The stuff about "ooh, this wonderful law will also be used against Antifa!" is not only cope but missing the point. If their support for the law rests on its being used to support a friend-enemy distinction then why are none of the people propogating it talking about Antifa? Read any article or listen to any soundbite on this - it's *all* targeted against racist and/or anti-Semitic leaflets or projections. Here's Mike Caruso, Republican:
Yeah, the anti-Semitic leaflets are goofy and I don't support them, but this is a classic case of giving an inch before a mile is taken. This entire bill is targeted at the far Right, and what the Left will do - which is strategically the correct thing for them to do - is simply expand the definition of far Right until it criminalizes normal political speech.
It's insane that people who think DeSantis is the king of "state power" can't grasp these basic points. You either work friend-enemy distinction into your laws or your enemy will do it for you.
Many provisions of bill would seem to run afoul of 1A as interpreted by court in RAV v. St Paul. That case—which seems pretty squarely on point—dealt with a local law providing that:
“Whoever places on public or private property, a symbol, object, appellation, characterization or graffiti, including, but not limited to, a burning cross or Nazi swastika, which one knows or has reasonable grounds to know arouses anger, alarm or resentment in others on the basis of race, color, creed, religion or gender commits disorderly conduct and shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.”
Even though threatening speech and speaking on another’s property without permission are both otherwise unprotected forms of speech, the court held that because the law was content based (it singled out intimidation based on race, creed etc) it had to be subjected to strict scrutiny (a constitutional test unfavorable to the government).
This seems of apiece with desantis passing other bills—like the social media common carrier legislation and the ban on anti-white workplace DIE sessions—that are good policy but shoddily drafted and vulnerable to 1A challenges. Except in this case the law is not good policy
His anti-tech censorship bill specifically allowed for companies to ban anti-semitism and did nothing about the primary issue. Most of his actions are stunts for conservative media to lap up. The Martha's Vineyard flight is the prime example.
I agree, terrific summarization of HB 269 and its impact on free speech in America and why DeSantis ushered in a defining moment for his political prospects with many conservatives.
My guess is that meatball Ron realised how poorly he's doing with the base and donors and is trying to out-institution Trump and thinks that he can get the zionist neocon wing on side by catering to their hypersensitive obsession with anti-semitism laws. Same thing with the heartbeat bill, he's falling out with donors and congressional endorsements so he's going for institutions like the foreign policy blob and con inc media to try and get the 2024 nomination
Jewish legislator Randy Fine sponsored and helped author this speech killing bill. Jewish elites have been the tip of the spear when it comes to attacking the 1st amendment and arguing for so called hate speech laws, Big Tech censorship, digital book burnings at Amazon and so many other things. The ADL is no friend of a robust 1st amendment.
I haven't heard of any pending legal challenges from civil liberties groups if any still exist. This will be a real test for the SCOTUS if it ever gets to them.
Unless Trump speaks out against this bill I don't see how he's any better than DeSantis.
The ACLU, the most iconic civil liberties group in the US, was and is heavily Jewish. They were free speech absolutists until relatively recently, but the new generation of activists has no time for free speech, which is seen as a racist relic. I don't think there remains a single national free speech absolutist organization of any relevance, which is a major problem in an age of high technology and centralization.
The main issue, however, is that there is no public appetite for a free speech battle. It's just not something that motivates voters. It doesn't even matter how you frame it. You can say that the likes of Julian Assange are martyred for the crime of telling citizens what their government are doing: it's just not a big deal to most people. You can point out the rampant collusion between the intelligence agencies and social media: people tune it out. You can show direct causal relationships between those same agencies and journalists, intel-washing to carry out ops ranging from Russiagate to the Iraq War. Most people tune out pretty early in that conversation. Americans, despite believing themselves to be free and maverick people, are really pretty conformist when it comes to political speech.
This is one reason among many why cultural issues must remain salient for the Right: things like immigration and gender and culture might embarrass donors at cocktail parties, but they're pretty much the only thing you can get Grandma Facebook excited about. If Americans lose their right to talk about the military-industrial complex or manufactured consent, most of them won't even notice. If they think they are losing their right to talk about gender-neutral bathrooms, they will show up to vote in droves.
I agree with your comments about the ACLU and they used to vigorously defend the extreme right and left but they no longer defend the extreme right. It was a Jewish ACLU lawyer who argued on behalf of the Nazis and their planned Skokie, IL rally in the 1970's.
I recall that the ACLU announced their refusal to defend pro-white and right wing causes due to the 2017 Charlottesville rally which was just a cop out. It also seems partly or mostly related to more George Soros money and influence. Either way it appears there is a new ethnic strategy among Jews to discredit and oppose a robust 1A as causing "hate" and violence. Naturally there are always exceptions to any general rule.
The ADL however is a very different story and they've long supported hate speech laws and other restrictions on the 1A. They should not be allowed to operate on our soil given their anti-white and anti-legacy America activism.
And you're mostly right about American being conformist when it comes to political speech. That's why I fear for the 1A and believe even SCOTUS might cuck if they think a majority of the nation supports speech restrictions or if they get browbeaten enough by the media and political class.
Skokie is always a weird one for me. I've thought about it a lot. The superficial contradiction of having the heavily-Jewish ACLU defend Skokie is in fact consonant with its culture, which at that time had two facets. The first is that there were genuinely principled free speech advocates on staff. The second is that the ACLU ultimately benefitted from the speech. The American Nazis beclowned themselves in Skokie: it was to their detriment that they were able to march because the world could see how lumpen and pathetic they were. In this sense, the ACLU gained by giving their enemies the oxygen of publicity.
With things like Charlottesville that is still somewhat true; the whole thing looked dumb and shambolic and out of control, so the ACLU wouldn't really lose out by having it take place. But this was more than some guys marching. Someone died at the event. It would, then, not behoove the ACLU to its supporters or donors to support it.
In this sense I don't think the overall strategy has changed overmuch: that, while it's a self-styled liberties organization, they have always applied that selectively. (In other words, a huge fuss was made over Skokie because it was advantageous to the ACLU.)
The change is indeed that the ACLU doesn't seem to regard free speech as a value at all anymore, and free speech arguments are instead deployed in the name of other values (e.g. anti-racism, anti-anti-Semitism, sometimes foreign policy etc.)
The Charlottesville UtR rally only looked out of control because the local and state police refused to maintain order and keep the violent left wing protestors a distance away from the legal rally which was opposing the removal of the Robert E. Lee statue. As a result UtR rallygoers were forced to physically defend themselves from antifa/blm/left wing violence which the media, including FOX/FAUX News, then spun as "white supremacist violence". The Heapy report even shows that this was essentially a conspiracy so the state could shut down the rally as an unlawful assembly. The black police chief is on record as telling his officers to let the two sides fight for that reason.
There were only a very small number of Nazis at the rally according to most reports but that's who the media focused on. Most people were regularly dressed alt-righters and there were even a couple of multiracial patriot groups who attended just to support free speech rights.
The rally only looked dumb and shambolic because the media depicted it that way. They cast the peaceful and legal UtR rallygoers as violent white extremists bent on hurting innocent people and the violent left wing activists as heroes protecting innocent people and minorities. No mention of the grievous civil rights violations of the legal rallygoers.
The media gaslighting that right wing speech leads to violence worked as paranoid lefties feared that fascists were around every corner and under every bed and pearl clutching kosher conservatives signed on to a resolution condemning "white supremacy" and neo-Nazis but not the black supremacy of blm or antifa. The Jewish ADL did their usual fearmongering and smearmongering.
This leads up to Florida now deciding that offending Jewish sensibilities is not protected under the first amendment.
The stuff about "ooh, this wonderful law will also be used against Antifa!" is not only cope but missing the point. If their support for the law rests on its being used to support a friend-enemy distinction then why are none of the people propogating it talking about Antifa? Read any article or listen to any soundbite on this - it's *all* targeted against racist and/or anti-Semitic leaflets or projections. Here's Mike Caruso, Republican:
https://floridapolitics.com/archives/584052-enough-is-enough-mike-caruso-files-bill-making-hate-acts-antisemitic-messages-a-felony/
Yeah, the anti-Semitic leaflets are goofy and I don't support them, but this is a classic case of giving an inch before a mile is taken. This entire bill is targeted at the far Right, and what the Left will do - which is strategically the correct thing for them to do - is simply expand the definition of far Right until it criminalizes normal political speech.
It's insane that people who think DeSantis is the king of "state power" can't grasp these basic points. You either work friend-enemy distinction into your laws or your enemy will do it for you.
Pretty disappointing.
I used to think American conservatives are 19th century Indians, but I’ve come to appreciate that are much worse and much lower than that.
They should vote for Vivek. He can understand the law (unlike them) and is probably more difficult to bribe and less misaligned culturally.
Unbelievable the low character of non liberal Americans.
Edit: not to overreact, but this is the #2 guy on the right! Supposedly. It’s not some random guy dropping the ball.
Many provisions of bill would seem to run afoul of 1A as interpreted by court in RAV v. St Paul. That case—which seems pretty squarely on point—dealt with a local law providing that:
“Whoever places on public or private property, a symbol, object, appellation, characterization or graffiti, including, but not limited to, a burning cross or Nazi swastika, which one knows or has reasonable grounds to know arouses anger, alarm or resentment in others on the basis of race, color, creed, religion or gender commits disorderly conduct and shall be guilty of a misdemeanor.”
Even though threatening speech and speaking on another’s property without permission are both otherwise unprotected forms of speech, the court held that because the law was content based (it singled out intimidation based on race, creed etc) it had to be subjected to strict scrutiny (a constitutional test unfavorable to the government).
This seems of apiece with desantis passing other bills—like the social media common carrier legislation and the ban on anti-white workplace DIE sessions—that are good policy but shoddily drafted and vulnerable to 1A challenges. Except in this case the law is not good policy
His anti-tech censorship bill specifically allowed for companies to ban anti-semitism and did nothing about the primary issue. Most of his actions are stunts for conservative media to lap up. The Martha's Vineyard flight is the prime example.
I agree, terrific summarization of HB 269 and its impact on free speech in America and why DeSantis ushered in a defining moment for his political prospects with many conservatives.
My guess is that meatball Ron realised how poorly he's doing with the base and donors and is trying to out-institution Trump and thinks that he can get the zionist neocon wing on side by catering to their hypersensitive obsession with anti-semitism laws. Same thing with the heartbeat bill, he's falling out with donors and congressional endorsements so he's going for institutions like the foreign policy blob and con inc media to try and get the 2024 nomination
Jewish legislator Randy Fine sponsored and helped author this speech killing bill. Jewish elites have been the tip of the spear when it comes to attacking the 1st amendment and arguing for so called hate speech laws, Big Tech censorship, digital book burnings at Amazon and so many other things. The ADL is no friend of a robust 1st amendment.
I haven't heard of any pending legal challenges from civil liberties groups if any still exist. This will be a real test for the SCOTUS if it ever gets to them.
Unless Trump speaks out against this bill I don't see how he's any better than DeSantis.
The ACLU, the most iconic civil liberties group in the US, was and is heavily Jewish. They were free speech absolutists until relatively recently, but the new generation of activists has no time for free speech, which is seen as a racist relic. I don't think there remains a single national free speech absolutist organization of any relevance, which is a major problem in an age of high technology and centralization.
The main issue, however, is that there is no public appetite for a free speech battle. It's just not something that motivates voters. It doesn't even matter how you frame it. You can say that the likes of Julian Assange are martyred for the crime of telling citizens what their government are doing: it's just not a big deal to most people. You can point out the rampant collusion between the intelligence agencies and social media: people tune it out. You can show direct causal relationships between those same agencies and journalists, intel-washing to carry out ops ranging from Russiagate to the Iraq War. Most people tune out pretty early in that conversation. Americans, despite believing themselves to be free and maverick people, are really pretty conformist when it comes to political speech.
This is one reason among many why cultural issues must remain salient for the Right: things like immigration and gender and culture might embarrass donors at cocktail parties, but they're pretty much the only thing you can get Grandma Facebook excited about. If Americans lose their right to talk about the military-industrial complex or manufactured consent, most of them won't even notice. If they think they are losing their right to talk about gender-neutral bathrooms, they will show up to vote in droves.
I agree with your comments about the ACLU and they used to vigorously defend the extreme right and left but they no longer defend the extreme right. It was a Jewish ACLU lawyer who argued on behalf of the Nazis and their planned Skokie, IL rally in the 1970's.
I recall that the ACLU announced their refusal to defend pro-white and right wing causes due to the 2017 Charlottesville rally which was just a cop out. It also seems partly or mostly related to more George Soros money and influence. Either way it appears there is a new ethnic strategy among Jews to discredit and oppose a robust 1A as causing "hate" and violence. Naturally there are always exceptions to any general rule.
The ADL however is a very different story and they've long supported hate speech laws and other restrictions on the 1A. They should not be allowed to operate on our soil given their anti-white and anti-legacy America activism.
And you're mostly right about American being conformist when it comes to political speech. That's why I fear for the 1A and believe even SCOTUS might cuck if they think a majority of the nation supports speech restrictions or if they get browbeaten enough by the media and political class.
Skokie is always a weird one for me. I've thought about it a lot. The superficial contradiction of having the heavily-Jewish ACLU defend Skokie is in fact consonant with its culture, which at that time had two facets. The first is that there were genuinely principled free speech advocates on staff. The second is that the ACLU ultimately benefitted from the speech. The American Nazis beclowned themselves in Skokie: it was to their detriment that they were able to march because the world could see how lumpen and pathetic they were. In this sense, the ACLU gained by giving their enemies the oxygen of publicity.
With things like Charlottesville that is still somewhat true; the whole thing looked dumb and shambolic and out of control, so the ACLU wouldn't really lose out by having it take place. But this was more than some guys marching. Someone died at the event. It would, then, not behoove the ACLU to its supporters or donors to support it.
In this sense I don't think the overall strategy has changed overmuch: that, while it's a self-styled liberties organization, they have always applied that selectively. (In other words, a huge fuss was made over Skokie because it was advantageous to the ACLU.)
The change is indeed that the ACLU doesn't seem to regard free speech as a value at all anymore, and free speech arguments are instead deployed in the name of other values (e.g. anti-racism, anti-anti-Semitism, sometimes foreign policy etc.)
The Charlottesville UtR rally only looked out of control because the local and state police refused to maintain order and keep the violent left wing protestors a distance away from the legal rally which was opposing the removal of the Robert E. Lee statue. As a result UtR rallygoers were forced to physically defend themselves from antifa/blm/left wing violence which the media, including FOX/FAUX News, then spun as "white supremacist violence". The Heapy report even shows that this was essentially a conspiracy so the state could shut down the rally as an unlawful assembly. The black police chief is on record as telling his officers to let the two sides fight for that reason.
There were only a very small number of Nazis at the rally according to most reports but that's who the media focused on. Most people were regularly dressed alt-righters and there were even a couple of multiracial patriot groups who attended just to support free speech rights.
The rally only looked dumb and shambolic because the media depicted it that way. They cast the peaceful and legal UtR rallygoers as violent white extremists bent on hurting innocent people and the violent left wing activists as heroes protecting innocent people and minorities. No mention of the grievous civil rights violations of the legal rallygoers.
The media gaslighting that right wing speech leads to violence worked as paranoid lefties feared that fascists were around every corner and under every bed and pearl clutching kosher conservatives signed on to a resolution condemning "white supremacy" and neo-Nazis but not the black supremacy of blm or antifa. The Jewish ADL did their usual fearmongering and smearmongering.
This leads up to Florida now deciding that offending Jewish sensibilities is not protected under the first amendment.
Please respond to my comment in your previous substack post.