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Nick Gillespie Discusses ADA Lawsuit Abuse w/ Varney & Co.

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 00:00:00 EDT

Reason's Nick Gillespie appeared on Fox Business' Varney & Co. to discuss the coming spike in lawsuit abuse due to latest ADA requirement for hotels and recreation centers. Airdate: April 17, 2012.

About 3 minutes

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Victory at San Tan Flat!

Thu, 15 May 2008 07:00:00 EDT

When Drew Carey and reason.tv last checked in on San Tan Flat, a family-oriented restaurant in Pinal County, Arizona the father-and-son owners Dale and Spencer Bell were fighting against a ridiculous, anachronistic, and anti-business ban on outdoor dancing. Check that video out here.

What a difference a video—and ongoing litigation courtesy of the libertarian public-interest law firm the Institute for Justice—makes! As The Arizona Republic reports:

Pinal County Superior Court Judge William O'Neil overturned a decision from the county Board of Supervisors that said the country-Western-themed restaurant was operating an illegal dance hall by allowing patrons to dance to live music on its back patio.

The judge's ruling brings closure to the conflict between the county and restaurant owner Dale Bell, who have been at odds for more than two years after San Tan Flat neighbors complained about noise coming from the property.
The saga of San Tan Flat drew national attention, prompting commentary from actor Drew Carey and conservative Washington Post columnist George Will. The case also received several comparisons to the 1984 Kevin Bacon film Footloose, in which a small town bans rock music and dancing.

Brian Doherty on the DC Gun Case

dan.hayes@reason.org (Dan Hayes) — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 11:41:00 EDT

On Tuesday, March 18, the United States Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in District of Columbia v. Heller, the first major gun-rights case to be decided by the Court since the 1930s.

Heller deals with Washington, D.C.'s ultra-restrictive gun control laws, which have been in place since 1976. reason Senior Editor Brian Doherty, author of This Is Burning Man: The Rise of a New American Underground and Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern Libertarian Movement, is writing a book about the case and its ramifications; the volume will be released later this year by Cato Books.

Last week, Doherty gave reason.tv a quick rundown of his project.

Videotaped by Dan Hayes; approximately five minutes.

Discuss this video at reason's staff blog, Hit & Run.

Long-Arming the Libel Tourist

jsullum@reason.com (Jacob Sullum) — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 17:06:00 EST

Last week the New York Court of Appeals heard arguments in a case that pits freedom of speech against British libel law. Israeli-American criminologist Rachel Ehrenfeld is challenging a libel judgment against her obtained by Saudi billionaire Khalid bin Mahfouz, whom she identified in her 2003 book Funding Evil as a source of financial support for terrorism. Last June the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit allowed her lawsuit to proceed, but the case hinges to some extent on issues of state law, one of which the New York Court of Appeals is now considering: whether New York's "long arm" statute can reach a defendant such as Bin Mahfouz who is outside the U.S.

Calling Bin Mahfouz to account before a U.S. court seems only fair, given his strategy in trying to shut Ehrenfeld up. Although her book was published in the U.S., Bin Mahfouz sued her in London to take advantage of England's pro-plaintiff libel rules, which he has used to intimidate other critics into silence. The excuse for suing Ehrenfeld in the U.K. was that people there (possibly cronies of Bin Mahfouz) had bought 23 copies of the book online. In 2005 a British judge issued a default judgment against Ehrenfeld, ordering her to apologize, pay Bin Mahfouz about $230,000, and destroy all copies of her book. Jared Lapidus, a fellow at the Moving Picture Institute ("Promoting Freedom Through Film"), has produced an eight-minute documentary about the case, which the prominent civil libertarian (and reason contributor) Harvey Silverglate calls "one of the most important First Amendment cases of the past 25 years." Although Lapidus gets a little distracted by how awful the Saudis are, the video does communicate the dangers of libel tourism pretty well.

I mentioned the Ehrenfeld case on Hit & Run last month. Silverglate considered the implications in a 2006 Boston Globe op-ed piece co-authored by Samuel Abady. Katherine Mangu-Ward interviewed Rob Pfaltzgraff, the Moving Picture Institute's executive director, in the October issue of reason.