Gingrich In New Hampshire: Let's Re-examine Free Speech In Age Of Terror
As Election Central reported yesterday, potential GOP Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich is hard at work trying to out-hawk John McCain by suggesting that our new prescription for success in Iraq should be "victory or death." Now Gingrich has done it again: He's told an audience of power brokers in the key primary state of New Hampshire that we should be re-examining free speech in the age of terrorism, lest we "lose a city" to the terror threat. From the Manchester Union Leader:
Gingrich, speaking at a Manchester awards banquet, said a "different set of rules" may be needed to reduce terrorists' ability to use the Internet and free speech to recruit and get out their message."We need to get ahead of the curve before we actually lose a city, which I think could happen in the next decade," said Gingrich, a Republican who helped engineer the GOP's takeover of Congress in 1994.
Incidentally, anyone wanting to know whether Gingrich will run for President will have to wait nearly a year to find out. In a pre-speech interview with the Union Leader, Gingrich revealed that he won't make a decision about running until September 2007.
Somebody else who needs to understand that 1984 was not a blueprint. It is a warning.
November 28, 2006 11:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
In the spirit of the GOP types who support Green Party Candidates...
Is Newt accepting donations to his campaign yet?
Count me in!!!
November 28, 2006 12:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
September 2007 is going to be a bit late to the game, isn't it?
November 28, 2006 12:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is a worry. Censorship of the internet hasn't reared its ugly head for awhile and now Gingrich is pushing it.
November 28, 2006 12:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Did Gingrich happen to volunteer whether he thought it would be acceptable if government censors worked over his Manchester speech and all articles about it prior to publication? And did he pledge to submit any future sweetheart book deals to government censors, who would look for and elide terrorism-helpful speech?
November 28, 2006 12:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Newt is going down the conservative --> authoritarian --> fascist path. He is saving time by omitting the first two steps.
November 28, 2006 1:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
"We need to get ahead of the curve before we actually lose a city, which I think could happen in the next decade"
Somebody tell Newton about New Orleans. Better yet, don't. Let him keep saying things like this and reminding everyone with his own words of the failure of his party.
I'll hug your elephant if you kiss my ass.
November 28, 2006 2:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Constitution? We don't have no stinkin' constitution!!! We don't need no stinkin' constitution!!!
I was hoping the political rw would get the message after the midterms that the American people refuse to be scared by the boogeyman under the bed anymore. But I guess Newt sees an upside in continuing the rw's jihad against the constitution.
BOO!!!!!!!
I wonder if Newt's rationale might morph into, since "our enemies hate our freedoms" we need to limit those freedoms to protect ourselves?
November 28, 2006 2:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Seriously. If he really believes that he's not going to have to make a decision until then, we should stop taking him at all seriously right now, b/c that's just way too late to decide whether you are even going to compete.
November 28, 2006 3:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Was Newt serious?
This "awards banquet" was a banquet for, wait for it, "people and organizations that stand up for freedom of speech."
!!!!!
Foot, meet mouth.
I hope everyone booed when he said that, or better yet, got up and left. Regardless, I'm not sure how effectively the government could "reduce terrorists' ability to use the Internet and free speech to recruit and get out their message" even if it wanted to do so.
"Gingrich spoke to about 400 state and local power brokers last night at the annual Nackey S. Loeb First Amendment award dinner, which fetes people and organizations that stand up for freedom of speech."
November 28, 2006 3:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
Will somebody PLEASE send Newtie somewhere on a KingAir?
November 28, 2006 4:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Our first change should be to muzzle right wing fear mongers whose main role seems to be to multiply the effects of terrorism.
November 28, 2006 4:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Internet censorship -- isn't that what they do in China? Did we "win" the Cold War only to become like the societies we supposedly defeated?
What Gingrich is proposing should more properly be called "Victory AND Death": victory over terrorism, and death of the civil liberties we have enjoyed for the last 200+ years. (And it's questionable whether even then we would achieve the "victory" part of that.)
Me, I stand with Patrick Henry: Give me Liberty or give me Death!
November 28, 2006 5:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Maybe to support his proposal Newt can persuade New Hampshire to change its motto from 'live free or die' to 'live less free or else.'
November 28, 2006 6:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Lots of possibilities:
Live Free and DIE
Don't Live Free or DIE
Live Kinda Free and hopefully be slightly less likely of dying
Live Free or Die unless you fall under suspicion of being connected to terrorism, for example by taking a trip abroad or placing telephone calls to people abroad, in which case your freedoms shall be revoked by the Bush Administration and the NSA unless and until you can prove yourself to be absolutely completely 100% innocent of any wrongdoing whatsoever ever in your life.
November 28, 2006 7:07 PM | Reply | Permalink
Let me get this straight. Gingrich gets invited speak at a forum that honors free speech and then tells that audience we need to limit free speech, so we can "get ahead of the curve rather than wait until we actually literally lose a city, which I think could literally happen in the next decade if we're unfortunate"? And those in the audience didn't boo him off the stage?
Wait, it gets better. Mr. "Contract On America" continued, "We should propose a Geneva Convention for fighting terrorism, which makes very clear that those who would fight outside the rules of law, those who would use weapons of mass destruction, and those who would target civilians are, in fact, subject to a totally different set of rules that allow us to protect civilization by defeating barbarism before it gains so much strength that it is truly horrendous."
Is it me, or did he just describe the Bush Administration's "War on Terror" in Iraq? You know, cluster bombs, blowing up wedding parties, advoctating torture at Abu Ghraib, depleted uranuim munitions, napalm in Fallujah, secret rendition and the like? Was Newt calling out the Bush regime or supporting its actions (the old biblical eye-for-an-eye bromide of foreign policy)?
Does Mr. Gingrich even see the irony that the First Amendment affords him the RIGHT to call for its destruction? One can only imagine Gingrich will keep speaking more on this, preaching his anti-Constitutional invective until he becomes the poster boy for everything that is wrong with the far right.
My rant can't hold a light to Olbermann's Special Comment on this topic, though:
Free speech and the delusion of grandeur
November 30, 2006 11:42 PM | Reply | Permalink