Senate The US Politics discussion

this has actually happened to you? ugh. historical inaccuracy aside, taking credit for accomplishments you yourself had nothing to do with is so gauche, and typically american. like even if it was true that the u.s. single-handedly saved the allied cause the idea that someone should be thanked simply for being born in the same country is still awful. anyway, sorry you've had to deal with that. only most of us are terrible, #notallamericans.

 

I just chalk it up to a bad education system rather than the person.
They can't help if in school they got told only about US involvement rather than a more balanced overview.

 

It does happen on a regular basis in all kinds of situations. "You should thank us for not speaking German" and variations thereof is common fare IRL and on the Internet. It's not something easy to budge people away from either, but there are an impressive of amounts of counterpoints offered on a platter by FDR himself on the matter...

 

How many Supreme Court opinions have you cited in briefs? What's better for your argument - dicta by the court, or the holding? Spoiler alert: the holding. Kennedy started the precedent of allowing discrimination toward gay couples based on religion, and he rationalized it by citing animus toward religion. The religious discrimination won that case. The gay couple lost.

 

If any president can be credited for ending the war, I'd much sooner say Truman (and, as others have said, Eisenhower even though he was not president) before I'd say Roosevelt. Roosevelt's actual accomplishments have more to do with setting fiscal policy and precedent that led to fifty years of sustained economic growth in America more than anything else. Great long-term for America's middle class, but he was no champion of minorities.

Well, part of that is simply *how often* we teach American history in contrast with everything else. In Virginia, the typical set-up for social studies education is:

1st: Civics.. kinda?
2nd: Civics.. kinda?
3rd: very simplistic world history
4th grade: State history part 1
5th grade: State history part 2
6th grade: American history part 1
7th grade: American history part 2
8th grade: Civics & Economics
9th grade: World History I
10th grade: World History II
11th grade: American history
12th grade: American government

So the typical kiddo in Virginia (which is nowhere near the worst about this when compared to other states) gets about 3 years of non-US perspective in their social studies education. In English classes, they study Brit Lit intermittently in 9th & 10th and almost completely in 12th.

Some of these are condensed. I know a lot of schools are now opting to combine some of those lower-level classes into one year instead of two (state history I and II, American History I and II) and I know some did that with World History when the AP Course covered the material of both World I and II, but now AP World History only covers 1450 onwards so it's pointless. Schools in the northern part of the state will also do "Government Studies" in which they make students take the coursework for AP US Government in the fall and AP Comparative Government in the Spring. Those schools typically make room for a mandatory World/Human Geography or Current Affairs class.

As for having nuance that regards other countries, there are still plenty of schools in the US that are teaching children that "states rights" are the reason for our Civil War, so I wouldn't hold your breath on that one.

 

oh i know nationalism isn't uniquely american, we just seem the loudest about it these days. but i detest it in pretty much every context. some of my favorite commentary on the subject (some bad words):

 

And who's disputing that? Not me. Your original argument was much more sweeping:

 

Well, this business refused service because the customers wanted a cake for their gay wedding, and the Supreme Court said Colorado couldn't say that was wrong. So yes, businesses get to refuse service. Case closed. That's what happened.

 

How the Austrians teach history:

prehistorical Austria - "The Venus of Willendorf"
Roman Austria - "Vindobona!"
The first written mention of Austria - Ostarrîchi !
The House of Habsburg and the Holy Roman Empire
Turkish Invasions
Maria Theresa
Franz Joseph I
Assassination of the Archduke and WWI
Anschluss and the fall of the first Republic
[SUMMER VACATION - SEE YOU IN THE FALL, KIDS!]
Austrian Independence Treaty, 1955! Austria is Reborn!

 

Oh, come on. So, you don't think that FDR's good accomplishments outweigh the bad by a considerable extent? And what exactly was the good that Hitler accomplished? I think FDR did a lot more good for the country and the world than make the trains run on time.

And Lincoln suspended habeas corpus and coerced immigrants into fighting for the North and seriously considered sending slaves back to Africa. Still, I think it's fair to say FDR and Lincoln are far, far superior to Hitler, and if Hitler = Trump = FDR = Mandela = Gandhi, then why are talking at all? Nothing can be distinguished. All human beings are equally vile because everyone at least one serious failing. People must be judged on the sum of their records.

Is this really a fair critique of what she was arguing? Isn't this kind of a low blow?

And if this is the level we're going to argue, can't it be said that people like you are the reason Trump is in the White House?

But I guess FDR and Obama are no better than him, so who cares.

 

Whoa, I just saw this. Is this a joke? No, I absolutely criticized Obama throughout his presidency for drones and he did not escape without criticism. People were very critical. He escaped without the media giving a damn.

I see you ignored the substance of what I said to attack my character. I think "people like you" are why discourse feels pointless to so many. You are rationalizing a lie by pointing to something totally different from the topic. I was the first to bring up those drone murders in this conversation btw, to say that if you want to go after Obama based on human rights, there's real ammunition. You don't have to lie about him doing the same thing Trump is now doing.

 

The Democrats have garnered a higher amount of votes in a lot of state races and still lost. There's no way they win control back ever.

It's over. And it's been over.

 

and here i haven't even been the appropriate amount of miserable. guess i better get to work on that.

seriously though, chin up appleseed. take comfort in the fact that basically every time in the history of human civilization has been as bad as this one. some have been tremendously worse! find something in your life to be hopeful for outside of electoral politics. it's not like the democrats are our saviors anyway.

 

tom likes to say there's no difference between dems and republicans, but he's wrong.

1) let's find the absolute minimum level of welfare state necessary in order to head off open revolt and then distract the poor from their misery with episodes of Real Housewives. (Democrats)
2) let's crush these unwashed masses beneath our boot heels and then distract them from their misery with episodes of Real Housewives (Republicans)

 

I work with a different law system (civil law), but part of my living does include reading court decisions, so here we go about that ruling... under spoiler tag, it's a wall of text

Spoiler: Wall of legalese

The Supreme Court's opinion in 16-111 (MASTERPIECE CAKESHOP, LTD. v. COLORADO CIVIL RIGHTS COMM’N) is articulated along the following points:

IIA1 - The Court begins by reasserting that "civil rights of gay persons and gay couples [...] must be protected by law and constitution", and by reasserting "religious and philosophical objections to gay marriage are protected views and, in some instances, protected forms of expression". It proceeds to pointing out "it is a general rule that such objections do not allow business owners and other actors in the economy and in society to deny protected persons equal access to goods and services under a neutral and generally applicable public accommodations law."

IIA2 - The Court proceeds to elaborate on the context of Phillips' decision. Phillips' argument is "that he had to use his artistic skills to make an expressive statement, a wedding endorsement in his own voice and of his own creation" - the basis for his claim is that in his case, he was required to express himself against his own religious views. The Court then proceeds to reassert the context of 2012 - gay marriage then being illegal in Colorado, the Supreme Court itself having yet to make its own definitive ruling.

The Court also points out the state law itself "also afforded storekeepers some latitude to decline to create specific messages the storekeeper considered offensive. Indeed, while enforcement proceedings against Phillips were ongoing, the Colorado Civil Rights Division itself endorsed this proposition in cases involving other bakers’ creation of cakes, concluding on at least three occasions that a baker acted lawfully in declining to create cakes with decorations that demeaned gay persons or gay marriages."

IIA3 - Furthermore, the Court points out that "any decision in favor of the baker would have to be sufficiently constrained, lest all purveyors of goods and services who object to gay marriages for moral and religious reasons in effect be allowed to put up signs saying “no goods or services will be sold if they will be used for gay marriages,” something that would impose a serious stigma on gay persons." The Court makes very clear that had a ruling in favor of the baker been made, it would have had to be of limited import.

IIA4 - The Court, however, did not deprive Phillips' argument of any worth. It notes that "there is some force to the argument that the baker was not unreasonable in deeming it lawful to decline to take an action that he understood to be an expression of support for their validity when that expression was contrary to his sincerely held religious belief", and reiterates that in the context of 2012, within the state borders, the validity of gay marriage was not recognized.

IIA5 - However, the Court proceeds with its most important point: "nonetheless, Phillips was entitled to the neutral and respectful consideration of his claims in all the circumstances of the case." The Court clearly explains that its decision is going to be motivated, not on whether the Court should have ruled in favor or in disfavor of the baker, but on whether he was granted "neutral and respectful consideration of his claims".

This is what the Court proceeds to refute in IIB.

IIB1 - The Court cites two statements by a Commissioner that can be interpreted in two ways, a shorter one and then "“f a businessman wants to do business in the state and he’s got an issue with the- the law’s impacting his personal belief system, he needs to look at being able to compromise.” These statements will be invoked again by another Commissioner at a following hearing, which will be the one where the Court finds fault.

IIB2 - The argument for the Court's decision is then made, and I will cite it in extenso for this reason:

Emphasis on the last point mine - it's the basis for the Court's opinion.

IIB3 - Moreover, the other three cases are brought up by the Court, in which the same court ruled in the baker's favor. The Court points out "The treatment of the conscience-based objections at issue in these three cases contrasts with the Commission’s treatment of Phillips’ objection. The Commission ruled against Phillips in part on the theory that any message the requested wedding cake would carry would be attributed to the customer, not to the baker. Yet the Division did not address this point in any of the other cases with respect to the cakes depicting anti-gay marriage symbolism." The Court gives another argument towards an absence of fairness and impartiality of the Commission's adjudication of Phillips' case, and it is entirely correct - the theory of the message being attributed to the customer and not the baker is absent in any of the three rulings in the bakers' favor when they objected on the basis of conscience.

IIB4 - The Court then proceeds to what went on in the Colorado Court of Appeals, where Phillips did indeed bring up the other three cases. The Court cites that Phillips "argued that the Commission had treated the other bakers’ conscience-based objections as legitimate, but treated his as illegitimate—thus sitting in judgment of his religious beliefs themselves", and cites the Court of Appeals' response which demonstrates that court made an assessment to determine whether the requested messages could be deemed offensive or not - answering by "not" in Phillips' case, but in the three other cases, ruling that "there was no impermissible discrimination because “the Division found that the bakeries . . . refuse[d] the patron’s request . . . because of the offensive nature of the requested message.”

IIB5 - The Court then reiterates that "A principled rationale for the difference in treatment of these two instances cannot be based on the government’s own assessment of offensiveness" and cites jurisprudence on this point. The Court then concludes that "The Colorado court’s attempt to account for the difference in treatment elevates one view of what is offensive over another and itself sends a signal of official disapproval of Phillips’ religious beliefs"

The answer to whether Phillips was given neutral consideration of his claim is therefore "no".

IIC1 - The Court thus decides that "[f]or the reasons just described, the Commission’s treatment of Phillips’ case violated the State’s duty under the First Amendment not to base laws or regulations on hostility to a religion or religious viewpoint." It reminds that "The Free Exercise Clause bars even “subtle departures from neutrality” on matters of religion. [...] Here, that means the Commission was obliged under the Free Exercise Clause to proceed in a manner neutral toward and tolerant of Phillips’ religious beliefs."

IIC2 - The Court then concludes that "On these facts, the Court must draw the inference that Phillips’ religious objection was not considered with the neutrality
that the Free Exercise Clause requires. While the issues here are difficult to resolve, it must be concluded that the State’s interest could have been weighed against Phillips’ sincere religious objections in a way consistent with the requisite religious neutrality that must be strictly observed. The official expressions of hostility to religion in some of the commissioners’ comments—comments that were not disavowed at the Commission or by the State at any point in the proceedings that led to affirmance of the order—were inconsistent with what the Free Exercise Clause requires. The Commission’s disparate consideration of Phillips’ case compared to the cases of the other bakers suggests the same. For these reasons, the order must be set aside."

The Court then proceeds to stating its decisions:

III1 - The Colorado Commission's order is invalidated, on the grounds Phillips was not, within his particular set of circumstances, faced with a neutral decisionmaker.

III2 - The Court states that the outcome of other similar cases must await further elaboration in the courts and be resolved "without subjecting gay persons to indignities when they seek goods and services in an open market."

III3 - The Court of Appeals' decision is reversed.

It makes very clear that the invalidation is founded on form, not on the issue itself.

TL;DR - The Supreme Court did not decide one way or another on whether Phillips' was allowed to refuse to bake a wedding cake for a gay couple. It invalidated the ruling which was made in Colorado on a question of form, justifying that Phillips demonstrably was not faced with a neutral decisionmaker.

 

You're right, @Lordban. People just missed the nuances of the ruling.

 

Isn't there some doomsday cult you can join? I just know if I were that pessimistic about things, I'd do my best to join a doomsday cult to hasten the end.

 

No, people disagree on their relevance legally.

 

This. Most of the shows that call themselves reality shows are really game shows anyway. And the ones that aren’t are mostly just stupid.

 

...The legal relevance of a Supreme Court ruling?