[Peace-discuss] Another amendment goes

[C. G. Estabrook]

Citing Shooting, Congressmen Eye New Curbs on Political Speech
Rep. Slaughter Urges FCC to 'Sanction' Critics
by Jason Ditz, January 11, 2011

Shortly after the shooting of Rep. Giffords (D – AZ) in Tucson on Saturday, 
officials and pundits from across the political spectrum were looking to make 
political hay out of it, struggling to tie the shooter to some rival political 
faction or other.

Now, however, a number of Congressmen are looking to turn that endeavor into a 
more concerted effort to introduce a series of new curbs on political speech, 
particularly political dissent, insisting that certain criticism of seated 
officials is “too incendiary” to be allowed.

Rep. Brady (D – PA) has promised to introduce new legislation to criminalize any 
political speech which could be perceived as incendiary, and other Democrats 
suggested that there should be a blanket ban on all speech and symbols which 
might be conceivably interpreted as incendiary against members of Congress.

Brady went on to claim that a number of Congressmen’s wives were terrified to 
hear of the shooting and questioning whether it was safe to remain on Congress. 
He insisted the only solution to this was to curb political speech. “The 
rhetoric is just ramped up so negatively, so high, that we have got to shut this 
down,” Brady insisted.

The ability of Congress to pass such a bill is likely not in doubt, but 
convicing the courts to allow broad-based censorship of explicitly political 
speech is likely to be an uphill battle. For some officials, this means that the 
effort should be more regulatory than legal.

Rep. Louise Slaughter (D – NY) insisted that the FCC should work hard to 
restrict political speech that “could incite people,” adding that “no one owns 
the airwaves” and that she clearly felt the FCC was not doing enough to regulate 
political commentary nor to sanction those whose criticism were unacceptable to her.

http://news.antiwar.com/2011/01/11/citing-shooting-congressmen-eye-new-curbs-on-political-speech/