Powerline comments on the sickening spectable of judeophobic mobs gathering outside synagogues, in Jewish neighborhoods, and at private residences of public figures perceived as being unwilling to lick Islamofascist toches enthusiastically enough being too pro-Israel.
We are obviously long past the point where decent behavior can be expected from leftists. So the question is, do we really need to put up with these outrages?
I yield to no one as a defender of free speech, but I think what we see here falls into the category of harassment, or disturbing the peace. Of course people can say what they want, but can they shout it through a megaphone in front of your house at 7:00 am or 10:00 pm? And we all have a right to peaceably assemble, but in your front yard? Or across the street from a synagogue or school, while screaming abuse at the people who enter those places?
With very limited exceptions, speech cannot be regulated on the basis of content. So if someone wants to write an op-ed or a social media post that says all Jews should go “back” to Germany, or Ted Cruz should not be re-elected, he is free to do that. But restrictions on the time, place and manner of speech have always been allowed. You can say you hate Jews, but, as I learned in law school, you can’t drive a vehicle through a neighborhood in the middle of the night, electronically blaring your sentiments to the neighbors. Likewise with the freedom to assemble. Sure, but where? And when?
If someone stood in the street in a residential neighborhood and played loud music, he would be told to move on and potentially arrested for disturbing the peace. Why is that individual treated with kid gloves because, instead of music, he is shouting anti-Semitic slogans through a bullhorn?
And when people congregate outside a synagogue or school and scream anti-Semitic slurs at Jews who pass by, there is an implicit, and sometimes explicit, threat of violence. Conduct that may, in the natural course, lead to violence is not protected by the First Amendment. The “fighting words” exception is longstanding and may have taken on new relevance in recent years.
If I lived next door to Ted Cruz or Jake Tapper, I would be sorely tempted to fetch a baseball bat and have a civil conversation with the morons who disturb the peace of my neighborhood. But it shouldn’t have to come to that.
It seems to me that in all of the above instances, well-established legal principles should allow the authorities to step in. Disturbing the peace is the most obvious rubric, but I think the threatening nature of the anti-Semitic slurs that are constantly shouted by pro-Hamas demonstrators raise additional issues.
Is it really the law that an innocent citizen walking down the street must be subjected to the screams of a mob, just a few yards away, expressing the wish that that person be dead, perhaps consigned to a gas chamber? Why? Expression of the opinion can’t be prohibited, but expression by a howling, threatening mob, in close proximity to the people being threatened, and to their schools and synagogues? What value is being constitutionally protected here?
One might draw an analogy to laws regulating firearms. It is, of course, illegal to shoot someone. But it is also illegal to brandish a legally-owned firearm. There are many definitions of brandishing, but a typical one might be to “display the weapon in a rude, angry, or threatening manner.” If a howling mob confronts a group of school children, screaming threats in a rude, angry and threatening manner, haven’t they gone long past “speech”? Why should such conduct be exempt from legal sanction?
We live in a perverse environment in which presenting facts and making logical, scientific arguments on such topics as the origin of covid or the efficacy of vaccines, or the authenticity of Hunter Biden’s documents, or the prevalence of voter fraud, are likely to be censored. And yet, screaming into bullhorns in residential neighborhoods and howling invective at children and worshippers is somehow sacrosanct. We need to fundamentally rethink what we mean by “free speech.”
Not sure we do, actually: we just need to enforce existing laws across the board, and not in the blatantly partisan manner it is happening now.
And in fact, we need to do so for the safety of “the other side” as well. Because you know what happens when people feel the law has its thumbs irredeemably on the scales, and is always going to favor the other side no matter what. Ultimately people conclude they have nothing to lose, and they might as well be hanged for a sheep as for a lamb. As Insty keeps reminding readers, the job of police is often less to defend you against criminals, but to protect criminals against the vigilante justice that would arise in the police’s absence.
BTW, I’ve been convinced since day one (as have many others) that these “grassroots” protests are in fact AstroTurfed with “rent-a-crowds”. The Arbel-daughter sent me the following:
ADDENDUM:
(a) Tom Knighton on politically selective prosecution.
These are real crimes that don’t require the mental contortionism Bragg engaged in when going after Trump, and yet he opted not to prosecute them. Why?
The obvious answer is that they held the right politics.
Bragg can try to explain it however he wants, but the protesters at Columbia are progressives pushing a progressive narrative and that’s something he has no interest in prosecuting, even if they were violent in doing so.
Meanwhile, Trump paid someone to keep their mouth shut and Bragg bends over backward trying to make it a campaign finance issue, thus justifying other charges being brought against the former president.
This is nothing but Bragg being politically selective about who he goes after. If you’re a good progressive in Manhattan, so long as you’re serving the cause, you could probably murder someone and get away with it so long as Bragg is on the job.
On the flip side, if you accidentally drop a piece of paper while advocating for a right-leaning cause, you’d better expect Bragg to try and throw the book at you.
Read the whole thing.
(b) “Personnel is policy”, Insty notes sarcastically.
An antisemitism watchdog group is calling for the Biden administration to fire a recently promoted White House official whose anti-Israel social media posts resurfaced this week.
StopAntisemitism said Tyler Cherry, who was promoted earlier this month as an associate communications director at the White House, called for the elimination of Israel and promoted anti-Israel viewpoints on social media going back years, as well as anti-police commentary.
“We’re hoping this is the quickest hire and fire scenario in President Biden’s administration to date,” Stop Antisemitism founder Liora Rez told Fox News Digital. “For the Biden administration to either A, not vet properly, or B, to vet and then approve an inner circle appointee like this… is just horrifying.”
[update: you can’t make this up. To quote a Douglas Murray quip, if he traveled to Gaza he’d better be grateful that IDF bombing didn’t leave enough tall buildings the HamaSSholes can throw him off of.]
(c) On the other hand, the White House, for the first time, has described the response of HamaSS to the American-sponsored Israeli ceasefire proposal as “rejection”.
Spin, strangeness, and charm 