By STAN ESCUDERODAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- American media is "not" immune from legal restriction. The Constitution of the United States, in Amendment One as regards the press, states that “Congress shall make no law ….abridging freedom of speech, or of the press….” This grants broad but not absolute legal protection.
Historically a number of laws and regulations have been passed and found to be constitutional which have imposed specific restrictions on the media. Among these no less a figure than Abraham Lincoln issued executive orders during the Civil War making it illegal and punishable by death to have correspondence with or to give intelligence to the enemy either directly or indirectly. Northern newspapers judged by the courts to have expressed sympathy for the Confederate cause were subject to a series of federal prosecutions.
In Brandenburg v Ohio and in Hess v Indiana the Supreme Court held that speech can be restricted and criminalized if it is intended to or is likely to produce imminent lawless action. Thus American persons, including the media, can be prosecuted successfully for inciting to riot.
More recently, in 1988, a high school principal was ruled able to suppress controversial articles in the high school’s newspaper and, in 2013 Bradley (now Chelsea) Manning was found guilty of revealing classified information to Wikileaks and the New York Times was prevented from publishing that information.
Other laws make it illegal for the media to engage in defamation.
The fact is that freedom of the press was granted in the Bill of Rights because the Founders believed, correctly, that a free press willing and able to oppose tyranny by presenting objective truth to the people is a necessary pillar of the foundation of our Republic. They did not expect each element of the press to be objective. Indeed, the press in the early decades of our nation’s history was anything but. However, they did expect a range of competing views and would have been revolted by the idea of an ideologically monolithic media.
Over the centuries a popular myth sprang up, with the full support of the media and the entertainment industry, that the media is some sort of neutral, apolitical public watchdog with the role and power of a fourth branch of government. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The media companies are profit-making corporations dedicated like any business to doing whatever earns them the most money. Populated almost entirely by liberal editors and liberal reporters educated in ultra liberal journalism schools, the bulk of the modern media exclusively supports their largest advertisers and the farthest Left causes.
Today, with the exception of some cable, internet and radio outlets, the mainstream media has become a unified and active ideological ally of America’s primary internal enemy, the neo-Marxist Democrat Party. As such they have foregone any claim to objectivity or evidenced truth. They routinely leak, or perhaps even fabricate, information which damages our allies and is of great value to our country’s enemies, both at home and abroad. In both so-called news reporting and in editorials they attack elected authority and encourage violent and intolerant liberal Fascism.
Today, with the exception of some cable, internet and radio outlets, the mainstream media has become a unified and active ideological ally of America’s primary internal enemy, the neo-Marxist Democrat Party. As such they have foregone any claim to objectivity or evidenced truth. They routinely leak, or perhaps even fabricate, information which damages our allies and is of great value to our country’s enemies, both at home and abroad. In both so-called news reporting and in editorials they attack elected authority and encourage violent and intolerant liberal Fascism.
It is time for our elected government and conservative American patriots to strike back, within the limits of the law.
First, the White House should end the practice of daily press conferences, which have become increasingly confrontational and adversarial. Reduce media contact to issuance of press releases and interviews granted to outlets which have shown themselves to be objective.
Second, find, fire and prosecute those leaking intelligence and other legally protected information to the media by setting “traceable identity traps” within the text of the copies of information distributed to those authorized to have it and via communications surveillance of specific groups of federal employees.
Third, in those instances in which intelligence information provided and published gives aid and comfort to our enemies (and we are certainly at war with terrorism) publically shame and, depending upon circumstances, prosecute the reporters involved and their media employers.
Through private non-government action, organize massive advertiser boycotts of those media outlets shown to be consistently biased in their broadcast and published content. In instances where advertisers refuse to participate, boycott purchase of their products.
Privately create and, via donations large and small, organize and operate a legal firm dedicated to the investigation and suit of media whose published information can be said to violate the law.
The divide within our country is growing worse. The media consciously contribute to this worsening on a daily basis. If a way is not found and action is not taken to bring them back to a reasonable level of objectivity, our leftwing press will have made a major contribution to the rise of that Leftist Fascist violence and modern Marxist rule which many among them seem so desperately to crave.