Silencing dissent a growing trend (Knight Ridder)

[Wordie]

Sat, Feb. 04, 2006
Silencing dissent a growing trend
By Steve Thomma
Knight Ridder

WASHINGTON - The ejection of two women from the U.S. Capitol for wearing message T-shirts during President Bush's State of the Union speech this week was the latest incident in a growing trend of stifling dissent.

...But their actions weren't atypical in today's overheated political climate. Protesters outside political conventions are herded behind razor wire far from the action, citizens wearing a rival candidate's stickers are forcefully ejected from presidential campaign rallies on public property, and those who heckle the president or broadcast issue ads within 60 days of an election can be prosecuted.

...This trend has a chilling effect on those who disagree with people in power, analysts say.

``The long-term consequence is a higher degree of self-censorship,'' O'Neill said. ``Society is the poorer when deprived of the marketplace of ideas.''

...It's a crime, punishable by up to six months in prison, to ``disrupt'' an event guarded by the Secret Service, which includes presidential rallies. A proposed extension of the Patriot Act now being negotiated in Congress would broaden such prohibitions to other vaguely defined national events.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/13791418.htm

The article also mentions a campaign-finance reform, passed in 2002, that prohibits the broadcast of issue ads w/in 60 days of elections. It said that the SC has ordered a panel to re-examine the prohibition, but any action on it will not happen until after the 2006 elections.

[Angry Girl]

1. Welcome to Amerika - Fascism in Democracy's clothing

That's all it is now.

[Nomen Tuum]

22. Welcome to the CCCP

The Conservative Christian Commonwealth of Pentacostals

...sounds familiar?

[Faygo Kid]

2. Need a ticket to see "our" president speak.

And better be supportive. Whassup with that? That never happened before? The Bush in a Bubble.

[roseBudd]

3. Let me guess, swiftboating is not an issuead because it's not about issues

[Wordie]

8. You know, I wondered about that...seems to me there were issue ads

right before the 2004 elections. In fact, I'm quite sure of it. I don't quite understand, I guess, about how the law applies. Or maybe it didn't go into effect for some reason until after the election. Odd.

[AndyTiedye]

35. They Are Only "Issue Ads" If They Are Run By Democrats

[Warpy]

4. Self censorship? In their wildest dreams, only

They can stop me from dissenting against fascism only with my permission, and they will never get that.

[tridim]

5. It's a crime...to "disrupt" an event guarded by the Secret Service

Note the plan for a Secret Service police force in the new patriot act. If the SS is everywhere, dissent will also be illegal everywhere.

[rodeodance]

12. I never hear anything about this one in the news--it is always about

libraries and medical records (very important)----Is this one of the provisions that are being objected to?--by the Senators?--


..It's a crime, punishable by up to six months in prison, to ``disrupt'' an event guarded by the Secret Service, which includes presidential rallies. A proposed extension of the Patriot Act now being negotiated in Congress would broaden such prohibitions to other vaguely defined national events.

[Wordie]

28. I read someplace that Specter proposed that as a NEW provision of the PA.

But I can't find much info about it.

Here are some other things I found just now on some of the new provisions:
(This entire article is worth reading)

Patriot Act provision could limit inmate appeals
BY JAMES KUHNHENN
Knight Ridder Newspapers

_An expansion of the Secret Service's ability to prohibit trespassing or disorderly behavior at big national events, such as Super Bowl games and political conventions. Under current law it's a federal crime to cause a disturbance at events that are attended by a person who's protected by the Secret Service. The change would apply to such events even if the person in the Secret Service's care weren't present.

_Language that makes it illegal to hold phony passes to events protected by the Secret Service. Current law makes it illegal to hold fake passes issued by an agency of the federal government. The change applies to passes issued by any group organizing a protected event.

_Adding the homeland security secretary to the presidential line of succession. The change places the secretary in the 18th spot, right behind the secretary of veterans affairs. Some Republicans had wanted the homeland security-succession slot to be the ninth, right behind the attorney general.

_A new position of assistant attorney general for national security, which would require Senate approval. The position would oversee the Justice Department's main national security offices: the Office of Intelligence and Policy Review and the counterterrorism and counterespionage sections of the department's Criminal Division.

And the article does confirm that it was Specter who slipped that first provision into the Patriot Act.

Here's something else that I just found:
US Detention Camps For Political Subversives
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x325240

[Hope springs eternal]

32. Hmmm

WHat other regime had an "SS" police force?.....

[Lefty48197]

6. Thank you Knight-Ridder for your very existence

You are one of the very few remaining journalistic outposts left in America.

[bullimiami]

10. no thank you to knight ridder for easing the argument by blaming both

sides. a common tactic.

removing 3 people disrupting hillary clinton for yelling is not the same as herding protesters into "free speech" pens so far away as to not be seen or heard and is not the same as arresting cindy sheehan and its not the same as turning public presidential events into partisan invitation only rallys.

yes, both conventions had their protest restrictions but that is a special case involving large numbers of people and an entire city, traffic and logistics, it could have been done better and should have in both cases.

NO. This is a new oppression created by the bush admin, they did it in texas and now to the entire country. This DID NOT happen under Clinton.

I remember when Clinton was speaking in our area, the protesters were kept across the street behind a police line, well in sight and sound of the entrance of the venue.

NO THIS IS NOT EQUAL. IT IS NOT BOTH PARTIES. IT IS JUST BUSH AND HIS FASCIST BASTARD SQUAD.

So, no I do not thank knight ridder for cowardly avoiding the wrath of the imperial president by muddling the truth.

[bluestateguy]

7. A dictatorship is all fine and good,

as long as you support what the dictator is doing.

But the pendulum always swings back.

Payback will be a bitch.

[ClayZ]

9. hmm....

[Crunchy Frog]

11. They write as if this stifling of dissent was occuring on both sides.

I see the general claim being made that people routinely get thrown out of rallies for presidential candidates as if it were a general phenomenon and not limited to one single party. At the Kerry rally I attended in Denver, there were large numbers of Repuke hecklers, many of them sporting enormous posters of dead fetuses, and no one was ejected from the premises.

It's interesting to see how far the "news" media will contort the facts in order to appear "fair and balanced".

[Lindacooks]

30. You're absolutely right.

"... citizens wearing a rival candidate's stickers are forcefully ejected from presidential campaign rallies on public property."

When has this ever, EVER happened at a DEMOCRATIC presidential campaign rally?

Lying fucking MSM.

[alarimer]

48. My thought exactly

The Democrats don't do that. Kerry was heckled from time to time and they didn't eject them.

[rodeodance]

13. ".Nor is it limited to one political party,"

.Nor is it limited to one political party, noted Robert O'Neill, director of the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Freedom of Expression at the University of Virginia. Both major parties limit speech at their national conventions, inside and out, he said.

In 1992, for example, the Democrats refused to allow an abortion opponent, the late Pennsylvania Gov. Robert Casey, to speak from the podium.

And when three anti-war protesters stood in the upper balcony of San Francisco's Masonic Auditorium last week during an appearance by Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and yelled, ``Hillary, stop supporting the war,'' they were quickly escorted away........

[Wordie]

17. ...but the article points out this is a "Growing Trend"...

I read that as substantial growth during the Bush administration. And the article also refers to that provision of the Patriot Act. So, even though the article discusses both the Republicans and Democrats, it's primarily Republicans that are responsible for the most recent and most egregious threats to the right of dissent in our country. Not a perfect article, perhaps, but I would assume that the average reader would be more concerned about what the Republicans are doing right now.

And if a Republican reads it and begins to think a little more about the issue because the article takes the approach it does, all the better.

[WinkyDink]

18. THEY NEVER print the WHOLE truth!

Casey (my Gov.) REFUSED to endorse Jimmy Carter! That is THE reason he was not given the podium!

[lordwhorfin]

25. God D-mn

Casey myth again! Argh.

[bluestateguy]

31. We are still straightening out that Casey myth 13 years later

So I'll do it one more time:

Casey was not allowed to speak because he did not endorse the nominee. When a candidate comes to the convention with a majority of delegates, he controls the convention. It's his show, meaning that all speakers are expected to endorse the nominee. The Democrats could care less about his position on abortion. There were other speakers there who were anti-choice, like Kansas Governor Joan Finney and Boston Mayor Ray Flynn, but they endorsed Clinton.

[high density]

34. Knight Ridder goes for that wonderful faux "balance"

I enjoyed that so much during the 2004 election and I'm glad to see it's still being used. It's such a joy to see the Republican Nazism balanced with "oh look those Dems didn't allow some guy to speak 14 years ago at a political convention and then they threw out disrupters from a Hillary speech!"

[leQ]

14. is it just me, or am i right when i think that only republicans silence

dissent? i can't remember any democrat ever doing something so un-American. correct me if i'm wrong tho.

[mikehiggins]

27. Chicago? Mayor Daley? How soon they forget. NT

[Voltaire99]

38. Another: Southern Dems v. Civil Rights movement. (nt)

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

15. I want a t-shirt that sez simply

"I DISSENT"

[WinkyDink]

19. How about one with the red circle and a "Not Allowed" red line

through the words "Free Speech"?

[Mnemosyne]

21. My email address is dissenter@, screw them all.

I'll label myself for them.

V

[eppur_se_muova]

16. Silencing dissent AGAINST REPUBLICANS a growing trend.

EXPONENTIALLY growing, at that.

[LynnTheDem]

20. "other vaguely defined national events..." such as when bush declares

himself King george & no more elections required.

[Wordie]

24. Apparently that is a NEW Patriot Act provision, now being considered! nt

[Igel]

29. It's a new provision.

But the text is old.

The Sec. Service police business has been around since the '60s, I think, although that may have been a reorganization and not when it was established.

The events of national significance have been designated for at least the last decade. Clinton designated some. * has, I believe, designated them with greater frequency. Each designation must be summed up in a year-end report to congress, specifying the grounds for such a designation and the steps taken as a result.

The language stipulating the police force and declaration of such events is being copied from their current locations to the Patriot Act. From time to time lawmakers decide to group like laws in like acts, simultaneously rescinding the previous (frequently identically worded) legislation elsewhere.

I bothered to look this stuff up and cut/paste the current (and long-standing) legislative language into a thread a week or two ago that was repeating some of the same fear-mongering non-truths. As for the other points, I'm not going to bother to actually check. It's the author's job to make sure s/he's not reporting inaccuracies, not mine.

Findlaw and a couple of other legislative law sites are free, public, easy to use, and your friends.

[Wordie]

33. The ACLU mentions that argument, but says checks and balances insufficient

on these things. And that's what makes these provisions dangerous, even though some of the law-enforcement provisions are the same as in other previous legislation, as you state:

From another Knight Ridder article on this issue:

The Secret Service provision, which Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., added, would make it a federal crime to trespass or create a disturbance at a "special event of national significance" such as the Super Bowl even if the president isn't in attendance. Under current law, people who enter security zones set up by the Secret Service to protest the president or others while they're at the event can be arrested and face imprisonment for up to six months.

"It expands the jurisdiction that the Secret Service has over its ability to put in place these exclusion zones," said Timothy Edgar, the policy counsel for national security at the American Civil Liberties Union.

Specter and his aides say the language is designed simply to allow the Secret Service to set up a protective perimeter and secure it before the president or another person in its care arrives.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/politics/13758568.htm

And here's some info from the ACLU's website:

Myth: The Patriot Act simply updated the tools of law enforcement to match the technology used by the terrorists and criminals today.

Reality: The Patriot Act “updated” surveillance powers but failed to “update” the checks and balances needed to ensure those surveillance powers include proper judicial oversight.

Section 206 of the Patriot Act allows the government to obtain “roving wiretaps” without empowering the court to make sure that the government ascertain that the conversations being intercepted actually involve a target of the investigation.

“Pen registers” and “trap and trace” devices are also allowed and track detailed information about Internet use, like specific web pages viewed or search terms entered into a search engine.

http://action.aclu.org/reformthepatriotact/facts.html

There's lots more on the Patriot Act at the ACLU link.

[BeyondGeography]

23. Seems like the cartoon aversion of our Muslim friends

should be part of this discussion. The combination of corporatocracy and theocracy around the world is making dissent a very risky business indeed.

For all of that, the would-be controllers of free speech will lose in the end. Mostly because human happiness and intimidation are fundamentally incompatible. Let's hope it doesn't take years for the rulers and the ruled to figure that out.

[democrank]

26. The Bush administration can not silence

all of us. In fact, I suggest we start getting a little louder.

[AbbyR]

46. Just what I was thinking...

"The Secret Service provision, which Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., added, would make it a federal crime to trespass or create a disturbance at a "special event of national significance" such as the Super Bowl even if the president isn't in attendance. Under current law, people who enter security zones set up by the Secret Service to protest the president or others while they're at the event can be arrested and face imprisonment for up to six months."


If thousands of us show up in t-shirts and banners under jackets, when we pull them all out, they can't arrest all of us. They may get a few of us, but if we sign up with each other ahead of time, maybe with the ACLU, we can't get "lost," either, when some are arrested. And I suggest absolutely no violence at all. It's time to revive the nice sit down and make them move us. I am tired of this. I am 55 years old, I have just joined the ACLU, and I want the rest of my life to be worth something. I think this is it.

Where do I sign up. It's time. Now. Before everything is gone.

[stickdog]

36. War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Dissent is Un-American.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2439522&mesg_id=2439522

[iconoclastNYC]

37. Democrats must make protecting Dissent a major campaign promise

[SoCalDem]

39. Just think of where we would be if our president was not a

uniter

[pinniped]

40. This article should really mention the new detention centers...

being built for that so-called emergency influx of immigrants.

I see the police have no problem following orders:

--Police said they acted under orders from federal officials. The charges were later dropped.--

[eomer]

41. Broadcast of issue ads w/in 60 days of elections is prohibited?

I missed that one.

Quite a brilliant move by the Republicans. They own the media so their faux news reports, which really amount to issue ads being broadcast continuously on their behalf, would not be prohibited. The last 60 days before an election will be pure Republican talking points with any ability to rebut them being prohibited by law. Man, these guys are good!

[Wordie]

47. You know, that does favor the incumbent, doesn't it? Good point, eomer.

Maybe that's why it's being reviewed by the SC. But the review won't be completed until after the 2006 elections, according to the article in the OP. :(

[greiner3]

42. I'm in;

It's a crime, punishable by up to six months in prison, to ``disrupt'' an event guarded by the Secret Service,

That makes it a federal offense and I'd be able to heckle the repugs that are put in prison re Abrohoff.

[leftchick]

43. Silencing dissent a growing trend

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/13791418.htm

WASHINGTON - The ejection of two women from the U.S. Capitol for wearing message T-shirts during President Bush's State of the Union speech this week was the latest incident in a growing trend of stifling dissent.

Capitol Police later apologized for ejecting the women -- after one of them, the wife of a congressman, complained bitterly, as did her husband. The police acknowledged they'd acted overzealously.

But their actions weren't atypical in today's overheated political climate. Protesters outside political conventions are herded behind razor wire far from the action, citizens wearing a rival candidate's stickers are forcefully ejected from presidential campaign rallies on public property, and those who heckle the president or broadcast issue ads within 60 days of an election can be prosecuted.

<snip>

It's a crime, punishable by up to six months in prison, to ``disrupt'' an event guarded by the Secret Service, which includes presidential rallies. A proposed extension of the Patriot Act now being negotiated in Congress would broaden such prohibitions to other vaguely defined national events.

[Cobalt Violet]

44. Isn't this something only republicans have done:

..."citizens wearing a rival candidate's stickers are forcefully ejected from presidential campaign rallies on public property"...?

[MADem]

45. Well, gee, why didn't this guy get hauled out for HIS tee shirt, then?