The Scary, Out-of-Touch, Narrow-Minded, Stuffy Old Man Gabfest
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Why That Judge Was Wrong to Ban a Lifetime Movie From TV
Lifetime is scheduled to air the TV movie Romeo Killer: The Christopher Porco Story Saturday night. Or maybe not. New York Supreme Court Judge Robert Muller issued an astounding order yesterday to stop the film from airing, and even barring Lifetime from running ads or sending out publicity for it. This is not an order that should hold up. It gets utterly wrong the balance between free speech protections and the right of an individual to control what are called “publicity rights,” the permission to use one’s name or likeness for commercial purposes.
The Gigantic, Delicious Sugary Drink Gabfest
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Nanny Mayor, Meet the Nanny Judge
Pick your imperial poison: New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg‘s order limiting the sale of jumbo-sized, sugar-filled drinks, or New York State Judge Milton A. Tingling’s order allowing sales to continue as usual. The choice is between a meddling executive pushing New Yorkers toward better eating habits, and a cranky judge smacking him down. Reading Tingling’s unconvincing ruling, I think I’ll take the mayor.
How the Supreme Court Should Rule on Gay Marriage
The court challenge to California’s ban on gay marriage has made me nervous since it began. The case, which the Supreme Court will hear at the end of this month, makes the argument that banning gay marriage violates the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection under the law, full stop. Amen to that. But in a world in which 41 states still ban gay marriage, it was asking a lot of the courts—and especially of Justice Anthony Kennedy, the oh-so-sought-after swing justice—to award gay couples the right to marry across the country. With polls quickly shifting in the direction of gay rights, why turn to the least democratic method of social change? And it bothered me that this challenge came not from seasoned gay-rights lawyers, but from two superstars of the bar, David Boies and Ted Olson, who swooped in on their own.
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