Below is my column in the Hill on the new American emigres: “disinformation experts” who are finding themselves unemployed with the restoration of free speech protections.
Here is the column:
President Trump’s election has brought about mass layoffs among federal employees and contractors, including some who have sued and others who have protested.
But one group — that of America’s would-be censors — is taking its cause worldwide.
During the Biden administration, a massive industry took root, sweeping up billions in taxpayer funds to research, target and combat those accused of misinformation, disinformation and “malinformation.”
Although the exact number is uncertain, many trained censors are now facing unemployment. These self-described “disinformation experts” have become the modern equivalent of rōnin, the Japanese samurai who found themselves without a master and wandered the land looking for a new use of their skill set. They are finding precisely that calling in academia, not-for-profit groups and, most importantly, Europe.
A speech-regulation industry that was booming under Biden has gone bust under Trump. Over the last four years, massive amounts of money were poured into universities, non-governmental organizations and other groups in an unprecedented alliance of government, academia and corporations.
The media lionized many in the industry as “saving democracy” by controlling, targeting and suppressing others’ political speech. Not only did federal agencies fund these efforts, but they also coordinated censorship of groups and individuals with opposing views, even objecting to jokes on the internet.
Universities cashed in on this largesse as well. It was popular with most liberal administrators and lucrative for academics.
The sudden shutoff of the federal spigot comes as a blow, but it does not mean the speech warriors will simply convert their censor-shields into plowshares. Many will follow in the footsteps of Nina Jankowicz, briefly the head of a now-defunct disinformation governance board. After the outcry over the board, Jankowicz quickly found her skills were in demand in Europe.
Free speech has been in free-fall in Europe for decades. Germany has long enforced a robust system of speech criminalization that began with Nazi symbolism but steadily expanded to include inciteful speech, insults and merely “disinformative” statements. The United Kingdom and France showed the same insatiable appetite for the inexorable expansion of censorship and prosecutions.
The European Union has also been ground zero for the anti-free speech movement’s aggressive use of the Digital Services Act, which bars speech that is viewed as “disinformation” or “incitement.”
When it passed over the objections of free speech advocates, European Commission Executive Vice President Margrethe Vestager was perfectly ecstatic, declaring it is “not a slogan anymore, that what is illegal offline should also be seen and dealt with as illegal online. Now, it is a real thing. Democracy’s back.”
That is why Vice President J.D. Vance’s recent speech in Munich was so historic. For the free speech community, Vance went into the belly of the beast and denounced the anti-free-speech movement in the heart of Europe.
The response to the Vance speech has been nothing short of panic in the anti-free-speech community. Many are assembling in conferences in Europe, including the upcoming World Forum in Berlin. Bill and Hillary Clinton will be in attendance. (I will also be speaking at the conference.)
It was Hillary Clinton who, after Elon Musk purchased Twitter with the pledge to dismantle the censorship system, called upon the EU to force him and others to censor her fellow U.S. citizens. She embraced the infamous Digital Services Act, which seeks to impose a global system of speech control. She has also suggested the arrest of those spreading disinformation.
Immediately after the speech, familiar European and American voices denounced Vance and doubled down on the need for Europe to hold the line against dangerous free speech.
For the free speech community, there could not be a better place for this debate to unfold. Germany has demonstrated the false claims of the anti-free-speech community over the years. Indeed, you might call their arguments “disinformation.”
Vance and others who have challenged the European censorship systems have been attacked as Nazi enablers or sympathizers. Many of those who have fostered this attack are part of the regulator ronin. Others simply repeated the narrative without thought or support.
Take CBS anchor Margaret Brennan, who confronted Secretary of State Marco Rubio over the outrageous fact that Vance was supporting free speech while “standing in a country where free speech was weaponized to conduct a genocide.” The claim is stupefyingly uninformed. The first thing that the Nazis did in coming to power was to crack down and criminalize free speech — just as many on the left have done in European countries.
A few have insisted that the Nazis were brought to power by the lack of government controls over what views could be expressed. But this is not true either. The crushing irony is that Article 118 of the Weimar Constitution guaranteed free speech only “within the limits of the general laws.” It did not protect statements deemed by the government as factually untrue, and speech was actively regulated.
Adolf Hitler, for example, was barred from speaking publicly. The Nazis did not use free speech because they did not have it. They did, however, use the denial of free speech to claim that the government was afraid to have certain views aired in public.
Germany has replicated the old system that failed to stop (and perhaps even helped) the Nazis, doubling down on speech controls and criminalization. As I discuss in my book, there has never been a successful censorship system in the history of the world — not one. Germany is again a chilling example of the true record of such systems.
Past polling of German citizens found that only 18 percent felt free to express their opinions in public. Only 17 percent felt free to express themselves on the internet. So the neo-Nazi movement is flourishing, even as average German citizens feel chilled in their own speech.
Despite this history, the regulatory ronin are hard at work to scare the public back into empowering and especially into funding their efforts.
The outgoing chairman of the Munich Security Conference spoke through tears as he expressed his “fear” that Vance’s call for free speech could take hold in Europe. He tellingly added, “It is clear that our rules-based international order is under pressure. It is my strong belief … that this multipolar world needs to be based on a single set of norms and principles.”
This “international order” has striven to impose a single set of norms on speech, particularly through vehicles like the Digital Services Act. The effort stands at odds with the very essence of the American constitutional system and values.
The only thing both sides agree on is that this is an existential fight. For those in the free speech community, it will determine the future of what Justice Louis Brandeis called “the indispensable right.” For the other side, it is the future of a European model of free speech, limiting the right to deter those with extreme or inciteful views.
The recent successes in the U.S. at X and more recently at Meta are real. However, the displaced speech regulators are not just going to retool and learn to code or train to work in the hospitality industry.
As Vance’s speech showed, we are more isolated than ever. Even Americans like Clinton have joined with the Europeans to fight for censorship. It is time to take a side and fight for freedom of speech.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro professor of public interest law at George Washington University and the author of “The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage.”
Of course the 47 Ronin is a timeless classic of literature where men of honor accepted dishonor in under to return and destroy the Lord who had dishonored their own Lord and thereby caused his death. Their faithfulness to their dead lord is a revered classic of Japan. Of course they signed their work by their own self inflicted deaths after avenging their lord and restoring his honor.
As far as the malefactors of mal-information are concerned, well that is a timeless war between the free speech and oppression with victories and defeats. Right now we have a wave of optimism but there is much to do here to cement the gains of free speech.
The feds have the weight and authority to go after the credentialing organizations and light them up until the DEI, CRT, and others are removed from college campuses and professional schools. The power of giving and withholding money should be used ruthlessly to crush these anti free speech and anti democratic groups. We also need to go after professional news organization and trade associations that rate reliability in news and other areas so as remove their ability to cause boycotts of disfavored free speech and companies that use free speech.
NewsGuard , SPLC are what I have in mind.
The United States should make a point of dealing with specific countries in Europe and try to ignore the European Union, thereby signaling its weakness and lack of real Authority. A concerted approach in that form might push the European Union out of existence.
The European Union is the land of the Elites, put there to make sure the unwashed masses don’t get too uppity especially about things like free speech, free association, and self determination.
“try to ignore the European Union”. You’re naive. Nothing happens if the union doesn’t allow it.
You are correct, Europe gave us WWI and WWII and the cold war, multiculturalism, nihilism, marxism, islamitization of the entirety of it, gretta the green puppet, the concept of open borders and let’s not forget the ever-feeble french or the ever prussian germans.
Not Europe, it gave us nothing. The USA gave them everything after each war. And did they do with it?
Yes, it was the autocrats of Europe that started both wars, they birthed the concept of marxism and all the ensuing rot that came with that failed anthropological experiment (even though they are still trying) and they also ruined western culture (for G-d’s sake a green butt plug in front of the Louvre?)
In fact, I would say that the enormous green butt plug in the plaza of the Louvre is a fitting description of Europe under the influence of the progressives and a fate that, if we are lucky, conservatives here in the US can prevent such a pernicious turn to insanity and depravity – but I am sure you would decry such a move.
Anonymous 9:54AM Yo may be more naive. Many things happen all the time that the higher ups are not aware of. Depends what you do and how you approach a nation. There are some EU members that are less inclined to follow Brussels and others are all in. You pick and choose who you approach and what sort of deals you present. You can cause discord and disorder simply by offering different deals to different nations.
The first Trump administration was a profound experiment in how the President was suborned by members of his own executive agencies. You think the same thing could not happen in the EU with different cultures and different languages all over that continent. People in the EU are not that different.
Well of course governments want to control disinformation! If they don’t, then false stories like this one can get out, and cause hurt feelings:
“If you search “Maryland power bill” on Facebook, you’ll find many frustrated residents voicing their outrage …
“Energy Bills are ballooning out of control due to EXTREMIST ENVIROMENTAL MANDATES!” Republican Delegate Brian Chisholm wrote on Facebook.
Resident Ronald Coster said: “The reason why our electricity bills are going so high,Maryland has to buy 40%of the power needed from surrounding states. Gov. Moore and the Democrat politicians will not allow new power plants.”
Marylanders must discuss with their neighbors whether Annapolis lawmakers are incompetent or deliberately sabotaging the state by bankrupting their residents with toxic green inflationary policies.
A recent conversation with a major asset management firm in the region revealed that Maryland’s financial situation is so dire that they no longer recommend the state’s municipal bonds to their clients—and have even advised some clients to leave due to fears of out-of-control tax hikes.
On top of this all, Democrats and Gov. Wes Moore have placed the state in a death spiral with a budget crisis that has arrived and risks a “deep recession.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/maryland-democrats-spark-power-bill-crisis-backfiring-extremist-green-policies
and here is a super-fun part – Condoms for Kindergartners:
https://x.com/fisher4maryland/status/1892994888267915744?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1892994888267915744%7Ctwgr%5E024498ae13e1ac87a87266d79738338657fc2f0e%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fcommodities%2Fmaryland-democrats-spark-power-bill-crisis-backfiring-extremist-green-policies
Educational reformers in the 19th and 20th centuries, like Horace Mann and John Dewey, advocated for public education as needed to have a voter population intelligent enough to choose good government leaders and policies. They were supporters of democracy and free education. This connection was not ignored by the enemies of America who have infiltrated our educational systems and turned our children against us. The so-called Ivy League was at one time the birthplace of many of America’s finest leaders. Even now, only one of nine justices on the Supreme Court hails from a non-Ivy League school.
But, alas, the Ivy League schools, like so many others, have become engulfed in the weeds of cynicism, racism, cultural exclusion, and non-diverse thinking. The enemies of America were clever to corrupt our educational system with their “disinformation” programs that stifled thinking and innovation. These concepts would never have been accepted by the general population but taught as virtuous principles by unvirtuous professors to young minds unable to weigh the merits. Our educational systems were undermined, and a generation of poor leaders and weak minds was ushered in, much to our chagrin.
Now is the time for change. Tax the endowments and manage the grants. We, the public, do not need to subsidize our own destruction.
“engulfed in the weeds of cynicism, racism, cultural exclusion, and non-diverse thinking…”
Let me get this straight, only liberals are cynics, racists, exclusionists, and non-diverse thinking?
Just reading the comments here make me believe you have a serious case of tunnel vision.
Anon: Go back and read what I wrote. Let me know if you find the word “liberal”? Methinks it’s you who is in the tunnel. Thanks for your comment.
You did write “ivy league schools” in that paragraph, aka bastions of liberalism?
And, you’re welcome.
Anon: I take it you didn’t find the word “liberal” and now need to save face. That’s OK, I’m not looking to embarrass or belittle you but only tell the truth and let the facts speak for themselves. Your “aka” is not mine and for the record, I’m a Harvard alum. Have a peaceful and pleasant day.
Harvard alum, that’s more an insult than a credential. And I’m in no way impressed. Even your type lacks in smarts. Again, you did write “Ivy league…”.
You’re welcome, again.
Anon: Of course I wrote “Ivy League…” but it was you, not me, that somehow eqated this expression with being “aka bastions of liberalism.” I never said this. How can you accuse me of saying something that you and you alone said? I think you’re being unnecessarily argumentative. You certainly have the right to disagree with what I said but, in fairness, you should be able to offer counter-arguments and facts, not claim to object to something that you, not I, said. That’s irrational. But have a nice day anyway.
You can stop being an intellectual, it doesn’t impress anyone. Using that Harvard intellect, define the use of Ivy league relative to your comment.
Wondering why you’re so upset about being questioned?
Anon: This discussion is over. I apologize for upsetting you. I cannot deal with someone harboring your fears and biases. I was hoping for a cogent discussion of facts rather than an exchange of personal and disparaging inuendos. It was never my intention to belittle you or wage a contest with you over the words and concepts in my message. I wish you well and godspeed in whatever you do. Good-bye.
so, you admit that ivy league schools and many more are bastions of ignorant progressive pseudo-liberal ideology?
Whim: Go back and read the tread. Anon said something like what you just said, not me. Of course you may be Anon, and, if so, you already know this.
When you make u 90%+ of the faculty and staff you own it.
Speaking of schools, it is not just colleges. Just read a story at Free Republic about:
Violent, Chilling Student Behavior Stories Shock Legislators (West Virginia)
“‘Ken’ is in third grade,” Haynes said, using another name to protect the identity of the student. “In his career, since kindergarten, he has been suspended more than 30 times. He has kicked, head butted and punched me repeatedly. Most recently on Thursday, I spent 38 minutes, because I hit my watch, being actively and violently attacked by him. On Thursday, I actually called the police, and if you don’t know this, the police cannot help me.”
“Student D destroyed my classroom on multiple occasions, including flipping tables and chairs, throwing all items off of shelves and onto the floor,” Laughlin said. “He pulled down my metal blinds off of my windows, which I still do not have to this day, took dry erase markers and drew all over the floors, on the walls, cussed worse than a sailor, and called me and the other students terrible things, words that five-year-olds should never hear. The other students in the classroom were hit in the head. Objects were thrown at them, and they had to evacuate the classroom.”
“Students are coming to school with less and less basic knowledge,” Elmore said. “They’re coming to us not knowing their name, not knowing their birth date, but I’m supposed to teach Johnny these things while I have another student in the corner, tearing the room apart. Scores can’t go up if I can’t be teaching, and instead, have to be acting as a counselor. In Randolph County, we do not have alternative learning for elementary students. We don’t have the nine week program. We don’t have a building to put them in. They are left in the classrooms.”
Tina Wallen taught for 16 years. She is now a Raleigh County elementary school principal who said many disruptive student behaviors begin with challenges at home.
“We’re seeing a lot of kids with trauma,” Wallen said. “A lot of kids who are born to drug addicted parents and being raised by grandparents or great grandparents. A lot of times when they come to us in kindergarten, they’re not even potty trained. Seeing that more and more each year. We remove kids from the classroom. I’ve been kicked in the face while trying to restrain a kid, and he got loose and kicked me with a good old construction boot upside the jaw. You bring them to my office, they’ll run and flip the chairs, pull all the books off the shelves.”
“Ninety-eight percent of the children are good and want to do well,” Haynes said. “It’s that one-to-two percent in the building that are so disruptive that the rest are suffering, and are not learning. And I can’t take their recess, and I can’t put my hands on them.”
The educators’ tales included: four-year-old students telling the teacher they’re going to shoot them with a gun and burn the school down; four-year-old students running and choking another student on the playground and punching them in the face on their very first day of school; a four-year-old slapping the teacher so hard that her glasses went flying across the room; a four-year-old student biting the teacher so hard that it drew blood and the teacher had to get medical attention; and a grade school student who was expelled because he brought a handful of ammunition and a large kitchen knife to class.
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/4300000/posts
why didn’t you just summarize the article into one sentence or one word? One word: horseshite.
No, I am sure it’s true. I have two relatives who both quit their teaching jobs because it was like working in a war zone. One was a born teacher, who loved it, but could not do the things he needed to in order to teach. Too many rules, and too little discipline, too much education bureaucracy. Like he says, it was a jungle.
Sure floyd. Tell another tale.
My late husband experienced the same sort of forced conformity even back in the late 80s and early nineties. He left his job as a certified
English and Social Studies teacher and debate coach for a job working with the children of migrant farm workers to make sure that they got an education. He was much more appreciated by them than the teacher’s union where he had worked (there main job was to sort out anyone not conforming and deny them tenure).
The Education Bureaucracy needs to go. One problem is, that most of that is specific to the individual states. We sort of have a “Deep State” problem in every state, every county, and every city. Each of those needs a DOGE treatment, but that needs to come from the individual states. Some states, like Illinois, have been run into the ground to the point where the only viable option, in the short term, is to leave the state.
The classroom— teacher said, thank you for ducking, Rachel. This was after another student hurled a pair of scissors across the room.
Trying to help a kid with problems is fine, but there must be limits, based on available resources, if on no other constraint. When those limits have been reached with a particular kid, then that kid must be transferred to an institution that is capable of dealing with him or her without detrimentally affecting the education of the other students. Or expelled, if a suitable institution is not available.
I witnessed in college a professor physically picking up a student and ushering him to the door. This student was reading the newspaper in the professor’s lecture. This student was most definitely shocked. It never happened again that semester and all of the other students paid attention, (BTW that professor years later was hired to head his academic department at another well known university.) My takeaway is that there are times to take matters in ones own hands. If one is not willing to do so, then you will need to live with the consequence.
Trump, like Obama, transferred from a decent school (Fordham vs Oxy) to an Ivy (Penn vs Columbia), while Biden’s low GPA kept him at UDel, where he graduated right at the bottom quartile.
“Educational reformers in the 19th and 20th centuries, like Horace Mann and John Dewey, advocated for public education as needed to have a voter population intelligent enough to choose good government leaders and policies.”
Unfortunately, those objectives were realized as a system that was amenable to centralized control, and centrally controlled systems are typically more susceptible than decentralized systems to continued attack from an adversary. Time for a new paradigm.
The smaller and more locally controlled schools, the more the will of the parents can be done. Get government employee unions, (and working for a public school system makes you a government employee) out of publicly funded schools and bar any taxpayer funds, (including grant monies for research etc.) from any university that promotes progressive ideology over other ideologies
“The smaller and more locally controlled schools, the more the will of the parents can be done.”
Getting the Federal government entirely out of education would be a good start. Frankly, I’m not convinced that taxpayer funded schools at any level of government are a good idea, but I’m willing to leave that up to the people of each state.
Ruling by false narratives, the belief that marketing spew can overcome fatal deficiencies of truth, requires censorship to delay the inevitable crash. People eventually figure out the deception. The EU should have remained the European version of our interstate commerce clause, instead it became a neomalthusian cult central committee.
What deception is that, that you perceive there, and no one else?
Deception? I’ll just throw out some key words and phrases.
CO2
Cow Farts
Virus natural origin
Transsexual
Masks
Lockdowns
Safe and effective
Constitutional crisis
Threat to democracy
Babies know they are trans
and so on…
OldFish-Agree
The so called OVER PRICED/DEM Disinformation crowd are simply Davos/Globalist Radical DEMS that need to be flushed out of the system. Let them go to the EU or Left Wing Universities. EU is slowing breaking down and their will be countries leaving. X, Rumble, now META? and others are the top news and social sites. Elon $44 Billion dollar investment in Twitter was the Key to the destruction of the Globalist Agenda and Controls. X is the number one site in the Globe. More and More people signing up. The EU and other control freaks can’t defeat X. Trump is cleaning house of all the Globalist/Resistance, etc.
As usual Professor Turley, you have expressed a profound and unassailable opinion that I agree wholeheartedly with. The disinformation advocates which are themselves the greatest purveyors of factually inaccurate, misleading “truths” and outright lies will be the downfall of civilization merely by their misdeeds and false narratives of history and present circumstances in the world… they ply their trade to the detriment of all of humanity who can deal with any truths but can’t support the utter bs the “truth nazi’s” are continually generating.
We need to end Federal Funding of Colleges, non-profits, cities and state.
Ban Public Unions.
TAKE AWAY Their Oxygen! Bring back actual capitalism and actual charity!
Or force them to take the loans off the government’s hands.
Or require education financing to be done by the schools themselves. Make the universities initiate student loans and financially manage them. Any losses charged against endowments. Watch employment and enrollment fall… plop!
I’m emailing Elon with that idea.
Does the average American ask themselves WHY 80-90 of federal employees are Democrats?
Was it a concerted effort to take over the gov’t? Is it because Dems are predisposed to being beaurocratic? Is it because the agencies just become echo chambers over time? Is it because libtards love no show jobs where they can phone it in from home? Or is it just the next best thing to welfare for sucking on the gov’t teat?
One thing is for certain. It cannot be a coincidence. There has to be a reason. And i can’t think of a good one.
“not a slogan anymore, that what is illegal offline should also be seen and dealt with as illegal online. Now, it is a real thing. Democracy’s back.”
The implied representation of ‘censorship’ as representative of “Democracy” reveals not only the oxymoronicity of the statement attributed to European Commission Executive Vice President but the conflation of opposing ideas now typical of the Democratic Party. As well, it demonstrates perfectly the nature of the dilemma into which every tyrant hopes to place his/her opponents.
Little wonder that the Clintons not only encourage but embrace this type of activity. Such activity is really nothing more than an extension of ‘political correctness’ the achieved its zenith during the Clinton presidency, decades after originating as a functional concept during the coming of age of Adolph Hitler and Joe Stalin. Apparently, after centuries of tyrants and their devastating conflicts, Europeans have learned nothing more than how to take an evil concept and refine it. Sophisticated savages are still savages.
The Trump administration is putting nearly all of USAID’s 4,700 full-time employees on paid administrative leave at midnight Sunday and will subsequently terminate 1,600 of those positions as part of a “reduction in force,” according to a memo that was widely distributed to agency staff Sunday afternoon and later published on the USAID website..
This announcement comes after a federal judge allowed the Trump administration to proceed with its plan to put thousands of USAID staff on paid administrative leave and bring back the agency’s foreign service officers in international posts within 30 days.
Suck it, libtards
It is idle to speak of “European” attitudes, as though Greeks, Swiss, Italian, Swedish, Italians, Finns, Poles, Portuguese, etc., are all on the same wavelength, when they don’t and can’t even communicate with each other. Any “european” unity in the free speech issue exists only among the faceless Davos – Bilderberg class of self-appointed, so-called “elites” that have risen to an administrative authority that they wish to convert into true totalitarian power over the peasants. The lumpen masses can usually be counted on to shrug and comply, but occasionally they have been known to rise up and overthrow those who overreach. They are certainly taking their sweet time about it.
“they have been known to rise up and overthrow those who overreach. They are certainly taking their sweet time about it.”
If Merz offers nothing substantially different as head of the new German government (my overwhelming expectation) AfD and others there may be the beginning of a pervasive uprising in Western Europe. EU states such as Hungary and Poland are on a different schedule, since they have never fully bought into to many positions that France, Germany and UK have attempted to force down their throats. Furthermore, I cannot see those latter states taking any measures beyond what they perceive as being strictly in their own narrow, parochial, interests to save the Western European powers from their own folly. Stay tuned.
I don’t buy into your dystopian view. You just discount the fact that European states are in fact democracies.
You American conservatives need to understand you sort of democracy is not “better” than European democracy. You elected a senile geriatric in 2020.
More American ignorance being passed off as intellectual axioms.
You EU socialists/commie-lite just don’t understand your mobocracy democracy is far inferior to our republican system of government when it comes to individual rights and freedoms. You aren’t even visible in the rear view mirror.
Of course, it has to be hard to experience a feeling of deprivation for something you’ve never experienced nor lost, instead being surrounded from your first day to the last by government managing your life from birth to bier.
I don’t buy your tedious European socialist self-appointed intelligensia crap being you attempt to sell in hopes some will go for it and by doing so give you some assurance that you actually matter.
We allegedly did elect a senile geriatric. That is true. But even at that, those brief four years are no match for your repeated elections putting communism-lite and police state fascists in power.
Churchill and Thatcher must be spinning in their graves to look at England today and consider how fortunate that at least England escaped the suicide pact that is the EU.
I have no envy for the smothering blanket of government control over your life that you prize so much.
It’s all yours, muffin; keep it all while attempting to convince yourself you have it better. I am not going to make any attempt to take even the smallest bit from you – it’s all yours.
After your defense of free speech, Professor, I daresay the EU grandees will be performing a version of that old classic, “Cry Me a River.” In all seriousness, however, I hope you speak after Madame Secretary Clinton, and remind/inform her if everything she forgot/failed to learn when studying the First Amendment in law school.
Just to be clear about the situation in Germany: In Germany, a man (actually a lawyer) was sentenced recently by a criminal court because he had called the German minister of economics, Robert Habeck, a “failure” (“Versager” in German). § 188 of the German penal code makes every critical remark about a politician a crime.
And you think hurling insults and taunts is American democracy in action? Not everything that comes out of your mouth is absolute free speech.
Ah look, a free speech proponent.
Not everything that comes out of your mouth is absolute free speech.
Let’s test that theory. As you wander around in the state of nature, with no government yet in existence, is not everything that you speak out loud an exercise in absolute free speech? It isn’t until you make first contact with another individual that the potential for infringement of that natural right to free speech exists. That is of course if you exclude self-censorship. So yes, everything that comes out of your mouth is free speech until an outside force infringes it.
“As you wander around in the state of nature, ”
If you put the poster disputing absolute free speech in your hypothetical situation, my bet would be that the first time he met a human with an opinion differing from his own, he would pound their head in with a rock, and then blame the deceased.
Once freedom of speech is lost, the only remaining thing to be assassinated is freedom of thought. Then the issue becomes: it depends on what the definition of “thought”…, is….
Um… you a philosopher? Or just plain dumb?
Turley is attempting to explain it to you, he can’t comprehend it for you.
Turley? Just refencing the comment, not the article.
Margaret Brennan should be jailed for spreading “malinformation”.
jailed, no law against stupidity. But in your case we should make an exemption.
You sure sound like a German, aka Nazi, ban all speech you don’t like.
Now boarding flight NAZI2025 to to the Reich. Old lawyers all aboard.
Hey two Anonymous guys, Wiseold was being sarcastic, but you didn’t have the ability to discern it.
“In a republic, light will prevail over darkness, truth over error.” (James Madison)
He was talking about power outages after the 2024 hurricane.
‘“In a republic, light will prevail over darkness, truth over error.” (James Madison)’
“A republic, if you can keep it” – attributed to Ben Franklin
Somewhat of a conflict between those statements. I think history very much favors Franklin’s realism…
History has no memory, its just people making up stuff to suit a narrative.
Madison was from the Jefferson school of optimism. While Franklin’s comments acknowledge the issues that tend to plague representative governments (see John Adams on democracy), we need the Madisons of the world to keep hope alive
“we need the Madisons of the world to keep hope alive”
Alternatively, we NEEDED the Franklins of the world to continuously remind us what absolutely despicable pr1cks people usually are when they gain undeserved power over others. For whatever reasons, that failed to happen, and it might possibly be too late for the experiment on which Franklin was commenting.
Imagine what it was like before writing was invented.
As for the Germans, once a Nazi always a Nazi.
Winston Churchill: The Hun is always either at your throat or your feet.”
I approve that statement. Germany is not a friend of the USA. They despise us, want to harm us. But they’ll take our money.
It would be to the USA’s advantage to let Germany assume responsibility for the defense. Recently mouthed by Baerbock. Hey, they got France – what are friends for.
Wonder how much it costs the USA to support US troops in Germany. Big savings?
“We have to silence you for your own safety!”
These self-described “disinformation experts” have become the modern equivalent of rōnin,…
Per your link
The term, ronin, simply translates to a ‘wandering man’ in Japanese, and it was used to describe a masterless samurai warrior in feudal Japan – equivalent of unemployed men in today’s society. ….
It was also common for ronin to hire themselves as less established and desirable positions, such as bodyguards mercenaries. What’s more, many of them turned to become criminals.
In other words, we have ronins right here on this forum as Act Blue funded Media Matters / DNC paid trolls.
No surprise. Gigi / George / Elvis Bug / Dennis / Wally / Franke et al – masterless samurai warrior….LOL
🤡🤡🤡
So what, useless and wasted space.
The Eurotrash are the countries of “hurt feelings” which has led to this insane idea that speech which disturbs or incenses someone – anyone- is not only hurtful but the equivalent of physical assault! While verbal bullying is a terrible thing most people know the slippery slope adage applies! Clearly the Eurotrash love to ski on Black Diamond trails when it comes to the oxymoron of approved free speech. They are becoming the new Soviet Union!
What the hell are you talking about?
“Eurotrash”! Have ever been to Europe? Have you ever been outside of the US?
Wally is troll-trash
Hahahaha! Pulled your chain tight.
Hahaha!
Often.
Europeans are no damned good. We are lucky our ancestors realized it and left.
The entire last 125 years of American History has been consumed with keeping various groups of Europeans from killing other groups of Europeans (WWI, II, Bosnia, Ukraine, etc) ; or cleaning up after European Colonial disasters (VietNam, the Middle East, China). This effort has cost the inflation adjusted equivalent of our entire national debt. Now, our “betters” in Europe are heading down the path of enabling a dystopian police state.
Screw Europe. We’d be a lot better off spending our money and time working on making the Americas an impregnate fortress. Work harder on building alliances in North & Soouth America and cast Europe adrift.
“Impregnable”
Europeans are no damned good. We are lucky our ancestors realized it and left.
The entire last 125 years of American History has been consumed with keeping various groups of Europeans from killing other groups of Europeans (WWI, II, Bosnia, Ukraine, etc) ; or cleaning up after European Colonial disasters (VietNam, the Middle East, China). This effort has cost the inflation adjusted equivalent of our entire national debt. Now, our “betters” in Europe are heading down the path of enabling a dystopian police state.
Screw Europe. We’d be a lot better off spending our money and time working on making the Americas an impregnate fortress. Work harder on building alliances in North & Soouth America and cast Europe adrift.
“cleaning up after European Colonial disasters (VietNam, the Middle East, China). ”
Generally agree with that sentiment. However, I think that Iran unarguably belongs on that list (e.g., the 1953 CIA-fomented revolution) and would also note that, in SE Asia at least, we expended quite a bit of effort constructing our own brand of disaster over decades after the French left.
I would agree with you – but did you know that between 1945 and 1956 (when the French finally and resoundingy lost) that US tax money was paying 70% of the cost of the French war effort in “French Indo-China”? That was French extortion in return for agreeing to be part of NATO.
Had we said “uh, no”, the French would have lost completely by about 1946, and the overwhelming likelihood is that we would never have been involved in a war there. As it was, our “best and brightest” had to fake the “Gulf of Tonkin” incident in order for us to launch the war.
Fortunately, the French managed to grab the Algerian briar before vacating the place, thus ensuring a good supply of tobacco pipes for many years.
Why Algerian briar was so highly prized then was the soil along the coast where the heath shrubs grew was so poor and exceptionally windswept the plants had to struggle to survive, making for superlative density which was claimed made sweet smoking pipes. Algerian briar required about three years to cure, and the best was then aged for several more.
The Algerian War of Independence (1954-1962) was so brutal and violent it effectively destroyed the harvesting of Algerian briar on a commercial scale.
https://pipesmagazine.com/forums/threads/why-algerian-briar-was-highly-regarded.96065/
“did you know that between 1945 and 1956 (when the French finally and resoundingy lost) that US tax money was paying 70% of the cost of the French war effort in “French Indo-China”? ”
I knew that we were involved, but not the extent of our financial commitment. In 1961 I did a 7th grade Civics report on US Special Forces (not sure they were called that at the time) that Eisenhower had surreptitiously deployed to Laos (this is the guy who had the colossal gall to preach to us about the Military Industrial Complex after spending most of his Presidential tenure embedding it in the fabric of our nation), and that Kennedy was debating whether or not to continue that involvement. Being aware of that from the age of 11 and watching subsequent disasters (in that theater and elsewhere) unfold has made me a lifelong cynic about US foreign policy.