Invoking Christian belief to deny service to a gay couple is not a First Amendment right, nor is it a matter of artistic expression. It’s good old discrimination under a new mask.
pierre tristam
Notes From Underground
In Afghanistan, there may be up to 1,000 children in prison with a parent–not because they committed a crime, but because Afghan law permits their imprisonment with a criminal parent until the children turn 18.
Scott’s Arab-Baiting Over Jerusalem
Continuing to prepare for his Senate run, Gov. Rick Scott’s Jerusalem ploy is demeaning Palestinians in the occupied lands to appeal to Jews in South Florida. He learned the trick at Trump’s knee.
Fantasyland and the Liberal Delusion
Liberals’s hopes that the likes of Jeff Flake or Bob Corker in any way speak for today’s vanilla-white GOP is a refusal to concede that the Age of Trump is here to stay.
In Kristen Hadeed’s “Permission To Screw Up,” A Cheerful, Nimble Corrective To Millennial Stereotypes
FPC Graduate Kristen Hadeed’s first book traces the stumbles of her 10-year journey as CEO of Student Maid, a cleaning company in Gainesville, with wit and counter-intuitive insights: a review.
An Aryan Ass Vomits At UF
Protesting honors the flag, so does taking a knee during the anthem, but so does letting an idiotic white bigot have his 90 minutes on a stage at UF. Freedom of thought can take it.
Pride In “Our Country”? Count Me Out.
There’s no contending with a president who speaks of his pride in this country in serial tweets even as his every other pronouncement is a cleave, a slur, a boast, a lie or a disgrace.
Kim Jong-Trump
There is no pre-emptive military option against North Korea. None. No matter how much Korea “provokes.” There is only containment, and shutting up Donald Trump.
Trump Will Win In 2020
There’s nothing original in Donald Trump’s presidency when seen through Nixon-colored glasses, considering the similarities–and the invaluable help both got from Democrats to get elected.
Gov. Scott’s Emily Hysterics
Even Tropical Storm/Depression Emily cried foul at Gov. Scott’s, sleazy, opportunistic hyping of what was no more than an overheated summer storm: look at how fast she high-tailed it out of the state.
When a President’s Tweets Ape the Squeals of a Swine
Trump’s tweets, like his latest about Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough, are now like our so-beloved mass shootings. They happen. They’re decried. They’re forgotten. Until the next hurl.
Four Funerals and a Wedding
In the past couple of weeks we’ve had four mass funerals and a wedding. Each tells a story about what we’ve become in a world turned on its head. Honorable is the least of it.
Why Is the Palm Coast City Administration Treating 400 Employees Like Children?
Last week Palm Coast HRD Director Wendy Cullen sent a degrading email about bathrooms to 400 city employees. The email is reflective of a contemptuous, disconnected administration.
A Lifetime In One Picture
My Daughter Odysseus
FlaglerLive’s editor reflects on the painful and joyful history behind a moment unexpectedly captured by a photographer at his daughter’s graduation from Grinnell College last week.
Journal of the Plague Year
In the assisted-living Neverland that’s become our White House, all pretense of reality is giving way to the sort of sycophant fawning previously associated with the yes-men around North Korea’s or Egypt’s dictators.
Whiplash
Donald Trump is rewriting the rules of politics, of time and of the English language, but the resulting explosions are as false a dawn as those of nuclear blasts.
Not My President
Renouncing Donald Trump is the conservative thing to do if one’s allegiance is to the rule of law, to American democratic institutions, to unobstructed law enforcement and to transparency and accountability.
La Différence
France’s Answer To Trumpism: Non, Merci
Emmanuel Macron’s election as President of France Sunday repudiates angry, anti-democratic tribalism represented by Marine Le Pen and Donald Trump. But it’s only a qualified win.
Goons With Guns, Sheriff Edition
A Florida sheriff’s ISIS-like video warning to drug dealers and the brutalizing of Dr. David Dao on a United flight in the same week are no coincidence, but symptoms of a re-emerging authoritarianism.
Fatal Irresponsibility:
How Palm Coast Willfully Ignored Street Lights And Sidewalks For 10 Years
Palm Coast’s government’s claim that it didn’t have the money to build sidewalks and street lights is a cynical lie: as people died, the city put luxury ahead of necessity, from city hall to expensive beautification and plenty more.
The Legislature’s Mullahs Threaten
Religious Freedom in Florida Schools
The Florida Legislature is about to approve a bill that would give religion preferential treatment in public schools, destroying a balance between secular rights and already inviolate personal expression.
Flagler Tourism “Promotions” Slush Fund Jumps 76% in 3 Years, And We’re Counting Pennies For Beach Repairs?
Paying for critical repairs to Flagler County’s beaches is hostages to a tourism budget’s scandalous and unaccountable promotions spending, which the county administration wants to increase despite the emergency.
Ron DeSantis’s First Principle: Do Harm
Obamacare repealer Rep. Ron DeSantis, whose congressional district includes Flagler, has a solution for cancer patients without insurance: the emergency room. A few corrections are in order.
Jim Landon’s Fake News
Palm Coast Manager Jim Landon’s plans for a “scripted” weekly radio infomercial hosted by Mayor Milissa Holland demeans the mayor, the council and her listeners. If Holland is to do a show, it should be on her unscripted terms.
I Am An Enemy Combatant
The media has been the enemy since the earliest days of the Republic. But to be an enemy in America is what all of us at one point or another have been or will be. It is an American responsibility. It’s proof of our beloved American citizenship.
Protesters, True Patriots
Freedom for the thought we agree with is as cheap as a Facebook click on the like button. Freedom for the thought that we hate is what separate Americans from thuggery.
Trump’s Middle Finger to Muslims, and Law
The executive order Trump signed on Friday does the opposite of what it aims for: it belittles American law, projects a nation in cowardly fear, alienates its own Muslim communities and endangers our security.
President Fake
We’ve been worried about fake news from all the wrong places. The most promiscuous peddler of fake news is the president himself, Donald J. Trump. That’s dangerous for media, for America and for democracy.
You’ll Miss Him
At noon today the world ended as the sound of seven trumpets was replaced by the words “I, Donald John Trump…” Until then it was a fairly good run. An excellent run, in retrospect, considering what we’re losing.
Cops Aren’t Under Siege.
Civilians and Liberties Are.
It’s a widely accepted but dangerous myth: that cops are under siege, handcuffed by “new restrictions.” The reality is the opposite, with more unbridled and brutal policing than we care to admit.
It’ll Be Alt-Right
Donald Trump’s appointments and short-lists are pointing the way to an administration not much different than his campaign, suggesting there’s more wishful thinking than reality behind the hope that he’d surround himself with people saner than he is.
The Day After
Despite a liberal’s shellshock from a Trump presidency and the dreadful clarity of times ahead, this is no time to decamp or retreat–nor to deny in any way that he is our president.
Why I’m Voting Clinton, Unreservedly
It’s not out of fear of a Trump presidency, although there is that, but in a support of a too-long list of actual policy proposals that shatter the manufactured absurdity of Trump as a viable alternative.
Hillary Clinton May or May Not Have Raped a Child
The FBI director’s McCarthyist revelations of more Clinton emails will change the trajectory of the presidential race some even as it underscores the emptiness at the core of a manufactured scandal.
Panic: On the Prospect of a Trump Presidency
“I spent the past year making fun of Trump and taking it for granted that Hillary Clinton would demolish him. I didn’t take into account her fabulous skills for self-destruction or the country’s ripeness for mass delusion.”
The National Anthem’s False Notes
Blasphemous as it seems, Colin Kaepernick’s freedom to sit out the Star Spangled Banner is written in the anthem’s very words, though his tormentors are more disturbed by his message, which they would rather not hear.
Flagler’s Primary Results: Shocks, Coronations and Probabilities
There were one or two shocks in the Flagler primary election results, not least of them another dismal turnout, but for the most part the numebrs produced expected winners and losers. Here’s a full analysis.
Ransom Rubbish
Oliver North would have you believe that the Obama Administration paid a $400 million ransom to Iran in exchange for three Americans. His history and compass are off. Here’s a little reminder.
A Misuse of Copyrighted Material in the Sheriff’s Campaign
A mailer from the Rick Staly campaign used a portrait of John Lamb from Lamb’s Live Interview, without permission. Staly and Lamb are among the six Republican candidates running for sheriff.
The Suicide Candidate
Donald Trump will never win the presidency. He knows it and doesn’t want it. But that makes him more dangerous, not less. He’s a fanatic. He’s a suicide candidate. And we still have three months of rampage.
The Mostly Bogus Case Against Kimberle Weeks
Ex-Elections Supervisor Kimberle Weeks was the most combative, distasteful, deceptive and ethically suspect elected official in the county, but she did not break the law with most of the “secret” recordings she made, contrary to the laundry list of felony counts against her.
The Stupidity of Race:
What My DNA Test Reveals
Arab AND Jew? Greek? Italian? A DNA test unravels the ethnic origins of FlaglerLive Editor Pierre Tristam–and underscores the absurdity of making assumptions about anyone’s race, color or so-called origins.
As Exceptionally American As It Gets
Our mass shootings have developed their own set rituals and denials, none so lethal as the complicity with murder that blames the wrong targets while excusing guns.
Donald Trump’s Fascism and His Appeasers
Trump will fade. Trumpism may not. And the longer the Republican establishment is willing to appease him as a better alternative to Clinton, the more it legitimizes his racism as an acceptable American value.
Obama in Hiroshima:
The Shallowness of American Atonement
Paul Tibbets, who captained the Enola Gay to its mission over Hiroshima, proudly sold WMD memorabilia into his old age, and President Obama refused to apologize in what was the first visit by a sitting president to Hiroshima in 71 years.
Transgender Indecency
There were pragmatic ways to ensure access to bathrooms for transgender people until lawmakers hijacked the process with predatory bans that dehumanize people and make a mockery of decency.
A Right To Die, Even For 20-Somethings
The revelation that a 20-something woman chose to die from PTSD related so 10 years of sexual abuse tests the boundaries of assisted suicide, but not if context and compassion replace armchair judgments.
The Republican Responsibility to Reject Trump
Derision, racism, default and brutality are strange ways to go about making America great again. Let’s hope for the GOP’s sake and everyone else’s that Republicans have the clarity not to fall for Trump’s latest reality show.
Gateway Drug Bunk: No, Smoking Pot Doesn’t Lead to Harder Drugs
Smoke pot and be merry. Cops’ and politicians’ claims that pot is a gateway drug is baseless fear-mongering intended to stop the legalization of marijuana. But it’s time to dispense with the lie once and for all.
Flagler County Royalty:
The Trouble With Uncontested Elections
Property Appraiser Jay Gardner and Tax Collector Suzanne Johnston have no competition, Tom Bexley for clerk of court barely does: Good as they are at their jobs, it’s not good for Flagler or for the offices they represent.