The Obama administration’s EEOC has loosed its reins.
Wearing a cap to work that has a “Don’t Tread On Me” slogan on it is a racist and EEOC-actionable thing to do.
Because Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech means whatever this Democratic administration’s Equal Employment Opportunity Commission says it means.
I’ll leave aside specifics of Democratic Party Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s goals in appointing Supreme Court Justices. The overriding goal of Clinton is to appoint Justices who meet a series of litmus tests, none having to do with the Justice candidate’s view of the Constitution. A potential appointee must explicitly agree that Citizens United must be reversed. A potential appointee must explicitly agree that limits to individual Americans’ right to keep and bear Arms must be subject to further government restrictions—including Government determining what weapons are fit for Americans to have (no “assault” weapons—defined by her Government—for instance). A potential appointee must explicitly agree that voter ID laws, which protect the sanctity of an American’s vote, are anathema. A potential appointee must explicitly agree that religious freedom is a matter of government determination with nothing to do with individual conscience.
Clinton’s goal, then, is to turn the Supreme Court away from an impartial judicial institution into one that is explicitly political, and one that will serve Progressive goals. Regardless of what the Constitution actually says.
It won’t take many Clinton appointments, either, to turn the Court into her completely political institution. Four of the existing Justices already are political judges rather than judges who uphold the Constitution. Justices Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsburg have said they consider the Constitution to be a living document that lives through “updating” reinterpretations to fit their views of the times—Article V and We the People be damned. Ginsburg has gone even farther, deliberately entering the political fray and publicly stating her views of the unfitness of one of the current Presidential candidates, thereby prejudicing in advance her decisions on any case in which that President’s administration might become involved. Justice Sonya Sotomayor has said the Court benefits from her “wise Latina” and empathetic talents—again, a political position and not a legal one. Justice Elena Kagan has said that a judge’s personal values must guide the judge’s development of her opinion, not solely what the Constitution says—still another political, rather than legal, position.
Elections have consequences, and this one’s will last far longer than just the term of one administration.
The NLMSM is vociferously reporting that Republican Party Presidential candidate Donald Trump tossed a baby out of one of his rallies.
Here are actual facts from an eyewitness, via PJMedia. The eyewitness is Will Estrada, Loudoun County Republican Committee Chairman; he also was invited to give the invocation at the rally. This is what he posted on his Facebook page about the baby incident [emphasis in the PJMedia quote]. Estrada’s Facebook post is here.
One thing I want to mention is the baby crying, because that has been national news. Contrary to news stories, it was a very funny thing, Trump was very supportive of the mom calling her and her baby “beautiful” and “wonderful”, and then when the baby kept crying he turned it into a joke. Everyone was laughing and it was actually very endearing and funny. Not at all anti mom or anti baby like the media has portrayed it to be.
Estrada had an additional comment, too, this time about the media…coverage.
Which brings me to the final point: I was there and saw and heard the entire event with the mom and baby. There was nothing to it. But then after I’m reading all the news coverage saying “Trump hates moms and babies!!!” I started to doubt myself. Did I really miss a huge story right in front of me? I started asking others who were there, including a husband and wife with young kids. And everyone in the room said the same thing: there was no story here. Trump was being funny and personable and going out of his way to make sure the mom wasn’t embarrassed by making it a funny situation. My conclusion is that the media is selling us a narrative. Be very skeptical of what the media is telling you, because I saw it with my own eyes and it was something very different.
Estrada is being generous. This is the dishonesty of the media.
As part of the Obama administration’s nuclear weapons deal with Iran, the US paid a $400 million ransom for four Americans who were being held by Iran on trumped up charges. Naturally, the administration denies the ransom aspect. It also denies that the ransom was part of the weapons deal, insisting that the all-cash payment, in euros, Swiss francs, and other unnamed currencies (because doing this in $US would be a violation of Federal law—a felony) and flown to Tehran in a cargo plane from which all national markings had been removed was part of a separate arms deal settlement. That the three things—the nuclear weapons deal, the cash payment, and the Americans’ release all happened together was just a coincidence. Nothing to see here, move along.
There’s a reason the US—until this administration—doesn’t pay ransom: it puts targets on every American travelling overseas, especially in the present case those who are visiting family in Iran. Some in government recognize this. Senator Mark Kirk (R, IL):
Paying ransom to kidnappers puts Americans even more at risk. While Americans were relieved by Iran’s overdue release of illegally imprisoned American hostages, the White House’s policy of appeasement has led Iran to illegally seize more American hostages.
That ransom was paid last January. Since then, two other Americans who were not ransomed remain in Iranian prisons, and three more Americans have been “detained” by the Iranian government while visiting Iran. Worse, Obama’s ransom payment appears to have endangered citizens of our friends and allies, too: four British, Canadian, and French citizens have been “detained” by the Iranians since Obama paid up.
Democratic Party Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has said loudly and clearly, she intends not only to continue the Obama administration’s policies, she intends to take them even further.
Elections have consequences.
In a sexual orientation case involving an adjunct professor who claimed she was denied “full time employment and promotions based on sexual orientation,” the 7th Circuit ruled unanimously that her employer can, indeed, do exactly that. In particular, Title VII, under which the case was brought, does not apply to sexual discrimination in the workplace.
The reason the Court got this one right has little to do with discrimination—and everything to do with it—rather, it’s centered on what the law actually says, and what the judges said about what the law actually says.
…a paradoxical legal landscape in which a person can be married on Saturday and then fired on Monday for just that act. For although federal law now guarantees anyone the right to marry an ‐ other person of the same gender, Title VII, to the extent it does not reach sexual orientation discrimination, also allows employers to fire that employee for doing so. … Many citizens would be surprised to learn that under federal law any private employer can summon an employee into his office and state, “You are a hard‐working employee and have added much value to my company, but I am firing you because you are gay.” And the employee would have no recourse whatsoever—unless she happens to live in a state or locality with an anti‐discrimination statute that includes sexual orientation.
Because the law, Title VII as it’s written, doesn’t address that question.
There’s more [emphasis added]:
…the distinction between gender nonconformity claims and sexual orientation claims has created an odd state of affairs in the law in which Title VII protects gay, lesbian, and bisexual people, but frequently only to the extent that those plaintiffs meet society’s stereotypical norms about how gay men or lesbian women look or act…. By contrast, lesbian, gay or bisexual people who otherwise conform to gender stereotyped norms in dress and mannerisms mostly lose their claims for sex discrimination under Title VII, although why this should be true is not entirely clear.
Yet, this [emphasis added]:
[T]he paradox is not our concern. Our task is to interpret Title VII as drafted by Congress, and as we concluded in Ulane, Title VII prohibits discrimination only on the basis of gender.
Regardless of what we might think of the particular ruling—concerning a woman who was denied advancement on the basis of her sexual orientation (assuming, arguendo, that her claim was accurate)—or of other rulings involving actual firings over sexual orientation, this court got this ruling right. The court is right because it applied the law as it was written, and not as it might have preferred it to have been written or as a government agency (EEOC had sided with the professor) wanted it to have been written.
The court also was right because it didn’t stop there. The court went on to point out that while the law in question, as it was written, conflicted with other laws—one driving the Supreme Court’s ruling on gay marriages, for instance—the court was powerless to resolve the conflict. Such a resolution is a political decision, not a judicial one; it’s for the people and their elected representatives to alter the law(s) in directions they see fit; no court can do that.
The court’s ruling can be read here.