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Michael Gove: Leveson Inquiry has created 'chilling atmosphere that threatens free speech'

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Feb 232012

He said there was a danger it would produce a 'cure that is worse than the original disease' Gove asks for freedom of Press to be defended from judges and celebs

By Jason Groves

Last updated at 9:08 AM on 22nd February 2012

The Leveson inquiry into Press standards has created a ‘chilling atmosphere’ that threatens free speech in Britain, Michael Gove warned yesterday.

In an outspoken defence of the Press, the Education Secretary cautioned against allowing ‘judges, celebrities and the establishment’ to set the boundaries of free speech because they had a vested interest in shackling the media.

Mr Gove, one of David Cameron’s closest allies, also appeared to question the Prime Minister’s decision to set up the inquiry last year, warning there was a danger it would produce ‘a cure that is worse than the original disease’.

The Leveson inquiry into Press standards has created a 'chilling atmosphere' which threatens free speech in Britain, Michael Gove warned

Addressing a Westminster lunch, Mr Gove acknowledged the need to investigate alleged wrongdoing at the News of the World.

But he said there were already laws to prevent reporters ‘going rogue’, including specific offences of intercepting voicemail messages and bribing public officials.

Gove warned there were 'dangers' in the wide-ranging inquiry chaired by Lord Justice Leveson

Mr Gove, a former senior journalist at The Times, said there was a natural temptation for politicians to ‘succumb’ to demands for an inquiry by ‘establishment’ figures in the wake of a major scandal.

But he warned there were ‘dangers’ in the wide-ranging inquiry chaired by Lord Justice Leveson.

He said: ‘There is a danger at the moment that what we may see are judges, celebrities, and the establishment, all of whom have an interest in taking over from the Press as arbiters of what a free Press should be, imposing either soft or hard regulation.

‘What we should be encouraging is the maximum amount of freedom of expression and the maximum amount of freedom of speech.’

He added: ‘Journalists should be more assertive in making the case for Press freedom, and politicians should recognise that we have nothing to gain and everything to lose from fettering a Press which has helped keep us honest in the past and ensured that the standard of debate in this country is higher than in other jurisdictions.

‘The big picture is that there is a chilling atmosphere towards freedom of expression which emanates from the debate around Leveson.

GOVE: A MAN WHO UNDERSTANDS THE MEDIA

Michael Gove was born in 1967 in Edinburgh and was educated at Robert Gordon’s College, Aberdeen and then Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford University.

He has been a journalist since he left university, working for local and national newspapers, radio and TV.

His career began as a trainee reporter for The Press and Journal in Aberdeen.

He joined The Times in 1996 as a leader writer. He also held the position of comment editor, news editor, Saturday editor and assistant editor.

Mr Gove has also worked for the BBC's Today programme, On The Record, Scottish Television, and was a regular panelist on BBC Radio 4's The Moral Maze and has appeared on Newsnight Review on BBC 2.

In addition he is also a published author and has written books including a biography of Michael Portillo.

He was first elected as an MP for Surrey Heath in May 2005. Following the 2010 General Election he was appointed Secretary of State for Education.

He is married to Sarah, a journalist at The Times.

'I think that there are laws already in place that we should respect and principles already in place that we should uphold that are central to ensuring that this country remains free.’

Mr Gove said previous inquiries into national scandals had produced reports that ‘give birth to quangos, commissions, and law-making creatures that actually generate over-regulation, over-prescription, and sometimes a cure that is worse than the original disease’.

He said the Food Standards Agency, which was born out of the BSE crisis, had gone from being a ‘body that was responsible for governing the safety of our food to one that became yet another meddlesome and nanny organisation that was telling us what we should eat and in what proportion’.

And he said 800 pages of guidance produced in the wake of the deaths of Victoria Climbie and Baby P was ‘impenetrable and has still not ensured that our children are safer today than they were two, three or five years ago’.

He acknowledged that he had sometimes been ‘irritated’ by Press coverage of his own conduct, but insisted that the media had a key role to play in holding politicians to account.

Sources close to the Education Secretary last night said he supported the decision to set up the inquiry but was concerned about the direction it had taken.

Downing Street said the Prime Minister stood by his decision to order the inquiry, but insisted he valued the role played by the media.

His official spokesman said: ‘He has made very clear on a number of occasions since how important he thinks it is that we have a free Press and free media that is able to challenge governments and others.’

GOVE'S SPEECH: 'A CHILLING ATMOSPHERE TOWARDS FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION'

“One of the things that struck me over the past few months is that a new set of stereotypes every bit as misleading and caricatured as those about politicians, have grown up around journalists and about the media and the way in which it operates. I am thinking in particular about the Leveson inquiry and the debate that has surrounded it.

“One the things that struck me about politics is that there is a particular tendency to which all politicians are tempted to succumb. In the aftermath of a specific crisis, when an undoubted wrong has been done, there is a desire to find a judge, a civil servant, a representative of the great and the good, inevitably a figure from the establishment, to inquire into what went wrong, and to make recommendations about what might be put right.

“It is a natural thing for politicians to do, but there are dangers associated with it. Sometimes the recommendations of that report may be modest, proportionate and sane. But sometimes they give birth to quangos, commissions, and law-making creatures that actually generate over-regulation, over—prescription, and sometimes a cure that is worse than the original disease.

“If we look back at government’s response to various crises in the past, there have been some profound crises that have affected all of our consciences. And because they have affected our consciences, people have wanted to be seen to act. So for example in the immediate aftermath of BSE and the problems associated with the quality of our food, the Food Standards Agency was quite rightly set up,

“But one of the problems is that the Food Standards Agency morphed over time from being a body that was responsible for governing the safety of our food to one that became yet another meddlesome and nanny organisation that was telling us what we should eat and in what proportion.

“The same thing applied to the vetting and barring scheme and also to the Every Child Matters agenda in the wake of the tragic deaths of Victoria Climbie and subsequently Baby Peter. In both cases the tragic death of two children led to an attempt to ensure that we more effectively policed those that worked with young people but the result of that was a situation where Phillip Pullman had to apply for a Criminal Records Bureau check in order to go into a school to read to children.

“In the same way we developed guidance which is 800 pages long, is impenetrable and has still not ensured that our children are safer today than they were two, three or five years ago.

“I see the same dangers in the Leveson inquiry and in the way in which the debate on press regulation are moving now. It is undoubtedly the case that there were serious crimes which were committed, but we know those crimes were serious because they broke, if the allegations are proven, the already existing criminal law. There are laws against the interception of messages, there are laws against bribery, there are laws that prevent journalists like any other professional, going rogue. Those laws should be vigorously upheld, vigorously policed. However, there is a danger at the moment that what we may see are judges, celebrities, and the establishment, all of whom have an interest in taking over from the press as arbiters of what a free press should be, imposing either soft or hard regulation. What we should be encouraging is the maximum amount of freedom of expression and the maximum amount of freedom of speech.

“The reason why I say there is a particular danger at the moment is that because we all know that newspapers are under threat, under threat from the pressure of advertising migrating online, under threat from a variety of new news sources, that is why whenever anyone sets up a new newspaper, as Rupert Murdoch has done with the Sun on Sunday, they should be applauded and not criticised, and that is why journalists should be more assertive in making the case for press freedom, and politicians should recognise that we have nothing to gain and everything to lose from fettering a press which has helped keep us honest in the past and ensured that the standard of debate in this country is higher than in other jurisdictions.”

“The big picture is that there is a chilling atmosphere towards freedom of expression which emanates from the debate around Leveson. I think that there are laws already in place that we should respect and principles already in place that we should uphold that are central to ensuring that this country remains free.”

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Michael Gove: Leveson Inquiry has created 'chilling atmosphere that threatens free speech'

High court torn over law banning lies about medals

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Feb 232012

WASHINGTON (AP) — Free speech cases before the Supreme Court often lead justices to consider far-fetched scenarios, and Wednesday's argument over a law making it a crime to lie about having received top military honors was no exception.

One after another, the justices wanted to know whether a decision upholding the Stolen Valor Act could lead down a slippery slope to new laws against such things as lying about the Holocaust, an extramarital affair, a high school diploma, college degrees or to impress a date.

“Where do you stop?” Chief Justice John Roberts asked at one point.

But the justices also suggested that it might be possible in this case to uphold the 2006 law anyway by reasoning that Congress has an interest in protecting medals it created to honor war heroes.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, who asked about lies about college degrees, also seemed open to sustaining the law.

“Here it does seem to me that you can argue that this is something like a trademark, a medal in which the government and the armed forces have a particular interest, and we could carve out a narrow exception for that. I think we would have to do that,” Kennedy said.

The high court has in recent years overwhelmingly rejected limits on speech, striking down a federal ban on videos showing graphic violence against animals and a state law aimed at keep violent video games away from children. The court also rejected the attempt by the father of a dead Marine to sue fundamentalist church members who staged a mocking protest at his son's funeral.

And in 1989, the court said the Constitution protects the burning of the American flag.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor said the earlier cases made clear that merely offending others by itself is not enough to justify limiting speech.

“So outside of the emotional reaction, where's the harm? And I'm not minimizing it. I, too, take offense when people make these kinds of claims, but I take offense when someone I'm dating makes a claim that's not true,” said Sotomayor, who is divorced.

She seemed the least willing member of the court to accept the Obama administration's defense of the law and disputed the view that the value of the highest award, the Medal of Honor, or any others has been diminished because some people lie about having received them.

The administration's top Supreme Court lawyer, Solicitor General Donald Verrilli Jr., defended the law as targeted to protect the integrity of the system established by Gen. George Washington in 1782. Wednesday was Washington's 280th birthday.

“The Stolen Valor Act regulates a very narrowly drawn and specific category of calculated factual falsehood, a verifiably false claim that an individual has won a military honor,” Verrilli said.

On the other side from Sotomayor was Justice Antonin Scalia. “When Congress passed this legislation, I assume it did so because it thought that the value of the awards that these courageous members of the armed forces were receiving was being demeaned and diminished by charlatans. That's what Congress thought,” Scalia said.

Jonathan Libby, the federal public defender arguing against the law, said Congress' intent is hard to discern because it passed the legislation without any hearings.

The effort to limit the reach of a ruling in favor of the law appeared to be the court's most pressing concern.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wondered whether Congress could use the same rationale put forth by Verrilli to justify laws against denying the existence of the Holocaust or lying merely about having served in the military.

Justice Elena Kagan asked whether the government's concern about the stability of the family could lead to a law “to prevent everybody from telling lies about their extramarital affairs.”

Several justices expressed concern that a ruling striking down the law might also call into question a separate provision that makes it a crime to actually wear an unearned medal.

Libby's client, Xavier Alvarez, was one of the first people prosecuted for violating the Stolen Valor Act. Alvarez told a meeting of the Three Valleys Municipal Water District in Pomona, Calif., to which he had been elected, that he was a wounded war veteran who has received the Medal of Honor.

He never served in the armed forces.

Libby said public exposure of lies about military medals is preferable to prosecution. Alvarez “still was exposed for who he was, which was a liar,” Libby said.

The two federal appeals courts that have considered the issue have come to different conclusions. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco struck down the law in Alvarez's case. The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver upheld the law in the case of another false claim of military valor.

Civil liberties groups, writers, publishers and news media outlets, including The Associated Press, have told the justices they worry that the law, and especially the administration's defense of it, could lead to more attempts by government to regulate speech.

Veterans groups are backing the administration.

If the court were to strike down the law, legislation proposed by Rep. Joe Heck, R-Nev., would make it a crime to benefit from lying about a military record.

A decision is expected by late June.

The case is U.S. v. Alvarez, 11-210.

___

Online:

Military Times Hall of Valor database: http://militarytimes.com/citations-medals-awards

Is A Lie Just Free Speech, Or Is It A Crime?

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Feb 232012

Enlarge Bruce Smith/ASSOCIATED PRESS

The Supreme Court heard arguments over whether it should be a crime to lie about receiving military medals. Here large replicas of the Medals of Honor hang at the Medal of Honor Museum.

Bruce Smith/ASSOCIATED PRESS

The Supreme Court heard arguments over whether it should be a crime to lie about receiving military medals. Here large replicas of the Medals of Honor hang at the Medal of Honor Museum.

The U.S. Supreme Court took up the subject of lying on Wednesday.

Specifically at issue was the constitutionality of a 2006 law that makes it a crime to lie about having received a military medal. But the questions posed by the justices ranged far beyond that — from advertising puffery to dating lies.

At the center of the case is Xavier Alvarez, a former California county water board member who is an undisputed liar. Among his lies is that he played professional hockey, served in the marines and rescued the American ambassador during the Iranian hostage crisis. None of those lies was illegal.

But when he claimed to have won the Medal of Honor, that lie was a violation of the Stolen Valor Act, which makes it a crime to make false claims about receiving military medals.

Alvarez appealed his conviction and won. A federal appeals court struck down the law as a violation of the First Amendment guarantee of free speech.

The government appealed to the Supreme Court where, Solicitor General Donald Verrilli on Wednesday told the justices that the law regulates only a narrowly drawn category of calculated falsehoods and that the “pinpointed” pure lies targeted by the statute are not speech protected by the First Amendment.

But Verrilli soon faced a barrage of questions about when Congress can make it a crime to tell a lie that does not defraud or defame.

Justice Sonia Sontomayor began by asking whether, under this law, the Government could have prosecuted a Vietnam War protester for holding up a sign that said, “I won a Purple Heart — for killing babies,” when the protester had not won the medal.

Verrilli answered that “it would depend” whether that expression was “reasonably understood by the audience as a statement of fact or an exercise in political theater.”

“That's somewhat dangerous, isn't it,” responded Sotomayor, noting that she thought it was the government's position that there are no circumstances in which calculated and false factual speech has value.

Yes, Verrilli said, that is the government's position. It is also the Supreme Court's position, expressed repeatedly in its opinions, he maintained.

At that suggestion, Justice Anthony Kennedy almost levitated out of his chair.

“I simply can't find that in our cases,” he said. “I think it's a sweeping proposition to say that there's no value to falsity.”

Verrilli responded by trying to narrow the reach of the language in the Stolen Valor Act. The law, he argued, regulates “a very narrowly drawn and specific category of calculated factual falsehood, a verifiably false claim that an individual has won a military honor, and that's information that is … uniquely within the knowledge of the individual speaker.”

Still, Chief Justice John Roberts wondered, “Where do you stop?”

Could Congress make it a crime for a person to falsely claim that he graduated from high school?

Verrilli conceded that Congress, or more likely state governments, could make it a crime to lie about having graduated from high school.

Justice Kennedy, however, was clearly in search of some narrower category of false speech that could be outlawed. “You can argue that this is something like a trademark, a medal in which the government and armed forces have a particular interest, and we could carve out a narrow exception for that,” he said. “But just to say that …there is no value to false speech. I simply cannot agree.”

Justice Samuel Alito asked whether the military medals law is limited to statements a person makes about himself.

Verrilli said it is, but then Alito asked why the government chose to draw the line there. “Suppose the statute also made it a crime to represent falsely that … a spouse or a child was a medal recipient?”

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg broadened the question further. Could Congress criminalize other false statements, such as denying that the Holocaust occurred?

Verrilli replied that that kind of statement would be protected under the First Amendment because “it's so bound up with matters of ideological controversy.” He said that the Holocaust example was different from this case, which involves, with “pinpoint accuracy, a specific verifiable claim about yourself having won a medal.”

Justice Elena Kagan noted that quite a few states have laws on the books that make it a crime for political candidates to lie during a political campaign. But Verrilli said those laws too would likely be unconstitutional because they would risk chilling speech.

Justice Antonin Scalia noted that “Even in the commercial context we allow a decent amount of lying, don't we? … It's calling puffing.”

“What about lying about extramarital affairs?” asked Kagan. After all, she observed the government has a strong interest in the sanctity of the family.

Verrilli acknowledged the hypothetical presented “a hard case.”

“The trouble is,” interjected Justice Stephen Breyer, that we “can think of 10,000 instances that meet your criteria,” for laws that could criminalize everyday lies.

“[T]he core of the First Amendment,” observed Justice Sotomayor, is to protect even offensive speech.” In this case, she contended, “we don't think less of the medal … we're offended ” by the lie. “So outside of the emotional reaction, where's the harm?”

“I'm not minimizing it,” Sotomayor added. “I take offense when someone I'm dating makes a claim that's not true.”

At that, Solicitor General Verrilli piped up. “As the father of a 20-year-old daughter, so do I.”

But this law involves weighty symbols of courage and valor, Verrilli said. These medals “are a big deal. You get one for doing something very important, after a lot of scrutiny. And for the government to … stand idly by when one charlatan after another makes a false claim to have won the medal does debase the value of the medal in the eyes of the soldiers.”

In that case, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wondered, did the military ask Congress to enact the military medals law?

No, Verrilli replied. It did not.

Following Verrilli to the podium was the lawyer for Alvarez, public defender Jonathan Libby.

The first question came from Chief Justice Roberts: What is the First Amendment value in a pure lie?

Libby answered that people often make things up about themselves, such as when “Samuel Clemens created Mark Twain,” fabricating much material about his own biography.

Roberts dismissed that example, saying Twain lied for “literary” purposes.

Justice Alito persisted: “Do you really think that there is a … First Amendment value in a bald-faced lie about a purely factual statement that a person makes about himself?”

When Libby floundered, Justice Breyer interjected by providing an example of a lie that had value: “Obvious example…are you hiding Jews in the cellar? No.”

Even some of the Justices who voiced concerns about the government's argument still seemed reluctant to strike down the law outright.

Justice Kennedy opined, “It's a matter of common sense that…[the false claim to a medal] demeans the medal.”

Justice Kagan questioned whether the Stolen Valor Act could affect other forms of speech. “The reason we protect some false statements…is to protect truthful speech,” she observed. So, “how is it that this statute will chill any truthful speech?”

Defense lawyer Libby conceded that he could not think of a way the Stolen Valor Act would in fact chill speech.

A surprised Kagan replied, “Boy … that's a big concession, Mr. Libby.”

Still, Libby insisted that in order to justify a law like this one, there would have to be an immediate targeted harm that is inflicted or there would have to be some sort of personal gain from the lie.

How much harm, asked Justice Alito. Suppose the lie built up the liar so much that he got a date with a rich potential spouse. Would that be enough harm?

I certainly would not think that is a significant “thing of value,” Libby responded.

Alito, with a wry smile: “Some people might have a different opinion.”

Court Rules Large Eminent Domain Sign Protected As Free Speech

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Feb 222012

ST. LOUIS, MO (KTVI-FOX2NOW.com)—

St. Louisans will continue to see a large, anti-eminent domain sign on a brick building near I-44 in south St. Louis City. It's been at the heart of a free speech legal case that had gone all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

But Tuesday the U.S. Supreme Court refused to take the case. That allowed a decision by the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis to stand. Under that ruling, the building owner, Jim Roos is allowed to express his opinion on the building and does not have to comply with St. Louis City commercial sign ordinances.

Roos' sign says “end eminent domain abuse.” He had the mural painted after St. Louis City took 24 rental buildings he owned or managed under a blighting ordinance.

“People didn't realize that you could lose your home or business for some private development . Not many people knew it and now they do and our mural, protest mural helped inform the public of that,” said Roos Tuesday.

St. Louis City Counselor Patti Hageman issued this statement: “Of course we are disappointed that the Court decided not to accept review. There is a clear split in the federal circuits as to how municipalities may regulate signs such as this one. In the meantime, the City will continue to look at its own ordinances and amend them as necessary.”

A public interest law firm in Arlington, VA argued the case for Roos and his Neighborhood Enterprises, Inc. firm and housing ministry “Sanctuary in The Ordinary.” “This case is very significant in its holding that government may not regulate signs or speech more broadly based on the subject matter or the speech,” said senior attorney Michael Bindas. Bindas said the city was choosing what topics its citizens could publically talk about by attempting to regulate the protest sign.

Roos' real opposition was to the use of eminent domain to take private property for another private development.

“The state of Missouri still has laws that could allow that building or that area to be declared blighted and still taken by eminent domain. What we do have the right is to protest; that was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court indirectly today by not reviewing the case,” pointed out Roos.

The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals covers seven states so its decisions apply within those states and not necessarily across the country. Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, North and South Dakota fall in the circuit.

Institute for Justice attorney Bindas sees another value to the decision. “This case shows how inter-conntected our constitutional rights are and how vibrant, free speech protections are essential to the protections of our other rights and liberties including property rights,” Bindas said.

For additional information contact the Neighborhood Enterprises at www.neapts.com or the Institute for Justice at www.ij.org.

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Court Rules Large Eminent Domain Sign Protected As Free Speech

Minister: The Leveson Inquiry is 'chilling' free speech

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Feb 222012

THE Leveson Inquiry into press standards is having a “chilling” effect on free speech, a top Cabinet minister said yesterday.

Education Secretary Michael Gove said laws and principles already existed to guard against the type of activities that initially gave rise to the probe.

He also warned there was a danger of regulation being imposed by “judges, celebrities, and the Establishment… all of whom have an interest in taking over from the press as arbiters of what a free press should be”.

He added: “The big picture is that there is a chilling atmosphere towards freedom of expression which emanates from the debate around Leveson.”

Former journalist Mr Gove said that with the rise of the internet, newspapers were under pressure like never before.

In a speech in London, he said: “That is why whenever anyone sets up a new newspaper, as Rupert Murdoch has done with a Sunday Sun, they should be applauded and not criticised.”

He said politicians had “nothing to gain and everything to lose from fettering a press which has helped keep us honest”.

David Cameron set up the Leveson Inquiry after accusations of phone hacking at the now-defunct News of the World.

Mr Gove said law-breaking by the media should be “vigorously policed”, but warned inquiries such as Leveson can spawn official bodies that present “a cure worse than the original disease”.

k.schofield@the-sun.co.uk

Day laborers win Supreme Court free-speech case

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Feb 222012

Lenny Ignelzi / AP 2008

Day laborers gather on a San Diego sidewalk in 2008 waiting to be hired. Cities sought to ban such workers from standing on sidewalks while seeking jobs.

Day laborers in Western states including California scored a legal victory Tuesday when the U.S. Supreme Court let stand a lower-court ruling declaring that cities violate free speech when they make it a crime to seek work from passing drivers.

The case comes from the Los Angeles suburb of Redondo Beach and affects dozens of cities in California and other states that have passed or considered bans on asking for work from the sidewalk.

In the Bay Area, federal courts barred Mountain View and Los Altos from enforcing similar laws nearly a decade ago, said Thomas Saenz, general counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which led the legal challenges. Many day laborers in California are Latino.

“Day laborers have a right to free speech, just as much as a wealthy corporation or a well-heeled political candidate,” Saenz said. “The First Amendment protects everyone's speech, particularly on a sidewalk, where from the beginning of our country's history folks have engaged in free expression.”

Lawyers for Redondo Beach argued that the city was regulating conduct, not speech.

“The city has a problem with day laborers congregating on sidewalks, causing cars to stop, creating traffic congestion,” said attorney Roderick Walston.

Scott Howard, a lawyer for the League of California Cities, said the Supreme Court's rebuff will force many cities to put proposed ordinances on hold and leaves them with little guidance on their authority to “regulate solicitation on public rights-of-way.”

The 1989 Redondo Beach ordinance prohibited anyone on a street or sidewalk from soliciting employment, business or contributions from motorists.

In its 9-2 ruling overturning the ordinance in September, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said the law could apply to children's lemonade stands, sidewalk food vendors that advertise to passers-by, sign-carrying demonstrators seeking donations, or youngsters shouting “car wash,” none of whom necessarily poses a traffic hazard.

“The ordinance restricts significantly more speech than is necessary” to promote the city's stated goal of traffic safety, Judge Milan Smith said in the majority opinion. He said cities have other safety options, like enforcing laws against jaywalking and obstructing traffic.

In dissent, Chief Judge Alex Kozinski said the Constitution doesn't prevent government from making sure that “sidewalks are reserved for walking rather than loitering; streets are used as thoroughfares rather than open-air hiring halls; and bushes serve as adornment rather than latrines.”

In seeking Supreme Court review, lawyers for Redondo Beach said the ruling conflicted with federal court decisions that have upheld day-labor-solicitation bans in other states. But Saenz said none of those laws prohibited asking for work from the sidewalk.

The case is Redondo Beach vs. Comite de Jornaleros, 11-760.

This article appeared on page C – 2 of the San Francisco Chronicle

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Day laborers win Supreme Court free-speech case

College rallies for free speech, student writer

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Feb 222012

BRIDGEWATER, Mass.—Hundreds of students, faculty and community members have rallied at Bridgewater State University for free speech and a student who says she was attacked after writing a campus newspaper opinion piece in support of same-sex marriage.

The Enterprise of Brockton reports (http://bit.ly/xzlNtA) that university President Dana Mohler-Faria called on the ralliers to make the campus “a beacon of brotherhood and justice.”

A school spokesman said a man and a woman approached 20-year-old Destinie Mogg-Barkalow last Thursday, and the man questioned her about the article titled “Prop 8 generates more hate” before the woman accompanying him punched her. Mogg-Barkalow had a bruised eye. Sketches of the suspects have been released, but no one has been arrested

Bridgewater State is stepping up security at a school play that opens Thursday and features two gay characters.

Information from: The Enterprise, http://www.enterprisenews.com

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College rallies for free speech, student writer

Hundreds march for free speech at Bridgewater State University

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Feb 222012

Hundreds gathered for a free speech rally on Bridgewater State University campus Tuesday just before noontime to show their support for a student journalist in favor of gay marriage.
   Students, faculty, community members and even some clergy gathered in front of the John Joseph Moakley Center on campus before marching to the Boyden Hall quad.
   Destinie Mogg-Barkalow, 20, was punched Thursday night after penning an editorial in favor of gay marriage in the col lege’s student newspaper, The Comment, according to Bridgwater police.
   College president Dana Mohler-Faria and Jordan Barkalow, Mogg-Barkalow’s father and a political science professor at the school, will join other speakers to address the crowd from a podium set up on the quad.
   The speaking portion is ex pected to begin around noon.

PLEASE WATCH THIS SITE AS THIS STORY UNFOLDS.

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Hundreds march for free speech at Bridgewater State University

Lying about valor: Justices to debate free speech case

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Feb 222012

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

Alvarez claimed to have rescued the U.S. ambassador in Iran in 1979 He's currently in prison on separate fraud charges The justices must decide if the First Amendment protects lies about military medals A lower court ruled Alvarez's free speech rights were violated in the medal fraud prosecution

Washington (CNN) — Xavier Alvarez ran for public office in California touting an impressive resume, including claims that he was a recipient of the highest military decoration awarded by the U.S. government, the Medal of Honor, for combat bravery.

He won the election but wound up in a heap of trouble — eventually shamed and imprisoned on charges not related to the medal declaration. Now his cautionary tale is before the Supreme Court, in an unusual free speech fight over lies and honor. Arguments in the case begin Wednesday morning, with a ruling expected by the summer.

At issue is the constitutionality of the Stolen Valor Act, a 2006 congressional law making it a crime to “falsely represent himself or herself, verbally or in writing,” as having been awarded military honors.

The justices will decide whether the First Amendment would normally protect such “knowing falsehoods,” unless they fit within a few narrow exceptions — such as defamation, monetary fraud, or perjury.

“The case really does present the question, when is it that lying can be a crime? How much harm does it have to do, and how much of a free speech right to lie is there?” said Thomas Goldstein, a prominent Washington attorney and publisher of SCOTUSblog.com. “Lots of times, cases get up to the Supreme Court precisely because the speech is really offensive and the justices end up saying: this is what it is to have a First Amendment in our country.”

A divided federal appeals court had earlier ruled against the Obama administration, concluding there was inadequate “compelling governmental interest” when Congress passed the law.

Alvarez had won a seat on the Three Valleys Municipal Water District's board of directors in 2007, and at one of his first open meetings claimed to be a retired Marine who received the Medal of Honor in 1987. A photo shows a bow-tied Alvarez openly displaying dozens of military honors on a dress uniform.

“I got wounded many times by the same guy,” Alvarez later declared in another public session, according to court records. “I'm still around.” It was a recording of that claim that gave prosecutors the evidence needed to file charges.

Bob Kuhn is the president of the district's board of directors, serving the San Gabriel Valley of southern California, east of Los Angeles. He said he first heard about Alvarez a week before the municipal election, when the candidate claimed in a local newspaper to have saved a woman from “certain death” when she got stuck behind a refrigerator, while he was allegedly out campaigning door-to-door in the neighborhood.

“He wasn't shy about talking about his military career, wasn't shy about talking about how many times he'd been shot” in combat, Kuhn told CNN. “He exaggerated… no, he didn't exaggerate, he lied about the fact that he'd been in three helicopter crashes, he'd been shot fifteen or sixteen times. The graduation from school, these were all things that he put down on literature to get elected. And where the public trust was really violated, in my opinion, and when I became very offended was when I realized that realistically, the election hinged on the fact that he was a war hero.”

The claims were all a fantasy: Alvarez never served in the military, and was not a professional engineer with a degree from Cal Poly, as his campaign literature stated. In fact, he never attended college.

Alvarez — who has also publicly referred to himself as Javier Alvarez — was prosecuted on two counts of falsely, verbally claiming to have received the medal. He had conditionally pleaded guilty, reserving his right to later appeal on constitutional grounds. He was fined $5,000, given three years' probation, and resigned in 2010 from the utility board based in Claremont, California.

Kuhn said Alvarez never fully explained his actions. “He was very combative and he did everything he could to get you to not bring it up again… I said you really need to step down. He just he looked at me like there's something wrong with me,” said Kuhn. “It was really kind of sad to watch him because it made a big difference in how people see us as politicians or at least at the water board level, in my own community.”

While the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals later ruled Alvarez's free speech rights were violated, they showed little sympathy for his actions, calling them “nothing but a series of bizarre lies.”

“We have no doubt that society would be better off if Alvarez would stop spreading worthless, ridiculous, and offensive untruths,” the three-judge panel concluded. “But, given our historical skepticism of permitting the government to police the line between truth and falsity, and between valuable speech and drivel, we preemptively protect all speech, including false statements, in order that clearly protected speech may flower in the shelter of the First Amendment.”

The appeals court ruling prompted outrage from veterans groups, and the Obama administration urged the high court to intervene.

The judges noted Alvarez apparently “makes a hobby of lying about himself.” Acquaintances told the FBI he claimed to have received the Medal of Honor during the U.S. Embassy hostage crisis in Iran in 1979, during which, he bragged, he personally rescued the U.S. ambassador. Friends also said he claimed to have won the medal during the Vietnam War, according to court records. He also spread stories that he was a former professional hockey player and a police officer; and that he was married to a Mexican movie starlet.

Alvarez sees his situation differently. His lawyer Jonathan Libby, a federal public defender who will argue the case before the justices, said his client's accumulated lies — while a “bunch of whoppers,” as Libby put it — were “political speech” and deserved protection.

“Mr. Alvarez was a publicly elected official who told a lie at a meeting,” said Libby. “It's our position he was engaging in that same kind of political speech.”

“If the court were to uphold the law, it's certainly possibly Congress could pass all kinds of laws: they could make it a crime to lie on one's Facebook page, or a dating website — and it doesn't necessarily have to be a serious lie, or have to harm anybody,” said Libby, who added that his client remains “very apologetic” for his deception. “Sometimes free expression goes too far and offends some people, but on the whole, the First Amendment gives us a certain level of autonomy and that's what the court has protected.”

The FBI in 2010 investigated more than 200 “stolen valor” cases, a number that has almost tripled in the years since the 9/11 terrorist attacks, according to the agency.

Beyond the circumstances of this appeal, the broader constitutional concerns deal with the power of the government to limit certain types of speech, particularly those made by public officials and those made during election campaigns.

The Supreme Court has been split in recent years over whether false statements of fact should be protected under the Constitution, except in very limited circumstances. The Justice Department had argued Alvarez's statements deserved no legal protection because they had little value, and that there was a larger societal need to “protect speech that matters,” in this case the bravery and integrity of military heroes who rightfully earned their medals.

The high court in 2010 struck down another federal law, this one designed to stop the sale and marketing of videos showing dogfights and other acts of animal cruelty. The 8-1 majority said it was an unconstitutional violation of free speech.

The federal Stolen Valor Act was designed to “protect the reputation” of military decorations, citing “fraudulent claims surrounding the receipt of the Medal of Honor (and other congressionally authorized military medals, decorations, and honors).” Similar laws have been in place since 1948.

The current law was a result of the hard work from Pam and Douglas Sterner, former Colorado natives who helped draft the legislation and who lobbied members of Congress to pass it.

“For every person who claims a Medal of Honor, I've uncovered scores of people claiming the Distinguished Service Cross, Navy Cross, hundreds claiming Purple Hearts,” said Doug Sterner, a Vietnam War veteran. “The numbers run into the thousands, and they run from the common criminal who's trying to pick up a girl or get a free meal, to politicians, to some of our most esteemed individuals in society.”

The Sterners created “Home of Heroes,” a popular website and database on veteran issues. They say if the law is declared unconstitutional by the high court, the next practical step would be to create a government-run, national database to track every medal earned by every American war veteran. That project is in the works and supporters say it would help ferret out frauds like Alvarez, but not stop them entirely.

As for Alvarez, he is currently in the California State Prison in Centinela, convicted separately last year for defrauding the water district. According to court records, he lied to the board about being married so his ex-wife could collect taxpayer-funded health benefits. The couple had actually been divorced for nearly three decades.

He's due to be released next month.

“Including the day of the trial when he was going into court, I never once to this second have ever heard him say, 'I'm sorry I did it' or show any kind of remorse. None. Zero,” said Kuhn. “He just doesn't have that gene in him.”

The medals case is U.S. v. Alvarez (11-210).

Continued here:
Lying about valor: Justices to debate free speech case

Free speech: Why I'm lucky to live in America, not Iran

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Feb 222012

Summary: The big reason we’re better: they don’t execute you for blogging in America. Sometimes your page rank goes down, but it’s not quite the same thing.

Yesterday was President’s Day here in the United States. It’s a strange little holiday, in part because even what’s being celebrated is unclear both legislatively, and between the states and federal government.

Briefly, the holiday is and always has been officially Washington’s Birthday, celebrating the birth of our first president, George Washington. And even that has some degree of controversy, because when ol’ George was born, it was on February 11, 1732, according to the Julian calendar. But when the Gregorian calendar was adopted in 1752, the date George popped in the world suddenly became February 22.

And then there’s Lincoln. When I grew up, we got a day off from school for Washington’s birthday and another for Abe Lincoln’s. Apparently, we were particularly bratty back in New Jersey, and the state did everything it could to get away from us little monsters, including celebrating two holidays in the same month.

In any case, sometime in the late sixties, having nothing better to do with its time, Congress decided to stick all federal holidays on Mondays and somehow combined Washington’s birthday with Lincoln’s and thus begat President’s Day. The only problem is that although most Americans think we’re celebrating President’s Day, we’re not. The holiday is still officially Washington’s Birthday, Lincoln’s birthday has been conveniently lost, and well, you get the idea. Your tax dollars at work.

So how does this all bring us to Iran? If you’ve been following Violet Blue’s excellent reporting on the crackdown on bloggers and social networkers in Iran, you’ll begin to understand how severe censorship can get in a truly regressive and repressive society. It’s deeply disturbing.

See also: Iran’s Deadly Cyber Police: Indefinite Detention and Execution for Netizens

There’s not even any tangible evidence of wrongdoing, and it’s likely web site operators and bloggers will be put to death, and that’s after torture.

Now, contrast that with the United States. Yesterday, I ran a very tongue-in-cheek gallery honoring some of our favorite presidents. Well, honoring them is probably going too far. Mostly, I mocked.

I imagined what pick-up lines would have been like for James Buchanan, our only bachelor president. I called Ronald Reagan a moderate and then proceeded to lampoon not just Newt Gingrich (low hanging fruit) but even Mitt Romney. I went to town with Bill Clinton and a company called Cigar Monster. I mentioned a blow-up Karl Rove doll and did a mission-accomplished dig with George W. Bush. And I even questioned the effectiveness of the current sitting president.

See also: Gallery: Presidents and their not so presidential apps

In Iran, they’d be pulling off my fingernails by now.

I was helped by other editors here at ZDNet, who gathered images and some background information. In Iran, their families would have been rounded up for questioning by now.

You know what happened after I went full monty mocking our leaders? You know what happens to me whenever I go fully monty mocking our leaders? Do you have any idea how often I mock our leaders? It’s virtually a full-time job. And, well, it’s not really full monty. I wear sweatpants.

The worst that ever happens is I get ignored. Sometimes readers get cranky. And then, on good days, I get a call from a staffer in a Congressman’s office, a chief-of-staff in an admiral’s office, or a special agent in charge from a three-letter law enforcement agency.

I don’t even get yelled at by these people (well, not counting our readers). But our government representatives often tell me how fun they find my writing. Sometimes, they’re nice enough to point me to additional information, or why they think my characterization of “their guy” is a little too harsh. Once in a while, I get asked to do some pro-bono advisory work.

In no case has anyone threatened to put me to death (well, not counting our readers). In no case has any federal official asked me to change my story, edit my story, or censor my story. Now, to be fair, I have access to a lot of sensitive information and have never published anything which is restricted. That’s part of why I’m trusted with sensitive information.

But, back to the point. In Iran, if you complain slightly or even are in the wrong place at the wrong time, you’re tortured and executed. Here, you’re either ignored or sent some white papers to read.

Many of you have wondered why I’m so pro-America in my writing, how I can possibly love a nation so flawed in so many fundamental ways. Well, now you know.

America is great because we have freedom of speech. The big reason we’re better: they don’t execute you for blogging in America. Sometimes your page rank goes down, but it’s not quite the same thing.

But — before you think I’m getting too jingoistic (look it up) — I need to point out a disturbing trend once again. The American government and American government policy is not trying to censor any of us. But lobbyists are. Special interests are. The companies we buy our tunes and flicks from are trying to censor us, and they don’t care how far they have to go to shut down our cherished free speech.

Think about that the next time a SOPA or a PIPA comes up as a bill. Is censoring us more like America or more like Iran?

See also: Chris Dodd and the MPAA: bribery or politics as usual?

I’m proud to be an American, but I’m not exactly thrilled with our lobbyists.

Disclosure David Gewirtz

At various times during his adult life, David has voted for both Democrats and Republicans, and has been disappointed by both. He is deeply disturbed by how partisanship has come before patriotism in America, which gives him the freedom to pick on both sides.

David is a frequent guest on TV and radio stations across America and can usually be heard or seen on-the-air at least once a week. He writes weekly commentary and analysis for CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 and has been interviewed by Fox News, CNN, various ABC and NBC affiliates, and Canada’s Global TV. He has been a featured guest on National Public Radio and has also been featured on Voice of America, Radio Free Europe, and Radio Liberty where his commentaries on technology, industry, and emerging nations have been broadcast into 46 countries (all in their own unique translations).

David is the executive director of U.S. Strategic Perspective Institute, a nonprofit research and policy organization. He is the Cyberterrorism Advisor for the International Association for Counterterrorism & Security Professionals, a columnist for The Journal of Counterterrorism and Homeland Security and a special contributor to Frontline Security Magazine. He is a member of the FBI’s InfraGard program, the security partnership between the FBI and industry. David is also a member of the U.S. Naval Institute and the National Defense Industrial Association, the leading defense industry association promoting national security.

David is an advisory board member for the Technical Communications and Management Certificate program at the University of California, Berkeley extension. He is also a member of the instructional faculty at the University of California, Berkeley extension.

David’s “day job” is as publisher and editor-in-chief of ZATZ publishing, an online publisher of technical magazines. Other than than his ownership stake in Component Enterprises, Inc. (the parent company of ZATZ), David has no additional industry investments.

ZATZ has many advertisers who do, in part, provide for David’s lush income and extravagant lifestyle. Most of them are IBM and Lotus aftermarket suppliers, some of them make goodies for Microsoft Outlook, and a few make all sorts of strange mobile devices and add-on products. David has been a regular judge of the IBM Awards, but has no formal financial interest in or with IBM.

Because the ZATZ online magazines often review products, David and ZATZ are sent an overwhelming stream of unsolicited, silly, and often useless products to review. Because they’re such a pain to track and ship back, these products often wind up in a dumpster or fill up the corner of a large closet. Although David has no plans to review products in connection to his ZDNet blog, if he does do a product review, he will disclose any relationship completely in that posting.

Both through ZATZ and independently, David derives a small income through various advertising and sales relationships with Amazon.com and Google. These are minor relationships and they will not impede his willingness or ability to chastise either company should they deserve it.

David has many other business relationships, but none of them relate to anything he covers in his ZDNet blog. David does have a bit of the sales-guy bug and if he’s not doing a sales deal with someone at least once a month, he goes through withdrawal. He has a number of consulting clients, but none of them relate to anything he covers for ZDNet (and if they ever do, he will either disclose that fact, or decline to write about them).

Back in the 1980s, David held the unusual title of “Godfather” at Apple. He has written and published 40 incredibly simplistic applications for Apple’s iPhone.

Although David is forbidden to disclose the terms of his iPhone developer agreement, he isn’t drinking the Apple Kool Aid, will never be confused with a metrosexual, and feels free to mock Apple, and Apple users, any time the occasion permits, on alternate Tuesdays, or if he’s bored.

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Free speech: Why I'm lucky to live in America, not Iran

Anonymous Message 2 Americans :Use the Constitutional Right to Free speech / hope 4 the PRESS also - Video

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Feb 212012

19-02-2012 07:13 Boycott youtube every SUNDAY, spread the word ! black-march.com blackmarch.info getmoneyout.com Anonymous Message 2 Americans :Use the Constitutional Right to Free speech / hopefuly the PRESS also

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Anonymous Message 2 Americans :Use the Constitutional Right to Free speech / hope 4 the PRESS also – Video

Confederate Flag On Home, Free Speech For Councilman? - Video

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Feb 202012

18-02-2012 13:04 “A Minnesota city councilman has a Confederate flag hanging outside his home and says he’s not taking it down, no matter what people say…”.* What is the meaning of the confederate flag? Is about slavery or state’s rights? Ana Kaspariana and Cenk Uygur discuss on The Young Turks. * news.yahoo.com

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Confederate Flag On Home, Free Speech For Councilman? – Video

Do lies about military honors deserve free-speech protection?

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Feb 192012

Originally published February 18, 2012 at 8:57 PM | Page modified February 18, 2012 at 9:37 PM

WASHINGTON — Xavier Alvarez is a liar and a scoundrel and has been called an idiot, a jerk and cretinous. All of these descriptions come in the briefs supporting his cause before the Supreme Court.

Alvarez, once a member of a California water-district board, earned such scorn by lying at a public meeting about being a war hero, specifically that he was awarded the Medal of Honor. But his lies did more than make him an outcast. They made him a criminal.

Alvarez was one of the first people prosecuted under the federal Stolen Valor Act, which makes it a crime to falsely claim to have been awarded military honors and decorations. It imposes increased penalties for lying about certain awards, including the Medal of Honor.

But Alvarez's lawyers — they are among those who make no excuses for his extensive lies — convinced a lower court that his untruths were protected by the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech. The Supreme Court on Wednesday will consider whether the Stolen Valor Act, signed into law in 2006, is unconstitutional.

Alvarez, a former elected board member of the Three Valleys Water District in Claremont, Calif., lied a lot. He said he rescued a U.S. ambassador. He didn't. He said he had been a Marine and expounded on his supposed Marine exploits in a September 2007 public hearing. He never served in the military, and there were no exploits. And, contrary to what he told his audience, he was never awarded the Medal of Honor.

Even his own lawyer admits Alvarez's sometimes tenuous hold on the truth. “He lied when he claimed to have played professional hockey for the Detroit Red Wings,” federal public defender Jonathan Libby acknowledged. “He lied when he claimed to be married to a Mexican starlet whose appearance in public caused paparazzi to swoon.”

Unlike those falsehoods, though, Alvarez's claim to military honors ran afoul of federal law.

The case has generated huge interest and divided First Amendment advocates, including the media, and veterans groups, which see the law as a necessary weapon to discourage what appears to a boomlet of self-aggrandizers.

According to a brief filed by the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) and two dozen veterans groups: “Pretenders have included a U.S. attorney, member of Congress, ambassador, judge, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and best-selling author, manager of a Major League Baseball team, Navy captain, police chief, top executive at a world-famous research laboratory, director of state veterans programs, university administrator, pastor, candidate for countywide office, mayor, physician, and more than one police officer.”

Congress, the Obama administration and veterans organizations all consider such false military claims uniquely harmful. Just ask George Washington, they say.

“Should any who are not entitled to the honors, have the insolence to assume the badges of them, they shall be severely punished,” Washington stated in a 1782 military order, according to a legal brief filed by the American Legion.

“This case is about theft, not lying in general,” District of Columbia lawyer Michael Morley wrote in one brief. “Alvarez, and others like him, have misappropriated for their own benefit an unearned share of the two centuries' worth of goodwill and prestige associated with American military awards.”

But the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco agreed with Alvarez that the law did not meet the high standard courts must apply to attempts to restrict speech.

“Saints may always tell the truth, but for mortals living means lying,” Chief Judge Alex Kozinski wrote in response to the government's request that the decision be reconsidered.

In the ruling that overturned Alvarez's conviction, Kozinski warned: “If false factual statements are unprotected, then the government can prosecute not only the man who tells tall tales of winning the … Medal of Honor, but also the JDater who falsely claims he's Jewish or the dentist who assures you it won't hurt a bit.”

“Without the robust protections of the First Amendment … exaggerations and deceptions that are an integral part of human intercourse would become targets of censorship” and set up the government as “truth police” with the power to punish.

Other judges have seen it differently. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit in Denver upheld the law's constitutionality in a separate Stolen Valor case.

“As the Supreme Court has observed time and again, false statements of fact do not enjoy constitutional protection, except to the extent necessary to protect more valuable speech,” U.S. Circuit Judge Timothy Tymkovich wrote for the panel.

He said there was no reason to believe that upholding a law criminalizing false claims about receiving military honors would lead to a “slippery slope where Congress could criminalize an appallingly wide swath of ironic, dramatic, diplomatic and otherwise polite speech.”

This split means residents of a 10th Circuit state such as Kansas and Colorado face Stolen Valor Act prosecution while residents of a 9th Circuit state such as Washington and California do not.

The conflicting court opinions are understandable; it is possible to find seemingly conflicting strains of speech protection in the Supreme Court's precedents, said David Hudson, a scholar at the First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn. “I think this may be a very difficult one for the court,” Hudson said.

On one hand, the court has held for years that “truth” may not be the standard for deciding whether speech is protected by the First Amendment. In 1964's landmark New York Times v. Sullivan, the court said “uninhibited, robust and wide-open debate” would be compromised if there was an exception for “any test of truth,” especially one that put the “burden of proving truth on the speaker.”

But the court also held later, in Gertz v. Welch, that “there is no constitutional value in false statements of facts.”

Certain categories of speech, as Chief Justice John Roberts made clear last year, fall outside of First Amendment protection: obscenity, defamation, fraud, incitement and speech integral to criminal conduct.

The Roberts court has been reluctant to expand the list. In several recent high-profile First Amendment cases, the court struck down a law about depicting animal cruelty, upheld the rights of a controversial group that demonstrates at the funerals of those killed in military service and blocked a California law that attempted to outlaw the sale of violent video games to minors.

Solicitor General Donald Verrilli defends the valor law by saying speech of limited constitutional value can be restricted so long as the law provides “breathing space” for fully protected speech, referencing another Supreme Court precedent.

But the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) told the court that the law gives the government “sweeping power to control and censor public debate.” And the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and 23 news organizations, including The Washington Post, the McClatchy Co. and The Associated Press, filed a brief saying that upholding the law would reverse “the basic presumption against official oversight of expression.” Better than criminalizing speech, the brief said, is to promote aggressive coverage of those making the claims.

It cited a 2008 Chicago Tribune investigation that used military records “to unearth 84 bogus Medals of Honor, 119 Distinguished Service Crosses, 99 Navy Crosses, five Air Force Crosses and 96 Silver Stars listed in biographies in the reference book Who's Who.”

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Do lies about military honors deserve free-speech protection?

Hannity Paints Buchanan As A Free Speech Victim - Video

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Feb 192012

18-02-2012 02:01 www.newshounds.us – Sean Hannity ignored the shockingly bigoted statement Pat Buchanan had just made in a previous segment and argued that his free speech was at risk. www.newshounds.us

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Hannity Paints Buchanan As A Free Speech Victim – Video

Doug McIntyre: Free speech is easy to support when you agree with the speaker

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Feb 192012

Last week talk radio giants John Kobylt and Ken Chiampou of Burbank-based KFI-AM (640) were suspended from the enormously popular “John & Ken Show” for calling the late Whitney Houston a “crack ho.”

Talk about kicking someone when they're down! Dead is about as down as you can get. Whitney fans were understandably furious.

Still, while piling on might make people mad, “ho” can get you fired. Just ask Don Imus.

“Ho” is street for “whore” and has a racial component the “w” word lacks. For example, politicians are routinely called whores with zero fallout, which seems unfair to actual whores. At least they do something for their money.

With the suspension, John and Ken fans are indignant their champions have been silenced, even if it's only for a few weeks. John and Ken haters celebrate the bellicose duo's comeuppance.

Both sides should think a second time.

John and Ken's First Amendment rights have not been violated. Nobody has a right to a radio show or a newspaper column. The First Amendment prohibits the GOVERNMENT from limiting our right to self-expression. Our employers can tell us to zip it whenever they like.

And more and more bosses are doing exactly that – enforcing draconian “zero tolerance” policies on jokes, office flirtations, and even religious expression.

While we celebrate free speech in America in a million ways we also pillory those who cross the ever-shifting and often arbitrary line

of what's currently considered socially acceptable.

Self-expression is under assault by a growing chorus of activist groups who are professionally offended.

The threat of lawsuits and/or boycotts against the employers of political opponents is often enough to frighten giant American corporations into cowardly silence.

At nearly the exact moment KFI was censuring John and Ken, MSNBC fired Pat Buchanan after deeming his new book, “Suicide of a Superpower,” racist. MSNBC president Phil Griffin told reporters, “I don't think the ideas that (Buchanan) put forth (in his book) are appropriate for the national dialogue, much less on MSNBC.”

But it's not just the left going after conservative voices. The Susan G. Komen cancer charity was subjected to a bullying boycott from anti-abortion activists resulting in a major flip-flop followed by the resignation of their senior vice president, Karen Handel.

Lowe's was vilified twice, first by the right for sponsoring a show about Muslims living in America and then by the left for caving to the right.

The right would ban flag burning. The left would ban “In God We Trust.”

The John & Ken Show is in-your-face about local and state issues from a decidedly non-politically correct perspective. Personally, I find their bluntness refreshing especially in a city where you get in more trouble for speaking the truth than regurgitating a politically correct lie.

Do they cross the line? Sure. But remember, one man's outrage is another man's chuckle. That's life.

The speech police who want to sanitize the airwaves are putting the hoods back on the Klansman. Fear of saying something spontaneous has our leaders tethered to their TelePrompters. We're better off with unpleasant truths than sugarcoated lies.

It's easy to support free speech when we agree with the speaker. The real test comes when we hate the message or when the message itself is hate.

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Doug McIntyre: Free speech is easy to support when you agree with the speaker

Lawsuit settled over political message on La Jolla High benches

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Feb 172012

A free speech lawsuit over benches at La Jolla High School painted with the words “Freedom For Iran” has been settled.

The litigation came after a senior painted the message in February 2011. Traditionally, seniors paint messages on the school benches in their final year.

The school's principal ordered workers to paint over the political message, but students repainted it a day later. That prompted another whitewashing, and a threat from the principal to remove the benches permanently.

Attorneys for the American Civil Liberties Union sued, citing violations of free speech. One year later, the long-awaited settlement is now final, Fox5 in San Diego reported Friday.

“The whole point is schools are supposed to be our laboratories of democracy,” said David Loy from the ACLU. “The schools are supposed to respect people's opinions and free speech.”

As part of the settlement, the San Diego Unified School District is not admitting any wrongdoing, but it will rewrite its student speech policy.

Students also no longer have to get permission to put messages on the benches. School officials said they were pleased with the settlement, adding most of the changes have already been implemented.

ALSO:

Sleepwalking teen breaks arm after three-story fall

Couple steals baby python from pet store on Valentine’s Day

Immigration agent shootings involved 3 supervisors, sources say

— John Langeler, Fox5 San Diego

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Lawsuit settled over political message on La Jolla High benches

Let It Rip: The Issue of Free Speech

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Feb 172012

SOUTHFIELD, Mich. (WJBK) — This week on “Let It Rip”, we tackle the issue of free speech. An Oakland University student is suspended after writing about his attraction to his female professor.

“I'll never learn a thing — tall, blonde, stacked, skirt, heels, fingernails, smart, articulate, smile,” Joseph Corlett said in his writings.

Was he just being creative or did he take his assignment too far?

Plus, Michigan has become a political battleground in the GOP presidential race. We explore why Rick Santorum is surging to the lead in Mitt Romney's home state.

Joining Huel Perkins and Charlie Langton on our panels to discuss these topics are Corlett, Free Press columnist Laura Berman and author Elizabeth Atkins, as well as Glenn Clark, president of the Michigan Faith and Freedom Coalition, attorney Tracey Henry and state Democratic Party Chair Mark Brewer.

Click on the video player to watch this week's conversations, and then tell us what you think by posting your comments below.

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Let It Rip: The Issue of Free Speech

Lawmakers to Homeland Security: Social Media Monitoring Threatens Free Speech

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Feb 172012

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security's monitoring of social media services could be a threat to civil liberties and online free speech, several lawmakers said during a hearing Thursday.

According to a report by a civil liberties group called the Electronic Privacy Information Center, or EPIC, DHS paid more than $11 million to General Dynamics for a system to keep an eye on Facebook and Twitter public posts, as well as comment threads on major news websites.

[More from Mashable: Why Apple’s Mountain Lion Didn’t Roar]

EPIC's report found that the system watches public social media posts for comments that “adversely reflect” on the government, and for responses to proposed government plans. EPIC tried to get information about the deal through a Freedom of Information request, but was denied. It then filed a successful lawsuit and was granted access to the specifics by DHS.

During Thursday's hearing, congressmen from both sides of the asile grilled DHS about the General Dynamics deal as revealed by EPIC's lawsuit. One Democratic representative, Jackie Speier of California, said she was “deeply troubled” by the arrangement.

[More from Mashable: Pixable Brings the Hashtag to Facebook Photos]

The Department of Homeland Security “is not a political operation,” she added.

Pennsylvania Republican Representative Patrick Meehan also expressed doubts about the plan.

“My guess is that the average American has no problem with other private individuals reading their commentary in online writings and postings in open forums, but may feel a bit of unease knowing the federal government may be doing the same thing,” said Meehan.

Reps. Speier and Meehan elaborated on their concerns about the deal in a letter sent to DHS Thursday.

“Although there are clear advantages to monitoring social media to identify possible threats to our security, there are also privacy and civil liberties concerns implicit in this activity,” they wrote. “With its domestic mission, the Department of Homeland Security needs to be mindful of the rights of the citizens of our country to express themselves online. Not only should guidance issued by the Department permit analysts to do their jobs identifying threats, but it should also be stringent enough to protect the rights of our citizens.”

DHS Chief Privacy Officer Mary Ellen Callahan defended the agency.

According to Callahan, DHS' social media activity has been limited to public outreach, gaining “situational awareness” when disasters strike and helping law enforcement. She added that privacy rules meant they could only collect information on public officials and during “life or death” situations.

“It is the what, not the who, being identified,” said Callahan.

Would you feel comfortable with the government monitoring your public social media posts? Sound off in the comments below.

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, adventtr

This story originally published on Mashable here.

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Lawmakers to Homeland Security: Social Media Monitoring Threatens Free Speech

Judge: Layout on Jordan free speech, not ad

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Feb 172012

CHICAGO (AP) — A federal judge has ruled that a national grocery store chain's reference to Michael Jordan in an ad-like magazine layout was constitutionally protected free speech — a decision that thwarts the former Chicago Bulls player's bid for control of his billion-dollar image.

In a finding that surprised some legal observers, the court in Chicago concluded Jewel-Osco wasn't endeavoring to sell anything with the page featuring basketball shoes emblazoned with “23,” Jordan's Bulls jersey number.

In the layout published in a special 2009 edition of Sports Illustrated on Jordan, Jewel-Osco congratulated the six-time NBA champion on his induction into the Basketball Hall of Fame, and it included a large Jewel-Osco logo under the text.

“The page does not propose any kind of commercial transaction, as readers would be at a loss to explain what they have been invited to buy,” U.S. District Judge Gary Feinerman said in an opinion posted late Wednesday on Jordan's lawsuit against the company.

Celebrities such as Jordon meticulously guard their images, and others have successfully sued companies for appearing to employ praise as a way to slip in references to a public figure into an advertisement.

But Feinerman said Jewel-Osco was expressing a view rather than trying to sell a product in this case.

Competing chain store Dominick's, which Jordan is suing separately, also ran a congratulatory page in the same magazine. Feinerman said the fact that both Jewel-Osco and Dominick's ran the messages further illustrated that the layout couldn't have been commercial because Jordan “does not play on two or more sides of the same fence, commercially speaking.”

“Jordan is Hanes, not Jockey or Fruit of the Loom; Nike, not Adidas or Reebok; Chevrolet, not Ford or Chrysler; McDonald's, not Burger King or Wendy's,” the judge wrote.

The judge's ruling suggests Jordan may not prevail in the lawsuit, which claims Itasca-based Jewel-Osco unlawfully invoked Jordan's identity, not primarily to congratulate him, but to market the company.

According to Jonathan Jennings, a Chicago-based trademark and rights of publicity attorney, the ruling goes against a prevailing trend of courts regarding such corporate messages as advertising.

“There may be concern that if this ruling stands or becomes accepted doctrine, then you could see more advertisement appear that are merely couched as tributes,” he said.

Jordan attorney Frederick Sperling said he disagrees with the ruling, saying several witnesses admitted the layout was intended to promote Jewel-Osco's goods and services. “That,” he said, “is an admission that the ad was commercial speech.”

Jewel-Osco spokesman Mike Siemienas said the company is pleased by the ruling. He added that, “We continue to believe we acted appropriately.”

Feinerman left open the possibility Jordan could continue his suit against Jewel-Osco, saying he wants to hear arguments on whether constitutionally protected speech is automatically immune from damage claims.

Jordan's legal team would be in a position to appeal only after the judge makes a final ruling on the lawsuit.

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Judge: Layout on Jordan free speech, not ad

Wells vetoes Free Speech Plaza resolution

Free Speech Comments Off

Feb 162012

Student Government President Cody Wells threw sparks into the SG Senate meeting Wednesday with a veto to a resolution passed last week and a speech that criticized Gov. Bobby Jindal and LSU System President John Lombardi.

Wells vetoed a resolution to urge and request Finance and Administrative Services to enforce Free Speech Plaza rules. According to Wells, Free Speech Plaza has no official policies and the authors of the resolution were misled to believe there were policies in place.

“You can't limit free speech,” Wells said. “We can produce some guidelines.”

But despite Wells' veto, a separate resolution “to urge and request Finance and Administrative Services to assemble a committee … in order to establish a set of Free Speech Plaza guidelines” was passed by the Senate.

On the topic of the University's finances, Wells told the Senate that SG members are the only protectors of the University who cannot be fired for voicing “discontent with the governor's policy” about budget cuts and said Lombardi is in Jindal's “back pocket.”

Wells also called out Faculty Senate President Kevin Cope after the Faculty Senate hammered Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Jack Hamilton's job performance Tuesday. Wells said Cope “spits in Jack Hamilton's face. That man [Hamilton] has done a great service to this university.”

In order to save the University from more budget cuts, Wells proposed a “task force” called the “Flagship Advocates,” who would meet one-on-one with state representatives and senators to urge them to protect the University's budget.

SG has repeatedly tried to start Flagship Advocates campaigns, but they've mostly consisted of letter-writing.

“It's all about relationships,” Wells said. “The future of the state truly lies in the future of LSU.”

The Senate also passed a resolution to urge “LSU Dining to provide allergen alert signs under the already available food labels” and four resolutions to approve members to the SG Black Caucus.

____

Contact Danielle Kelley at dkelley@lsureveille.com

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Wells vetoes Free Speech Plaza resolution

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