We stumbled upon an eye-opening July 22, 2006 Associated Press article on the Forbes Magazine website a couple of days ago:
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) - When school was canceled to accommodate a campaign visit by President Bush, the two 55-year-old teachers reckoned the time was ripe to voice their simmering discontent with the administration's policies.You can read the rest of the article here.
Christine Nelson showed up at the Cedar Rapids rally with a Kerry-Edwards button pinned on her T-shirt; Alice McCabe clutched a small, paper sign stating "No More War." What could be more American, they thought, than mixing a little dissent with the bunting and buzz of a get-out-the-vote rally headlined by the president?
Their reward: a pair of handcuffs and a strip search at the county jail.
Authorities say they were arrested because they refused to obey reasonable security restrictions, but the women disagree: "Because I had a dissenting opinion, they did what they needed to do to get me out of the way," said Nelson, who teaches history and government at one of this city's middle schools.
How about it, gentle readers? are there local implications here? Is it OK for Boss Godfrey to rent out public parks and sidewalks, and allow private promoters to engage in viewpoint discrimination? What about the First Amendment? Is it alright to single out and ban the discussion of the gondola topic at the Farmers' Market, for instance, while politicians and political wonks of all other stripes and issues continue to stroll the event freely, peddling their own pet political issues and causes?
Comments are invited, as always.
22 comments:
Have you no sense of dignity RudiZinK?
Do we really want the gondola gang hawking their miracle cure at the Farmers Market? Do you want the whole town drinkin the stuff and getting as confused as they are?
Do you really want Sharon Beach duking it out with Bobby Geiger in front of the children and old folks?
Do you really want the Sierra guy down their huggin trees and sluggin gondola cars?
Hmmm, now that I see it in writing it sounds like a pretty good show.
Ozboy,
Will you be my mgr?
Rudi can be the ring announcer.
I want a turquoise cape and gloves. It's the universal color, that color specialists say, 'anyone can wear!'
Will this be telecast on Ch 17?
You guys continue to amaze me from afar. Don't you have anything better to do with your time? Next you are going to lead a campaign to disallow the chipmunk from crossing Washington Boulevard on a red light.
Wow... get a life.
GFY, Producer.
Is it alright to single out and ban the discussion of the gondola topic at the Farmers' Market, for instance, while politicians and political wonks of all other stripes and issues continue to stroll the event freely, peddling their own pet political issues and causes?
Actually, no.
The Ogden Farmer's Market I think is having a bit of ideological trouble here.
For instance, if one is an artist or craftsperson, one has to submit photos of one's work and then a jury of people decide whether or not one can participate.
However, there are also political and charitable organizations allowed booth space, and these evidently have no criteria on which they are deemed fit or unfit to participate, since they are all either promoting something or decrying something and asking for the public's support. As both Smart Growth and Lift Ogden would undoubtably be doing also.
Since Ogden City supports the Farmer's Market financially, the tax dollars of members of both SmartGrowth and Lift Ogden are going to support that event, and yet both organizations have been barred from participating in it. And although the argument is that Downtown Ogden, Inc., is in charge and can therefore choose and bar whomever it wishes, still, allowing one political, civic, or charitable organization in and barring another smacks of a bit of politicizing on its part, does it not?
Either politicizing or censorship. Not allowing freedom of speech at a public event because of fear of what Might Happen is really not that admirable. And the same is true in the case of the Bush dissenters.
Producer...learn your wildlife. That's no chipmunk...that's a weasel that escaped from the 9th floor.
your're all eveil, evil, evel.
Is "Producer" the so-called 'producer, who came from Hollywood to Ogden by invitation of the LO's and felt disrespected for not being embraced by the rabble?
Maybe he could produce the match between the kid Geiger and Ms Beech?
The film could be shown in the Ampitheater for Family Night.
Rudi:
Lots happening in the courts on this very topic. In Austin,TX recently, for example a judge ruled that the City of Austin had acted wrongly when it kept they away from a Bush event in the city. Link here for the story in the Austin paper.
Judge says city violated protesters' rights during Bush appearance
In Oregon, the ACLU is going to court on behalf of anti-bush [peaceful] demonstrators who were driven away, forcefully, from in front of Bush's hotel while proBush demonstrators were permitted to stay. Here's a paragraph from the local paper's story, followed by link:
Police used clubs and pepper spray bullets to forcibly move the anti-Bush demonstrators several blocks from the Jacksonville Inn, even though organizers of the protest earlier had cleared their protest plans with Jacksonville Police Chief David Towe and Jackson County Sheriff Mike Winters. The protesters included seniors and families with small children.
ACLU Of Oregon Files Lawsuit Over Breakup of Demonstration During 2004 Bush Visit to Jacksonville
In fact, in the last campaign, the Secret Service worked hard to screen Bush from any protesters at public events, permitting only those who were pro-Bush from being seen. The "protest" consisted in some cases of wearing a Kerry tee shirt or button. Period. Link below has details on many of the incidents:
Quarantining dissent: How the Secret Service protects Bush from free speech
What is a little scarey is the governments resorting to what it cynically calls "free speech zones" as a means of controlling speech and particularly dissent. The idea is that the police or secret service creates a fenced in area, miles from the public event, and they declare it to be the "free speech zone" where protesters may assemble. Supporters of the president --- or those who say they are --- are pemitted to assemble at the event itself. The Secret Service is being sued, along with cooperating local police agencies, all around the nation over this. Good.
Time was, the "free speech zone" was the entire country, or at least all of the public spaces therein. The notion that free speech is or can be legally restricted to police monitored limited "zones" miles from public events in public places is a frightening one.
Why does it not surprise me that it's a Republican administration that has come up with this idea, and implemented it?
Excellent links, Curmudgeon. It's encouraging to see that American courts (lower courts, at least,) are ruling in favor of a broad interpretation of First Amendment rights.
We must not forget, however, that Bill Clinton first came up with the bright idea of "free speech zones."
That of course doesn't absolve Bush and his neoCON cabal from taking this anti-American concept to the next level.
Nor does it excuse Utah's littlest neoCON from mimicking and adopting every antidemocratic neoCON concept that comes down the Washington, D.C. pipeline.
It'll be interesting to see whether members of the Lift Ogden or SmartGrowth will have the sack to engage in active pamphleteering at the Farmers' Market this summer, notwithstanding Boss Godfrey's Stalinesque "gag rule."
Rudi:
In re: SGO/LO having "the sack" as you delicately put it to challenge the Farmers' Market exclusions: well, it doesn't always come down to that. Two other considerations come in as well. The first is money. Mounting a constitutional challenge is always expensive, and can be very very expensive. Takes pockets far deeper than those normally possessed by groups of ordinary citizens organized to promote smart community development over boondoggles designed to please the downtown merchants' organization.
Second: raising such a challenge would take an immense amount of time, resources and energy away from the main task, that of promoting smart growth for Ogden, sustainable growth while preserving the city's parklands and public bench lands which are part --- yes, only part but an important part --- of making Ogden both a distinctive place to live and an attractive place to visit. Sometimes, it's necessary to keep your eyes on the prize. And in this instance, the prize is saving the public park lands and promoting the kind of development, like trolley transit, that will foster growth in a sustainable, substantial way.
Is slapping down government whenever it tries to limit free speech unreasonably in a public place important? Absolutely. But not every citizens group can be, or should be, willing to make it a primary end in every dispute. If they did, the surest way for the Godfreys and Bushs of this world to sidetrack opposition would to deliberately trigger a first ammendment fight by restricting access to a public market, say, knowing it would divert resources, time and energy from the main issue being contested.
Or to sum up all of the above: ya gotta pick your fights, my friend. Can't engage on every issue all the time.
As for your claim that Bill Clinton first instituted the idea of "free speech zones"... well, I notice that your source is Wikpedia, a nororiously unreliable source since everyone who logs in can change any encyclopedia entry. And having followed this matter for some years, I happen to know that on this, Wikpedia is wrong.
Free Speech Zones were first pioneered [with shame... SHAME... be it spoken!] on American college and university campuses. One of the first was LSU's "Free Speech Alley" which made national news when a very young David Duke appeared there, giving neo-Nazi speeches. Other campuses began establishing "free speech" zones and the idea spread.
Originally, the notion was to establish a place and time [but not the only place and time] where students could congregate on campus to hear speakers on any given topic say anything they liked. And get heckled. Administrations however then thought they could be used as a way to limit speech they deemed uncomfortable [from racist diatribes to religious rants to attacks on administration policies] anywhere else on campus. Sad to say, college after college and university after university went down that path. [WSU was not, I think, one of them. In any case, WSU does not today have the kind of restrictive speech code that other public universities are being dragged into court nationwide over, and are losing in case after case after case. You'd think they'd eventually learn, wouldn't you? You'd be wrong.]
Happy to say, there is an organization out there called FIRE that has for some years been merrily taking public universities [private ones like BYU may limit free speech on their campuses whenever and whereever they like] to court, and beating them, over campus "free speech zones." Here's a link to their site:
http://www.thefire.org/
Yeah, I get it, Curm...
But, with human life not seemingly worth much and American presidents assassinated and nearly assassinated, the Secret Service has a hell of a job seeing to the safety of the president.
Presidents and cops are fair game these days...something that was practically unheard of....but is so common now.
Anti anythings often don't just spew rhetoric, they also spray bullets.
Some colleges and their professors incite students to be rude and disrespectful
It seems the students only emulate their profs without a clear thought or conviction of their own.
Wally:
Well, the problem is, there seems to be no, repeat no, security element involved in the free speech zones and even less in the exclusion of "protesters" at public events. For example, several people were removed from a Bush public speech in Colorado when it was noticed they had a Kerry bumper sticker on the car that brought them. They were not heckling, yelling, blocking path ways, spewing profanity. They were sitting in chairs, waiting for the event to begin, and were removed by the Secret Servece. Security? Nonsense. Providing a unformly appreciative audience for the president so the film clips would be politically favorable? Absolutly. But that last is not the job of the Secret Service. Or it hasn't been until recently. Their job is to keep the president safe. Not happy.
At mass public events, anyone, and I mean anyone wearing a Bush tee shirt or button was admitted. You'd have to be a pretty dumb terrorist not to figure out that all you'd have to do to get access to the event is wear a Bush button, and you'd breeze right through.
Yes, security is an important matter. But the claim that all these exclusions and free speech zones are driven by a concern for it is nonsense.
Now, about the other behavior you mention: throwing things, disrupting meetings. Those behaviors are, and should be, illegal, and for them you can be, and should be, arrested. Wearing a Kerry for President button is not illegal. Even if President Bush is driving by. Nor should it be.
BTW, the gulag-looking "free speech zone" at the Demoncratic National Convention picture that is on the Wikpedia site Rudi linked to was set up not by the Democratic Party but by the Division of Homeland Security, for, ostensibly, "security purposes." Uh huh. Right.
By the way, presidents have more or less always been fair game for nutball assassins. Lincoln, McKinley and Kennedy were all murdered. And assasins had tries at Reagan and Ford and FDR as well. Security is always and has always been a problem.
I might buy your argument... there might be a modicum of truth to it... if ALL demostrators [allegedly pro and con] were being screend away from the president's appearances, etc. But it has been, so far, only those who indicated, even in the mildest of ways [wearing a tee shirt or button] that they oppose the president. So the security argument isn't going to fly.
Finally, however annoying you [or I] might find rudeness and disrespect, neither of them are illegal. Nothing in the constitution requires you or me to be polite to, or to respect, any elected official. Should you be moved to call out as a president, a governor or, perchance, a mayor drives by [any official, any party] that you think he's an non-truth-telling illigitimate child [or words to that effect], you are perfectly free to do so, and you will not have commited a crime. Not in the US. Not yet anyway. It's called freedom. And it can get noisy now and then. But that kind of comes with the territory. And as rude as students can sometimes be, the alternative --- making rudeness and a demonstrated publically-voiced lack of respect for elected officials crimes --- is far far worse. We've seen how that works. Over and over again, the world around. In Saddam's Iraq, for example.
I like our way, sometimes called "the American way," better.
Agree with you, Curm about free speech and our American right to call into question the paternity of the speaker!
However, I was not intimating that disrespect, booing, turning one's back during a speech, etc should be reason to be arrested.
Heaven forbid! I am dismayed at the incivility that we see too often heaped upon those who hold high office whether political or academic.
This incivility, unchecked, is spawning a great many of society's ills.
(eg) Disrespect in the classroom for other students and teacher. That starts in K and goes throughout the university career.
And, we see too many profs, in my humble opinion, advocating and modeling such rude, clownish behavior in the name of freedom.
Ask any law enforcement offical today if this breakdown of civility and respect puts them in danger from hotheads with guns!
Yes, we Americans are freedom loving, freedom blessed but don't you agree that with all that freedom goes responsibility and self respect too?
"As for your claim that Bill Clinton first instituted the idea of "free speech zones"... well, I notice that your source is Wikpedia, a nororiously unreliable source..."
DANG!
Howbout this one:
"Although such (free speech) zones existed earlier, instituted by the Clinton administration, they gained more attention after the WTO Meeting of 1999 and have been used vigorously by the George W. Bush administration. They were also used aggressively at the Democratic National Convention in 2004, which drew criticism in comparison to the Republican National Convention of the same year that left protestors free to protest in the streets."
Answers.com -- Free Speech Zones
Free Speech Pen @ 2004 Demo Convention
Danged democRATS!
It's all THEIR fault!
(Bush is too dumb to have thought this up himself.)
heheh...
Wally:
Could not agree with you more about incivility and its poisonous impact on the operation of a democratic society.
Rudi:
Still trying to track down something authoratative on origins of free speech zones at presidential events. Will report back if/when I do.
I still think the fact that they, in their modern sense [excluding free speech from other areas] were pioneered by American universities and colleges is appalling. But I agree, it is much more likely that a Democratic president found a precedent for something on a university campus than George Bush did.
Would that be a university handing out free condoms to future Democrat presidents by any chance?
Abner:
God, I hope not. We want them to breed. We've seen what Republican presidents' breeding leads to....
If the in-breeding done among dem's is so desirable, why do they support Planned Parenthood?
Neo Cons just want your raped 14 year old daughter, be forced into having no choice.
Oh, NOW I get it!
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