Wednesday, September 11, 2013

The temperature is rising, and it isn't global warming...

5 comments:

  1. The Obama "impersonator" (at first i thought that it was the real Obama) is wrong. In most municipalities, a permit is required for demonstrations. And the permits are Constitutional. The usual exception is union strikes.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. True, but it becomes a question of line drawing at this point. They are jumping around with signs and costumes, but is that a demonstration? How would that be defined? Is one person doing that a demonstration needing a permit, or is there some cut off point? How is a permit granted? Arbitrarily, or according to some defined standard? I'm on the side of the "demonstrators" here, given that they are not impeding traffic, but just making a show. If there were a thousand of them, I don't know if I'd think any different, as long as they stayed on the sidewalk and let anyone else through without harassment.

      Delete
  2. The key is simply to apply. I suggest that had they done so, the permit would have been granted. It usually is. I recall the Tea Party rallies - including the one at Harry Reid's home in Searchlight, NV that I participate in. They were granted. At some point, the Nevada Highway Patrol put a cap on the one in Nevada because the area was so JAMMED with traffic (and yes, it was. I had to go "off road" to find a parking place - but that's why God invented 4x4). Estimates were in the 12,000 person range when they simply told people to keep driving. Brietbart was there as was Sarah Palin. There are people who comment on my blog who were there with me.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I recall that rally in Searchlight. The schadenfreude of having it in Harry's hometown was sweet indeed.

      Note that the Two Million Biker Ride into DC was denied a permit, after applying, while the million muslim march, which turned out to be about 21, was granted. I feel that they could have applied, but then again, why, if you only have ten or twenty people jumping around on a street corner. That seems to me to be a right of assembly issue rather than an event that needs a permit. But then again, that's my line, and it clearly wasn't the city's. The real question is at what point the whole permit thing becomes a mechanism used by a hostile bureaucracy to shut down needed political speech? Certainly, we have seen a multitude of government institutions perverted recently by the administration into doing just that. I feel given that history, it is far better to err on the side of demanding unhindered constitutional rights, even if it means pushing things a bit, than allowing the establishment to bully us around using their considerable state powers.

      Delete
  3. It has nothing to do with what size of group constitutes a "demonstration". Reasonable time & place regulation of speech, even political speech, is appropriate. This is a clear issue of being a traffic hazard. Listen to the LEO - he tells them they need to be out of the street and over on the sidewalk. Big signs block drivers view of the intersection and distract them. There's no indication this warning is based on political content, just common sense.

    ReplyDelete