Bob Kearns, president of the Loma Linda Homeowners Association, says a resident of his neighborhood can’t put a Christmas wreath that incorporates a peace sign on her door. Why? Well, explains Mr. Kearns, “Some people have kids in Iraq, and they are sensitive.” Also, he says, the peace sign is possibly Satanic. Plus, the peace sign “can be considered divisive.”
Apparently, this is the new free speech: you can say whatever you like, unless some people are sensitive, or it might be Satanic, or if it can be considered divisive. “I like the color red” doesn’t qualify under this new conception of American liberty.
But wait, it gets better. A committee reviewing Mr. Kearns’ decision unanimously rejected his edict, so what did he do? Yep, he fired the whole committee and forged right on ahead. Bob Kearns has brought the Bush-Cheney theory of the unitary executive home to Colorado.
Mr. Kearns finishes with this argument: “If you let one go up you have to let them all go up.” Well, yes. That would be the idea. It would be, except that the woman with a peace sign lives in a subdivision with a covenant, a covenant that she signed when she bought the house. At the individual level, we can ask this woman why she would want to live in a neighborhood in which people have to submit their free speech for review. But at the structural level, the spread of these covenant neighborhoods makes it increasingly difficult for people to live in spaces where their freedom is intact.
i can hardly wait for the stahh of the “daily show” to descend on this small town. mr. kearns will be a laughing stock in his rural home. if this were to happen i believe his tenure as association president will be short lived.
My money is on the homeowner, Lisa Jensen. The -sen name ending is usually Danish, but sometimes Norwegian, which would be even more ominous, if you have read your Saga literature. A person with a name like this is usually pig-headed and you can’t tell them anything. I once knew two Norwegians who carried on a feud for 75 years–continuing for 15 years after one of them died.
See? She’s nothing but a troublemaker. He doesn’t understand what he is in for.