala.

*So? At this point, what difference does it make? She won't be in charge anymore than the stumbling meat puppet alleged president we have at the moment.*

6.  If (when) they do impeach, you can (and will) endlessly argue some other lacking or failing.  Impeachment is one possible path, perhaps a good one because it forces a trial, but not in itself the solution.

*Wrong. It gathers evidence. It puts people on record. It forces things they want hidden into the light. It actually pushes back in a potentially meaningful way. This is exactly why it hasn't happened yet and probably won't happen.*


Back to my point, "uniparty" means two things are the same, pulling in the same direction, no real difference.  It's a math equation and it's wrong.  Pointing out similarities, flaws or shortcomings one one side does not negate the differences, especially in the context of this thread and topic.

You make so many other great posts and insights.  Why settle for such sloppiness here, with infinitely counterproductive consequences?

If the parties are the same and elections don't matter, why is Neil Gorsuch sitting in Merrick Garland's seat?

*Don't confuse the gamesmanship between the factions for the reality of how things really work. The heel wins against the good guy every so often to keep things interesting, what they don't do is anything that actually threatens the power of the one true branch. Remember when I first told you all that J6 was a FEDsurrection? Tinfoil hat stuff, right? Tucker was going to show us and then that suddenly stopped and then Fox cuts it's own throat by firing him. The power of the memory hole, once again.
When do we see Ray Epps questioned under oath?

Ted Cruz inflicting sick burns on FBI talking heads is meaningless as the repubs then vote to fund the FBI's new headquarters.

Talk is cheap, actions matter.*


 It makes no difference?  How is Row v Wade doing?

*Abortion isn't doing very well in those RED States where we have our numbers concentrated, but it's doing quite well elsewhere, isn't it?*

Why did one party make us energy independent and the other canceled the gains and crippled the grid?  That doesn't affect you or the voter or the country?  Bullshit. Why did one one party's policies give people record wage growth and the other reversed it?  Why does one party want math and reading taught in schools and the other wants first graders to know how bad this country is and to question their gender?  Same?  Nonsense.

*Want to see the RNC wing of the DC Uniparty in action? Read this:
https://apnews.com/article/immigration-north-america-donald-trump-ap-top-news-border-security-0f920239070c44549dfb66405f60800c

Trump was a fluke. He was never supposed to win against Hillary. The Uniparty worked together to make sure we couldn't secure our border. Funny enough, the Uniparty was willing to fund Israel's border wall. That AIPAC money goes to both sides of the Uniparty.*


In one post you mock voting and in another (the same morning) you (rightly) tell how important choosing the right local Sheriff is.

*I mock national voting because the 2020 playbook is how it will happen EVERY election from now until they've flooded the FUSA with enough aliens that they don't have to worry about cheating anymore. Local is all we have left.*



But a major factor bringing people out to vote for local officials is the choice on the national ticket, divided on party lines.  That might not move much in a 70-30 district, but it does in 50-50 contests.

*Which is why the Uniparty scuttled any real attempt to secure the border. Which is why the money taken from us at federal gunpoint is being used to deploy future dems voters to red states. We are nearing the endgame and despite your intelligence, your normalcy bias leads to to think you are going to vote your way out of what is coming.*

Don't like either candidate?  Too many RINOs?  Well that's why we try to get involved earlier in the process, judge the candidates - to your mocking.

The parties aren't the same.  You know that, I know that and the American people know that.  Why dilute all the good on the board with such nonsense?

Again, pease don't quote me here or on any post if you have no interest in answering the substance.  I answered yours.

the "rev":

https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2023/06/29/sharpton-on-scotus-affirmative-action-decision-sticking-a-dagger-in-our-back/

Hey Rev:
I got some news for you ->
it isn't race
it is socioeconomics


The Dems :
start the ballot harvesting

get them to sign up while this is hot !

    

https://washingtonstand.com/commentary/dont-say-gay-say-groomer-instead

Quote from: DougMacG on June 27, 2023, 08:01:38 PM

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/06/27/ukraine-recaptures-donbas-territory-from-russia/

https://www.theburningplatform.com/2023/06/26/extermination/

https://rumble.com/v2wu04v-john-solomon-reveals-he-called-hunters-phone-and-joe-biden-picked-up.html?mref=22lbp&mc=56yab&fbclid=IwAR3a2B0hRVPfsqMNnYbDHI5O1qsCI6_RZglljRAMCZFd2dg32rLZ3GxHSZ4

Might there be some additional reasons?

Putin was Soviet KGB and now the "president for life" of Russia.

You make a distinction without much difference.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19756/hamas-in-sweden

https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=852,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/141/533/699/original/eab3aa26ef8174f9.png



He's doing that to protect their democracy!

Russia’s Godfather Is Losing It
Putin is too weak to win the war and also too weak to end it.
Holman W. Jenkins, Jr.
By
Holman W. Jenkins, Jr.
Follow
June 27, 2023 6:28 pm ET


The signature of Vladimir Putin’s rule has been the export of Russia’s creative, entrepreneurial, ambitious people until there was one left, Yevgeny Prigozhin.

The process culminated with the flight of Russia’s technical and business talent amid the Ukraine war. It began with Mr. Putin’s attack on the most successful and creative of the oligarchs, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, in 2003. Like Mr. Prigozhin, who started as a hot-dog vendor, Mr. Khodorkovsky operated a café. He expanded into energy and his crime was seeing a political role for himself based on his oil wealth. His biggest mistake, apparently, was not having a private army.

In the subsequent legal charade, which saw Mr. Khodorkovsky jailed and his assets redistributed to regime cronies, a question was Mr. Putin’s real agency. Originally maneuvered into position by oligarchs looking to protect their Yeltsin-era wealth, Mr. Putin’s rise was cemented by terrorist bombings that killed hundreds of Russian apartment dwellers in their beds and are now believed to have been carried out by his own supporters with or without his knowledge.

Ditto murders of journalists, critics and opposition politicians, including some who insisted on investigating the bombings. Were these outrages authored by Mr. Putin or by those trying to control him?

The echo in Mr. Prigozhin’s method in the recent uprising is hard to ignore. He rose to a sudden celebrity status via his public commentary on the failings of the Ukraine war, understood over and over to be his way of communicating with and trying to manipulate Mr. Putin.

Tellingly, amid a supposedly “existential” war, behind this week’s showdown was a standard Putin-era battle over money and graft, which was also the source of the war itself, Mr. Prigozhin explained in one of his videos. He was only acting to stop rival kingpins, Sergei Shoigu and Valery Gerasimov of the Ministry of Defense, from stealing his major asset, his Wagner mercenary force, by incorporating it into the Russian military.

It has always paid to focus on the true nature of the Putin regime rather than the Russian political and geographic imperatives that realists talk about.

Mr. Putin dreams of Peter the Great, but his retinue resembles the “prat” British gangsters who populate a Guy Ritchie movie. The very nature of his regime drove his neighbors toward NATO, which might otherwise have become vestigial. Only state cronies thrive in his economy dominated by the pursuit of graft opportunities. From local entrepreneurs to BP and Ikea, investors learned that to build something in Russia was to risk having it stolen by the regime.

From early on, he lacked a retirement strategy, meaning he would have to stay around forever and grow calcified in office. When he couldn’t give his people hope of European-style prosperity and freedoms, he gave them military adventures and “national enemies.”

And now even his leverage over his sub-bosses is starting to deteriorate, because he no longer is able to solve any real problem. He only creates them, such as launching a war in Ukraine on the misinformed premise that Ukrainians would surrender.

Mr. Prigozhin is the most off-kilter of the Putin elite but the first to say the war was launched on false pretenses. Ukraine and NATO weren’t threatening Russia. There were no “Nazis.” For all his wrong-side-of-the-tracks ambience, Mr. Prigozhin channels what every respectable regime official thinks. The truth seeps even into the propagandistic coverage of Russia’s state-controlled TV. And Mr. Putin’s attempt to brace up his godfather system this week by invoking the dignity and legalism of the state hardly helped. It was better calibrated to suggest a dictator’s wishful thinking than to show he has any answers.

Mr. Prigozhin’s fate remains up in the air, but he enjoys bargaining chips Mr. Khodorkovsky lacked, as when his employees shot down several aircraft seeking to interfere with their protest “march of justice” to Moscow. Despite the apparent amnesty afforded by Mr. Putin to end the showdown, will Mr. Prigozhin now fall out of a window as other inconvenient Putin associates have? I am more skeptical than some. Would somebody be able to place hands on him? Would they dare? What’s in it for them? Mr. Putin faces risks whichever way he turns in the still-unfinished crisis; by a strange logic, Mr. Prigozhin may even have bought himself some immunity by putting elite doubts about the war officially on the record.

At the same time, a weak Putin is even less likely to make peace. He is also less likely to be able to order the apparently strengthened Messrs. Shoigu and Gerasimov to undertake any more hopeless fantasy offensives in pursuit of ultimate victory. Expect paralysis in Moscow and defensive inertia in the war. With the ending yet to be written, the final chapter is likely to exhibit the same elements of burlesque that characterized internal Russian politics this week.

I'm making a distinct point here, which is that the meme was written in a manner oblivious to the obvious counter arguments.  Thus, is serves only to accentuate the collective militant understanding of one faction.  Yes, memes tend to do this, but ideally they have wit and humor as well (see cf. Alinsky)  That said, this one serves particularly little purpose.