TikTok sues
https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/68506893/tiktok-inc-v-merrick-garland/
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Romanian court annuls presidential vote after Russian interference claims
The court canceled Sunday’s run off and invalidated a Nov. 24 first round that saw Calin Georgescu, a 62-year-old agricultural scientist who has praised Russian President Vladimir Putin, stage a meteoric rise to clinch a first place finish. The government will now need to start the process over, holding a new election at an unspecified date.
Georgescu campaigned with no political party and declared no advertising budget, but propelled by viral content on TikTok, he went from 1 percent support a month ago to winning 22.9 percent.
Romania’s security services pointed to Russian interference to explain his sudden success. Documents declassified last week concluded that a Russian-backed operation helped manipulate TikTok algorithms to boost Georgescu’s popularity.
Does exposure to TikTok propaganda invalidate one’s vote? The same principle might be applied to voters under the influence of the Search Engine Manipulation Effect.
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Share how you feel about drag queen story hour for little kids.
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Why , I love it, of course! 
Heehee, sorry to disappoint you, M.le docteur, but no, I deplore it.
But, lemme ask: how do YOU feel about parents’ rights? Cuz little kids aren’t driving themselves to Story Hour, and nobody is forcing the moms to take them there. Incomprehensible as it is to you ‘n me, these kids’ guardians evidently LIKE the content.
One of my articles was about this: “Who’s Your Daddy? the Pilgrim Fathers vs. the Founding Fathers on Religious Education” . The pilgrims, Puritans, came here not for religious freedom, but for religious hegemony: their own. It’s why they left uber-tolerant Leiden. But our FFs, first generation children of the Enlightenment, feared no knowledge. I gotta come down on their side. The government should not be banning pure speech or pure thought.
Private individuals, though, SHOULD be vocal about speech with which they disagree. And if they can recruit enough other people to their p.o.v., there will be de facto censorship of the objectionable opinions. (Of course, that can be bad, as we’ve seen over the last 5 years or so.)
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While this may apply to Story Hour, it doesn’t apply to what goes on in the public schools, hence the irate parents showing up at school board meetings and gaining the attention of the FBI, who labeled them as domestic terrorists. As for parents voluntarily subjecting their minor children to live porn shows (aka Drag Queen Story Hour), do parental rights extend to that form of child abuse? How about driving them to X-rated films? Okey-dokey by you?
The larger point is that free speech has its limits — and I don’t mean that shouting fire in a crowded theater nonsense. As an attorney, I’m sure you know that Holmes’s foolish decision was subsequently overturned and rightly so. Drag queens flashing their privates to children at the public library is not political speech and I’m pretty sure the Founders didn’t have that in mind when they adopted the First Amendment.
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“What goes on in the public schools” is more akin to “establishment of religion”, which is also forbidden by the Constitution.* It’s GOV’T -sponsored speech/ thought. That wasn’t what you challenged me on.
(*Pace Mme. “Justice” Jackson, of course; she seems to be laboring under the delusion that it is the government which enjoys the right of freedom of speech…)
“Flashing their privates”: I think that is a crime in most if not all states—IF you do it in public. “In public” doesn’t so much mean that some members of the public might choose to view your jewels, as it means that other members of the public who do NOT so choose may be involuntarily exposed to the sight.
Context is all. Total nudity on stage has been commonplace for decades now. I’m not saying it SHOULD be, just that it is. Theaters are privately owned spaces. Before you ask would I take a three year old to see a revival of “Hair” , I’ll tell you: No.
WHAT should little kids hear, see, be taught? I agree with you that it is “abusive” to expose them to all this sexual stuff, whether perverse or heteronormative. I think until puberty hits, they simply aren’t interested in it. But, some people might think religious indoctrination of the very young is “abusive”, too. And many people think that imposing the parents’ religious strictures concerning medical treatment is beyond mere abuse.
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A very lawyerly response; I’d expect no less. The bottom line is that the perverts are running the show and hiding behind 1A doesn’t make it any better. (“Schoolteachers have free speech rights, too!! And so do trannies in public libraries.”) And good luck getting any court in the land to declare LGBTQIA+ a religion.
Is a public library “in public”? How’s the “it is a crime” been working out? Any trannies got arrested?
Hope you’re enjoying the decline of the West, which has become a kritarchy — more accurately, a kritarchy with Our Democracy decorations. Give Glubb’s Fate of Empires a read and you’ll be able to recognize the current stage of the West, as well as a vision of what comes next. It’s not too long and you can find the text online for free.
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You don’t quote where I explained what “public”means in this context.
I don’t approve of governmental censorship of pure speech. People are free to speak against objectionable and harmful content, or they SHOULD be—without fear of govt. reprisals.
YOU don’t like the govt targeting those parents at school board meetings, and neither do I. But see, the govt, unlike the citizenry, cant pick-and-choose based on content.
People can also, and IMHO should, just shun it. Don’t buy porn,snuff films, etc, and don’t inflict it on your kids! But it’s up to the people not the govt.
And thanks for your kind good wishes, but no, I’m not enjoying the decline of the West. Im just watching. And hoping for a surprise happy ending.
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Distressing as this might be, your definition of “public” is of no importance to the Woke Left. Drag queens were strutting their stuff in public libraries — the word “public” right there in the name.
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…and you think they shouldn’t be allowed to do it because it’s disgusting, perverse, and if marketed as a story hour for children, immoral.
I agree.
But that’s between us.
Do we want the state government imposing its idea of morality on us? I’m just asking. Personally, I don’t. Over the last decade or so, we Rightly-Guided find ourselves on the wrong side of the civic creed being imposed, which I’d sum up as tolerance toward deviants and the intolerant. I’m sicka it. But I don’t think it’s an area government can improve.
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In case you hadn’t noticed, law is applied morality. That’s why stuff like murder and fraud are illegal. Job one of the state is to enforce the moral precepts that the culture has adopted. Guess they didn’t cover that in law school.
Maybe you’re confused about this since there is no longer a consensus on right and wrong in this multicultural society. That’s what happens in the late stages of empire. The GAE is on its way out. It will be interesting to see what comes next. Musk likes to say that the most entertaining outcome is the most likely. We’ll see if he’s right on this one.
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Speech and thought are distinguishable from conduct. But I reckon maybe you do have to go to law school to understand the extreme importance of that.
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Is burning an American flag speech or conduct? Only a lawyer knows for sure.
My favorite part of Our Kritarchy is how actions that have no vocal element are somehow speech. John Hasnas (an actual law professor) was on to something.
As an aside, I gotta say that this is just too easy.
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Bari Weiss’s The Free Press is not necessarily the most reliable source. The study author, NCRI, is part of the kookocracy that includes SPLC and Soros’s Open Society Foundation.
On the other hand…
https://www.cato.org/blog/lies-damned-lies-statistics-misleading-study-compares-tiktok-instagram
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