Category: Free Speech
"A Swedish cartoonist whose controversial image of the Prophet Muhammad led to a series of death threats said today that he had secured his property with a homemade panic room and booby-trapped artwork. The latest threat to Lars Vilks emerged yesterday when seven people were arrested in Ireland accused of plotting to kill the 63-year-old artist."
"After securing an apology from one Danish newspaper for publishing a cartoon satirizing Mohammed, a Saudi lawyer now plans to confront another 15 newspapers, filing lawsuits against them if necessary."
"Lessons from the Netherlands, the University of California, and Yale."
"We are accepting government prohibitions on the thoughts we may express, we are allowing extremists to shout us down and shut us up, and we are self-censoring out of fear or faux-sensitivity. A few examples? Start with the Dutch government’s prosecution of Geert Wilders . . . ."
Since the scientific foundation of anthropogenic global warming has been crumbling, shouldn't the EPA be rethinking the economically disastrous regulation of CO2? In another blow to any scientific basis for regulation, a professor of economics who was invited by the IPCC panel to review its last report says his team "concluded, with overwhelming statistical significance, that the IPCC’s climate data are contaminated with surface effects from industrialisation and data quality problems. Read more »
The idea that intentionally offending someone is a criminal offense should be a matter for Kafka or comic opera, but such is the advance of multiculturalism in the Netherlands today, and the rest of Europe is not all that far behind. Geert Wilders, the Dutch Parliamentarian who produced the film Fitna, went on trial January 20 for charges including having “intentionally offended a group of people, i.e. Muslims.” Political correctness is always an attack on free speech. MORE
The case is Christian Legal Society v. Martinez, and it involves a policy at the University of California Hastings requiring all student groups to accept members regardless of the effect it will have on the groups message. Students for Life America submitted a friend of the court brief to explain that the policy could force a pro-life group to accept a pro-abortion student as the group's president. Read more »
The Hill offers this explanation of the Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United v. FEC and what it means for the 2010 election cycle. As they explain, the Supreme Court did not open the floodgates to corporate financing of campaigns as many "reformers" have predicted. Indeed, the federal ban on corporate contributions to candidates, political parties, and political action committees. Read more »
ACLU's Executive Director, Ira Glasser, explains why the Supreme Court was right in Citizens United and why campaign-finance "reformers," MSM, and liberal Democrats complaining about the decision are wrong.
"The Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United stands with Brown v. Board of Education as a landmark refutation of discriminatory treatment. It is ironic that the President accused the members of the Supreme Court, who have upheld freedom of speech for corporations and unions, as being politically motivated [i]. Read more »
Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) responds to President Obama's comments during the State of the Union address about the Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United v. FEC. Hatch avoids discussing whether it was appropriate to criticize the Court, but explains that they next time the President decides to do it, he might want to make sure his understanding of the case is correct first.
Senatory John Kerry is calling for a constitutional amendment to reverse the Supreme Court's ruling in Citizens United v. FEC. Kerry said the amendment is necessary to "make it clear once and for all that corporations do not have the same free speech rights as individuals." Read more »
Bill Maurer, the Institute for Justice (Washington Chapter), offers his opinion about Citizens United v. FEC. The case has generated considerable controversy, including comments by President Obama during his State of the Union address that prompted Justice Samuel Alito to shake his head.
