Mad Lib of the Day: Justice Stephen Breyer - Shouting Fire & Burning Koran the Same

Useful Info Nation ^ | 9/14/2010 | Thomas Bryan

[toma29]

Today's Mad Lib of the Day is Justice Stephen Breyer, a guy who has written things like this in McDonald vs. City of Chicago:

In sum, the Framers did not write the Second Amendment in order to protect a private right of armed self-defense. There has been, and is, no consensus that the right is, or was, “fundamental.” No broader constitutional interest or principle supports legal treatment of that right as fundamental. To the contrary, broader constitutional concerns of an institutional nature argue strongly against that treatment.

Breyer now seems to equate burning the Koran with shouting fire in a crowded theater and no one has a Constitutional right to do either.

From ABC News:

Justice Stephen Breyer: Is Burning Koran 'Shouting Fire In A Crowded Theater?'

Last week we saw a Florida Pastor – with 30 members in his church – threaten to burn Korans which lead to riots and killings in Afghanistan. We also saw Democrats and Republicans alike assume that Pastor Jones had a Constitutional right to burn those Korans. But Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer told me on "GMA" that he's not prepared to conclude that -- in the internet age -- the First Amendment condones Koran burning.

“Holmes said it doesn’t mean you can shout 'fire' in a crowded theater,” Breyer told me. “Well, what is it? Why? Because people will be trampled to death. And what is the crowded theater today? What is the being trampled to death?”

So, according to Breyer, the whole world is now the crowded theater. I've heard the warnings of overpopulation, but this goes beyond the pale.

Last week President Obama told me that Pastor

[toma29]

God help us all if liberals ever take control of the Supreme Court.

[teletech]

God help us all if liberals ever take control of the Supreme Court.

The ONLY perfect justice is God's justice.

[TigerClaws]

So, our right to free speech is solely dependent on the REACTIONS of the hearers???

If people start cutting off the heads of flag burners, this then creates “institutional concerns” that justify banning flag burning?

If Bible burners or, say, those that take the Lord’s name in vain, leads to murder then that speech can likewise be banned?

Free speech is free at the whim of the hearer?

The self-destruction of the West continues. All those complaining about how horrible our society is should be given a free pass for six months to a Muslim country. There’s no knowledge or reference point for Americans to life under Islam.

[Le Chien Rouge]

Is yelling ‘Obama Sux’ protected by the first amendment or would that ‘inflame’ the enlightened progressives to go on a rampage???

[Jewbacca]

The lesson here is that liberals are physical cowards and to get your way, be violent terrorists.

I suggest killing liberals any time a Bible or Torah is defaced or a baby is aborted.

(Yes, SARCASM. MASSIVE SARCASM.)

[Will88]

So, according to Breyer, the whole world is now the crowded theater.

What a moron. A fire is a real danger that no amount of self-control or good judgment can protect us from. You just have to get away from it. So, evidently, Breyer considers Muslims to be some sub-species incapable of exercising the self-control and good judgment to not go off the deep end if someone burns a Koran.

If someone burns a Koran, or Bible or any other book, that act does not endanger a single person. It's the out-of-control, berserker reaction that endangers people. And no one has to react that way but by their own choosing, unless, as I said, Breyer considers Muslims to be incapable of such self-control.

With this sort of 'thinking' and 'judgment' on our SCOTUS, we can have little confidence in it.

[fruser1]

If you hold up a pizza joint that bought ingredients from a company in another state, you can be prosecuted as a federal offender under the commerce clause (actually happened).

Using this same brilliant type of reasoning, yelling fire and burning korans are joined in that both acts involve flame.

[expatguy]

The Justice is devoid of logic and his sophomoric analogy makes absolutely no sense at all.

[JimSEA]

Once “hate speech” loses constitutional protection, the government controls what speech is allowed. No government can be permitted that kind of power unless, of course, you want a tyranny.

[StonyBurk]

My respect for Stephen Breyer is matched only for my respect for Imam Puking Dog. Neither one understands our US Constitution ,nor our way of life.I believe it was Breyer who told law students a few years back there is no way anybody can know what the founders intended when they wrote the Constitution. He said constitutionalists simply have no proof
that they represent what the framers of the Constitution meant. Puking dog thinks going to see the Giants play makes one a loyal citizen.

[StonyBurk]

Exactly how did Breyer vote on Texas v. Johnson—where the majority of the supreme Court said desecration of our flag was protected speech.Breyer and Colin Powell are a good match to defend Imam Puking Dog.

[nathanbedford]

“Holmes said it doesn’t mean you can shout 'fire' in a crowded theater,” Breyer told me. “Well, what is it? Why? Because people will be trampled to death. And what is the crowded theater today? What is the being trampled to death?”

Folks, This is how it works.

There is nothing in the Constitution that prohibits shouting "fire" in a crowded theater anymore than there is anything in the Constitution which requires a "wall of separation" between church and state. These are mere shibboleths elevated to Mosaic status and ultimately given the force of constitutional mandate.

Breyer is an indiscriminate shopper for rationalizations anywhere he can find them, and, alas, not limited to American origins either. Either there is a right to burn the Koran as a matter of free speech or there is not and that right comes or fails to come out of the Constitution, not out of throwaway lines even by those so venerated as Justice Holmes. By the way, Justice Holmes also said, "three generations of imbeciles is enough!" And then authorized the sterilization of alleged mental defectives.

We are in a place in America in which all of our institutions, especially our academic institutions, have combined to produce the likes of Justice Breyer. He is a very dangerous man, one who is temperamentally unfit for the Supreme Court. He is an egoist, or at least an egotist, of the most insidious sort, the kind who stalks us from within black robes and who presents a benign face to the world.

Damn your eyes Justice Breyer.

[hellbender]

Last week we saw a Florida Pastor – with 30 members in his church – threaten to burn Korans which lead to riots and killings in Afghanistan.

Bad grammar there, but come to think of it, I'm all in favor of burning those Korans, because they do cause riots and killings, not just in Afghanistan but all over the world.

[chris_bdba]

There should be a way to remove Justices from the court who say things that directly contradict the constitution.It is obivious that he is now too old to have any sense time to retire.