their beliefs. we don t know the outcome yet of the website case. my hunch is that the court is going to distinguish between service and speech. in other words, the baker, the website developer, the florist will be treated like artists who speak through their work and, therefore, are allowed to refuse business or service. the guy who delivers the tables and chairs to the wedding, not so much. my own view is if you re a baker of wedding cakes, it s your responsibility, your obligation to bake a cake for all wedding couples. same with the wedding website designer or the farmist, for that matter, who has call s about distributing birth control. you signed up for the gig. you cannot now stand behind your religion as a shield when you discriminate. instead, maybe you need a career change. i see the hockey player differently. provorov was hired to play hockey. i personally wish he had skated with the pride night jersey.
in not doing so, unlike the baker, unlike the website developer, he s not discriminating against everybody. he s not denying service. i think we need to distinguish between discriminatory acts and discriminatory beliefs. provorov is free to think what he wants and should not be compelled to wear a hockey jersey with a political viewpoint that he finds objectionable. now, if he takes up baking or website design in his retirement, that will be a different story. still to come, we just hit the debt ceiling again at $31.4 trillion. that has parked a battle between the republican-controlled house and the white house and congressman george santos has made a name for himself by making bigger and bigger lies about himself, begging the question what exactly is a path logical liar? i want to remind you, answer this week s poll question at smerconish.com, please sign up for the daily news letter while you re there. the website question is this
an nhl defenseman under fire because he s uncomfortable with those who play for the other team. did he deserve to be benched? ivan proef vovorov plays for th philadelphia flyers. when the flyers took the ice before the game, players were wearing lgbtq pride night warmup jerseys and using sticks wrapped in rainbow tape. provorov cited his russian orthodox faith and stayed in the locker room. its patriarch has a close association and friendship with vladimir putin. the church maintains homosexuality is a sin. the patriarch has used homosexuality as a justification for the russian invasion of ukraine. after this game, provorov was asked about his decision. i respect everybody.
to hell. yes, he should have been benched. to give you a sense of the widespread public fallout on this issue, some have even hurled nasty comments at the instagram page of the adorable golden retriever belonging to provorov. she felt compelled to post this is a dog s page. please stop sending me hateful messages. as is often the case, the facts are straightforward, but the issues a little bit complicated. it has echoes in several recent cases that have reached the united states supreme court. you ll remember that in december the court heard the case of a devout christian website designer from colorado who didn t want to make a website for a same sex wedding, notwithstanding that she had not even been asked to do so, with i is similar to another colorado case, the baker who didn t want to bake the wedding cake for the same sex couple who the court ruled in favor of by a 7-2 margin. the website designer is challenging a colorado public
The NHL was supposed to be celebrating people living out their truth on pride night but when Flyers' defensemen Ivan Provorov tried to live out his, he was attacked. “Pride Night wasn’t a celebration of tolerance and inclusion. It was a celebration of conformity.”