Category: Free Speech

Free Speech, International, Media, Politics, Science, Society

Satellites As A Free Speech Tool

Submitted by Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor

SputnikWith many reports becoming all to familiar with state sponsored censorship of internet traffic users in these nations are engaged in a cat and mouse game with a government that is showing increasing levels of sophistication and legislative muscle. The tactics often used include filtering objectionable material, firewalling targeted IP addresses, tracing data back to individuals and sanctioning those individuals, and creating a system of fear generally in which the public is dissuaded into engaging in free speech.

The common element in these electronic censorship measures is that the government controls access via the physical structure of the network. They are able to do this through land based infrastructure. But what if these physical vulnerabilities to free speech and press were removed and instead replaced with broadcast satellite systems that are immune from filtering and geo-locating individuals?
Continue reading “Satellites As A Free Speech Tool” →

Free Speech, Media, Politics, Uncategorized

Should We Supersize the Cable Guys?: On the Subject of the Comcast Time Warner Mega-Merger, Lobbyists, the FCC, and the “Revolving Door”

Comcast

Submitted by Elaine Magliaro, Weekend Contributor

I’m sure many of you have read or heard about Comcast’s plan to buy Time Warner Cable. If these two companies merge, Comcast would then become the cable service provider for one third of the households in the United States. It would also give Comcast “a virtual monopoly in 19 of the 20 largest media markets.” In a press release dated February 13, 2014, Michael Copps, the special adviser to Common Cause’s Media and Democracy Reform Initiative and former FCC Commissioner, said, “This is soFCC-Seal_svg over the top that it ought to be dead on arrival at the FCC. The proposed deal runs roughshod over competition and consumer choice and is an affront to the public interest.” Copps added that the $45 billion deal “would turn the already oversized Comcast empire into a colossus. The combined firms would have the muscle to push competitors out of the marketplace, leaving consumers exposed to continuing price hikes and declining levels of service.”

Copps appeared on Democracy Now! recently. He told Amy Goodman the following:

…This is the whole shooting match. It’s broadband. It’s broadcast. It’s content. It’s distribution. It’s the medium and the message. It’s telecom, and it’s media, too. And it just would confer a degree of control over our news and information infrastructure that no company should be allowed to have. And all of this is happening in a market where consumer prices are going up and up and up, and competition is going down, down, down.

Continue reading “Should We Supersize the Cable Guys?: On the Subject of the Comcast Time Warner Mega-Merger, Lobbyists, the FCC, and the “Revolving Door”” →

Constitutional Law, Criminal law, Free Speech, International, Media, Politics

Still Crazy After All These Years: Iranian Cleric Renews Death Fatwa For Salman Rushdie After 25 Years

1988_Salman_Rushdie_The_Satanic_Verses220px-Salman_Rushdie_2012_Shankbone-2Believe or not, it has been 25 years since Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a death fatwa for Salman Rushdie — promising paradise and reward to anyone who killed the author simply because he wrote a book with what was viewed as blasphemous to Islam. For civil libertarians, it was a defining moment where Islam was pitted against the most basic and cherished values of free speech. The world was shocked by the decision even from the radical Iranian government. However, we have not heard much of the fatwa in years. Just to prove that the Islamic clerics remain as fanatical and anti-speech as they were in 1989, senior cleric Ahmad Khatami renewed the call to kill Rushdie and declared that the “historical fatwa” is “as fresh as ever.” What is clear is that, while the world views the fatwa as an example of religious extremism and insanity, the Islamic cleric remain proud of the death order as a pure expression of Islamic law and values.

Continue reading “Still Crazy After All These Years: Iranian Cleric Renews Death Fatwa For Salman Rushdie After 25 Years” →

Constitutional Law, Courts, Free Speech, Lawyering, Politics, Religion, Society

Posner Spars With University Lawyer And Threatens To Cut Off Oral Argument Due To “Babbling” And Interruptions

posnerMatthewKairisI previously blogged on an oral argument before Judge Richard Posner where I felt he had shown a surprising antagonism toward privacy and a civil liberties lawyer. Given my respect for Posner as a brilliant academic, I was surprised to read of his open dismissal of arguments that later prevailed in the court. Now, Posner is again the news with a heated exchange with a lawyer, Matthew Kairis, who he said was talking over his questions and refusing to direct questions with direct answers. The case is Univ. of Notre Dame v. Kathleen Sebelius. The oral argument tape below presents an interesting example of how lawyers respond to aggressive questioning from the bench in such arguments.

Continue reading “Posner Spars With University Lawyer And Threatens To Cut Off Oral Argument Due To “Babbling” And Interruptions” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, Courts, Free Speech, Justice, Politics, Society, Supreme Court

Is Voting Going the Way of the Edsel?

LyndonJohnson_signs_Voting_Rights_Act_of_1965

Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty (rafflaw)-Weekend Contributor

Is there anything more fundamental to a democracy or democratic republic then the ability of its citizens to vote for their representatives at every level of government?  The privilege or as many state, the right to vote is essential for citizens to control who is running the local and state and national governments and controlling what direction they want their community and country to go in.

As I write this article, there are groups and indeed, national political parties attempting to restrict the right to vote and restrict the early voting opportunities and attempting to restrict the ability of registered citizens to vote at all.  In the past few national elections, we all witnessed the horror stories of people waiting for hours in line to vote on election day.  Instead of increasing early voting days and installing additional voting machines in crowded precincts, just the opposite seems to be happening.  Continue reading “Is Voting Going the Way of the Edsel?” →

Constitutional Law, Courts, Criminal law, Free Speech, Justice, Lawyering, Politics, Religion, Society

Loving For All In Virginia: Getting It Right The Second Time Around

By Mark Esposito, Weekend Contributor

Mildred_Richard_Loving_1967Somewhere out there Mildred Loving must be smiling and wondering how things could change so much since 1967.  You might recall Ms. Loving as the African-American and Virginia resident who had the audacity to marry a white man and then procreate in the Virginia of the 1960s. Charged with violating Virginia’s  Racial Integrity Act of 1924, an anti-miscegenation law which criminalized marriages between members of different races, the case was heard in Hanover Courthouse, where liberty’s most eloquent spokesman, Patrick Henry, once argued the famous Parson’s Case.  Circuit Court Judge Leon Bazile, whose portrait still hangs in the hallway of the new courthouse, sentenced the couple to one year in prison suspended upon the condition they would leave their home state. In doing so, he announced to the world that Virginia would not step so quickly away from its historical racism:

Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.

Continue reading “Loving For All In Virginia: Getting It Right The Second Time Around” →

Constitutional Law, Criminal law, Free Speech, International, Justice, Politics, Religion, Society

International Humanist And Ethical Union Publishes Comprehensive Global Report On Athiest and Non-Religious Rights

Submitted by Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor

Humanist EmblemWhile many, primarily Islamic, countries have received much press regarding flagrant abuses of religious and non-religious persons or views, seven of which have death penalty offenses for crimes such as apostasy, the true impact for most of the worlds citizens are not as stark but can be often a suffer a form of punishment, repression and imprisonment of some kind for their beliefs.

The international Humanist and Ethical Union published a broad and comprehensive study of world governments listing laws, social constraints, and customs of government for nearly each nation. The study provides a deep insight into how even subtle restrictions on atheists and subscribers to differing religions or non-religions can have a chilling effect on the expressions of their citizens and it is often this subtlety that can become a form of suppression of dissent in surprising areas.
Continue reading “International Humanist And Ethical Union Publishes Comprehensive Global Report On Athiest and Non-Religious Rights” →

Free Speech, Media, Society

Facebook Subscribers Can Now Choose Among Fifty Six New Gender Identities

Submitted by Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor

Facebook LogoLGBT USA Pride FlagFacebook won much acclaim in the LGBT community by configuring their website to allow a great many choices their subscribers may use in their user profiles. Where most websites permit simply male or female, and perhaps a few all encompassing terms such as transgender or transsexual, Facebook consulted with the LBGT community to identify as many gender identities the community encompassed. Subscribers are also provided with additional tools such as which pronouns to use when they are referred to. Subscribers can use ten different options for gender or can choose to keep this information private.

Most outside the LGBT are not familiar with the nomenclature of these new identities but what Facebook is trying to accomplish is to provide as many choices for the individual to describe themselves in a manner as close as possible to what each of them can identify with. With as large a subscriber base as Facebook commands, many believe this will offer some insight and understanding of how analog gender is becoming.
Continue reading “Facebook Subscribers Can Now Choose Among Fifty Six New Gender Identities” →

Free Speech, International, Society

Haram Is Where the Heart Is: Muslim Clerics Denounce Valentine’s Day As UnIslamic

225px-Victorian-valentines-cards-two-cherubs-red-heartsIslamic leaders celebrated Valentine’s Day again this year by denouncing the holiday as anti-Islamic and calling for a “Modesty Day” instead that celebrates such items as burkas and veils. Students clashed today in Peshawar as dozens of liberal students sought to celebrate the holiday and defy orders from religious leaders to boycott the holiday. The result was an exchange of rocks and bricks between the pro-Valentine and anti-Valentine protesters. At least one student was shot and wounded. In Indonesia, warnings were issued that celebration of the holiday was an offense of Islam. In Malasysia religious monitors have been patrolling the streets looking for unIslamic practices. Valentine’s Day has been declared haram, or forbidden.

Continue reading “Haram Is Where the Heart Is: Muslim Clerics Denounce Valentine’s Day As UnIslamic” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, Free Speech, Politics, Religion

Alabama Legislator Moves To Make Prayer Mandatory In Public Schools

praying_hands[1]hurst_sIt appears that Alabama legislators want to trigger yet another legal challenge to the ban on prayer in public schools. A new piece of legislation introduced by Rep. Steve Hurst, R-Munford would require teachers to read a prayer every day. However, this bill has an interesting twist: it would have the teachers pick a prayer given in Congress. The point is obvious that if such prayers are permissible in one government setting, it must be permissible in this public setting. That assumption is misplaced and the timing for the bill may be as ill-conceived as its constitutional interpretation. There is a pending case dealing with legislative prayer before the Court and this controversy will only remind justices that the legislative prayer cases may collide with school prayer cases unless it draws a clear line in the constitutional sand. This however is an improvement for Hurst who has moved on to prayer from his prior interest in castration.

Continue reading “Alabama Legislator Moves To Make Prayer Mandatory In Public Schools” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, Courts, Criminal law, Free Speech, Justice, Lawyering, Media, Politics, Society, Supreme Court, Uncategorized

All In a Day’s Work

220px-Houston_Gun_Show_at_the_George_R__Brown_Convention_Center

Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty (rafflaw)-Weekend Contributor

On February 7th, 2014, the sad reports were compiled from the deadly day before.  On Thursday, February 6th, at least 24 people were shot and 14 of them were killed.  Two of the dead were small children.  The shootings and killings were from cities and towns all across the country.  A 17 month old girl was accidentally shot by her 3 year old brother in North Carolina.

A 13-year-old was accidentally shot and killed while playing with a shotgun in the state of Washington.  In Seattle, Washington, a man was shot and killed by a fellow tenant.  A man in his 30’s was shot several times and critically wounded in Owasso, Oklahoma.  A 18 year man was shot and killed at his uncle’s home in South Carolina.  These and others were all wounded or killed by gunfire on February 6th, 2014.  Just one sad day out of many. Continue reading “All In a Day’s Work” →

Constitutional Law, Criminal law, Free Speech, International, Politics, Religion, Society

England Bans Comedian For Hateful Jokes and Gestures

220px-DieudoWe have been following the prosecution of French comedian Dieudonne M’Bala M’Bala, 46, for hateful speech in France, particularly his alleged anti-Semitism. While I do not consider Dieudonne funny in the slightest and rather offensive, the prosecution reaffirms the growing divide between the United States and its closest allies over free speech. Now, England has magnified those concerns by barring Dieudonne from entering the country. This sounds strikingly like the equally controversial move against Michael Savage.

Continue reading “England Bans Comedian For Hateful Jokes and Gestures” →

Constitutional Law, Criminal law, Free Speech, International, Lawyering, Politics, Religion, Society

Saudi Arabia Passes Law That Defines A Terrorist As Anyone “Undermining” or “Offending” The State

200px-Coat_of_arms_of_Saudi_Arabia.svgSaudi Arabia has long been criticized as a feeder nation for terrorists, including some of those who attacked this country on September 11th. Well, the country is finally cracking down with its own counterterrorism law but it turns out that the law may have more to do with political dissidents than religious fanatics. Civil libertarians are denouncing the law that would allow the arrest of any reformer or government critic as a terrorist.

Continue reading “Saudi Arabia Passes Law That Defines A Terrorist As Anyone “Undermining” or “Offending” The State” →