No "free speech zones" for the tea baggers....

[livingonearth]

I heard on the news about the tea bagger rally this Thursday on the Capital steps and couldn't help but wonder why the tea baggers aren't thanking Obama for their freedom of speech. When Bush was president the secret service set up free speech zones, designated areas set aside to keep those who did not agree with the Bush administration's views out of the main flow. But, now that Obama is in office free speech is everywhere. Thank you Obama. The tea baggers should be thanking you too, but Glenn Beck forgot to tell them how Orwellian the Bush "free speech zones" were.

[NYC_SKP]

1. I remember that, Free Speech = Aiding Terrorists.

"Free-Speech Zone" The administration quarantines dissent.

By James Bovard

On Dec. 6, 2001, Attorney General John Ashcroft informed the Senate Judiciary Committee, “To those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty … your tactics only aid terrorists, for they erode our national unity and … give ammunition to America’s enemies.” Some commentators feared that Ashcroft’s statement, which was vetted beforehand by top lawyers at the Justice Department, signaled that this White House would take a far more hostile view towards opponents than did recent presidents. And indeed, some Bush administration policies indicate that Ashcroft’s comment was not a mere throwaway line.

When Bush travels around the United States, the Secret Service visits the location ahead of time and orders local police to set up “free speech zones” or “protest zones” where people opposed to Bush policies (and sometimes sign-carrying supporters) are quarantined. These zones routinely succeed in keeping protesters out of presidential sight and outside the view of media covering the event.

When Bush came to the Pittsburgh area on Labor Day 2002, 65-year-old retired steel worker Bill Neel was there to greet him with a sign proclaiming, “The Bush family must surely love the poor, they made so many of us.” The local police, at the Secret Service’s behest, set up a “designated free-speech zone” on a baseball field surrounded by a chain-link fence a third of a mile from the location of Bush’s speech. The police cleared the path of the motorcade of all critical signs, though folks with pro-Bush signs were permitted to line the president’s path. Neel refused to go to the designated area and was arrested for disorderly conduct; the police also confiscated his sign. Neel later commented, “As far as I’m concerned, the whole country is a free speech zone. If the Bush administration has its way, anyone who criticizes them will be out of sight and out of mind.”

more at the OP link: http://www.amconmag.com/article/2003/dec/15/00012/

I remember this and thinking, "Those Bastards!"

:patriot:

K and R

[livingonearth]

2. I really don't think the Founding Fathers had "zones" in mind

when they put forth the first amendment.

[Lagomorph]

3. It's one of those "as expected" things.

Of course you honor the first amendment. GW didn't and look where it got the Republicans.

Now that things are back to normal, people will direct their attention to their next bitch.

Look at all the good things that have happened in America. There are some here who couldn't name one off the top of their heads, other than "Obama got elected".

[Kievan Rus]

4. Of course. They're pro-rich, remember

At the G-20 in Pittsburgh, innocent college students walking around on their own campus were violently assaulted and summarily arrested for little or no reason. Lest we forget, anti-G20 types are anti-rich.

A few weeks earlier, pro-rich Teabaggers assaulted other demonstrators, disrupted government functions, and even assaulted a Congressman. And the cops never did anything.

[kentuck]

5. But these "freedom-loving" Americans had no problem when it was your freedom.

that was being trampled upon.

[TlalocW]

6. I've pointed out to my paranoid conservative gun-nut friends

(No offense to gun-owners on the board, but you know what I'm talking about - the black helicopter, militia-joining neo-cons who get erections more often looking at Gun and Ammo than Playboy)

Anyway, I've pointed out several times that not only has Obama gotten rid of the free-speech zones set up under W., but the White House issued a statement concerning the nutjobs that carry guns at the protests outside the building Obama happens to be in that as long as they're following state and local laws, there's no problem with their packing heat. I dared them to man up and admit that they should give props to Obama over this, but they've refused so far.

TlalocW

[Jim Lane]

7. Help me spread this word by getting me some information....

Wikipedia has an article on the subject of the . It correctly reports that "it was during Bush's presidency that their scope has been greatly expanded."

I'd like to update the article with more detailed information about how things have changed.

* Has the Obama administration issued an official revision or renunciation of the Bush administration policy on free speech zones?
* As to the specific example of teabaggers on the Capitol steps, can we contrast that with a specific example of an anti-Bush demo that was barred from the Capitol steps?
* Any other good stuff to include?

I can't use it in Wikipedia without a citation, and a citation to a blogger or to another DU post won't cut it.

[livingonearth]

8. Those are good questions.

I don't know if Obama has ever said anything official as to his stance on free speech zones, but just the fact that you don't see his administration using them says a lot. Could you imagine what the right wing nuts would say if he did use them? They'd have a fit. Hell, they compare him to Stalin and Hitler as it is.

[Jim Lane]

9. I agree with what you say but I'd love to have a reference

DUers know that Obama is no Bush, but I want to get this information to prospective swing voters who don't read DU. I can't put it on Wikipedia, though, without a citation.

The trouble is that "Administration refrains from restricting free speech" doesn't get written about in the MSM because there's no event to hook it to. I did some minimal Googling and came up empty.