Liberals not always free speech backers
Liberals love to define themselves as staunch supporters of the First Amendment. They claim they may not agree with what you have to say but they will defend to the death your right to say it.
This support for free speech has been held up as the epitome of tolerance and understanding in our society. Some have characterized their First Amendment protection as a new breed of patriotism. Liberals love to pat themselves on the back for these glamorous compliments, but the truth is not so flattering.
Liberals will fight to the death to protect the most vulgar and ridiculous statements in our society, and then they turn around and fight to silence legitimate political dialogue. In other words, liberals protect their speech and try to shut conservatives up. Let me give two recent examples to illustrate my point.
The first is the Gen. Petraeus ad that was printed in the New York Times by a far-left organization, moveon.org. The ad referred to the commander of all U.S. forces in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus as "General betrayed us." Obviously, this ad was referring to him as a traitor for giving an optimistic progress report on the Iraq war. This ad clearly was not just to discredit the general but to silence anyone else from the military who may have the same opinion.
The second example is from the recent "phony soldiers" comment made by syndicated talk show host Rush Limbaugh. Limbaugh while talking to a caller to his show used the phrase "phony soldiers" to describe the attention seeking Jesse Macbeth. Macbeth became a topic of conversation after a YouTube video where he claimed he served in Iraq and had seen our military kill innocent Iraqi civilians in cold blood. These claims were shown to be untrue after an ABC news report proved Macbeth had never served in Iraq. Even further, the report showed Macbeth had never even made it through basic training. After discovering these facts, Limbaugh call Macbeth a "liar" and a " phony soldier."
The "phony soldier" comment enraged liberals in both house of Congress. Many said Limbaugh had gone too far. They even went to the extent of writing a letter to Limbaugh's syndicator in hopes he would be reprimanded or fired. Other Democrats attempted to get his show banned from armed forces radio. Even more extreme, some suggested a rating system for radio programs in the political arena.
This was liberal members of our government attempting to silence a private citizen. This is an example of liberals attempting to use the power of the state to hush and subdue their political adversaries.
Christian Reynolds
Geneva