1. true freespeech IS a BEDROCK right that needs to be REestablished from sea to shining sea: NO isolated chainlink sheeple pens; NO public spaces privately owned where freespeech is denied; NO piggies tasering, spraying, clubbing CITIZENS (you know, the People they are SUPPOSED to be protecting and serving) for practicing free speech, and NO online venues that DARE call themselves constitution-loving, freespeech-practicin', and progressive *WOULD* even *THINK* about despicable CENSORSHIP, for virtually ANY reason...

widespread CENSORSHIP deleteriously influences public debate about EVERYTHING, at ALL levels of society...

2. you will NOT have a free and unfettered reporting media UNLESS/UNTIL you have establised free and unfettered speech among the citizenry... you can NOT have a functioning democracy UNLESS/UNTIL you have established free and unCENSORED speech among the citizenry AND the reporting media... it is a prerequisite to EVERYTHING important in democracy...

(sweet geebus, i *thought* that was more-or-less the Whole Point of this column...)

you excoriate (RIGHTFULLY) the mainstream media (AND much of the alternative media is guilty of the same) for THEIR not asking hard questions, for self-serving self-censorship, and avoiding uncomfortable issues...

BUT, here, where nobody's livelihood (with the exception of greenwald's) is at stake, where the only thing at 'stake' is the anonymous 'rep' of repeat posters (and *what* is that 'worth' ?); you STILL can't allow TRUE FREE SPEECH...

(spare me the justifications... CENSORS Always have 'good intentions', etc...)

you can't/won't/don't have Free Speech *here*, how the fuck do you expect it to exist independently and separately at levels of society where much more than childish ego is at stake ? ? ?

3. svensker, my comment was especially directed to io-in-hell, but if the snit fits, kitt will wear it...

4. anniew, um, nope, i'm not *that* art guerrilla... sorry(?)

i live where the sun shines east, the sun shines west, we know where the sun shines best...

5. cash ob? thanks for comment about contributing, it was appreciated; but i can assure you i am 100% internally motivated in my righteous rage against the machine... i *know* i am the skunk at the party, the vinegar and not the honey, the cod's liver oil and not the cokey cola...

but *SOMEONE* has to speak the uncomfortable truths, bitchslap the babbling babbitry, and spread the memes of rebellion...

(as greenwald is to the mainstream media, i am to the self-righteous, clueless, and ineffectual progressives...)

6. kitty, your posting in reference to chomsky made non sense, but you are only 2-3 steps removed from the great man himself ! what a great anecdote, have you submitted it to reader's digress ?

i revere chomsky for helping the scales fall from my eyes years ago, but i don't agree with his views on everything... he appears to implicitly reject consequences of deep politics (a la peter dale scott), and promotes a systemic cause to society's ills without non-sytstemic k-k-k-konspiratorial aspects of any significance...

i don't...

however, your attempt to quash my argumentation leaves you a lot more work to do: chomsky's views on the issue of TRUE free speech are widely promulgated... he has -numerous times- submitted testimony/essays on behalf of people (even more despicable than me) caught up in free speech cases... always in terms of defending Free Speech itself, NOT whatever the particular person said... (in fact, THAT is irrelevant to the issue of free speech)

i don't think he was incoherently 'rambling' in all those instances...

7. to clarify: *besides* the unknown number of times i have been CENSORED at salon, and/or observed it happening, the 'original sin' happened when i posted a justifiably snarky comment in response to dung excreted by woman-camel-pig...

that was funny (both my CENSORED post and the spiteful CENSORSHIP itself)... and i didn't really care (EXCEPT for the fact of CENSORSHIP in general...)

(AGAIN, my point is NOT that wittle putupon persecuted dangerous ME ME ME was CENSORED, but that ANYBODY, ANYWHERE is CENSORED... i happen to count as a person too, though...)

*then* -and this is the one that 'hurt', *sniffle*- greenwald (presumably, who knows, the nature of CENSORS and CENSORSHIP is: you don't KNOW why, they won't inform you, and you don't know who they are) took down a series of posts *here*, which were COMPLETELY AND TOTALLY INFORMATION content: it was a multiple posting of ALL the kongresskritters, their washington and home district office phone/fax numbers, their office physical addresses, and their email eddresses...

(*many* of which were the hard-to-track-down 'straight' email eddresses where you could write them directly instead of using their idiotic forms you have to sign up for...)

the all-important, highest-priority 'reason' (i have just sort of learned from greenwald's dismissive missives) that i was CENSORED with extreme prejudice for, was so po' po' cross-eyed saloonists wouldn't have to keep smooshing the 'next' button to scroll past my annoying 15 or so posts which had all the contact info greenwald was exhorting his readers to contact...

how weird is that ?

here i was, being a Serious, Good, Responsible, Contributing, Helpful netizen (for once!); conveniently spoonfeeding ALL the contact info greenwald's readers needed in the campaign -in this case, telecom immunity- and i get CENSORED for my trouble...

it was 100% NOT my usual lunatic ravings, it was 100% info, it was 100% relevant, and it was 100% useful...

IF that contact info HAD been allowed to stand, i wonder if TWICE as many saloonists -who otherwise might not have bothered to look up the info- *would* have contributed to the cause...

(FYI, i faxed EVERY STUPID FUCKING KONGRESSKRITTER over this issue... no, i'm not looking for a medal, just forestalling the j'accuse-ocracy)

...but, far more important that saloonists not be visually polluted with -you know- trivial and useless information; far more important that the millionth snarky nothingburger by the kewl kidz be unobscured...

*snort*

art guerrilla

aka ann archy

artguerrilla@alltel.net

eof