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If You Blog in Philly, Please Pay the $300 Tax For Your Thoughts

By Adam Bitely

If you operate a blog in Philadelphia, PA, get ready to pay a $300 tax. That’s right, if you are a blogger in the city of Philadelphia, you may soon face a $300 tax for simply operating a blog regardless of how much money you make from doing so.

According to Aaron Proctor, who blogs at the Philadelphia Libertarian Examiner, “If your ’site is designed to make money’–and by City standards that means your site exists — then you must file for a ‘business privilege’ and pay the $300 to ‘run a business’ in this City.”

The city of Philadelphia considers any blog that has the ability to generate money as a ‘business’. Thus, the city is requiring people to pay $300 to register for a Business Privilege License–which allows the city government to have a registry of those potentially making money online. However, most of the bloggers affected by this generate little to no money.

As reported by the Philadelphia City Paper, tax attorney Michael Mandale of Center City law firm Mandale Kaufmann said, “Even though small-time bloggers aren’t exactly raking in the dough, the city requires privilege licenses for any business engaged in any ‘activity for profit’… [This applies] whether or not they earned a profit during the preceding year.”

The true goal of the city of Philadelphia here is to raise revenue from a source they currently aren’t. To those affected by this, this appears to be the city imposing a tax on free speech.

According to Bill Wilson, President of Americans for Limited Government, “A tax on free speech is obscene. Government in this instance shows its true face; greedy, grasping and the enemy of individual liberty.”

Wilson continued, saying “Actions like these by the City of Philadelphia are what is destroying what little credibility government as an entity has left.”

The credibility of the city of Philadelphia is diminished when they seek to raise money by taxing people more than they earn. If a blogger makes $11 a year in Philadelphia, they still have to obtain the license, causing them to be short $300.

This is repugnant — how else to describe a speech license? — and should be stopped.

Adam Bitely is the Editor-in-Chief of NetRightDaily.com for Americans for Limited Government.

Reid's War on Dissent

By Robert Romano

Harry Reid just does not like dissent. Yesterday, the Senate Majority Leader failed to muster the votes necessary to proceed to the so-called DISCLOSE Act, which would impose burdensome restrictions on corporations and nonprofits that choose to engage in advertising for or against candidates for federal office.

In arguing for the bill, Reid blasted Senate Republicans for dissenting against major Democrat policy initiatives, in particular the $2.5 trillion ObamaCare, the government takeover of the nation’s financial sector, the $862 billion “stimulus,” and the $34 billion extension of unemployment welfare benefits.

What Reid failed to acknowledge is that Senate Republicans were unable stop a single one of those measures. They merely dissented against legislation that ultimately passed.

Perhaps that was the problem. Perhaps he would prefer unanimity in support of his legislative agenda. Or a one party system.

Nonetheless, that did not prevent Reid from labeling Senate Republicans who blocked the bill as being in the pockets of corporations and special interests. Only, the DISCLOSE Act, which Reid supports, is laced with special interest exemptions. The NRA, AARP, the Sierra Club, unions and others have all achieved privileged carve-outs that will allow them to make independent expenditures without any disclosure at all.

Media, too, maintained its decades-long exemption from federal election law. According to 2 USC 431 (9) (B) (i), the 1971 Federal Election Campaign Act: “The term ‘expenditure’ does not include any news story, commentary, or editorial distributed through the facilities of any broadcasting station, newspaper, magazine, or other periodical publication”. This media exemption to campaign regulation is reinforced in the DISCLOSE Act’s language on page 24.

To add insult to injury, Reid said, “Why would we let those who go through such great lengths to conceal their names, and those who try to protect them by blocking this bill, dilute or manipulate our voices?” What about the NRA, AARP, Sierra Club, unions, and media? Why does their protection from disclosure yield the excessive regulation of everyone else?

The mere presence of exemptions for anybody in this bill discredits the premise for disclosure — that there is something inherently corrupt about political speech. Never mind that that the freedom of speech and of the press is explicitly protected by the First Amendment to the Federal Constitution. Never mind that the Supreme Court struck down disclosure requirements in 1958 in NAACP v. Alabama.

The same Senators who keep quoting former Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, who said, “Sunlight is the best disinfectant,” are the same Senators who are supporting legislation with disclosure exemptions for the privileged few. How is it that the possibility for corruption from anonymous speech exists for everybody except those so exempted?

It would merely be a theater of the absurd if its ramifications were not so far-reaching. Corruption is not prevented under the DISCLOSE Act. It is being institutionalized. In fact, Congress is giving out privileged speech licenses to the highest bidder.

Reid revealed his true motivation when he said, “Whenever the voice of the corporation is the loudest, the voice of the citizen is harder to hear.” He’s okay with businesses and nonprofits criticizing him when he runs for reelection, he says, he just wants to know who they are.

Perhaps businesses and other groups are afraid to speak out in the open for fear of federal intervention into their affairs. In fact, under the bill, express advocacy for a candidate running for federal office is an open invitation to opening up the books of even the minutest details of a business or nonprofit’s activities.

The Act’s disclosure requirements includes any expenditures in excess of $10,000 of express advocacy for or against a candidate up to 20 days before an election and in excess of $1,000 within 20 days before an election, which must be reported to the FEC within 24 hours. The disclosure requirements extend to 120 days prior to the first presidential primary or caucus, and 90 days before the first Congressional primary or caucus, and extend through general election day.

Anyone who invests or donates in excess of $600 to a company or organization that engages in express advocacy of a candidate, except for media organizations and other exempt entities, would have their names submitted to the FEC. The bill also requires that the highest ranking official of a business or nonprofit appear on camera to say that he or she is approving the message on the organization’s political communication, and they must list the top funder of the ad and the top five donors of the organization.

The effect on political speech will be a chilling one. The message is, “Don’t you speak out against candidates running for office, or we’ll come after you. We’ll show your books to the public. We’ll destroy you.” The intent here is to intimidate by making the costs of speaking out outweigh the benefits, all under the guise of disclosure.

Americans don’t let the government spy on individuals in the ballot box, so why should they let government officials necessarily know who is criticizing them?

Dissent against government is supposed to be one of the highest forms of patriotism. But under Reid’s regime, it will be a marker, a scarlet letter by which dissidents can be weeded out for government discrimination. This should be greatly alarming for all who value any legitimate, credible opposition in our political system.

Robert Romano is the Senior Editor for Americans for Limited Government (ALG) News Bureau.

Eric Holder's Black Panther Case

Eric Holder's Justice


Supporting one-sided disclosure

By Rick Manning

With scandal swirling around the Daily Kos and Research 2000 polls, there are many questions that need answers. Since these polls were widely reported as fact by many in the mainstream media, and since Daily Kos has declared support of the DISCLOSE Act, one wonders what might have been public record had the DISCLOSE act already been law.

For instance, Kos paid for over 150 operator assisted polls. That is quite expensive. I mean millions of dollars expensive. Where did Kos, and more specifically, Markos Moulitsas get the cash for such an operation? Surely, as a supporter of DISCLOSE, he wouldn’t mind publishing his cash sources.

Also, the groups that paid for this operation are most likely exempt from disclosure, should DISCLOSE become the law of the land. The money most likely came from left-wing orgs, which the Democrats carved out of the new disclosure regulations to protect their money trail.

Under current finance laws and under the House of Representative passed, partisan DISCLOSE Act, we are left to speculate about whether labor unions or others are big donors to an operation like Kos, which continually pumps up their candidates and peddles their talking points.

So, it remains up in the air if Daily Kos was just fronting for Big Labor, providing unreported in-kind contributions to favored candidates or just trying to skew the public debate related to attitudes toward their favored leftist candidates.

One thing that is absolutely clear, is that Markos Moulitsas feels that he got ripped off by his pollster, and is demanding that all the research be provided to him through the legal discovery process.

The irony shouldn’t be lost on anyone that while Markos is demanding full disclosure from his pollster, he is hiding behind the laws from providing the public full disclosure on his shady left wing front operation.

If it turns out, as many suspect, that these fraudulent polls were funded using money taken from union treasuries, this might turn out to be the most politically expensive lawsuit in history. We might just be witnessing the permanent tarnishing of the carefully cultivated golden boy sheen of Markos Moulitsas, who could be revealed as nothing more than another big labor shill. At best, Moulitsas will be seen as a naïve political player who thought he could buy millions of dollars worth of polling at pennies on the dollar and expect it to maintain high quality standards.

Perhaps he should have been clued in by his pollster doing his statistical compilations at the local Kinko’s.

Kos’ only hope for redemption is to open his books and answer the following questions:

1. What was the intent of the polls?

2. Who were the polls intending to help?

3. Who paid for the polls, and where did that money originate?

4. Were the polls provided to political candidates, and if so, which one’s?

Failure to answer these simple questions will leave political insiders snickering when the latest golden boy launches his next venture. It is time for Kos to come clean.

Rick Manning is the Director of Communications for Americans for Limited Government.

Saying no to DISCLOSE

By Michael Swartz

Traditionally, newspapers have enjoyed the freedom from restrictions on political speech. A good editorial board will consider all views for publication and exhibit some sort of balance among those they allot space for in the editorial pages. Being of the conservative persuasion I would expect to have my columns paired up against another representing the liberal or progressive perspective.

In broadcast media, it’s rare to find a radio or television station which promotes a multitude of editorial viewpoints; however, that singularity is countered by the fact that many markets have a wide variety of broadcasters and consumers can select the ones they rely upon. Similarly, the internet is the wild, wild West of media because its myriad and less edited viewpoints are available with a click of a mouse.

Yet with most of these cases, we don’t really know who is making the decision to air these viewpoints – this column found in your newspaper or on particular websites is an exception. You can read the byline and the short description of who I am in the footer to realize that I am syndicated through Liberty Features and, if you haven’t already gathered this, we generally write with a conservative-to-libertarian slant. A little bit of study can provide the disclosure you need.
Proponents of the DISCLOSE Act (H.R. 5175) which recently passed the House and was sent to the Senate for approval wish to shine this light on corporate donors to political campaigns. This is an admirable goal, but in practice will serve to chill the prospect of free speech in a year where, by most conventional wisdom, the majority party which is driving this bill will be losing its power in Congress.

More proof of the aspect of political gain comes from those who are exempted. The bill was written narrowly enough at first to exclude unions from its restrictions, with other carveouts added later to satisfy particular groups – as an example, the National Rifle Association switched sides on the measure, dropping its opposition when language which would exempt the organization was added.

It’s an unfortunate byproduct of our thirst for information that certain groups can be targeted for expressing themselves through contributions to political candidates or ballot issues. The poster children for this may be proponents of California’s Proposition 8, which banned the state’s allowance for same-sex marriage. Even small contributors to that cause have been targets for harassment by opponents bitter that the repeal passed at the ballot box and hasn’t been overturned in court.

In fact, it was a court case – Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission – which inspired House Democrats, led by Rep. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, to write and introduce the DISCLOSE Act just in time for the 2010 campaign. In their view, the conservative justices on the Supreme Court went too far in throwing out restrictions on political speech. And by enacting a 90-day period of effect for Federal races (120 days for Presidential campaigns) they go even further than the 60-day timeframe of McCain-Feingold – a bill which was called an incumbent protection act.

If one is to assume a corporation is a group of citizens and money given to political campaigns is a form of speech, there’s little doubt that the Senate is simply poking its nose into a hornet’s nest and inviting a court battle if the DISCLOSE Act isn’t stopped there. But Democrats don’t seem to mind just as long as the rules are in place for this election. They can always make up something more draconian as necessary for 2012.

Michael Swartz used to practice architecture but now is a Maryland-based freelance writer and blogger whose work can be found in a number of outlets, including Liberty Features Syndicate. His e-mail address is lfs.mswartz@gmail.com.

The FTC, FCC and FEC are going to war on free speech

By Adam Bitely

This week may prove to be the most important week for free speech the nation has ever seen. With a three-way assault being waged on our First Amendment rights, it is little surprise that the Obama administration would use the Federal Trade Commission, the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Elections Commission to regulate free speech. After all, the Obama administration has made it clear that if you speak out against their agenda, you are an enemy of “progress”.

Let’s start with the FTC. This morning, the FTC will hold a public forum in Washington D.C. to discuss the findings of their commission that is tasked with discovering how to make the news reporting business profitable again. This is no short order, as dinosaur news organizations such as the New York Times have lost extreme amounts of readership. But as most outside of D.C. know all too well, bailouts don’t work and lead to companies that peddle government-influenced junk to appease their financiers.

Instead of allowing the market to work its magic, the FTC seems to believe that government intervention can remedy the decisions made by consumers who moved away from the news organizations of the past. In their opinion, they can “bail out” the nearly dead news agencies with ideas such as an Ipad tax to subsidize the nearly forgotten news agencies.

On Thursday, the Federal Communications Commission will hold an open meeting to discuss Net Neutrality. After the FCC was dealt a set-back in the recent Comcast Corp. v. FCC decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, the FCC will be considering other options to enforce regulations on Internet Service Providers (ISP’s) known as Net Neutrality.

The FCC, in its announcement of the meeting, mentions two possibilities for the regulations, while jokingly inserting what they refer to as a “third way” that would result in no regulations, leaving the Internet alone as it currently stands. The FCC is attempting to lump ISP’s under archaic regulations that were passed for the telecommunications industry decades earlier. If the FCC succeeds with this effort, they will be able to control your ISP. This will result in a regulated Internet, raising costs for consumers and regulation of the content that consumer’s access.

Include all of the above with legislation that is expected to hit the Senate floor later in the week. This next assault on free speech will be introduced by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY).

Schumer has proposed what he is calling the DISCLOSE Act, which would empower the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) to regulate political commentary. Curiously, Labor Unions and traditional news outlets are exempted from this legislation. Which leads one to wonder what the purpose of the bill actually is? Well, according to the AFL-CIO’s Josh Goldstein, who supports the legislation “… the final bill should treat corporations different than Democratic organizations such as unions.”

Taken together, these are flagrant assaults on free speech and press.

Government officials in Washington, D.C. want the public to believe that they can fix the traditional news media organizations that are failing with the flick of a magic wand. One has to wonder if their true objective is to create a national state-run media. These same Obama officials would have the power to compete unfairly with media outlets with which they disagree.

A bailout of news organizations will prove to be far more dangerous than anyone can even comprehend. If any news media organization is bailed out, the independence that a credible news organization should have from its stories to provide honest journalism will be lost. News organizations that are the recipients of a “bailout” will be in a tough spot when covering anything that casts the government or a particularly supportive politician in an unfavorable light. The “bailout” cash will have strings attached that will further discredit and ruin news organizations that are already zombies.

By forcing bloggers to disclose their connections with political operations, the Obama administration and Congress are making a blatant move to keep an eye on and potentially coerce the very people that their newspaper/national media investments are in direct competition with.

The administration has proven where it stands on this matter. When it comes to free speech, only those that agree with their agenda should be permitted to freely exercise freedom of speech guaranteed to all under the First Amendment. The administration has shown all Americans that they will go to any length to expand their regulatory powers to ban speech that they deem as inappropriate while protecting their supporters and allied organizations.

If the DISCLOSE Act comes to pass and the FTC moves forward with rescuing the newspaper industry, while the FCC grabs the reins of the Internet, the First Amendment will have been shredded and those supposed defenders of the Fourth Estate will be wholly-owned subsidiaries of the very government they are supposed to monitor.

Adam Bitely is the Editor-In-Chief of NetRightDaily.com.

A Victory for Free Speech

By Robert Romano

On March 26th, 2010, SpeechNow.org won a federal case against the Federal Election Commission (FEC), which had barred the organization from raising unlimited amounts of money from its donors. The ruling by the D.C. District Court applied the reasoning from the recent Citizens United case, which previously lifted restrictions on expenditures by independent organizations.

Independent organizations by definition act without any coordination with candidates or candidates’ campaigns, and do not necessarily make donations to campaigns. Instead, they raise money on their own to advocate for and against the election of candidates via expenditures.

However, the law restricted organizations from taking any more than $5,000 from any individual, and in the case involved, according to the ruling, three individuals who wanted to donate more than that.

From the case’s background: “All five of the individual plaintiffs – [David] Keating, [Edward] Crane, Fred Young, Brad Russo, and Scott Burkhardt – are prepared to donate to SpeechNow. Keating proposes to donate $5500. Crane proposes to donate $6000. Young, who is otherwise unaffiliated with SpeechNow, proposes to donate $110,000. Russo and Burkhardt want to make donations of $100 each. In addition, as of August 2008, seventy-five other individuals had indicated on SpeechNow’s website that they were interested in making donations.”

However, because of the law, SpeechNow.org never collected any of the intended donations, and thus never was able to engage in the political activities it had planned for 2008. According to the ruling, “As for expenditures, SpeechNow planned ads for the 2008 election cycle against two incumbent candidates for federal office who, in the opinion of SpeechNow, did not sufficiently support First Amendment rights. These ads would have cost around $12,000 to produce. Keating intended to place the ads so that the target audience would view the ads at least ten times, which would have cost around $400,000.” But that never happened.

So, the Court ruled that if the government has no anti-corruption interest in limiting expenditures made by independent organizations, as in the Citizens United decision, then it has no such interest in limiting donations to those same independent organizations.

That was a pretty straightforward ruling, but with the Federal Election Commission, nothing is ever so simple. It appears that they never intended to honor the ruling.

As SpeechNow.org noted yesterday in a press release, after the initial ruling, “the FEC did not agree to refrain from enforcing the laws against prospective donors to SpeechNow.org who were not plaintiffs in the case.”

In other words, the danger existed that the FEC absurdly intended to apply the March 26th ruling very narrowly, only allowing unlimited donations from those five petitioners to SpeechNow.org.

That would have created an untenable situation wherein prospective individuals wishing to donate as much as they want to independent organizations would have to individually sue in court, incurring the legal fees necessary to win the case. All that to obtain a right that according to the Court is supposed to be protected by the First Amendment.

So, SpeechNow.org returned to Court, arguing for an injunction that would allow the organization to solicit donations from prospective contributors free of the prior, unconstitutional restrictions — including those who were not plaintiffs in the original case.

Finally, on June 1st, SpeechNow.org won the injunction, enforcing the March 26th ruling.

“By enjoining the FEC from enforcing limits against prospective donors to SpeechNow.org, the court has ensured that everyone is free to associate and speak about politics,” said Institute for Justice (IJ) Senior Attorney Steve Simpson, who along with the Center for Competitive Politics represented SpeechNow.org in court.

“No one should have to choose between their First Amendment right to speak and their First Amendment right to associate,” Simpson added. That’s right. And yet that is exactly what the FEC and proponents of campaign speech restrictions are attempting to force everyone to do. The SpeechNow.org v. FEC decision is a victory for free speech.

But the war is never won. Remarkably, the FEC may still need to be enjoined from enforcing limits against prospective donors to independent organizations besides SpeechNow.org — just so it gets the message. In the end, it is as John Philpot Curran warned: “The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance.”

Robert Romano is the Senior Editor of ALG News Bureau.

Patriotism Is Not a Crime

By Chris Slavens

Cinco de Mayo is a minor holiday in Mexico, first marketed to Americans by Corona (yes, the beer company) in the 1980s for the express purpose of selling, well, beer. That it has been turned into a celebration of Mexican heritage is bizarre, and indicative of ignorance on the part of those who take it seriously. So why were five California students sent home from school on May 5 after showing up wearing American flag t-shirts?

One of the students (who happens to be half-Hispanic) claims that Assistant Principal Miguel Rodriguez called the shirts “incendiary.” Yet, on the next day, about 200 Hispanic students staged an illegal walk-out in the Morgan Hill Unified School District, shouting “Sí se puede” (which translates to “yes, it is possible” or “yes, we can”) and disrupting traffic. They were not disciplined by the school district, which begs the question, was Rodriguez’s decision to send the American-flag wearing students home racially motivated?

The First Amendment recognizes the God-given (or natural) right to free speech, which includes symbolic speech, or expression, a fact supported by numerous court decisions over the years. It applies, without exception, whether one is in a private residence, religious building, city park, or public school.

The administrators’ decision to punish students for expressing their patriotism on a Mexican drinking holiday is beyond absurd — it is flagrantly unconstitutional.

Students are free to wear what they choose to school; whether a shirt depicts an American flag, a Mexican flag, an anti-war slogan, or the face of Hitler, it is neither the duty nor the right of a school administrator to decide that certain expressions are permissible, while others are not.

And, no public official has the right to punish a citizen for wearing or displaying the American flag in the United States of America. Ever.

Fortunately, the school district seems to have gotten the message from outraged parents and patriots across the nation, and is responding correctly. Superintendent Wesley Smith wrote, in a statement released shortly after the incident occurred, that “students should not, and will not, be disciplined for wearing patriotic clothing. This matter is under investigation and appropriate action will be taken.” Some parents have called for the administrators in question to be fired.

Do Hispanic students have the right to display pride in their country of origin? Of course. The First Amendment does not choose sides; it protects all Americans equally. They have the right to do this, not only on May 5, but any other day of the year.

Yet, in this nation, America comes first. E pluribus unum. Out of many, one. Our many ethnic backgrounds take second place to our pride in being, simply, Americans.

While Cinco de Mayo is an unofficial holiday enjoyed by many Americans, its hijacking by racist Mexican groups like La Raza—the members of which dare to be offended by the precious flag of the nation in which they live—shows that there are some who, even in the land of opportunity, enjoy stirring up trouble without the slightest provocation.

Five patriots wore American flag t-shirts to school. Two hundred anti-patriots walked out of school and marched on the streets. Which group’s expression was more “incendiary?”

Chris Slavens, former contributor to the Wilmington News Journal, is a Liberty Features Syndicated writer for Americans for Limited Government.

A War on Dissent?

By Rick Manning

Are we witnessing the opening salvos in a war against political dissent and the First Amendment?

Read carefully what the President said last Sunday at Hampton University, “the era of iPads and Xboxes had turned information into a diversion that was imposing new strains on democracy. You're coming of age in a 24/7 media environment that bombards us with all kinds of content and exposes us to all kinds of arguments, some of which don't always rank that high on the truth meter."

Is Obama really telling American students pay less attention to what his Administration is up to?

Realize that this is the same Administration that has tried to use the Federal Communications Commission to regulate the Internet through its so-called Net Neutrality proposal that was recently found unconstitutional by the courts.

This is the same Administration that sent its spokespeople out on the various networks to publicly excoriate FOX News for not following the approved Obama party line.

This is the same Administration that regularly attempts to demonize media hosts and regularly attacks Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck and a host of others.

This is also the same Administration that incredibly has failed to hold an official White House news conference since last July, and had the audacity to offer the White House press corps a taped interview of Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan rather than letting reporters actually interview her.

This is the same President who has advocated shuttering First Amendment political speech rights that were afforded corporations in the Citizens United Supreme Court decision — in his State of the Union Address with the very justices who rendered the decision in attendance. This is really the heart of stopping political dissent, can a corporation pay for and distribute a political book, pamphlet, or movie.

This President’s nominee to the Supreme Court actually gave the Orwellian argument that the First Amendment should be used to prohibit this very type of political speech.

Chief Justice John Roberts directly rejected Kagan’s argument writing, “The Government urges us in this case to uphold a direct prohibition on political speech. It asks us to embrace a theory of the First Amendment that would allow censorship not only of television and radio broadcasts, but of pamphlets, posters, the Internet, and virtually any other medium that corporations and unions might find useful in expressing their views on matters of public concern.

“Its theory, if accepted, would empower the Government to prohibit newspapers from running editorials or opinion pieces supporting or opposing candidates for office, so long as the newspapers were owned by corporations — as the major ones are. First Amendment rights could be confined to individuals, subverting the vibrant public discourse that is at the foundation of our democracy.”

Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in rejecting the Kagan position that, “the First Amendment confirms the freedom to think for ourselves.”

Obama and the Left’s war on dissent has gone far beyond the hallowed halls of the Supreme Court however, as the organized attacks on the Tea Party movement by the power brokers who control the White House, Congress and the media have shown.

The revelation in liberal columnist Jonathan Alter’s book that Obama, who has repeatedly called for civility in his many national lectures, had used the sexual pejorative term preferred by the Left to describe these Americans who are exercising their First Amendment rights to redress Congress is hardly surprising. What is surprising is that the slur was deemed acceptable by the intelligentsia as there was no resulting uproar or demands for apology.

Imagine the uproar by this Administration if the Los Angeles Unified School District teacher who called for revolution by La Raza on the UCLA campus in the wake of the Arizona immigration law had instead been a tea party supporter in the wake of the health care law.

Incredibly, calls for revolution and racist hate speech from a public employee union member on the campus of a public university is somehow okay, yet professional left-wing instigator groups like the Southern Poverty and Law Center constantly warn against imagined conservative threats.

Why?

Because the war on dissent by this Administration is real, but not just any dissent — conservative and libertarian dissent are the targets, since these dissenters seek to stop Obama’s policies that are designed to radically change our nation forever.

If you still have any doubts about this, just look at this past week’s hearings and subsequent debate on the new campaign finance reform legislation being considered by Congress. Patton Boggs political law expert William McGinley warns that the proposed law for the first time opens the door to even regulate bloggers who engage in political expression. This would be a significant expansion of the Federal Election Commission’s regulatory reach directly targeting the most basic political speech.

The Left’s assault on the First Amendment right to dissent is under assault as never before in what appears to be a desperate attempt to control the information flow that Americans receive in a bid to maintain power.


From a Supreme Court nominee who thinks that a modern day pamphlet in the tradition of Thomas Paine’s “Commonsense” should be banned if a corporation publishes and distributes it, to an FCC that is trying to regulate the Internet, to a White House that tolerates blatant hate speech from the left while lecturing those on the right to tone down the rhetoric, the uniquely American right to free speech is under attack.

So, when Obama muses in a very public and carefully considered speech that the many new forms of media are putting “strains on democracy,” and that some, “don't always rank that high on the truth meter.” Be concerned, be very concerned. He’s talking about anyone who doesn’t agree with him cluttering the minds of the masses with inconvenient facts and arguments.

When it comes to the assault on each of our First Amendment rights, in my Dad’s words, “speak now or forever hold your peace,” ring in my ears. This is the time to speak up — before it is too late.

Rick Manning is the Director of Communications for Americans for Limited Government.
 
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