The Washington Post's Alexandra Petri turns the Christofascists' Roe argument back on itself in the case of Kavanaugh v. Having My Cake and Eating It Too:
“Politics, regardless of your side or views, should not trample the freedom at play of the right to congregate and eat dinner. There is a time and place for everything. Disturbing the dinner of all of our customers was an act of selfishness and void of decency.” — Statement from Morton’s, after protesters gathered outside the D.C. steakhouse while Supreme Court Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh ate there.
Oh, this is embarrassing! The right to congregate and eat dinner is actually not to be found anywhere in the Constitution. I have been studying the Constitution very carefully, including the emanations of the penumbras, and I can see why people might think there was some inherent right to dinner. Eating seems so fundamental: Whether or not you want to have steak inside yourself seems like something you ought to be able to determine on your own behalf. Eating and chewing, alone or in the company of others, feels as though it ought to be up to the person most affected, and protected from abridgment of any kind, even by the states. [snip]
[Kavanaugh] might want his old freedom back, or ask for someone to escort him through the gantlet of protesters who want him to feel bad about his choices, which after all don’t affect anyone other than millions of people whose lives are going to be fundamentally changed and whom he is consigning to a status lower than that of full person with the bodily autonomy and right to direct their lives that this entails.
He might say, “This is a horrible constraint to put on me! I am just trying to live my life, with my family, according to my own lights! I just want to have dinner, like a person!” And I sympathize! I would love to find that this was a right. But there is no right, however seemingly basic, that cannot vanish away like a ghostly mist the second someone remembers that there might be a medieval text, somewhere, out there that disagrees. And the Bible. And the beans. I’m sorry! My hands are tied.
You'd be surprised how many rights are not specified in the 18th and 19th century Constitution (but we're about to find out). In the meantime, bon appetit, Kavanaugh!
BONUS: Bingo --
A reminder that SCOTUS struck down a MA law that created buffer zones around clinics to protect people from angry protestors. Scalia: "Protecting ppl from speech they don't want to hear is not a function of the 1st Amendment." https://t.co/XrTS1cYDUW
— Celeste Headlee (@CelesteHeadlee) July 8, 2022
