Dispatches from the Creation Wars

Orwellian Irony

Posted by Ed Brayton on October 23, 2004
(4)
More »

This is just disturbing. Three teachers go to a campaign speech by President Bush. They have tickets for the event that they got from the Republican party headquarters; they give the tickets at the front gate and are let in; then they are approached by event security and told that they have to leave because of what their matching shirts say. And what did they say?

Protect Our Civil Liberties

And Orwell wept. This is par for the course for the administration, which has made “free speech zones” a regular part of events attended by the President and required loyalty oaths to let folks into normal campaign events and speeches. And for those of you who think I’m biased against Bush, I will be more than happy to publicize any such instances done by the Kerry campaign and hammer them just as hard. Feel free to send them to me.

(4)
More »

Comments

  1. #1 Matthew Phillips
    October 24, 2004

    Why have the “free speech zones” not been struck down in the courts?

  2. #2 Reed A. Cartwright
    October 24, 2004

    Probably because there hasn’t been the perfect, all-american, girl-next-door plaintif yet.

  3. #3 Ed Brayton
    October 24, 2004

    Good question, Matthew. I don’t know if there have been any cases make it to court yet. One of the difficulties may well be that each event is a one-time event only, which may cause a standing problem for a court case. Any of the 4000 attorneys who read this page wanna weigh in on that?

  4. #4 GeneralZod
    October 24, 2004

    I am sure Scalia, Renquist and Thomas would be OK w/ Bush’s “free speech” zones. Probably knock down any suit as being moot.