"Rat & Swan" > wrote in message
...
> >
> > Yeah? Well, that's just, like, your opinion, man.
> >
> > Anyway, I'd like to hear Swan's take on this before I offer my rebuttal.
>
> Swan here. Rat's partner. The terms "left" and "right" are relative on
> a continuum. What is hard line left to one person can be interpreted as
> hard line right by another. Even in one given individual, political
> stances can be all over the map. Take myself, for instance. I am pro
> death penalty, pro-choice and favor language requirements in certain
> professions. Rat and I do not agree on certain areas, politically, yet
> we are both seen as liberals. While socially liberal, I am flatly
> against gun control and would favor restrictions on immigration. I
> think society has placed TOO much emphasis on "family values" as opposed
> to simple "human values" and I'd like to see an end to subsidised
> childbearing in *all* strata of society.

Then, by contemporary American standards, you could be acurately described
as a liberatian. Something to be proud of.

> Rat and I are *not*
> "monolithic"


> and I can say with confidence that the same is true of
> conservatives, liberals, everyone. we are *people* first and foremost,

I disagree. Too many Americans are all too willing to swallow the party
line hook, line, and sinker. I know--and I'll bet you do, too--many, many
people who not only vote a straight Republican or Democratic ticket, but
allow their party to dictate their values to them. For example, if GWB came
out tomorrow and said that no one should ever again own a vehicle made by
Chrylser, that company's stock would take a nasty tumble, because many of
the Kool-Aid drinking Republican faithful would henceforth eschew Chrysler
products.

> and only an idiot or a lazy person blindly follows a "party line"
> without thinking for him or herself.

Then there a lot of idiots out there.


> as for the idea that liberals only tolerate "certain kinds" of freedom
> of speech... Hardly. The "right" wants it both ways. "Liberals are so
> mushy on values!" "The left wants you to have a mind so open, your
> brains fall out!" etc... but then... "The left only allows certain
> kinds of speech!"

Look to the recent SCOTUS decision on campaign finance law; the liberal bloc
(along with swing voter O'Connor) voted to uphold McCain-Feingold. In a
sweeping repudiation of the 1st Amendment, those guardians of free speech
decided that the 1st Amendment, which was drafted primarily to protect
political speech, no longer applies to political speech.

> Well which IS it? Remember, it was a LIBERAL organisation, the ACLU,
> that *defended* the right of the American Nazi Party to march in Skokie
> Illinois! Are there leftists who won't tolerate true freedom os speech?
> Hell, YES! I got whacked with a thrown (full) Coke can thrown by a
> radical anti-Nazi protester at a rally once. OW!

Why would the anti-Nazis ping you with a Coke can? You weren't marching
with the skinheads, were you? :^)


> And the people who had
> come to speak were shouted down and driven from the hall. NOT a shining
> example of freedom of speech and assembly, that's for damn sure!

Sure it is. Remember, your right to speak your mind does not entail a
concomitant right to be heard. If people don't like your message, expect to
be shouted down. When it comes to expressing a controversial or contentious
point of view . . . well, it's a jungle out there. As long as the force of
law isn't being brought to bear on the situation, anything goes.

> But
> there are more liberals DEFENDING freedom of speech as there are
> attacking it. I defend it!
>
> I DESPISE Fred Phelps and his disgusting webpages godhatesfags.com and
> godhatesamerica.com and I think he's a pig.

Man, I've seen that. That ****er's got some issues. No doubt ****ed in the
ass as a tot by his hermaphrodite mom. Sad, really . . .

> But if I heard that someone
> was trying to burn down his church, I'd be on the front steps BESIDE
> him, defending the place! he has a RIGHT to spew his bile and I have the
> SAME right to tell him he's an ass. I do NOT have the right to shut him
> up, nor he, me.

I'm thinking that arson is juuuuuuust a bit outside the purview of the 1st
Amendment . . .


> The cold hard fact is this: Freedom is damned hard, but it is worth
> EVERY drop of blood spilled defending it! It is difficult to have the
> moral STRENGTH *not* to shout down and shut down those you think are
> wrong. Freedom takes strength, trust, brains, forbearance, courage and
> hard work to safeguard. There is a basic truth that freedom CANNOT be
> given... it must be taken by force and it must be earned, and
> maintained, by hard work. Once lost, it can only be regained by the same
> force with which it was once won. Freedom exists for you, me, Michael
> Jackson, Oral Roberts, George Bush, Rat, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Tim
> LeHay, Fred Phelps, Jane Fonda, PETA, the ACLU, the KKK, AARP, EVERYONE.
> But it only exists so long as we have the GUTS to defend it and allow it
> for EVERYONE, even the ones we violently disagree with. As a matter of
> fact... ESPECIALLY the ones we disagree with.

Hear! Hear! Nice soliloquy, Swan! :^)