STEPHANOPOULOS: You know, when we spoke several years ago, you talked about how the process of globalization was changing our understanding of the law. When you think about the internet and when you think about the possibility that, you know, a pastor in Florida with a flock of 30, can threaten to burn the Koran and that leads to riots and killings in Afghanistan, does that pose a challenge to the First Amendment, to how you interpret it? Does it change the nature of what we can allow and protect?
BREYER: Well, in a sense, yes. In a sense, no. People can express their views in debate. No matter how awful those views are. In debate. A conversation. People exchanging ideas. That's the model. So that, in fact, we are better informed when we cast that ballot. Those core values remain. How they apply can-
STEPHANOPOULOS: The conversation is now global.
BREYER: Indeed. And you can say, with the internet, you can say this. Holmes said, it doesn't mean you can shout fire in a crowded theater. Well, what is it? Why? Well people will be trampled to death. What is the crowded theater today? What is-
STEPHANOPOULOS: That's exactly my question.
BREYER: Yes. Well, perhaps that will be answered by- if it's answered, by our court. It will be answered over time, in a series of cases, which force people to think carefully. That's the virtue of cases.
To me, Breyer is doing nothing more than smearing around the usual platitudes about how judges interpret law and decide cases in the context of ever-changing real world facts and let's have a fine day in the classroom cogitating about the elaborateness of all that.
But maybe you think he's revealing that he thinks that ill-behaved hot-heads in other countries are changing the scope of our First Amendment freedoms, now that the internet transmits every local free speaker's performance art around the world.
IN THE COMMENTS: XWL said:
Unsaid, but implicit, Breyer:
'What fun we could have re-interpreting the Constitution if only Scalia and Thomas would drop dead while we still have Obama as President and a Democratic majority in the Senate'
Seems like he knows there isn't a plurality of justices that agree with his implied stance that freedom of speech should be limited based on the global sensitivities, so he dances around saying what he really wants to say.
If Scalia, Thomas, Roberts or Alito were to leave, and we had the likes of Breyer in the majority in the Supreme Court, all sorts of new 'rights' would be established, and all sorts of old rights would be curtailed.
I think you're right. By the way, "he dances around saying what he really wants to say" has a second meaning, which I know you didn't intend.
Standing outside his 50-member Pentecostal church, the Dover Outreach Center, alongside Imam Muhammad Musri, the president of the Islamic Society of Central Florida, Jones said he relented when Musri assured him that the New York mosque will be moved.
Jones had never invoked the mosque controversy as a reason for his planned protest. He cited his belief that the Quran is evil because it espouses something other than biblical truth and incites radical, violent behavior among Muslims.
But he said Thursday that that he prayed about the decision and concluded that if the mosque was moved, it would be a sign from God to call off the Quran burning....
"We are canceling the event because we have agreed, I take him at his word, he has agreed to move the Ground Zero mosque," Jones said. "I verified that three or four times with witnesses. I trust that man who gave me that. I believe he is a man of integrity, a man of his word, I do not believe that he lied to me."
Jones said that if the mosque is not moved, "then I think Islam is a very poor example of religion. I think that would be very pitiful. I do not expect that."
OBAMA: If he's listening, I just hope he understands that what he's proposing to do is completely contrary to our values of Americans. That this country has been built on the notions of religious freedom and religious tolerance.
And as a very practical matter, as commander of chief of the Armed Forces of the United States I just want him to understand that this stunt that he is talking about pulling could greatly endanger our young men and women in uniform who are in Iraq, who are in Afghanistan. We're already seeing protests against Americans just by the mere threat...that he's making.
… this is a recruitment bonanza for Al Qaeda. You know, you could have serious violence in places like Pakistan or Afghanistan. This could increase the recruitment of individuals who'd be willing to blow themselves up in American cities, or European cities. You know and so you know, I just hope that, he says he's … he's someone who's motivated by his faith....
STEPHANOPOULOS: I wonder what this must feel like from behind your desk. You're President of the United States. You have to deal with the fallout. And he's a pastor who's got 30 followers in his church. Does it make you feel helpless or angry?
OBAMA: It, well it is frustrating. Now, on the other hand, we are a government of laws. And so, we have to abide by those laws. And my understanding is that he can be cited for public burning. But that's the extent of the laws that we have available to us. You know, part of this country's history is people doing destructive or offensive or harmful things. And yet, we still have to make sure that we're following the laws. And that's part of what I love about this country.
Oh, lord. There's so much wrong with that! And yet our President, unlike Mr. Jones, is supposedly very, very smart. For one thing, Obama eventually gets around to Jones's freedom of expression, but that treasured right is presented as an obstacle that the President has got to put up with, because it is, technically, law. Why isn't it one of the "values of Americans" like "religious freedom and religious tolerance"? But, no, in Obama's view, the symbolic speech of burning a book because you think it's evil is "completely contrary to our values of Americans."
So: the values of "religious freedom and religious tolerance" are what really matters... except that Jones's opinion is religious. If the point is that Jones has the right to burn the book, but he should refrain from exercising it and be sensitive to the feelings of others, then Obama is contradicting the approach he took to the close-to-Ground-Zero mosque, which is that the overwhelmingly important matter is that there is a right to build the mosque and he really doesn't want to talk about whether it's a good idea.
You know, a key religious freedom value is that government must not treat different religions differently. But Obama takes one attitude toward the NYC Muslims and another toward the Florida Christian. With respect to the former, he highlighted the right and wouldn't express an opinion about how that right should be exercised. With the later, he begrudgingly acknowledged the right after stressing the importance of the individual's restraint and sensitivity toward others.
Now, you might jump to say that Obama thus favored Muslims over Christians, but think about how it's actually the other way around. Without hesitation, he called upon the Christian to exercise forbearance and to care for the feelings of others. He didn't dare say that to Muslims. And he talked about Muslims as if they are incapable of understanding a society based on individual liberty and freedom of expression. Obama propounds the stereotype of irrational Muslims who resort to acts of violence when they don't like what people are saying.
Ironically, Rev. Jones wanted to burn the Koran because it seemed to him that it "incites radical, violent behavior among Muslims." And Obama wanted Jones to refrain from burning the Koran because it would incite radical, violent behavior among Muslims.
That's Tina Brown trying to babble her way to saying something that makes sense. Watch the video at the link. I think she realizes in the middle — at the "you know, very much, uh, uh, you know" — that after invoking the big idea "feminism," she doesn't know how to say the right thing about feminism. It's not right to say according to feminism, women aren't supposed to be Republicans, so she can't say that. What then can she say? She goes with the weak, mealy-mouthed "against so many of things that women have fought for such a long time." So many of the things, eh? What? And fought for such a long time — as if women are supposed to — what? — adhere to traditional values and not make waves?
And what about the idea that there is variety within feminism and vivid debate about what is good for women? George Stephanopoulos pushes Brown with "Well, you could argue they're different kinds of feminists...." And Brown settles in to the routine partisanship that is easy to spit out clearly: "Women, too, can be wing nuts, is the point." Yeah, that's cogent and clear. Funny too. Brown's attempt at a point about feminism was flabby blather because it was dishonest. "Women, too, can be wing nuts" — she's telling it straight now and shows it with the kicker that it's "the point." Thanks for abandoning your pretense of intellectual analysis for some plain politics. We get it, Tina. You're a liberal. You don't like when strong candidates emerge on the other side. And you have nothing interesting or insightful to say about feminism. Noted.
And speaking of the poverty of feminist analysis on "Good Morning America," the discussion turns immediately to Carly Fiorini's comment about Barbara Boxer's hair:
STEPHANOPOULOS: ...Carly Fiorina after the election, getting caught on tape....
CARLY FIORINI: Laura saw Barbara Boxer briefly on television this morning. And said what everyone says. God, what is that hair? So yesterday....
BROWN: You know what I love about it so much? It's like, as we were saying... it was great that it was gender-neutral. Then, all of a sudden, you've suddenly switched to absolute claws come out. And it's like — the women. What really killed? It was so yesterday. It wasn't just women. It was rich women. That's the point.
Oh! Brown is declaring something else to be "the point." I'm not sure what, though. Rich women. Stephanopoulos cuts her off and crashes headlong into what will be the next underdeveloped topic (that Fiorini and Meg Whitman were CEOs). Presumably, if given a little room, Brown would have spouted some class politics about hair. Think of all the middle aged women who heard the rich lady's catty remark and looked at themselves in the mirror and saw a overgrown, undercolored, Boxeresque mops of hair and wondered if they could squeeze enough dollars out of the family budget to make a trip to the salon. Boxer's floppy, grizzled tresses will get knotted up with the heartstrings of California working women.
But Brown didn't get to say that, because it was time — fast-moving "Good Morning America" time — to opine about whether America could admire a corporate CEO these days. As if Hewlett Packard and eBay were spewing oil into the Gulf of Mexico.
Because he, like the President, is black. Now, he didn't bring up the subject. He was answering a question from George Stephanopoulous. And he weaseled away from his own answer pretty much:
I mean it’s a different role for you know, for me to play and others to play. And that’s just the reality of it. But you take that as part of the nature of it. It’s more because you’re not someone they know. I’m not a Washington insider. ... My view on politics is much more grass-roots-oriented. It’s not old boy network oriented and so I tend to come at it a little bit stronger, a little more streetwise if you will. That rubs some feathers the wrong way. At the end of the day I’m judged by whether I win elections and I raise the money.
Can I judge you by whether you're straightforward, clear, and persuasive?
