U.S District Court decisions don't mean squat if not upheld on appeal.
Too true - but to date, nobody has bothered to appeal....so here we are, law of the land and all that.
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. The district judge has a lot of leeway in general. The general principle is that District Court decisions are less binding than Circuit court decisions, which are less binding than SCOTUS decisions. But even the SCOTUS rejects its own precedents every so often.