Which is worse: homophobe chickeneer or Bostonian dictator?

Menino has a black belt in posturing. Must be an election coming up for ol' fatty to get so vocal over nothing whatever.

I agree, Lash. Boycott the bastarads. But you can't restrain trade by refusing to grant them the right to set up shop.

I know several places that have bans on certain businesses. In the Queen Charlottes you can't get fast food. In Coquitlam, if you're an addict, you can't get a methadone fix or a tattoo. I believe there are some areas in the US that ban car lots or pawn shops. No business has the right to open a business in any area. Businesses aren't people.
Lots of businesses never get a license for various reasons, zoning laws etc.. Boston's stance is moral. Try opening a smut shop next to a church or school, you wont get one based on moral grounds either.
This isn't Anti-American. They're just telling them to shop elsewhere.

You're mixing your apples and oranges again, Ceili. It's one thing to ban an entire category of business from a specific neighborhood. It's another to arbitrarily say, 'this chicken shop can't come in here because they've expressed a bias but this other one is welcome.'

Right you are.

I agree - whether I like a particular business or not, you cannot pick and choose which fast food you would want as a mayor. Basically you could say the mayor is discriminating against Christians.

But Mennino likes to mumble about such stuff - first Walmart, then I forget one of the stores on Newbury street had some display he thought was offensive so he went to papers and tried to "boycott" them too.

Myself, I think I'd like to see a McDouble as mayor.

i'd love to hear how mayor mumbles pronounces chick-fil-a

i once heard him call his home town bofferston

I'm not sure I know how it's supposed to be pronounced myself.

According to the Chicago Tribune,

This seems to be a bit different to Boston, though:

First, the Mayor of Boston is an elected official. He represents the people who elected him, the people of Boston. The people of Boston overwhelmingly agree with Menino in this, at least as far as being offended.

Second this isn't anti-Christian. It is anti-asshole. There are Christians who Menino strongly supports including President Obama. Of course these happen to be the Christians that don't run around saying idiotic things.

So if a Jewish deli or an Islamic restaurant or mosque want to open, and the mayor dislikes their politics or beliefs, he can keep them from opening...? There is something very wrong with that.

I understand that he's backed off from attempting to ban Chik-Fil-A. I think someone advised him that it isn't legal.

I agree that the mayor is way more off base than the restauranteur.

As I said in my first post, Tom Menino has a black belt in posturing. His stand got the media coverage he was looking for. Now whether or not the chicken joint opens or not is no longer of importance. Getting the press coverage was what was wanted.

The answer is the dictator.

What's this "dictator" crap? Massachusetts by law supports equal rights for all its citizens, including gay ones. Massachusetts by law supports equal rights for all its citizens, including gay ones, to marry. Chickfila does neither, and spends a lot of the money they get from their customers to oppose those equal rights. In MA that makes them bad corporate citizens. Menino stood up for our citizens, which makes him a defender of civil liberties. Where do you get off thinking that makes him a dictator? Stay in whatever rotten sinkhole of a state you live in now and stay out of ours. I would have supported the Montgomery bus boycott, which was one of the major spurs to the struggle that abolished segregation and made the country live up to the Constitution, had I lived there and been old enough. I supported the boycott of South Africa, which helped abolish apartheid. And I support keeping further Chickfilas out of our state. With any luck the two already here will lose so much business they withdraw too. A few years ago, my then-girlfriend, who lived near the Burlington Mall,and I ate at the one there a few times. I'd be interested in seeing how much their business has dropped. I'll bet it's substantially. Good.

You DO realize that this company has given voice the the opinion of the vast majority of its customers, right? There are a whole lot of people making special trips to nosh on chicken sammiches from Chick-fil-a BECAUSE they made this stand. I you are waiting for a sales decline you will likely be waiting a very long time.

****, I have only visited the Bible Belt once in my life but I know at least this much about the South. The military does a huge portion of its recruiting from the south, I am well acquainted with the good old boys from the South.

Fine, let 'em stay in the south (incidentally, Burlington is in Massachusetts).

And let them think that the Yankees are attacking their values again and that Chick-Fil-A is making a stand for their values. You did notice didn't you that this company has no intention of either changing its position or apologizing for its position on embracing Christian values.....right? "Guilty as charged" as in "you are damn right" that they stand for these values.

Fine, let 'em stay in the South. We're not gonna change our values either (and we're winning--the "support/oppose" percentages have almost exactly reversed themselves in the country as a whole in the last nine years.)