Pledge of Allegiance to Dissent: An Intolerant ‘Excess of Liberty’?

“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands: one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”  

An Arkansas fifth-grader made news recently by claiming there is no “liberty and justice for all” in America as his reason for refusing to recite the Pledge of Allegiance during his school’s daily patriotic exercises. 

Red Skelton could’ve taught him a thing or two:

– 

Of course, the Supreme Court ruled in 1943 that as long as such dissent is practiced in a non-disruptive manner a student is acting well within his Constitutional rights — his faulty reasoning for the dissent being irrelevant — and he may not be compelled to participate by either the school, or the state. 

Teachers and administrators are strictly prohibited from singling out such peaceful dissent for discipline, admonishment or public ridicule.  (more…)

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Tags: gay marriage, Pledge of Allegiance, public school, Red Skelton, school
Posted Nov 20th 2009 at 3:12 pm in Featured Story, Politics | 266126221 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/abaldwin/2009/11/20/pledge-of-allegiance-to-dissent-an-intolerant-excess-of-liberty/Pledge+of+Allegiance+to+Dissent%3A+An+Intolerant+%E2%80%98Excess+of+Liberty%E2%80%99%3F2009-11-20+23%3A12%3A34Adam+Baldwin

The Tragi-Comedy of Sonia Sotomayor

“I’m looking through you, where did you go? I thought I knew you, what did I know? You don’t look different, but you have changed. I’m looking through you, you’re not the same.” — Lennon/McCartney: “Rubber Soul,” 1965

When Sonia Sotomayor was nominated in May, I wrote a satirical essay for Big Hollywood called The ‘Magic Latina’. The title was a send up of the “Magic Negro,” or “Magical Negro,” a fictional stereotype common in film and literature. The “Magic Negro” has been criticized by white and black commentators alike. Blacks, most famously Spike Lee, but many others, view the role as ultimately degrading. As Rita Kempley, writing for DVRepublic, said about the “Magic Negro,” “What’s the deal with all the holy roles?” The core of the critique is that the characters are given special powers and/or underlying mysticism. It is not that the characters per se are so bad.  The perception is that this kind of character, the selfless and powerful, insightful, and sometimes magical being, is always black, has no “interior life”, and is always serving white people. To name a few at random, they include such famous stars as Hattie McDaniel (”Gone with the Wind”), Sidney Poitier (”The Defiant Ones”), Morgan Freeman (”Shawshank Redemption,” “Driving Miss Daisy,” “Bruce Almighty”), and Laurence Fishburne (”The Matrix”). (more…)

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Tags: morgan freeman, Obama, Sonia Sotomayor, Spike Lee, Supreme Court
Posted Jul 24th 2009 at 10:33 am in Entertainment, Politics | 18779435 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/mrulle/2009/07/24/the-magic-latina-part-2-the-tragi-comedy/The+Tragi-Comedy+of+Sonia+Sotomayor2009-07-24+17%3A33%3A50Michael+S.+Rulle+Jr.

Wolves in Conservative Clothing

Why is it that when liberals want to advocate their ideas before the American public, they suddenly take on conservative language and become completely disingenuous about their intentions?  Democrats always claim to have the better ideas when it comes to leading America forward, and yet, their refusal to sell their ideas for what they are, big-government liberalism, shows that they may believe Americans think otherwise. 

Whether it is Barack Obama promising to cut 95% of Americans’ taxes, instead of admitting that he wants be expand the government’s role in redistributing wealth, or the Democrats’ support of the misnomer Employee Free Choice Act, which removes an employee’s right to a secret ballot in union elections, liberals always disguise their leftist agendas with conservative talking points.  I will happily support the Democrats the day they actually advocate meaningful tax reform, and support workers’ rights over the monopoly of overgrown unions. (more…)

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Tags: Barack Obama, political discourse, Senate hearings, Sonia Sotomayor, Supreme Court
Posted Jul 23rd 2009 at 9:00 am in Politics | 18647083 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/smitchell/2009/07/23/wolves-in-conservative-clothing/Wolves+in+Conservative+Clothing2009-07-23+16%3A00%3A43Seth+Mitchell

Obama Wants to Buck Us Up

In speaking to the American Nurse Association in the Rose Garden today, Mr. Obama, speaking of the urgent need to pass his hugely exorbitant and grossly ineffective health care bill, said, “”We need to buck up people here,” Obama said. “That’s what nurses do. It’s time for us to buck up the Congress. We need to get this done…”

And I agree – that the President is doing his level best to buck this country up. 

His bucked-up foreign policy has signaled weakness to our detractors and encouraged aggression from those who would destroy us. 

He bucked up our financial institutions by taking control of over 600 banks.  He bucked up the automotive industry with at first his bail-outs with strings, and firing CEO’s, and placing stipulations, regulations and mandates on formerly private companies.  (more…)

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Tags: "buck people up", Cap and Trade, health care, Obama, Sotamayor
Posted Jul 16th 2009 at 5:27 pm in Featured Story, Politics | 185238294 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/ggraham/2009/07/16/obama-wants-to-buck-us-up/Obama+Wants+to+Buck+Us+Up2009-07-17+00%3A27%3A10Gary+Graham

The End of Reverse Discrimination?

Reverse Discrimination, according to Wikipedia, is defined as, “the practice of favoring members of a historically disadvantaged group at the expense of members of a historically advantaged group.”  Since the 1964 Civil Rights Act when the phrase came into usage, it has been practiced in many different ways.  Some examples include employment practices and college admissions.  A more euphemistic way of saying reverse discrimination would be “affirmative action.”  However you say it, it is still discrimination plain and simple.

The United States Supreme Court tackled the issue in the seminal case of Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, 438 US 265 (1978).  In that case, the Court found that race could only be one of numerous factors in determining admission to a university.  It stated that the University of California policy was unconstitutional, but that the policy used by Harvard was a valid type of affirmative action.  The result was that Mr. Bakke was admitted to medical school and became a respected physician. (more…)

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Tags: affirmative action, Bakke, discrimination, Harvard, Politics
Posted Jul 6th 2009 at 7:03 am in Politics | 17489886 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/fdemartini/2009/07/06/the-end-of-reverse-discrimination/The+End+of+Reverse+Discrimination%3F2009-07-06+14%3A03%3A33Frank+DeMartini

A Legal Blockbuster Headed Your Way

Just in time for Hollywood’s Blockbuster Summer season, the west coast is scheduled for a limited engagement legal premiere of sorts. This week on June 25th, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals will host the latest episode in the saga of the long-running litigation between the estates of Anna Nicole Smith and oil baron J. Howard Marshall.

This remarkable drama demonstrates the lasting power of a lawsuit that has outlasted the life and death of Anna Nicole Smith and her former husband, billionaire oil man J. Howard Marshall II. As the litigation against the estate of her former husband goes on without them both, the absurdity of the case grows clearer. (more…)

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Tags: 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, American judicial system, Anna Nicole Smith, Frivolous lawsuits, inheritance
Posted Jun 24th 2009 at 4:34 pm in Celebrity News, Law | 167650One Commenthttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/hcooper/2009/06/24/a-legal-blockbuster-headed-your-way/A+Legal+Blockbuster+Headed+Your+Way2009-06-24+23%3A34%3A26Horace+Cooper

Having Your Racial Cake and Eating it Too

John C. Calhoun, father of the confederacy, said about the ideas expressed in the Declaration of Independence: “there is not a word of truth in the whole proposition, as expressed and generally understood.” These sentiments were echoed by Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Roger B. Taney. Writing the majority opinion for Scott v Sanford, Taney also denied the veracity of the founding noting, “…the Declaration of Independence shows that neither the class of persons who had been imported as slaves, nor their descendants, whether they had become free or not, were then acknowledged as a part of the people, nor intended to be included in the general words used in that memorable instrument.”

It is a continuing source of fascination that the new left has chosen this view of the founding, replete with its historical inaccuracies, while the political right has adopted that of Abraham Lincoln and Justice John Marshall Harlan. It was Harlan who wrote in his famous dissent in Plessey v Ferguson that “Our Constitution is colorblind and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens.”

This brings us to the current controversy surrounding the president’s nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the United States Supreme Court. (more…)

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Tags: identity politics, Obama, race, racial politics, Sotomayor
Posted Jun 8th 2009 at 12:31 pm in Politics | 1546145 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jphillips/2009/06/08/having-your-racial-cake-and-eating-it-too/Having+Your+Racial+Cake+and+Eating+it+Too2009-06-08+19%3A31%3A25Joseph+C.+Phillips

Sickness of our Age: Leftist = Historic

If someone like Beethoven had a vision of the future and realized the impact his music had on humanity, would he be able to compose with the same fortitude and confidence, or rather, would the pressure of the realization of his own importance would eventually render him dysfunctional? 

I don’t confuse this hypothetical inquiry with Beethoven’s realization of his genius. I’m sure he knew of his own greatness. This is different, though, from the pressure that one may experience if his or her genius is also perceived in its historic context and significance. 

In other words, would Beethoven be able to remain Beethoven if, well, he was conscious of the fact that he was Beethoven, (or Beethoven the way he is perceived today)?

These musings of mine could easily be dismissed as exercises in futility or outbursts of excessive if not useless imagination if they were not so coincidental with the policies and style of our current government and prevailing cultural mindset.  (more…)

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Tags: Clarence Thomas, Guinness Book of World Records, Hillary Clinton, historic, history
Posted Jun 5th 2009 at 9:58 am in Politics | 1485582 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/ykochar/2009/06/05/historic%e2%80%99-sickness-of-our-age/Sickness+of+our+Age%3A+Leftist+%3D+Historic2009-06-05+16%3A58%3A00Yervand+Kochar

Sotomayor: Justice Denied

Alright, let’s see a show of hands, how many of you think that Sonia Sotomayor got nominated for the big job because she is, hands down without a doubt, the best qualified judge in America. Exactly! If our friends on the left are honest we can all agree that there are three reasons she got the nod: she is liberal, she is Hispanic, and she is a woman.

Is there any clear thinking conservative out there who thought that President Obama might actually try to fill this job opening that has the best benefits package in history with someone who might be, in some small way, acceptable to the right? This is the one appointment that cannot have any concession to conservatives. You can dislike Judge Sotomayor for her racial comments, that’s fair. You can look at her troubling record and the number of times she has been overturned on appeal and question her legal acumen. However, no intellectually honest conservative or liberal can deny that judges make policy and law in this country. Starting with the guy who takes your donations to local government for speeding right up to the First Street Nine, judges have the final word. In the game we like to call America, judges have all the marbles. Justice may be blind but she has a big mouth and when she speaks you must listen. (more…)

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Tags: Barack Obama, Catholic school, Sonia Sotomayor, Supreme Court, the jesuits
Posted Jun 3rd 2009 at 11:55 am in Politics | 1485304 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jjena/2009/06/03/sotomayor-justice-denied/Sotomayor%3A+Justice+Denied2009-06-03+18%3A55%3A05Jeffrey+Jena

No More Apologies from Sotomayor

This week’s Washington Times column:

With Barack Obama, many Americans had hoped to get a post-racial president. With Mr. Obama’s pick of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to replace David H. Souter on the Supreme Court, it looks less and less like they got one.

President Obama – a man we still hardly know – clearly subscribes to the notion that we should judge each other not just on the content of our character, but also by the color of our skin.

We’ve had warning signs before. Remember the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr.?

As for the outrage du jour, the call for Sotomayor to apologize for making a racist comment in a 2001 speech is silly. She said what she meant, and she meant what she said: “I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.” (more…)

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Tags: Academia, Alberto Gonzalez, Barack Obama, Clarence Thomas, Condoleezza Rice
Posted May 31st 2009 at 8:04 pm in News, Politics | 148470No Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/abreitbart/2009/05/31/no-more-apologies-from-sotomayor/No+More+Apologies+from+Sotomayor2009-06-01+03%3A04%3A59Andrew+Breitbart

Daily Gut: You Win, I’m Racist!

And so within hours of posting my Gregalogue, a bilious blogger did what bilious bloggers do best: call me a racist. Which is awesome, because it proves my point. In the world of racial politics, all you have to do is call someone a racist, and you win! 

Game over. 

And now, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs is pretty much doing the same thing preemptively, telling critics of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to watch what they say when it comes to her confirmation hearing. This is amazing, only because there was no need to say it at all.  (more…)

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Tags: Marlin Fitzwater, Obama, racism, racist, Robert Bork
Posted May 28th 2009 at 12:48 pm in Daily Gut, Featured Story | 1459788 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/ggutfeld/2009/05/28/daily-gut-you-win-im-racist/Daily+Gut%3A+You+Win%2C+I%27m+Racist%212009-05-28+19%3A48%3A26Greg+Gutfeld

What’s ‘Latina’ Got to do With It?

When you favor someone because of their race over others who are equally or more qualified, that’s racism. Except in America where an old policy that was supposed to help people in an age of real separatism is still on the books and enforced.

The appointment of judge Sonia Sotomayor by President Obama to the Supreme Court is a classic example of how absurd affirmative action has become. And she unwittingly said it all in the following statement:

“I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.”

First of all, that is a foolish statement. Wise people don’t call themselves wise. And anyone who thinks their ethnicity (Latinos aren’t a race) or race makes them somehow more wise is not very smart. There are clueless people of every race. Life experience only imbues wisdom if you actually learn something from it. A lot of people don’t. (more…)

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Tags: Martin Luther King. jr, political correctness, Politics, President Obama, Sonia Sotomayor
Posted May 27th 2009 at 8:28 am in News, Politics | 1442867 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/jhudnall/2009/05/27/affirmative-action-is-racist/What%27s+%27Latina%27+Got+to+do+With+It%3F2009-05-27+15%3A28%3A40James+Hudnall

Daily Gut: The Reign of Race

So President Barack Obama just named federal appeals judge Sonia Sotomayor as the nominee for the next Supreme Court Justice.

So what do we know about her?

Well, she’s Hispanic.

Also, she’s Puerto Rican.

And…she’s Hispanic.

Plus, she’s Puerto Rican.

Case closed.

That’s the joy of racial politics and the media that swallows it– all you need to know about a person is their racial makeup – and in the words of the cop grimly taping off the bedroom in my vacation condo, there’s “nothing more to see here.” (more…)

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Tags: Barack Obama, John Edwards, race, Sonia Sotomayor, Supreme Court
Posted May 26th 2009 at 12:39 pm in Daily Gut, News | 14414611 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/ggutfeld/2009/05/26/daily-gut-the-reign-of-race/Daily+Gut%3A+The+Reign+of+Race2009-05-26+19%3A39%3A36Greg+Gutfeld

Court Upholds FCC Authority Over Broadcast Indecency

The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the FCC’s authority to impose fines on broadcasters for allowing obscene language on the air.

By a 5-4 majority the Court ruled that the Federal Communications Commission did not violate the federal Administrative Procedure Act in its 2006 decision that the Fox TV network had violated decency rules in 2002 and 2003 when singer Cher and actress/TV personality Nicole Ritchie blurted out expletives on live television in separate incidents. The FCC did not actually impose any fines in the case at issue.

The Court will likely be asked to rule on the constitutionality of the FCC policy as broadcasters challenge the ruling on constitutional grounds. (more…)

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Tags: Cher, FCC, Fox network, Nicole Ritchie, Supreme Court
Posted May 3rd 2009 at 1:31 pm in Entertainment, News | 123718No Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/stkarnick/2009/05/03/court-upholds-fcc-authority-over-broadcast-indecency/Court+Upholds+FCC+Authority+Over+Broadcast+Indecency2009-05-03+20%3A31%3A46S.T.+Karnick

Hollywood’s Rendezvous with Government Censorship and why Michael Moore Should be Worried

Last week the United States Supreme Court held oral arguments over a fascinating question:  whether or not the federal government has the authority to decide if a movie/documentary is a form of entertainment free from most broadcast restrictions or if the video is instead a lengthy attack ad – albeit 90 minutes long – against a candidate for federal office subject to the landmark 2002 federal campaign finance law. The BCRA (Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act) prevents “electioneering communications” within 30 days of a primary election or 60 days of a general election.  The case is Citizens United v. FEC and Hollywood should be greatly alarmed by its implications. 

David N. Bossie, President Citizens United

The movie in question is “Hillary the Movie” and as a low budget documentary it bills itself as providing the untold story of who Hillary Clinton is by presenting nearly “40 in-depth interviews with experts, opinion makers, and many of the people who personally locked horns with the Clintons.”  Regardless of one’s perspective on the electoral merits of Hillary Clinton’s candidacy, it should be seen by industry insiders as truly remarkable that such a movie is subject to federal government regulation.   (more…)

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Tags: "Hillary: The Movie", BCRA, Citizens United, Government censorship, Supreme Court
Posted Apr 1st 2009 at 6:26 am in Entertainment, Featured Story, Politics | 936304 Commentshttp://bighollywood.breitbart.com/hcooper/2009/04/01/hollywoods-rendezvous-with-government-censorship/Hollywood%27s+Rendezvous+with+Government+Censorship+and+why+Michael+Moore+Should+be+Worried+2009-04-01+13%3A26%3A45Horace+Cooper