[hchutch]

Can't stand these KKK goons. And I think I've heard of this judge before - a previous outrageous ruling.

[hchutch]

I've heard of this judge before, but I don't remember the specifics. Can someone fill me in on the details?

Quite frankly, the government ought not give these sheetheads the time of day.

[paul in cape]

Guest of Honor

[mhking]

Black conservative ping

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Extra warning: this is a high-volume ping list.

[dead]

The KKK are a bunch of morons, but a selectively-applied law banning masks is a crappy law.

[lds23]

They should probably also wear running shoes and have a pretty good escape route planned.

[Republic of Texas]

Is Al Sharpton going to wear his hair?

[Dog Gone]

I don't see why it's a bad ruling. Forget it's the Klan; how does the government justify a dress code for demonstrators that doesn't apply to anyone else?

[Cicero]

You either have to apply the law or not apply it.

The biggest annual public event in New York every year is not the St. Patrick's Day Parade but the annual Halloween parade. Are they about to tell a couple of million gay/lesbian/transgendered marchers and their friends that they can't wear masks?

[NativeNewYorker]

The law was originally placed on the books decades ago, when hooded goons roamed the streets and attacked people, escaping prosecution by avoiding identification. It wasn't a "speech" issue.

[Consort]

Hoods in the 'hood.

[Steve Eisenberg]

Norman Siegel, a civil rights attorney who pressed the case when he headed the New York Civil Liberties Union, said the ruling was significant because it upholds anonymous free speech.

I don't see what is so important about having a right to anonymous speech. I hardly think our founding fathers would have had any regard for such a right, or any expectation that the first amendment would be interpreted to protect those not manly enough to expose their identity.

Remember, for the first hundred years of U.S. history, letting your neighbors know your vote was a condition for being granted the privlege of voting. The reason the anonymous ballot was adopted was not at all for privacy, but rather for prevention of vote buying. The theory, hotly disputed in the nineteenth century, was that if the vote buyers could not really know if you voted as paid for, they would not bother buying your vote.

It doesn't make sense to petition the government for redress of a grievance if you don't have the courage to sign the petition.

[sheik yerbouty]

Robert Byrd probably wants to visit.

[gatex]

The BATF wears masks.

[Salman]

To think that these marginal morons were once a menace.

That KKK rally in New York was about 20 Klansmen surrounded by about 200 police with about 2000 counter-demonstrators (leftists with time on their hands). Also more police to keep the counter-demonstrators peaceful (they were).

I say let the KKK wear their masks, but make them pay for the extra police. And extra sanitation men for the litter left by the counter-demonstrators.

[betty boop]

He added that New York City engaged in viewpoint discrimination when it applied the law to the Klan but not to other groups in similar scenarios....

``No one disputes the fact that (the) plaintiff is a notorious racist organization, at least not this court,'' he wrote. ``The focus here, however, is on constitutional protections.''

I am very sorry, but IMHO there are absolutely no scenarios under which the federal judiciary is required to uphold and protect projects of organized hatred, designed to be acted upon.

The First Amendment does not protect perjury; it does not protect crying "Fire!" in a crowded building; it does not protect slander or defamation....

Therefore, certainly it cannot protect any person or group of people whose entire reason for being is to prosecute acts of hatred against other persons or groups of people.

Please note: I do not here argue for "hate speech" laws. What I DO argue for is basic, civilized standards of public custom and discourse.

People who wear hoods while perpetrating evil deeds hardly seem to fall within the zone of protection afforded by the Bill of Rights.

FWIW, IMHO.