353 Dispatches from
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Dispatches from
STEPHEN LENDMAN
An ignorant and petulant brat, no doubt, but is there something more sinister in his personality? Profoundly ADD, the man has rarely read a book.
The Constitution’s First Amendment “prohibits the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion, abridging the freedom of speech, infringing on the freedom of the press, interfering with the right to peaceably assemble or prohibiting the petitioning for a governmental redress of grievances.”
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Flag burning is a legitimate form of speech. In Texas v. Johnson (1989), Justice William Brennan, writing for the majority, said “if there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea offensive or disagreeable.”
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Jefferson said “(w)hat country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance.” Separately he said free speech “cannot be limited without being lost.”
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Former Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall stressed “(a)bove all else, the First Amendment means that government has no power to restrict expression (regardless of its) ideas…subject matter (or) content…Our people are guaranteed the right to express any thought, free from government censorship.”
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That includes flag burning or calling a public official a son-of-a-bitch – or words to that effect if he or she deserves it.
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Compromising academic, press and speech freedoms risks losing all others. If Trump governs this way, he’ll be despotic, breaching fundamental international and constitutional law. Hopefully his tweet was just bluster.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
STEPHEN LENDMAN lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III." ( http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html ) Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
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Many see the Trump presidency as an unmitigated disaster with an accelerated reduction in all social services, a conservatively closed supreme court, attacks on constitutional rights, etc etc., but in fact it may give rise to a more sophisticated political landscape in the US. After all Trump’s pronouncements as well as his appointments elucidate the power that capital holds over the US government. Already one finds a remark on Fox (sic) about the contempt in which the founding fathers held the masses and CNN flunkies commenting on Wall Street rapacity. These are but throw away remarks easily reversed if necessary… Read more »
PS There seems to be no doubt that the reversal of elite support from Clinton to Trump is caused by the fact that the establishment wants a strong man in charge, someone not beholden to any liberal factions. The slow but definitive disintegration of popular belief in hollow promises and half hearted small reforms necessitates for the government to adapt stronger anti-democratic measures, which Trump is superbly trained to execute. But the danger as can be learnt from the French and Russian revolutions is that the tighter the spring of repression is bound, the closer the whole system reaches into… Read more »