Englewood Cliffs: Weinberg’s double-standard on public assembly
/By Rubashov
How you play the game does matter. Everybody respects the law when it is applied equally, to everyone. We don’t know how Loretta Weinberg, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, and Gordon M. Johnson were raised as children, but we doubt their parents taught them to break the rules, to be unfair, and to win at all costs. We don’t think their parents counseled them that “all is fair” in pursuit of what you feel is “right”.
Lawyers don’t kneecap opposing counsel in advance of trial. Not yet, anyway.
When taxpayer advocate Bill Hayden was denied a permit to exercise his right to peaceably assemble in accordance with the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights, we don’t recall a peep out of state legislators Loretta Weinberg, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, and Gordon M. Johnson. Was that because Hayden is a conservative Republican and those legislators are left-of-center Democrats?
We hesitate to call them “liberals” because true liberals behave as liberals and understand the fair application of the law – to everyone, equally.Loretta Weinberg, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, and Gordon M. Johnson strike us as too partisan, too close-minded, and too unfeeling to be called liberals. Where a liberal sees a fellow human being, wayward perhaps, but a person deserving of human compassion, they appear to see only an enemy, needing to be crushed to death.
In contrast with Bill Hayden, when young Emily Gil wished to organize a protest on behalf of the Black Lives Matter movement, she was given a permit to exercise her right to peaceably assemble in accordance with the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights. It was provided to her despite the fact that many protests by the movement she claimed to represent – Black Lives Matter – have turned violent (and there are many millions of dollars in insurance claims – as well as video – to prove this). This is how it should be. To our knowledge, young Emily has lived a blameless life and should not be held to account for what others in the BLM movement may or may not have done.
Of course, given the violence and destruction accompanying many of these protests, the elected local government of Englewood Cliffs, the site young Emily selected for her BLM protest, decided to ensure the safety of those who elected them, by increasing a police presence for the protest. This step not only protected the lives and property of the town’s citizens, but also protected both the BLM protestors and anyone exercising their First Amendment rights to protest against them. We have all seen the clashes that have occurred at some of these protests.
Loretta Weinberg knows all about government taking such preventative measures. When she visits the State of Israel, as a VIP, Weinberg is afforded extra security in the form of several Israeli Defense Force soldiers armed with fully-automatic assault weapons.
The need for this police presence added an unforeseen cost to the elected local government. It is a cost that must be paid because – just like Loretta Weinberg, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, and Gordon M. Johnson – those providing security for this protest do not work for free. They appreciate a payday every bit as much as our three legislators do. And when you look at what some police officers must put up with at these protests, you get the feeling they’ve earned the money.
The question is: Who should pay for this?
Should the person organizing the protest pay for the unforeseen costs of the event she asked to have? Or should the taxpayers of Englewood Cliffs – the property taxpayers – be made to pick up the costs?
Is this any different from the added costs related to any other public event that would require an increased police presence or public works presence to clean up afterwards? Will street fairs now argue that the taxpayers should take the costs because theirs is a kind of “performance art” – free expression, covered by the First Amendment?
These are questions for the Legislature, who could pass a law defining the appropriate costs related to peaceable assemblies – ALL PEACEABLE ASSEMBLIES – covered under the First Amendment. If such costs to local government, ultimately borne by taxpayers, should be ruled an unfunded mandate, then the Legislature would be obliged to make a financial provision in the state budget for such.Of course, this would require that Loretta Weinberg, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, and Gordon M. Johnson conduct themselves like liberals. They would need to be open-minded and fair in creating rules by which all citizens could exercise their right to peaceably assemble, while addressing the added costs to local taxpayers that such assemblies inevitably incur.
But Loretta Weinberg, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, and Gordon M. Johnson did not respond like liberals. They behaved very differently indeed.
Writing in NorthJersey.com, journalist Katie Sobko was able to extract from the legislators this rather irrational reaction, bordering on hysteria. Sobko wrote:
State legislators have called for an investigation into the practices in Englewood Cliffs, after 18-year-old Emily Gil received a $2,500 bill for organizing a Black Lives Matter protest in town earlier this summer.
Senator Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg, Assemblywoman Valerie Vainieri Huttle and Assemblyman Gordon M. Johnson expressed their outrage about Mayor Mario Kranjac’s decision to charge Gil for police overtime at the July 25 event.
“We were outraged to learn about the treatment of a young Englewood Cliffs resident by her own Mayor and Administration,” their statement said. “Students like Emily Gil should be celebrated and not be threatened with a bill for $2,500 by her own local community for speaking out against racism and bigotry.”
They called for a review by the ACLU to review the constitutionality of this “outrageous decision and to step in to protect Emily's rights if necessary.”
A request for comment from the ACLU was not immediately returned.
Yeah… but after you get done “celebrating” who gets the bill? The same taxpayers who you just increased tolls and taxes on? In the middle of a pandemic? With historic levels of unemployment and underemployment, foreclosure and homelessness, food pantry dependency and child hunger?Theirs isn’t a liberal response, because these legislators aren’t liberals. They are winner-takes-all, ends-justify-the-means, break-a-few-eggs leftists. Not afraid to incorporate some tactical fascism into their approach. Maoists maybe… but definitely not American liberals.
What is genuinely sad about a legislator as powerful as Loretta Weinberg calling for an “investigation” into so small a matter is that she’s one of those legislators blocking an investigation into the deaths of 7,000 New Jersey residents in the state’s nursing and veterans homes.
Perhaps when Loretta Weinberg, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, and Gordon M. Johnson stop blocking that investigation – to allow the families of those 7,000 dead victims to know why their loved ones died – perhaps then you can hold your investigation into this matter of $2,500.
7,000 DEAD VICTIMS… Say their names!
Better hurry, because it looks like Loretta Weinberg, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, and Gordon M. Johnson want to cover those deaths up. Move along, nothing happened here, sure 7,000 people died… but what’s that when compared to a bill for $2,500?
Why don’t these legislators just chip-in and pay young Emily? If you really believe in the BLM movement, why not put your money where your mouths are? Afterall, how many $2,500 checks have Loretta Weinberg, Valerie Vainieri Huttle, and Gordon M. Johnson trousered? Dozens? Hundreds? How many were little more than legal bribes?
Instead of demanding that property taxpayers pay – why not part with a little bit of the money you’ve trousered? Help out young Emily. Show that your support for her is more than just words. Give the taxpayers a break. PAY THE BILL.
You can afford it. Someone gave you the money for free (unless it was a bribe).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tu32CCA_Ig
“The preferences of the average American appear to have only a miniscule, near zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.”(Princeton University Study, Represent.Us)
