What are you talking about?

Welcome to the New World Order. The same people who will cry "Censorship!" when you try to prevent dissemination of terrorist-friendly information are the same people who will, post-terrorist attack about how you failed to keep them safe.

It's an absolutely impossible situation.

Larry Summers lost his job not for saying that there might be biological differences between men and women that could explain why men do better in certain scientific areas, but for merely suggesting that this was a topic worthy of discussion! He didn't even share his opinion on the subject, but rather referenced some recent research.

If there's one thing that annoys me most about the left, especially in academia, it is their lip service to basic freedoms while doing as much as they can to condemn, ostracize and expel anyone who says something which can even be perceived as politically incorrect. One way to combat this, as I do, is to support FIRE. I have other ways of defending free speech from the claws of the PC crowd more specific to my situation, but I won't get into those.

Oh, and publishing bomb-making instructions is not very responsible. Then again, I've had a copy of the Anarchist's Cookbook since I was a teenager, and I've never had the desire to build a bomb (I can pick locks and tap phones, though ;). Still, not a wise move.

Jay Tea,

Clearly, as drooling, knuckle-dragging idiot neocons, we are intellectually incapable of grasping the nuanced differences involved here...

There is a very clear differences in all these cases, including also the invitation extended by Columbia to Ahmedinejad.

You have to understand the Left's interpretation of the meaning of "Freedom of Speech": Those on the left, or even issuing ad hoc attacks on America/capitalism/western culture, are accorded 100% freedom. Everyone else also has 100% freedom - UNTIL they say something the Left doesn't like, in which case it must be suppressed.

I hope that's clear enough.

~~~~~~~~~

The Imus case had a happy ending - at least for Imus. He reached a reportedly hefty (although undisclosed) settlement with CBS when he threatened to sue them for $120 million (his new contract was for $40 mil, + damage to his reputation, etc.). It must have been a good amount, because he agreed not to bad-mouth the network as a part of the settlement.

The one Rutgers player who had sued Imus also dropped her case, apparently after her attorney checked the laws on libel and defamation.

To the Right, George Orwell's 1984 was a shudder inducing vision of where communism and totalitarianism lead. The the Left, it was a primer on tactics.

It goes hand-in-hand with the oft repeated argument from much of the left that to dissent is patriotic. As if dissent, by simple virtue of being in disagreement regardless of the merit of that dissent, is what defines it as patriotism.

Yet, if one is not in dissent and says something in agreement with that which does not fit into the the leftist credo, they're called "sheeple" and are accused of "lock-stepping".

Clearly, as drooling, knuckle-dragging idiot neocons, we are intellectually incapable of grasping the nuanced differences involved here..

Jim, Imus got 20 million I believe.

Larry Summers, Michael Richards, and Don Imus were not censored. Period.

They were never told "You cannot say that". There is no law to prevent them from going standing in the street and repeating the same things, although some might consider some of what Michael Richards said to be approaching a threat.

They _were_ all censured. In each case they were told by their employers that they would no longer be paid to voice their opinions as a representative of the employer. That is the employers right.

In each case, pressure was put on the employer to fire the individual, and in each case the employers responded to that pressure.

Similarly, you are allowed to bring to bear on boilerman10's employer, whatever pressure you can muster, to have his "microphone" shut down.
That is your right as an American.

Jay, I'd like to share a little something with regard to the racial issue:

I'm starting to lean toward the "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" theory. I am Italian and Irish, but for some reason, I've been accused of being an eskimo (in 5th grade by a classmate), Chinese (by two separate Chinese women, believe it or not) and most recently, a black man stopped me at a gas station and said "This place is loaded with Indians, and you're one of them". I said "What?" and he repeated it. I said "I'M an Indian?" and he said "Yup. I can tell from the earlobes and the cheekbones". I said "Well, my birth certificate says I'm Italian and Irish" and he said "Nope, you're one of those Indians". I said "Ok then, I'm an Indian". I'm not sure if that's Native American or from India, but we'll go with it.

My kids thought the whole thing was hysterical, because they always seem to be there when I'm "accused" of being a new race. I decided that from now on, if anyone asks, I'll be "Mikawopian". (Now don't you Italians and Irish get all uptight - laugh and the world laughs with you....)

My middle daughter, who is the product of a very short and very stormy marriage to a Dominican man, said "What does that make me?" and I said "Dominamikawopian".

The two older ones are now Scotsamikawopian and two younger ones are Francomikawopian. My husband thinks we are all insane, but he's Francowopian.

Yup, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em.

So dont the liberals the same bunch of lowlifes that oppose allowing conservatives to speak on campus. I guess these liberal scum only support free speech for antiamerican reptiles hey were talking ANIMAL FARM here