US Senate Bill could stifle free press

March 13th, 2006 at 17:47 Björn Hallberg

In would-be fascist America, it might soon be illegal for anyone to disclose that the government is violating the constitution. Which in itself is violating the constitution. For a people and a government that constantly spouts off about their constitution, which they seem to think is the center of the universe, they sure don’t understand it very well. Most Americans know more about the Simpsons, the rest seem intent on shredding the constitution for fear that the others might smarten up.

Specifically, informing the people of domestic spy programs such as the NSA wiretapping story that broke in December could be considered illegal under the proposed legislation. Most likely the Senate Bill, if it becomes legislation, will target lesser dissenters and non-corporate media while the mainstream media itself can probably be intimidated to fall in line. The scribblers of the bill in question claim, though conveniently not through official channels, that it will not target reporters but that seems unlikely given the extremely open and ambiguous wording. First, the wiretapping story as I recall it was first reported by none else than The New York Times. Though it took them a year and the government had no legal measures with which to stop the publication. It is highly unlikely that the NYT would reveal its sources so in all likelihood the Bill can only be useful to shoot the messenger and intimidate an already uncritical press to be even less so. Whether or not anyone will ever be persecuted is another matter. Much like with the future civil rights abuses this Bill will cover up, the strong-arming and intimidation of reporters going on behind the scenes will also pass us by.

Slashdot user “babbling” put it very succinctly and summed up the rationale for surveillance.

The president shouldn’t have anything to worry about if he’s innocent, so there’s no need for this law.

So either the “innocent people have nothing to fear” argument is flawed for the surveillance program, or the US president is far from innocent …

Indeed, revealing the existence of wiretaps does aid and abet the enemy — the American people.

Entry 484 filed under: North America. This entry was posted 3 years, 12 months ago. RSS feed for comments on this post.