Another Attack On Free Speech In America

Check out what the United States Senate recently passed.

From U.S. Trying to Criminalize Free Speech - Again:

On April 4, 2017, the US Senate passed Senate Resolution 118, "Condemning hate crime and any other form of racism, religious or ethnic bias, discrimination, incitement to violence, or animus targeting a minority in the United States". The resolution was drafted by a Muslim organization, EmgageUSA (formerly EmergeUSA) and the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC).

[...]

The resolution refers to hate crimes against Muslims, Jews, African-Americans, Hindus, and Sikhs

Read the rest HERE. There is much more. A must-read!

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Obama White House: Moral Responsibility To Abrogate The First Amendment

The end of journalistic and blogging anti-jihad?  Daily Caller article in its entirety (emphases mine)....

White House: Obama Will Fight Media To Stop Anti-Jihad Articles

President Barack Obama has a moral responsibility to push back on the nation’s journalism community when it is planning to publish anti-jihadi articles that might cause a jihadi attack against the nation’s defenses forces, the White House’s press secretary said Jan. 12.

“The president … will not now be shy about expressing a view or taking the steps that are necessary to try to advocate for the safety and security of our men and women in uniform” whenever journalists’ work may provoke jihadist attacks, spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters at the White House’s daily briefing.

The unprecedented reversal of Americans’ civil-military relations, and of the president’s duty to protect the First Amendment, was pushed by Earnest as he tried to excuse the administration’s opposition in 2012 to the publication of anti-jihadi cartoons by the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.

The White House voiced its objections in 2012 after the magazine’s office were burned by jihadis, followings its publication of anti-jihadi cartoons.

Earnest’s defense of tho 2012 objections came just five days after the magazine’s office was attacked by additional jihadis. Eight journalists, two policeman and a visitor were murdered by two French-born Muslims who objected to the magazine’s criticism of Islam’s final prophet.

In 2012, “there was a genuine concern that the publication of some of those materials could put Americans abroad at risk, including American soldiers at risk,” Earnest said.

“That is something that the commander in chief takes very seriously,” he added, before saying that “the president and his spokesman was not then and will not now be shy about expressing a view or taking the steps that are necessary to try to advocate for the safety and security of our men and women in uniform.”

In December, Congress approved and the president signed a $585 billion defense budget to train and equip soldiers, marines, sailors and airmen to defend Americans — including journalists — from foreign threats. The nation’s media industry does not have a defense budget to protect soldiers.

Earnest tried to rationalize the president’s opposition to the publication of anti-jihadist materials as a moral duty.

Whenever journalists consider publishing materials disliked by jihadis, “I think there are a couple of absolutes,” he told the reporters.

The first is “that the publication of any kind of material in no way justifies any act of violence, let alone an act of violence that we saw on the scale in Paris,” he said.

The second absolute is the president’s duty to lobby editors and reporters against publishing anti-jihadi information, he said. ”And there is — this president, as the commander in chief, believes strongly in the responsibility that he has to advocate for our men and women in uniform, particularly if it’s going to make them safer,” Earnest said.

He repeated the two-fisted formulation a moment later. ”What won’t change is our view that that freedom of expression in no way justifies an act of violence against the person who expressed a view. And the president considers the safety and security of our men and women in uniform to be something worth fighting for,” he said.

Throughout the press conference, Earnest repeatedly said the media would be able to decide on its own whether to publish pictures, articles or facts that could prompt another murderous jihad attack by Muslim against journalists.

But he did not say that his government has a constitutional and moral duty to use the nation’s huge military to protect journalists from armed jihadis, but instead hinted strongly that journalists should submit to jihadi threats.

“I think that there are any number of reasons that [U.S.] media organizations have made a decision not to reprint the cartoons” after the January attack, he said. “In some cases, maybe they were concerned about their physical safety. In other cases, they were exercising some judgment in a different way. So we certainly would leave it to media organizations to make a decision like this.”

“What I’m saying is that individual news organizations have to assess that risk for themselves,” he said. “I think the point in the mind of the president and certainly everybody here at the White House is that that is a question that should be answered by journalists.”

“I’m confident in saying that for the vast majority of media organizations, that [fear is] not the only factor. But I would readily concede that it is one in the minds of many of those news executives. But again, that is a decision for all of them to make,” he said.

Obama’s willingness to pressure media outlets, to quit defending First Amendment rights and also to mollify jihadis, reflects Obama’s overall policy of minimizing conflict with militant Islam.

Throughout his presidency, Obama has tried to shift the public’s focus away from the jihadi threat toward his domestic priorities.

He also repeatedly praised Islam and Muslims, and criticized criticism of Islam. “The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam,” he told a worldwide TV audience during a September 2012 speech at the United Nations.

“As a student of history, I also know civilization’s debt to Islam,” he declared in a 2009 speech in Cairo. “It was Islam — at places like Al-Azhar [seminary] — that carried the light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe’s Renaissance and Enlightenment,” he claimed.

Obama ha also tried to elevate the status of Islam in the West. “As a student of history, I also know civilization’s debt to Islam,” he told his audience in Cairo. “It was Islam — at places like Al-Azhar — that carried the light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe’s Renaissance and Enlightenment. … I also know that Islam has always been a part of America’s story.”

To reduce the public’s focus on jihadis, Obama has even named the jihadi threat as a non-specific issue of “violent extremism,” and has repeatedly said jihadis have no connection with Islam. “Those who have studied and practiced this religion would tell you — Islam is a peaceful religion. … [Violent acts are] entirely inconsistent with the basic principles of that peaceful religion,” Earnest said Jan. 12.

But that claim of a peaceful Islam was repeatedly coupled with Obama’s policy of pressuring journalists not to anger aggressive Muslim believers. ”I will say that there have been occasions … where the administration will make clear our point of view on some of those assessments based on the need to protect the American people and to protect our men and women in uniform,” Earnest said.

“I wouldn’t rule out making those kinds of expressions again,” he added.

Infidels, care to look into your crystal ball and tell us what you see therein?

American Freedom Of The Press In Decline

According to Breitbart's Big Journalism:

According to Reporters Without Borders, America dropped 13 spots on the World Press Freedom Index 2014, designed to rank 180 countries in terms of the freedoms journalists enjoy and the regulations placed on them by government authorities.

The Index, published Feb. 11, shows that America now ranks number 46, below countries like South Africa and France. The Index has been published annually since 2002, but the 2014 ranking for America marks one of the most significant declines ever reported....

At Jihad Watch, Robert Spencer makes the following observation:

Mr. Spencer then refers to Allen Drury's 1973 novel Come Nineveh, Come Tyre.  Mr. Spencer pointed out:

[In Come Nineveh, Come Tyre] The media adores President Jason, cheerleads for him energetically, defames and denigrates his foes relentlessly, and does everything it can to make him look good, right up until the point when a few of them realize that the freedom of speech is gone...

President Jason of Come Nineveh, Come Tyre is given to fantasy-based policymaking.

If you have read that book — or even if you haven't — please read the entire post at Jihad Watch.

Yes, some of us are pushing back. Especially here in the blogosphere. But the mainstream media clang on, and it seems to me that most voters do get most of their "news" from the mainstream media.

How much effect is our pushing back really having?

Are we living in America anymore?  Or are we living in a caricature of America?

FCC Monitoring

From the Daily Caller (hat tip to Bunkerville):

FCC to police news media, question reporters in wide-ranging content survey

The Federal Communications Commission is planning a broad probe of political speech across media platforms, an unprecedented move that raises serious First Amendment concerns.

The FCC’s proposed “Multi-Market Study of Critical Information Needs,” which is set to begin a field test in a single market with an eye toward a comprehensive study in 2014, would collect a remarkably wide range of information on demographics, point of view, news topic selection, management style and other factors in news organizations both in and out of the FCC’s traditional purview.

The airwaves regulator would also subject news producers in all media to invasive questioning about their work and content.

[...]

Among the questions federal contractors will be asking of private media companies:

For media owners:

“What is the news philosophy of the station?”

For editors, producers and managers:

“Have you ever suggested coverage of what you consider a story with critical information for your customers (viewers, listeners, readers) that was rejected by management?” (Followup questions ask the reporter to speculate on why a particular story was spiked.)

[...]

“In this study, the FCC will delve into the editorial discretion of newspapers, web sites and radio and TV stations,” Hudson Institute Fellow Robert McDowell, who served as an FCC commissioner from 2009 to 2013, told The Daily Caller. “This starts sticking the government’s nose into what has traditionally been privileged and protected ground. Regardless of one’s political stripes, one should be concerned.”

Can scrutiny of the blogosphere be far behind?

Obama's DOJ and Islamophilia: "Social Media Posts" (that means Blogs, Facebook, etc.) Telling the Truth About Islam May Violate Civil Rights

BUMPED TO THE TOP FOR NOW - SCROLL DOWN FOR NEWER POSTS

This is not a surprise, but it is a clear and present danger to our freedom (dated May 30, 2013):

DOJ: Social Media Posts Trashing Muslims May Violate Civil Rights

In its latest effort to protect followers of Islam in the U.S. the Obama Justice Department warns against using social media to spread information considered inflammatory against Muslims, threatening that it could constitute a violation of civil rights....

[...]

The area’s top federal prosecutor, Bill Killian, will address a topic that most Americans are likely unfamiliar with, even those well versed on the Constitution; that federal civil rights laws can actually be violated by those who post inflammatory documents aimed at Muslims on social media. “This is an educational effort with civil rights laws as they play into freedom of religion and exercising freedom of religion,” Killian says in the local news story. “This is also to inform the public what federal laws are in effect and what the consequences are.”

The DOJ political appointee adds in the article that the upcoming presentation will also focus on Muslim culture with a special emphasis on the fact that the religion is no different from others, even though some in the faith have committed terrorist acts, Christians have done the same....

Go read the rest HERE. Now.

So, what are we to do about this, an issue of supreme importance. What the DOJ is trying to do strikes at the heart of Freedom of Speech!

Ace of Spades asks, "Has Obama Repealed the Clear and Present Danger Doctrine"?

The Line In The Sand

When Obama gave his speech at the United Nations last week, he tried simultaneously to excuse the recent Muslim riots over the YouTube film "Innocence of Muslims," he managed to motivate Egypt and Yemen to draw the proverbial line in the sand.

According to this article in the September 29, 2012 edition of the Washington Post:

...[The presidents of Egypt and Yemen] made it clear that their brands of popularly chosen government do not look like the United States or share all of its values.

“We expect from others, as they expect from us, that they respect our cultural specifics and religious references and not seek to impose concepts or cultures that are unacceptable to us,” Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi told the U.N. gathering Wednesday.

Morsi, on the job three months, told the U.N. that the protests outside the U.S. Embassy in Cairo reflected the legitimate, and decidedly Islamic, voice of Egyptian popular will. And he effectively told Obama he would have to get used to new rules.

“Insults against the prophet of Islam, Muhammad, are not acceptable,” said Morsi, whose political roots lie in the Muslim Brotherhood. “We will not allow anyone to do this by word or by deed.”

In an interview with The Washington Post on Saturday [September 29, 2012], Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi sounded a similar note...

All of Obama's many statements about values that the West shares with the Islam and the glory of the Arab Spring have not gone unnoticed by leaders in the Middle East.  The following, dated September 13, 2012, did not go unnoticed, either:

...Obama administration officials said Thursday that they have asked YouTube to review the video and determine whether it violates the site's terms of service...

Some media observers predict that the incident will prompt calls for Google Inc.'s YouTube to play a more active role in curating the billions of hours of videos found on its site. One prominent 1st Amendment lawyer even suggested that YouTube should seek a judge's ruling about whether to remove potentially incendiary content.

Also, let us recall Obama's Cairo speech in June of 2009.  What message did that speech actually send?

Muslims are committed to what they believe and act on what they believe. Can we say the same for the West's commitment to freedom of expression?

Additional reading: "The Anti-Blasphemy, Anti-First-Amendment President" by Diana West. Excerpt:

Clearly, this president is not protecting free speech as our founders guaranteed it, and, in fact, he gravely endangers it. Meanwhile, if I choose to write against child rape as condoned under Islamic law with roots in Muhammad’s consummation of a marriage with a 9-year-old – Islamic “slander,” for sure – in what way is the “mutual respect” President Obama calls for even conceivable as an antidote?

Here’s the secret that blasphemy laws are written to smother: Regarding the fundamentals of freedom of conscience, the autonomy of the individual, protection of children and equality of women, Islamic and Western doctrines have nothing in common and are, in fact, at irreconcilable, dagger’s-point odds. Silence – Shariah blasphemy laws – is the Obama-Clinton-OIC Islamic answer. Indeed, in the Shariah-compliant end, silence will replace the questions, too.

But we’re already used to it. Don’t believe me? Afshin Ellian, an Iranian-born Dutch law professor, poet and columnist, puts it this way: “If you cannot say that Islam is a backward religion and that Muhammad is a criminal, then you are living in an Islamic country, my friend, because there you also cannot say such things. I may say Christ was a homosexual and Mary was a prostitute, but apparently I should stay off of Muhammad.”

Read the entire essay HERE.

"You will not disrespect the president of the United States in this classroom"

Part of the exchange in THIS STORY at The Blaze.

More from the exchange between the teacher and the student:

...The back and forth continued and the most strident of the two students reminded his teacher that President Bush was constantly treated to negative statements about him while he was in office: “Whenever Bush was president, everybody talked sh-t about him.”

To which the teacher responded: “Because he was sh-tty.”

The social studies educator went on for a full minute with more ranting, saying that people were arrested for saying derogatory things about President Bush. The student correctly reminded the teacher that opinions are protected, but you cannot be arrested unless you threaten the president.

More HERE, including an audio of the entire exchange.

Silencing Voices

About the shuttering of Bare Naked Islam for the second time in a month....

We are living in Orwellian times.

A few days ago, I posted THIS here at IBA: "The End Of Blogging?" SOPA looms. Its power to silence voices is nearly unlimited.

It's not farfetched to realize that our days of freedom of speech on the web are numbered.

Furthermore, I expect that 2012 will bring the closing of all sorts of web sites, particularly blogs that are controversial.

I won't quit speaking out until my blog is shuttered by the forces of silencing voices, until I'm in jail, or until I die. After all, I'm an old woman. I don't have much to lose, really. The life I loved ended when Mr. AOW had his crippling stroke in 2009.

But I doubt that younger folks feel the way that I do. And I can't blame them for feeling that way.

"Life goes on, even after the thrill of living is gone."

It's Official: The Pentagon Has Met the Enemy and It Are Us

FOX is now reporting the following:

Pentagon Exam Calls Protests 'Low-Level Terrorism,' Angering Activists
Wednesday, June 17, 2009 By James Osborne

A written exam administered by the Pentagon labels "protests" as a form of “low-level terrorism” — enraging civil liberties advocates and activist groups who say it shows blatant disregard of the First Amendment.

The written exam, given as part of Department of Defense employees’ routine training, includes a multiple-choice question that asks:

“Which of the following is an example of low-level terrorism?”
— Attacking the Pentagon
— IEDs
— Hate crimes against racial groups
— Protests
The correct answer, according to the exam, is "Protests."

“Its part of a pattern of equating dissent and protest with terrorism," said Ann Brick, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, which obtained a copy of the question after a Defense Department employee who was taking the test printed the screen on his or her computer terminal.

"It undermines the core constitutional values the Department of Defense is supposed to be defending,” Brick said, referring to the First Amendment right to peaceably assemble.

The Pentagon spokesman says he thinks this is from an exam intended for people stationed abroad. He doesn't say how "attacking the Pentagon" fits that particular spin. Maybe they could replace it with "Tea Parties".

There's lots more. Read it all.