The American Spectator

Reader Mail

(Page 2 of 11)

This is a dreadful situation. The crazies now run the asylum. Or maybe Big Brother finally arrives? The Founding Fathers would be ashamed and furious. We all should be -- and we ought to take action.

This First Amendment gag rule, which some predicted McCain-Feingold would be, insults the memory of any soldier who gave his or her life, or was wounded, maybe crippled, for the Republic. They did so, so we could forfeit one of our most cherished freedoms? One that's envied the world round?

It's disturbing now to see the Bush and Kerry camps wanting to quench the outside-the-campaign ads. Kerry I understand; Bush, no.

But it's even more alarming and frightening to see the mainstream media support that. But, hey, what's to be expected from them these days?

Last Thursday, when the New York Times awoke from its slumber about the Swift Boat Veterans for the Truth and their allegations against Sen. Kerry, it scorched alternate and free news outlets for even reporting the news. "The assault is gaining attention, with Internet and cable television zealots debating combat minutiae and even whether Mr. Kerry enacted wartime events with his political future in mind or held secret meetings with Communists."

We need more zealots, tens of millions of them, who'll demand our Constitution be liberated and given back to us. That is, if free speech and redress of grievances aren't further criminalized.

p>But even if they are, how can we allow more erosion of our rights without doing something? br> -- C. Kenna Amos Jr. br> Princeton, West Virginia /p> p> The saddest aspect of all re: McCain-Feingold is its evidence of John McCain having sold his soul to...John McCain. In pandering to the benefit of the conventional media -- an entity whose utility is in a historic freefall -- McCain simply hoped to extend his visibility and cachet in a place where Liberals Rule. Without his canny ability to play opposites against each other as an "Independent" (i.e. "Sellout") Republican, McCain would scarcely receive even a Dennis Kucinich's worth of a mention anywhere in the press. One thinks that the saddest aspect of all this is the sense that somewhere in the night of his own personal Hell at the Hanoi Hilton, an extraordinary and courageous young man vowed never to be left powerless again. Never. No Matter What. Thus, as mindless and constitutionally destructive as McCain-Feingold may be, it is only symptomatic of the Tragedy of John McCain. For his world does not envision Mr. McCain, or Lt. McCain, or Alderman McCain, Mayor McCain, Senator McCain, President McCain, Dictator McCain, King McCain, Master of the Universe McCain or even McCain Almighty. It sees only McCAIN!!!!. br> -- Gene Wright br> Laguna Niguel, California

topics:
John McCain, Mainstream Media, Television, Sports, Constitution, Law, Founding Fathers, Military, NATO