posted on November 29, 2006 01:14:50 PM new
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has sparked a nationwide debate about the First Amendment after saying the war against terrorism may force the United States to reexamine freedom of speech guarantees.
Gingrich, a potential Republican presidential candidate in 2008, said Monday that a “different set of rules” may be needed to reduce the terrorists’ ability to use the Internet to recruit and communicate. "We need to get ahead of the curve before we actually lose a city, which I think could happen in the next decade," Gingrich said in a speech covered by the Union Leader of Manchester. The address has been widely disseminated and debated on Internet sites such as HOTSOUP.com, an issues-based social network.
“Scary,” said Badger38, a regular commentator at HOTSOUP. Gingrich’s remarks are “a bit like a speech given by Tommy Franks in 2003 in which he talked about the scrapping of the Constitution if another terrorist attack took place on U.S. soil.” A veteran who goes by the username “independentvoter” said fear should not immobilize the nation or lead to the elimination of freedoms “that millions have died for. As for me, I am a Marine (72-76; once a Marine, always a Marine). I wasn’t afraid to die for my freedoms back then and I sure as hell am not afraid to die for them today.”
In the same discussion Loop, others argued that Gingrich may have a point. “You know, he’s right,” wrote Mikekeyy. “Those freedoms just hinder those trying to protect us. Besides, if you’ve got nothing to hide, why should you care? The only ones they’re after are the terrorists.”
Some gave Gingrich credit for thinking outside the box at a time when most politicians are trapped by convention. “It is all clear cut to me folks: watch and listen intensely the next few months as Newt and all other politicians sprout objections to the way things have been run in Washington,” said Mayor Jon Tucci of Weston, W.Va.
“They know that there is a very intelligent populace like never before that has finally caught on to the shenanigans in our house. The age of mass communication and nearly-split-second information at the fingertips of the voting public demands honesty and, hopefully, integrity,” Tucci wrote. “Some of the old timers will never change, but, the savvy Newt and all like him will try and turn the plate over and uncover that twist – that niche that he and other feel will pull them up out of the murky waters to the promised throne.” Join the debate at www.hotsoup.com .
Absolute faith has been shown, consistently, to breed intolerance. And intolerance, history teaches us, again and again, begets violence.
---------------------------------- The duty of a patriot in this time and place is to ask questions, to demand answers, to understand where our nation is headed and why. If the answers you get do not suit you, or if they frighten you, or if they anger you, it is your duty as a patriot to dissent. Freedom does not begin with blind acceptance and with a flag. Freedom begins when you say 'No.'
posted on November 29, 2006 01:15:49 PM new
Newt Gingrich called for a reexamination of free speech at the Loeb First Amendment Award Dinner in New Hampshire this week, saying a “different set of rules to prevent terrorism” are necessary.
Gingrich’s call to restrict free speech is mainly focused on the Internet.
Keith Olbermann discussed the constitutionality of this with George Washington University law professor and constitutional law expert Jonathan Turley.
This is a transcript from the show.
It’s in the quintessential movie about this city, “Chinatown.” Morty the Mortician turns to Jack Nicholson’s character and says, “Middle of the drought, and the water commissioner drowns. Only in L.A.” Tonight, a real-life equivalent. Middle of a dinner honoring the sanctity of the First Amendment, and the former speaker of the House talks about restricting freedom of speech. Only in the Republican Party.
Our fifth story on the COUNTDOWN, it might have been his first attempt to fire up his base for a possible presidential run, or it might have been something more ominous. But Newt Gingrich has actually proposed a different set of rules and invoked the bogeyman of terror.
Gingrich was the featured speaker at the annual Nackey S. Loeb First Amendment Award Dinner in Manchester, New Hampshire, Monday night, where he not only argued that campaign finance reform and the separation of church and state should be rethought, because they allegedly hurt the First Amendment, but he also suggested that new rules might be necessary to stop terrorists using freedom of speech to get out their message.
Here is his rationalization:
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NEWT GINGRICH, FORMER HOUSE SPEAKER: My view is that either before we lose a city, or if we are truly stupid after we lose a city, we will adopt rules of engagement that we use every technology we can find to break up their capacity to use the Internet, to break up their capacity to use free speech, and to go after people who want to kill us, to stop them from recruiting people before they get to reach out and convince young people to destroy their lives while destroying us.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
OLBERMANN: If you’re going to destroy freedom of speech, bub, you’ve already lost all the cities.
To paraphrase Pastor Martin Noemuller’s poem about Germany in the ‘30s and ‘40s: First they came for the Fourth Amendment, then they came for habeas corpus, then came for free speech, and there was no one allowed to speak up.
The politics in a moment.
JONATHAN TURLEY, CONSTITUTIONAL LAW EXPERT, GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY: Thanks, Keith.
OLBERMANN: So the conventional wisdom on this is, he’s to breathe life into the same scare tactics that worked so well for the president and the vice president until four weeks ago. But could this be more nefarious than just politics? Could any president really gut free speech in the name of counterterrorism?
TURLEY: They could. I mean, it’s bizarre it would occur in a First Amendment speech. God knows what he’d say at a Mother’s Day speech.
But, you know, this really could happen. I mean, the fact is that the First Amendment is an abstraction, and when you put up against it the idea of incinerating millions of people, there will be millions of citizens that respond, like some Pavlovian response, and deliver up rights. We’ve already seen that.
People don’t seem to appreciate that you really can’t save a Constitution by destroying it.
OLBERMANN: We asked Mr. Gingrich’s office for the full speech. To their credit, they provided most of it to us, late relative to our deadline. But let me read you a little bit more of this that we’ve just gotten, Jonathan.
“I want to suggest to you that we right now should be impaneling people to look seriously at a level of supervision that we would never dream of, if it were not for the scale of this threat.” That’s one quote.
“This is a serious, long-term war,” Gingrich added, “and it will inevitably lead us to want to know what is said in every suspect place in the country. It will lead us to learn how to close down every Web site that is dangerous.”
Jonathan, are there not legal methods already in place to deal with such sites that do not require what Mr. Gingrich has here called “supervision that we would never dream of?”
TURLEY: Well, there are plenty of powers and authorities that could be used to monitor truly dangerous people. But what you see here, I think, is the insatiable appetite that has developed among certain leaders for controlling American society.
We saw that with John Ashcroft not long after 9/11, when he said the critics were aiding and abetting the terrorists. There is this insatiable appetite that develops when you feed absolute power to people like Gingrich.
And people should not assume that these are just going to be fringe candidates, and this could never happen. Fear does amazing things to people, and it could a sort of self-mutilation in a democracy, where we give up the very things, the very rights that define us, and theoretically, the very things that we are defending.
OLBERMANN: Also, when you talk about closing down Internet sites, who is the one who’s going to decide which those are? I mean, it could be the Daily Kos, it could be Citizens for Legitimate Government, it could be the sports Web site Dead Spin, for all we know, if he doesn’t like any one of them in particular.
TURLEY: Well, what these guys don’t understand is that the best defense against bad ideas, like extremism and terrorism, is free speech. That’s what we’ve proven. That’s why they don’t like us, is that we’re remarkably successful as a democracy, because we’ve shown that really bad ideas don’t survive in the marketplace, unless you try to suppress them, unless you try to keep people from speaking. Then it becomes a form of martyrdom. Then you give credence to what they’re saying.
OLBERMANN: Last question, the specific idea about the Internet. There was a story just today out of Toronto that researchers at a Canadian university developed some software that will let users in places like China that have Internet restrictions, the phrase they used were, “hop over government’s Internet firewalls.” Might it be that the technology will be our best defense against the Newt Gingriches of this country?
TURLEY: It may be. We may have to rely on our own creativity to overcome the inclinations of people like Newt Gingrich.
OLBERMANN: George Washington University law professor and constitutional law expert, and, I think it’s fair to say, friend of the Constitution, Jonathan Turley. Great thanks, Jon.
TURLEY: Thanks, Keith.
Absolute faith has been shown, consistently, to breed intolerance. And intolerance, history teaches us, again and again, begets violence.
---------------------------------- The duty of a patriot in this time and place is to ask questions, to demand answers, to understand where our nation is headed and why. If the answers you get do not suit you, or if they frighten you, or if they anger you, it is your duty as a patriot to dissent. Freedom does not begin with blind acceptance and with a flag. Freedom begins when you say 'No.'
posted on November 29, 2006 02:01:29 PM new
What's particularly scary is that anyone still takes this man seriously.
____________________________________________
May 1, 2003, America brings "democracy" to Iraq. November 7, 2006, Iraq brings democracy to America.
posted on November 29, 2006 02:07:51 PM new
The Republican are so desperate to gain back control of Congress they are willing to use any scare tactic they can. Since Newt helped them to gain control of Congress years ago why not bring him back into the national spotlight in order to motivate their base.
There will be people like Crybaby_K that will take him seriously.
Absolute faith has been shown, consistently, to breed intolerance. And intolerance, history teaches us, again and again, begets violence.
---------------------------------- The duty of a patriot in this time and place is to ask questions, to demand answers, to understand where our nation is headed and why. If the answers you get do not suit you, or if they frighten you, or if they anger you, it is your duty as a patriot to dissent. Freedom does not begin with blind acceptance and with a flag. Freedom begins when you say 'No.'
posted on November 29, 2006 02:10:53 PM new
Guess that depends on IF you're taking what someone else says he said....or listening to him yourself.
No surprise...I STILL like a lot of what he says.
He's on OUR side....not the terrorists side. I support ALL who are 'with us'....none who are 'against us'.
=========
from Newt's blog site: On HIS position on the 1st Amendment:
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Newt: Get Rid of Campaign Finance Reform Laws
Newt Gingrich has called for eliminating the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform laws because he believes they are a restriction on the First Amendment's guarantee to freedom of speech.
"Just as tax lawyers always succeed in out-thinking the (Internal Revenue Service) because they stay after five and the IRS goes home, the private-sector lawyers will always out-think the (Federal Election Commission) because they stay after five and the FEC goes home," Gingrich told about 400 people at the Nackey Scripps Loeb First Amendment Awards Honors dinner."(source)
Instead, Gingrich believes contributions should be reported within 24 hours on the internet.
McCain-Feingold restricted contributions to political parties from unions, corporations, and individuals. Nevertheless, organizations like PAC's (political action committees), CCE's(committees of continuing existence), and 527's have found loop holes to raise enormous amounts of money for political ends.
posted by The Strong Conservative
"While the democratic party complains about everything THIS President does to protect our Nation": "What would a Democrat president have done at that point?"
"Apparently, the answer is: Sit back and wait for the next terrorist attack."
