Speaking of democracy and freedom, anyone know what these "First Amendment" and "free speech" things are that Barney Frank and those other liberal losers on Capitol Hill are whining about in this letter? Don't they know that the pResident has a right to NOT see or hear people who disagree with him? It's all part of being King...
According to reports from protestor Brett Bursey and the press, police officers arrested Mr. Bursey for standing with thousands of Republicans welcoming the President at a Columbia, South Carolina airport because Mr. Bursey refused to change or put down his sign. Mr. Bursey reports he was told that if he wanted to protest the President, he would have to go to the designated protest site half a mile away near a highway and outside the sight and hearing of the President. “It’s the content of your sign,” officials said.
Mr. Bursey was arrested and charged by the South Carolina police with trespassing. When that charge was soon dropped by South Carolina authorities, Mr. Bursey was then indicted by United States Attorney J. Strom Thurmond, Jr. for violation of a federal law that allows the Secret Service to restrict access to areas visited by the President. If Mr. Bursey is convicted in the non-jury trial that Mr. Thurmond is seeking, Mr. Bursey faces up to six months in prison and a $5,000 fine.
In the letter to Ashcroft released today, the Members of Congress called the prosecution of Mr. Bursey for carrying his sign outside the designated free speech zone “a threat to the freedom of expression we should all be defending”:
“As we read the First Amendment to the Constitution, the United States is a ‘free speech zone’. In the United States, free speech is the rule, not the exception, and citizens’ rights to express it do not depend on their doing it in a way the President finds politically amenable . . . . We ask that you make it clear that we have no interest as a government in “zoning” Constitutional freedoms, and that being politically annoying to the President of the United States is not a criminal offense. This prosecution smacks of the use of the Sedition Acts two hundred years ago to protect the President from political discomfort. It was wrong then and it is wrong now. We urge you to drop this prosecution based so clearly on the political views being expressed by the individual who is being prosecuted.”
I'd say if the US Secret Service is going to "restrict access to areas visited by the President" they are going to have to restrict access toeveryone. That and not singling out orderly protestors for removal and supporters for inclusion is clearly the intention of the law.
Geez, dubya is just waaay too sensitive! I mean, a guy who has to throw people in jail because they publicly express their disagreement with him is like...well like...a despot!
Couldn't happen here, no sir. Not in America. Too much like Saddam Hussein, so it can't possibly be Bush....
::::waking up from nightmare:::: egads, it's actually happening!
