Harvard Professor Alan Dershowitz appears to be living through a remake of the Seinfeld Soup Nazi episode. However, Dershowitz is facing a new culinary menace in Martha’s Vineyard. Chef Krem Miskevich has barred the famed lawyer from buying pierogis because of his political views . . . and liberals are applauding him for it. Welcome to Pierogi Politics, it is the same distasteful politics that is tearing apart this country . . . only with an added carbo load.
Dershowitz has previously described how his liberal neighbors, who were friendly when he was advancing liberal causes, have blacklisted him in the elite community due to his defense of Donald Trump. He is treated as a persona non grata and shunned by the wealthy community.
Now the blacklisting has extended to food. Dershowitz would regularly go to the West Tisbury Farmers Market and buy food from the Good Pierogi. Then Miskevich decided to join the mob and bar him from eating.
Miskevich (who goes by pronouns “they” and “them”) also accused Dershowitz of misgendering by referring to “him” in passing (Dershowitz said that he would happily use his preferred pronouns). However, Miskevich admits it is his political and legal views that led him to blacklist the professor.
Dershowitz is now pursuing legal action against the West Tisbury Farmers Marketand posted a statement on his YouTube channel last week, stating “He didn’t approve of my politics so he wouldn’t serve me.”
Dershowitz suggested that the initial rejection may have been due to his wearing a pro-Jewish T-shirt. In his initial encounter, he had reminded the vendor that Massachusetts law prohibits refusing service based on race, religion or sexual orientation: “You couldn’t say I don’t serve black people, you couldn’t say I don’t serve gay people, you couldn’t say I don’t serve Jews.”
The police were called in the incident and led Dershowitz away.
“When he came to our booth, I experienced a surge of emotion. As a chef, I love to share what I cook with the public, regardless of who they are. In this case, what was in the forefront of my mind was the fact that this was the high-profile attorney who represented several sexual predators and abusers including Jeffrey Epstein.”
Dershowitz is entirely in the right here, and the treatment that he received was outrageous. What is chilling is how hate is now celebrated on the left as a perverse type of virtue signaling.
We have seen how the left has embraced blacklisting, an abuse that was once associated with the McCarthy period. In 1950, columnist and civil libertarian Max Lerner penned a chilling prediction in the New York Post about the Red Scare: “There is a hate layer of opinion and emotion in America. There will be other McCarthys to come who will be hailed as its heroes.”
It turns out it would come from the left. From the start of the first Trump Administration, restaurants refused to serve well-known Republicans and their families.
Calls for blacklisting have come from city councils to public interest groups. Others called for banning those “complicit” from college campuses, while still others demanded a “Truth and Reconciliation Commission” to “hold Trump and his enablers accountable for the crimes they have committed.” Daily Beast editor-at-large Rick Wilson added his own call for “humiliation,” “incarceration,” and even ritualistic suicides for Trump supporters in an unhinged, vulgar column.
Writers and editors have joined blacklisting efforts targeting Trump supporters, conservative justices, and authors like JK Rowling for their political views. It is all part of the Orwellian logic of the left, intolerance in the name of tolerance, blacklisting in the name of free speech.
We have also seen lawyers increasingly targeted by the left for their clients, a tactic once used against liberal lawyers representing unpopular criminal or civil clients. That includes the successful targeting of a Harvard professor for representing Weinstein. Many leading lawyers helped fund the Lincoln Project in its national effort to harass and abuse any lawyers representing the Republican party or President Trump.
This week, President Trump even had to sign an executive order to deter “debanking” where financial institutions discriminate on the basis of political or religious views.
Now, back to Dershowitz. Liberals are applauding the denial of food to people who do not share their political views. Indeed, Miskevich is parading and posturing like the MLK of Martha’s Vineyard for joining the mob against a single, unpopular neighbor. Instead of treating food as a basis for shared dialogue and exchange, Miskevich wants to weaponize it to use against those who dare to hold opposing views.
What is particularly striking is how these are many of the same people who insisted that a Colorado baker should be required to make cakes that violate the owner’s religious and free speech rights. In Masterpiece Cakeshop and later cases like 303 Creative, the left hounded business owners for refusing to sell products that celebrated same-sex marriages. They were outraged that such denials are hateful and intolerant.
However, in Masterpiece Cakeshop, the owner insisted that he would sell cakes to same-sex couples and anyone else coming into his store. He only drew the line at preparing cakes expressly celebrating same-sex marriages as an expressive act that violated his core beliefs.
In this case, Miskevich is refusing to sell pre-made pierogi based on a political litmus test. It is not clear that this violates the law, but it is wrong. If Dershowitz asked Miskevich to cater a pierogi-based party in celebration of Trump, I would support his right to decline as a matter of free speech given his dislike for conservatives. However, this is the denial of service for pre-made pierogis based on viewpoint discrimination.
There is little doubt that Miskevich will haul in customers by pandering to the mob. The only thing that is more enticing today than the love for good food is the hate for opposing views. The problem is that feeding on hate will never satiate people; they simply want more servings. That insatiable appetite is destroying this country and now Miskevich is contributing to it one pierogi at a time.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro professor of public interest law at George Washington University and the author of the best-selling book “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage.“
This column appeared on Fox.com
“Dershowitz denied food in Martha’s Vineyard”
Now you get the power of “PRIVATE PROPERTY.”
Only the owner of the private property restaurant has the power to “claim and exercise” dominion.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
“[Private property is] that dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in exclusion of every other individual.”
– James Madison
_____________________
A very large part of the “legislated” welfare state is unconstitutional precisely because it denies private property—the rest of the welfare state is unconstitutional because there is no enumerated power to tax for, fund, or regulate it in Article 1, Section 8.
The 5th Amendment right to private property is self-qualified by the “Takings Clause” and is not subject to further qualification, making it absolute.
Only the owner of the restaurant may determine whom he will serve, what to serve, whom to hire and fire, prices, wages, hours, design and construction of the structure, etc., ad infinitum, in exclusion of every other individual.
The essence of America is freedom, and the essence of freedom is private property.
The proof is in the pudding: The essence of communism is the abolition of private property.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________
“In one word, you reproach us with intending to do away with your property. Precisely so: that is just what we intend.”
– Karl Marx, The Communist Manifesto
Private party is not out of the reach of civil rights and anti-discrimination laws.
“It’s the [law], stupid!”
– James Carville
___________________
You just don’t get what it means to be an American under the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
Civil rights and anti-discrimination laws are irrefutably unconstitutional.
The singular American failure is the judicial branch, with emphasis on the Supreme Court.
Judges and justices swore an oath to support the literal verbatim Constitution, not to amend or modify it or amend or modify it by “interpretation.”
The inflection point for American freedom was secession, which may have never been denied and which was included in the constitutional ratification documents of multiple states.
It’s been all down hill for American fundamental law ever since.
Reprehensible slavery must have and should have been abrogated by state legislatures and Congress.
*. Moral dilemmas are constructed to force people into crime or sin. “Sophie’s Choice” was a Nazi such effort. Choose which child shall die. Sophie should not have chosen but let them shoot her or all three. Then would she have been guilty of causing 3 deaths instead of one? No, she was not complicit.
Part of winning is picking one’s battles. I think that chef Krem Miskevich has, by denying service to law Prof. Alan Dershowitz, has picked the wrong battle. It will be entertaining for the rest of us but I think expensive for the chef. I’m afraid that he is cooked. He should have just stewed in his own juices.
By the way, I recall growing up in the South where it was not uncommon to see signs outside of restaurants proclaiming, “We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone.” We avoided those places but I still have a sharp negative reaction to anyone who proclaims that “right”. In my non-legal mind, refusal of service should be tailored pretty narrowly to an unacceptable behavior or some non-commodity, bespoke order.
5th Amendment
No person shall be…deprived of…property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
“[Private property is] that dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in exclusion of every other individual.”
– James Madison
Dear Prof Turley,
I wouldn’t treat a dog like that.
First of all, I’m entirely confident the ‘good Pierogi’ is not refusing business with the Whirling Dershowitz on the basis of any race, religion or sexual orientation (assuming Dershowitz has a sexual orientation.). I’d bet dollars to dumplings the good Pierogi is Jew-ish.
Clearly, Dershowitz’s claim that he was denied service because he is a ‘Jew’ – a religious connotation – is without merit. If the glove doesn’t fit, you have to acquit.
Secondly, refusal of service is not, necessarily, a sign of unreasoned, blind hate-fulness. .. much less a new ‘Red Scare’ ala Sen. Joe McCarthy.
*special note. the present ‘Red Scare’ is propagated by incessant ‘fake news’ U.S. media reports on U.S./Nato military involvement in Ukraine circa 2014 coup .. . and continues under Trump, more or less (hopefully less).
I suspect the good Pierogi vendor’s distaste (no pun) for the Whirling Dershowitz stems from his unseemly relationship with Epstein – both personal and professional – and Dershowitz’s untrammeled support for Israel’s atrocities in Gaza, first and foremost.
Iow, criticism of Israel is not the same thing as criticism of ‘Jews’. .. especially the Whirling Dershowitz!
*he suffers for his soup .. .
“criticism of Israel is not the same thing as criticism of ‘Jews’”
Yeah right. Anti-zionist, anti-semite, anti-Israel, it’s all the same thing, just you leftists are trying to sound a little higher-browed now that you’ve been caught out with your hatred.
*. He intends to have a win establishing political speech as protected as it already is. Equal protection doesn’t frighten him.
““When he came to our booth, I experienced a surge of emotion. As a chef, I love to share what I cook with the public, regardless of who they are. In this case, what was in the forefront of my mind was the fact that this was the high-profile attorney who represented several sexual predators and abusers including Jeffrey Epstein.”
Something tells me he’d have welcomed Hillary with open arms despite her having represented several sexual predators and abusers including a child rapist (which she laughed about getting off).
What about John Adams, who represented Redcoats of the Boston Massacre?
Did John Adams laugh about the victims afterward? Right.
No credibility serial liar George apparently thinks that a few days away would make all of us forget his constant lying and prevarication. Hey George, when you lied and said that Maxwell testified under oath in open court, and was convicted of perjury, why did you keep doubling down and lie even more to cover that first lie? Are you even capable of telling the truth?
Typical leftist hatefulness. I’ve experienced it my whole life. Besides being consistently wrong on every issue, they’re miserable human beings.
I love pierogi’s, but I love Alan Dersowitch even more.
What’s next? Not letting Jews in swimming pools?
——————————
July 27, 1938
National Socialist German Workers’ Party
Kreisleitung of Greater Frankfurt am Main
To:
The Lord Mayor
Of the City of Frankfurt am Main
Frankfurt a. M.
Subject: “Jewish Bathing Area” in Niederrad
Complaints from the population are multiplying day by day concerning use by Jews of the Niederrad bathing area. In particular, the inhabitants of Niederrad and of those parts of the city near the bathing area complain that they are being forced to go a relatively long way when they want to swim, because the bathing areas near them are continually being used by Jews. Moreover, on warm days the trams to and from Niederrad are so full of Jews that it often results in unpleasant incidents. With regard to the fact that the bathing facilities here are not adequate for the German population, it is no longer acceptable that the Jews should have a bathing area at their disposal. I therefore request that Jews be forbidden to use the Niederrad bathing area as soon as possible.
I would therefore ask you to ban Jews from the Niederrad bathing area as soon as possible.
Please be so kind as to inform me of the measures you have taken.
Heil Hitler
“Complaints from the population are multiplying day by day…”
– Frankfort Mayor
_____________________
We will not take complaints from the population.
The population will do precisely what it is told to do.
Wait. What about freedom of speech, press, assembly et al.—freedom of THOUGHT, CHOICE, and DISTINGUISHABILITY must be in there somewhere, right, comrade?
You don’t suppose American freedom means people have no right to their own opinions and are subject to dictatorship, do you?
Thank you DJT…
“[Trump] awakened a lot of people to the issues we’ve been raising for years,” said Oklahoma resident and neo-Nazi Dalton Henry Stout. “He’s the best thing that’s happened to us.”
“Thank you DJT…”
And yet David Duke endorsed Jill Stein, who is decidedly on the left side of the spectrum. Maybe he’s smarter than this clown to knowing where the anti-semites and racists reside on the political spectrum these days.
And Ku Klux Klan Grand Dragon Will Quigg endorsed Hillary Clinton during the 2016 Presidential election.
“It’s the [law], stupid!”
– James Carville
___________________
Naturalization Acts of 1790, 1795, 1798, 1802
United States Congress, “An act to establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization,” March 26, 1790
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, That any Alien being a free white person, who shall have resided within the limits and under the jurisdiction of the United States for the term of two years, may be admitted to become a citizen thereof….
January 1, 1863—The greatest high criminal act of illegal immigration in U.S. history, followed by Biden/Harris’s four-year open borders.
Res Res Est says: Civil Rights v States’ Rights v 1A.
A. You should be allowed to refuse service to anyone for any reason, but is this allowing to yell, “FIRE” in a crowded theatre?
B. Which is Supreme – The several states or the Feds?
Both A & B have decided 1A, but poorly. Now, we are “paying the piper” for judiciary cowardice and Constitutional Liberalism.
Good article. Good comments. For me, it’s the location of this event, Martha’s Vineyard, the home to some of the wealthiest and most tolerant liberals in Massachusetts. They have a small record here. Of course denial of pierogi sales to a Jew is the most recent. Another is that just couple of years ago, these good citizens arranged the re-transfer of illegal aliens from their “sanctuary.” Different kinds of sanctuary location for Democrats depend on wealth.
Zebras have different stripes; whereas Democrats have the same, they are all character assassins.
Boston has lost its memory: they burned witches at the stake oh so many years ago!
George W
key issue: refusal to sell PREPARED food/products in a PUBLIC setting/venue is illegal.
All the rest is political posturing: boycotts, defense of conservatives, predators, free speech, antisemitism,etc.
The vendor claims reason for denial is Dershowitz’s defense of Epstein, sexual predation/abuse,pedophilia. Deshowitz claims that vendor is antisemitic based on participation in a protest against a local Jewish culture event where the speaker was an IDF supporter and Zionist. Dershowitz confronted vendor with this on camera and video and vendor appeared not to respond. Reponsible journalism woukd call for examination and clarity of ALL the l facts.
Suggest more critical thinking on legal issues and not political opinions.
The vendors are members of the alphabet cult, LGBTQ+eieio who are known as the number one pedophiles in the world. The vendors hate Jews but they love grooming children to do the nasty
Can you back that claim up with actual facts?
Or has DJT taught you that facts are what you believe?
“Or has DJT taught you that facts are what you believe?”
“Facts” like men can become women? Move along, you have no credibility here you cultist.
The Left is complete, total scum. If they get the opportunity, they would gladly jail you for a made up crime. If they can’t do that, they’re happy to take all your stuff. They’ll support domestic terror groups, gang members, illegal aliens, anyone. They don’t care. They’re not even trying to hide it any longer. We are not going to vote these people into a neat little box.
Blacklisting is an exercise of free speech. Turley doesn’t like it because in this situation it’s targeting conservatives. Blacklisting is no different than a boycott.
Businesses can blacklist people for many reasons except those specifically mentioned in law. Political views is not one of them. Ironcially Trump blacklisted the Associated Press becasuse they refused to call the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America. Where was Turley’s criticism?
A lot of things wrong with those assertions to unpack there, but the Gulf of America is on a map. It isn’t a person requesting something from a business entity. If some media entity refuses to acknowledge this is the United States, and decides to call it something else, say Southern Canada, in it’s publications, then the appropriate response is to excise them from public participation in closed events requiring the permission of the authority of, or agents thereof, the United States to attend.
Big difference.
——————————————
–Oddball
“Take it easy Big Joe, some of these people got sensitive feelings.”
Almost all blacklisting, esp the serious stuff, is done by the Left. De-banking, refusing to do any business with lawyers that worked for Trump, attempting to disbar said lawyers, and on and on.
How dare you be logical? Something has happen to Prof Turley. He used to be able to understand both sides of issues. But – like many other Republicans – since Trump has been exposed as a complete fraud, Turley has doubled down on his defense of him.
Exclusion is the little guy’s way of having an impact. As I read Turley’s article I just kept flashing back on the video I saw of ICE arresting a grandma in military dress, too cowardly to show their faces. Not a peep from Turley on this. How can a citizen lodge a complaint against an anonymous officer covered from head to toe like a woman in Afghanistan? Crickets. But Turley hops to the defense of another multi-billionaire Epstein buddy,
We should make criminals of the political variety and the uberwealthy feel unwelcome everywhere. We should make them deeply uncool. And if they are a little scared of the people they put out of work – as well as their own disgusted sons and daughters – well, what do they expect?
“How dare you be logical? Something has happen to Prof Turley. He used to be able to understand both sides of issues. But – like many other Republicans – since Trump has been exposed as a complete fraud, Turley has doubled down on his defense of him.”
Stop white knighting for serial liar George. Also, Turley’s a Democrat you nimrod. Way to use friendly fire on your own people.
George, are you ready to give us that sweet Maxwell testimony, in which you claimed that she lied under oath, and was convicted of perjury? Perhaps you can finally just define perjury for us? George, why would anyone here listen to anything that a serial liar like you has to say?
That is exactly the kind of Orwellian reasoning Turley mention. A boycott is used against a product or establishment but the product is still available for purchase and customers can still go to the establishment being boycotted. When you blacklist a person his or her opinions are cancelled and their entire lives are disrupted with potential loss of employment (ie the Hollywood 10)
georgie doesn;t seem to get the difference between a private person or persons blacklisting other persons or businesses, and blacklisting official governmental action or policy. It is OK to speak out a against renaming the Gulf, but you cannot spread a lie by officially pretending to the public that its name is still Gulf of Mexico. clown georgie.
A major difference between the left’s blacklisting – which everyone with any historical knowledge knows was part of their modus operandi from the very beginning, starting with the vicious infighting between factions in the various internationals and communist parties before they came to power – and the right’s blacklisting is two-fold:
1. the communists being blacklisted really were all about subverting the American republic in favor of communism; and
2. they weren’t so much being blacklisted for having been communists, but for not coming clean and testifying about other communists.
I always thought the right’s blacklisting was ill-advised. The left’s blacklisting is actually much worse.
A small correction a native Chicagoan should be aware of ;-): ‘pierogi’ is plural, but it’s ‘one pieróg at a time.’. Bon appetit!
National Pierogi Day in the USA is observed annually on October 8th.
It’s a day to celebrate the delicious Polish dumplings known as pierogi. The day encourages people to enjoy these savory or sweet treats, participate in pierogi-related events, and learn more about the dish’s cultural significance.
Chicagoan Honorable Mention: “National Potato Pancake Day”
While there isn’t a distinct “National Potato Pancake Day,” you can celebrate the dish on either National Pancake Day or National Potato Day.
National Pancake Day (September 26th): This day celebrates all kinds of pancakes, including potato pancakes.
National Potato Day (August 19th): This day recognizes the versatility and culinary significance of potatoes in general, making it an opportune time to celebrate the ingredient found in potato pancakes.
National Potato Day (August 19th)
National Pancake Day (September 26th)
National Pierogi Day (October 8th)
Professor Turley is wrong about blacklisting. I inow the professor is a staunch supporter of free speech. Blacklisting is free speech. It’s no different that a boycott. A private business who chooses to blacklist for political reasons is protected under the 1st amendment. Dershowitz is free to express his views and opinions. The downside is they are also subject to consequences.
We can debate the absurdities of what the left does all day long, but that achieves nothing. The problem isn’t the laws, per se, it is how 2 separate and mutually exclusive societies view the laws and there in lies our problem.
At this point in our nation’s evolution we have created 2 separate schools of thought that are in, and will continue to be in, direct opposition to each other’s world views. There is no “coexist” solution to this any more than there is a solution to the inbred animus that islamists have for the infidel. One side, only, will prevail ultimately and it is our business to enlighten as many to make the most logical choice.
Unfortunately, we have allowed our media/education industry to indoctrinate/blind many to the truths of socialism/multiculturalism and they are predestined to be obstinate deniers to the unfortunate truth that there is no free ride anywhere and eventually they will, as Margaret Thatcher so glibly stated, that socialism works until you run out of other people’s money.
Our only hope is that centers of unbridled socialism/communism will shortly run out of other people’s money and we will, hopefully, still have a conservative federal government that will not help them crawl out of their mess but allow them and their constituents to wallow in the disaster that follows the collapse of socialism.
*. Well said, whims
Imagine it is 2021 and a liberal black guy walked into a bakery with a Biden hat on and the owner tossed him out. Now, does anyone not think that Biden and Garland’s DOJ wouldn’t have claimed a civil rights violation because the guy was black?
In today’s America, or Doublestandardstan as I call it, we have people being sent to prison for praying in front of an abortion clinic while a pro-life lunatic beats up, pummels actually, a man in his 70s and a man in his 80s for being pro-life…and he gets HOME CONFINEMENT! I am so damn sick of these double standards.
In another example we have a mob of about 10 black people almost killing a white guy and knocking out a white woman and the city council is mad that the white duo didn’t get arrested. They seriously claim that the white guy was using the N word at the mob. Now use your God given judgment and ask yourself if it is believable that an older white guy would start calling a mob of young black guys the n word. Ask yourself if you can ever imagine a white guy being surrounded by black guys and deciding to attack them. Plus the mayor and the police chief blamed “social media” for the fact that a mob of black guys beat the p*ss out of two white people and everyone standing around FILMED IT rather than call 911.
I guess I
Missed this ⬆️⬆️⬆️, do you have a link?
It happened in Cincinnati at a Jazz Fest. The woman (white) was seriously injured. We’ll see if there are consequences but so far the guys who beat them up are out of jail for a few hundred dollar bond posting. FYI they absconded as far away as GA.
*. Holly has given interviews. What happened to the man?
I don’t know how to do links, sorry. But these two stories have been everywhere so if you really want to see them just turn of ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC and CNN and stop reading the NY Times, WAPO, LA Times and the Boston Globe.
There are numerous print and video reports, including:
https://youtu.be/bZp4c_wQGkw?si=Us4wap28qk2ZUf1l
https://youtu.be/-8QWS0rBw1Q?si=NnZbml0utWRSXU38