Replies

You really do have to wonder, how many of our politicians - let alone the collective brain fart that is Hollyweird - actually can recite the First Amendment.

When I hear a brainiac like The Whale Natalie Maines going on about First Amendment rights - I wonder, "Where's the violation?"

I'm reminded of the line unttered by Wilford Brimley in the 1981 film "Absence of Malice":

“That’s BULL$H!T, Counselor. The First Amendment don’t SAY that, the privilege DON’T EXIST!”

Verbatim, the First Amandment of the Constitution says:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

There is NO RIGHT to FREE SPEECH in the First Amendment as I read it, folks. It's an abridgement on the powers of Congress/The Government - as is most of the Constitution.

If you wish for that abridgement to extend logically to be an absolute right of free speech, so be it. But it most certainly does not give one the right to an audience - or to be liked universally, let alone have a right to a PAYING audience that allows her the accumulation of personal wealth. If The Whale Natalie Maines has the right to speak her mind - then I certainly have the right to speak mine in disagreement. How Orwellian for her to recoil so dramatically in the face of adverse public opinion.

If someone threatened her with physical violence, the story would be dramatically different.