Yup. This kind of thinking is why the Republicans keep nominating people who can’t win the popular vote — their whole organizing mechanism ensures that whoever seems to be “next on deck” gets the nomination with only token resistance. Their last actual insurgent nominee was Reagan in ‘76. Since then, it’s been Reagan,…

Just a few points, since I think we’re on similar pages in principle:

“The freedom to manifest one’s religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.”

Probably there is. The U.K. has no Bill of Rights, so the Crown respects freedom of religion and freedom of expression on a purely voluntary basis (and, of course, has often deliberately attacked both at various points throughout its history). Even its current statutory law is laughably weak-sauce when it comes to…

Didn’t Robert Heinlein suggest that only those who serve in the armed forces should be able to vote? That doesn’t make too much sense in a country like the U.S., but, in Israel, where foreign policy is an existential concern and military service is nearly universal, it might.

I don’t think it’s Hillary. The writer says, “I do not want the opponent in office.” This strongly suggests that the writer knows (or assumes) who the opponent actually is.

So are we now just pretending Dunham’s behavior stopped when she was seven? Is that our chosen defense mechanism?

Probability this law holds up in court is about the same as the probability Arkansas’s 12-week ban wins on appeal.

Your username confuses me now. So you’re a fake doctor, but you’re not fake? Or are you faking not being fake, too?

How long do you think it would take for charges to get filed if this guy phoned a death threat to Ron O’Brien, Ohio Prosecutor? Seconds, or whole minutes?

Might this be overthinking it a little?

So you’re good with Citizens United, then?

The GOP had to move the bill, because their pro-life wing was coming down hard on them. Jill Stanek, Operation Rescue, and a few others did a sit-in in front of Boehner’s office and got arrested. The angry correspondence poured in. “How can you abandon these babies who die in agony?” etc. The “Republicans depend on us…

Understanding of the internals of the pro-choice movement is about as common among pro-lifers as understanding of the internals of the pro-life movement is among pro-choicers.

No, I have no formal legal training. I WANT to have formal legal training, and I am friends with a couple of prominent law professors, but it’s tough to get a law degree at a reputable school when you’ve got a family to raise, so for now I’m just an enthusiastic amateur and reader-of-rulings who happens to have taken…

No, the court will almost certainly rule that there’s no substantial burden to a religious belief here — and that assumes the suit even clears the threshold test of *sincere* belief.

The original joke about the “PC Master Race” — the video from which we get the phrase — explicitly compared us to Nazis. It’s always had Nazi overtones, and always will.

The legislature lacks the votes to override.

...though slightly-less-official pronouncements forbidding contraception have steadily poured out of the Catholic Church since the Didache, back in the middle of the second century A.D.

If they want to stick with precedent, they’ll vote no. Even petitioners’ counsel conceded that what they’re asking for is unprecedented not just in American jurisprudence, but in human history.