Wgsalter--

Most countries have criminal prohibitions on incitement to racial or religious violence, and some countries take a fairly expansive view of what constitutes such incitement. The result is that many countries effectively ban all hate speech as incitement to violence. In fact, a requirement that countries criminalize incitement or hate speech is included in many of the major human rights treaties. The U.S. is a party to some of these treaties (I'm thinking specifically of the ICCPR) but has entered a reservation stating that we will not be bound by treaty provisions in conflict with the First Amendment.

Prior censorship, such as the kind apparently being implemented in Iraq, is another matter altogether. Hate speech laws punish certain types of expression after the fact, prior censorship disallows ideas to be produced or disseminated in the first place. And a government that selectively decides what its citizens can see, as opposed to one that punishes some people who produce "irresponsible" expression after the fact, assumes a dangerous amount of power over the minds of its citizens.

I'm not arguing one way or another regarding the goodness of restrictions on freedom of expression, but prior censorship is another beast.

It should also be noted that Muslim countries like Iraq frequenly forbid more than just hate speech. Blasphemy laws and "defamation of religion" laws punish anyone criticizing or questioning Islam, no matter how mildly expressed.

The race-baiting from the white...er, the right, has been particularly bad the last few days. What I love the most is the commenters on this site who don't even bother to respond to charges that the race-baiting is wrong or racist, and immediately skip to justifying their own obvious racism. Because black people kill and beat up white people, so they deserve to be the targets of racial hatred. This accounts for 90% of what UTR posts here. I've never seen him deny that he hates black people; instead he expends all his energy attempting to prove that black people have earned his hatred. It's really quite hilarious and pathetic.

It's also funny that the police have determined the attack was not racially motivated, but the white wing refuses to take them at their word. They know it really was racial.

Please don't reduce Beck to his drug addiction, it's insulting to drug addicts round the world who don't also happen to be morally reprehensible.

Don't reduce Beck to his religion, it's insulting to Mormons around the world who happen not to be douchebags.

Glenn Beck is a wonderful mix of mental illness, substance abuse, childhood trauma, white privilege and white American exceptionalism. America is the greatest country in the world, in Glenn Beck's mind, because people like Glenn Beck are born and get rich in America.

Oh, and if Glenn Beck cared about the Constitution he should read it, as well as the Supreme Court cases interpreting what it says. Marbury v. Madison would be a good place to start. "It is emphatically the province and the duty of the judicial branch to say what the law is." Not pundits, not the decider or his mindless drones.

They got Death Panels down in Texas.

That's what I was jumping in to say. "Street FIght" is really an amazing doc. Pity I'll have to wait for this on DVD because I don't get Sundance.

And everyone else, ignore the race-baiters; also today is one of those rare occasions where I sorta understand where Electro Robot is coming from. But I'm sure he'll say something absolutely reprehensible soon and the universe will balance itself.

Will you be around here more often or is this a one-off?

Oh and reader, since you're the dude who said Obama must have got into Harvard law based on affirmative action because he must have done disastrously in undergrad because he wouldn't release his undergraduate school records...I think it's safe to assume nobody who actually pays attention to the shit you post on the internet, and understands a thing or two about how the world ACTUALLY works, is going to waste their valuable time listening to what you have to say about anything. Don't you have something better to do? Doesn't Palin have another Facebook update for you to read or something?

Wow, man. Not only do you fulfill my prediction (I won't go so far as to call it a prophecy), you do it in the post immediately after mine. You are predictable, and the universe once again makes sense. Thanks, I guess.

I do have on demand, and I will try that. Thanks for the tip.

As for what you said about Obama's academic qualifications, your post on that topic is linked at my sig. You and anyone else can read it and decide whether my characterization of what you said back then is accurate.

FWIW, president of the Harvard Law Review is one of the most prestigious student-held positions in academia, and requires a ridiculous amount of work in accepting, reviewing and editing articles written by highly respected and usually egotistical authors, which often forecloses the possibility of writing your own article. As someone who has written a law review article that will be published this winter, I can say that I don't feel in any way academically superior to Obama for having done so.

Since it was my opinion then and remains so now that you are not engaging in good faith, I won't waste breath discussing your substantive questions.

All us good conservatives have pride in our country, the one founded on good Christian values.

Refresh my memory, who said to turn the other cheek?

Vitter knows a thing or two about not turning sexual impulses inward. He turns them outward, in the direction of the nearest available whore. Like a good Christian man should.