Warning: Has many curse words in it.

Perhaps this goon doesn’t realize that it’s illegal to assault someone here. The people are just expressing their political opinion, which is constitutionally-protected speech.

The New York Times reports:

50% Good News Is the Bad News in Russian Radio
By ANDREW E. KRAMER
MOSCOW, April 21 — At their first meeting with journalists since taking over Russia’s largest independent radio news network, the managers had startling news of their own: from now on, they said, at least 50 percent of the reports about Russia must be “positive.”

In addition, opposition leaders could not be mentioned on the air and the United States was to be portrayed as an enemy, journalists employed by the network, Russian News Service, say they were told by the new managers, who are allies of the Kremlin.

How would they know what constituted positive news?

“When we talk of death, violence or poverty, for example, this is not positive,” said one editor at the station who did not want to be identified for fear of retribution. “If the stock market is up, that is positive. The weather can also be positive.”

In a darkening media landscape, radio news had been a rare bright spot. Now, the implementation of the “50 percent positive” rule at the Russian News Service leaves an increasingly small number of news outlets that are not managed by the Kremlin, directly or through the state national gas company, Gazprom, a major owner of media assets.

The three national television networks are already state controlled, though small-circulation newspapers generally remain independent.

This month alone, a bank loyal to President Vladimir V. Putin tightened its control of an independent television station, Parliament passed a measure banning “extremism” in politics and prosecutors have gone after individuals who post critical comments on Web chat rooms.

Parliament is also considering extending state control to Internet sites that report news, reflecting the growing importance of Web news as the country becomes more affluent and growing numbers of middle-class Russians acquire computers.

On Tuesday, the police raided the Educated Media Foundation, a nongovernmental group sponsored by United States and European donors that helps foster an independent news media. The police carried away documents and computers that were used as servers for the Web sites of similar groups. That brought down a Web site run by the Glasnost Defense Foundation, a media rights group, which published bulletins on violations of press freedoms.

“Russia is dropping off the list of countries that respect press freedoms,” said Boris Timoshenko, a spokesman for the foundation. “We have propaganda, not information.”

Meanwhile, we’re considering letting them in our missile defense system? The Soviets are moving against press freedom, religious freedom, and freedom of association.  Sadly, they are turning back to their old evil ways.  We need to keep track of their aging arsenal of nuclear weapons so they don’t get into the hands of terrorists, and we also need to pressure them to respect freedoms.

World Net Daily points out how YouTube temporarily blocked an anti-Clinton adminsitration ad by using a warning, even though there wasn’t anything close to being offensive in regards to sexual, violent or explicit content on it.

They have also banned conservative videos, videos critical of Islam, and videos by Michelle Malkin.

And now they’ve been aquired by Google, an organization that has given overwelmingly to liberals.

Google has also refused to remove a blog on its blogger.com site, that advocates man/boy love, run by predators and perverts.

Robert Cox of the Examiner points out how many social networking and search sites–technorati, google, youtube, six apart, rss and podcasting–are all owned by liberals and this may become troublesome to conservatives’ freedom of speech. Michelle Malkin was recently threatened with a deleted account because her videos were deemed “offensive” for being conservative by YouTube.com.

So if you upload a video of American soldiers being killed, don’t worry; but if you stray from the lockstep liberal orthodoxy and make a conservative video, then watch out–that’s just too much common sense.

Michelle Malkin has pointed out how leftists stormed the stage and prevented the Minutemen Founder and others from speaking at Columbia University. Now World Net Daily reports how the leftists and pro-illegals actually called the Black Minuteman speaker the “n” word. Not surprising, actually.

During the attempted speech, Minutemen member Marvin Stewart was harassed and called the “n” word by the pro-illegals. Just more violent, liberal, anti-political speech threats.

Socialists and pro-illegals hate freedom of political speech. Here they storm the stage against a mainstream, American specker, calling the black speaker the “n” word. WND Photo.

Michelle Malkin recently points to a blog by Patterico pointing out how L.A. Times columnist actually condoned the violence against freedom of political speech, speech which most mainstream American support. The columnist, Meghan Dahm, wrote:

THE EVENTS at Columbia University on Oct. 4, in which about a dozen students stormed a stage where the founder of an anti-illegal immigration group was speaking, didn’t exactly resemble those of April 1968. There were no arrests, no soundtrack by the Grateful Dead, no occupation of the president’s office. But considering that most young people are considered to be politically apathetic, you have to credit the Chicano Caucus and the International Socialist Organization for trying.

Patterico points out how Daum is fully aware of the violence of the thugs:

Protesters later said Gilchrist was knocked backward and his glasses were broken. The student newspaper, the Columbia Spectator, reported that “one student was kicked in the head and bleeding.”

And she still gives them a “good grade” for trying:

Still, I’ll give them an A (OK, maybe a B+) for trying.

Patterico then points how she tries to defend her stance by calling a former terrorist Mark Rudd, the founder of the Students for a Democractic Society. He later was a member of the radical Weather Underground and went into hiding from 1970 to 1977 after being involved with making bombs to attack the United States.

So Daum defends attacking freedom of political speech by using violence then defends her stance by talking to a former terrorist who planned attacks against United States citizens. The illegals and their supporters are not for American values like freedom of political speech.

What an idiot. You can write Meghan Dahm at mdaum@latimescolumnists.com.

Besides hosting considerations, most web sites are able to be accessed at a fairly fast speed. A person can create a blog or web site and that can be accessed by people from around the world. That soon may change. Cable and phone companies are proposing changes to the way the Internet works, where they would charge money for faster access to web sites. So the big corporations’ web sites would load faster if they decided to pay this “protection money” to the telecom giants who currently have a virtual (and sometimes?very real) monopoly on the telephone and cable lines that the Internet runs through.? But citizens, groups, some politicans and even the guy who invented the Web have come out in support of protecting smaller web sites and Net Neutrality. PC World has a good article about the Net Neutrality debate:

Your favorite Web sites may be relegated to the Internet’s slow lane if the companies that run its backbone network have their way. Proposed services from telecommunications and cable companies would let ISPs and other Web businesses pay extra to receive preferential treatment for their data packets carrying everything from video to music to text over the Internet. Such packet prioritization would deliver a more responsive Web to those sites’ visitors–a valuable perk for high-bandwidth services like streaming video.

Rick Boucher points out in BusinessWeek Online in “Beware of a Two-Lane Internet” the problem and solution:

Some companies’ efforts may mean larger outfits with financial heft get faster-priority access on the Net. At stake is the very essence of the Web.

In the decade since Congress last rewrote the nation’s telecommunications laws, our open and accessible Internet has become a wellspring for innovation, producing the likes of Google (GOOG ), Yahoo (YHOO ), eBay (EBAY ), Amazon (AMZN ), and thousands of smaller successful e-commerce enterprises. Collectively, the services they sell at home and abroad, and the jobs they have created, are driving forces of the 21st-century economy.

Yet storm clouds are gathering, threatening to inhibit further progress. And as we prepare this year to refine our telecommunications rules once again, a measure to assure continued Internet openness and accessibility is now required.

Recently, executives at some telephone companies have indicated that their business model for providing broadband service will include not only charging customers for an Internet connection but also assessing a fee on Web sites to enable their customers to reach them more quickly.

Essentially, what these executives are proposing is the creation of a two-lane Internet where larger, more established Web sites with financial resources that pay for fast-lane access will be able to squeeze out smaller, emerging Web sites.

One must ask what will happen to the next Google or Yahoo struggling in a garage today, if new, innovative companies (that must often give away their services as they strive to become established) are stuck with inferior, slow-lane Internet access, simply because they lack the resources to pay the toll-booth keepers.

The solution…

…a firm principle of network neutrality is essential. With two simple new rules, and without hurting consumers or limiting innovation, telephone companies could launch an array of new services, including high-quality multichannel television.

Under the first requirement, broadband providers would be prohibited from blocking, interfering with, or impairing the ability of Internet users to access lawful content, applications, and services on the Internet. Under the second principle, the broadband operators would be prohibited from favoring themselves or their affiliates in the allocation, use, or quality of Internet access services.

…

Simply put, to foster the conditions that have contributed so much to our economy and our way of life, we need to avoid a two-lane Internet, controlled by incumbents manning toll booths. That’s the net on net neutrality.

Proponents of keeping the web free of bandwidth favoritism is not without its opponents. In a bit of doublespeak, Gerald Wesel, CEO of Ellacoya Networks, defended charging some web sites money for fast loading time:

The reality is that traffic must be managed in order to ensure fairness of service quality for all Internet users.

But cable and phone companies, like Verizon and Time Warner, already have a virtual monopoly on many markets. In many areas, there is only one cable provider. Opponents of Net Neutrality talk about the “free market” but a monopoly is not the free market. The phone and cable companies have a strangehold on the lines that connect the various computers. They should not abuse this to favor their own streaming videos or web sites that pay “protection money” so that their web sites load faster (kind of a like a broadband mob).

Some politicians have proposed a common sense idea to ban these companies from favoring one paying web site (a huge corporate web site) over others (smaller web sites that cannot pay protection fees). Although the vote was not completely partisan, mostly Republicans voted against saving the web about a month ago, although some Republicans have supported less regulatory ideas to combat favoring one content provider over itself or another.

I am for the free market and capitalism (with a safety net at the bottom for those that are poor, but not helping the people that are just lazy and refuse to work). But I am also for freedom of speech (besides the exceptions of copyright, actual malice, slander and the rare obsenity). A handful of companies should not be able to discriminate on the basis of paying protection money to them, just because they own the lines that connect the web. I feel the web is more important than even radio and television.

See also:

CNet’s Net Neutrality Showdown

Net neutrality fans lose on Capitol Hill

Without ‘Net neutrality,’ will consumers pay twice?

Should the Internet Play Favorites?

Don’t let phone giants ‘Ctrl’ what you get on the ‘Net?(USA Today)

When the Net Goes From Free to Fee?(Newsweek)

Do something!

Save the Internet

Common Cause’s?Hands of My Internet!?and Net Neutrality

Others blogging or writing about Net Neutrality:

Mia Culpa, Gici, DavensJournal, Rep. Ed Barkley, Jason Wong, Accomodatingly, Josh Silver, Washington Post (Internet Firms Want FCC to Enforce Net Neutrality), (The Coming Tug of War Over the Internet),

From ProLifeBlogs, another example of pro-abortion intolerance towards the standing up for innocent human beings:

Rose Mawhorter was viciously assaulted while protesting abortion across the street from Vancouver’s most notorious abortion clinic. Although the story was covered by LifeSiteNews a few days after the April 7 incident, Rose has just released a video of the attack (warning - explicit language).

Just another example of liberal tolerance, right?

According to Tongue Tied,

The Alliance Defense Fund is standing up for a university librarian in Ohio who has been accused of creating a hostile atmosphere on campus by recommending that people read books with conservative themes

Scott Savage, a reference librarian at Ohio State University in Mansfield, suggested four best-selling conservative books for freshman in his role as a member of the school’s First Year Reading Experience Committee. The four books were The Marketing of Evil by David Kupelian, The Professors by David Horowitz, Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis by Bat Ye’or, and It Takes a Family by Senator Rick Santorum. Savage says he recommended the books after other committee members suggested books with a primarily left-wing perspective.

Savage was put under “investigation” by OSU’s Office of Human Resources after three professors filed a complaint of discrimination and harassment against him, saying that the book suggestions made them feel “unsafe.”

Wow. So a librarian suggests being exposed to opposing ideas and he is “investigated.” According to this insanity, leftist professors like Ward Churchill who say that innocent victims of the 9/11 attacks are Nazis are not a threat to our nation, but merely reading mainstream conservative books is dangerous. Give me a break.

Wow. I’ve had some pretty intolerant slurs thrown at me from some leftist students while getting my Journalism Master’s just for being a Christian and sometimes conservative. But this is just ridiculous. Leftists e-mailed Malkin and called her “slanty-eyed,” a “cunt” and a “chink.” Wow, liberals just have so much tolerance for other ideas and races don’t they? Read her blog.

They are also trying to raise money to sue her… for… what? Ha. In a bit of doublespeak, they said: “Lets get a thread going on this and see if we cannot excercise some of the few remaining constitutional powers Michelle and her friends have not yet taken away from us.”

What constitutional powers have Malkin wrestled away from them? They are insane! They are the ones trying to silence her freedom of political speech, the most important type of speech protected by the First Amendment!

Selena Ewing, research officer at the Southern Cross Bioethics Institute and a member of Women’s Forum in Australia points out in a recent article in?the Australian paper The Age titled The insiduous censorship of pro-life women how pro-life women are on the move:

When it comes to abortion, women are on the move. They are writing, talking, agitating for change. Women who have had abortions, women who are mothers and women who are not, working women, academics, students - many different kinds of women think society can and should offer more than abortion.

They are pro-life women, challenging the status quo. And they’re not having aloof discussions about other women. It’s about us women.

Yet pro-abortion commentators continue to push the lie that only men want an abortion debate, and that women uniformly support abortion. Why? Why do they want pro-life women to be invisible?

Perhaps they can’t believe that women might question abortion. Perhaps they think these women are simply puppets. Perhaps it’s ignorance.

But most likely, it’s because the lie suits the pro-abortion agenda. The strategy is a form of emotional blackmail. It suggests that to stand in solidarity with other women, we must support abortion as a private decision, as a woman’s choice. To help women, we must abandon them to their desperate “free choices”. To fit women into society, we must surgically restructure their bodies.

….

A divisive and harmful strategy of traditional feminism has been to pit women against men as though enemies. The same old tactic is being played out now. The effect is to stifle the alternative woman’s voice.

So here’s the truth. Most women don’t hate men, and most women don’t like abortion. Some women may feel compelled to support abortion because it appears that women need it. If things were different, women would rather not have it at all. Idealistic? Perhaps.

But that’s why we need to have a public discussion about more than just having abortions. We need to discuss what drives women to abortion, then we need to find solutions.

There is a new generation, young women who have watched many friends and sisters endure the torment of abortion. They are aware of the pressures of motherhood and the demands of the corporate world. They know abortion is a quick, cheap response to a desperate woman - but that its effects can be devastating.

These women want a debate and they want change. They don’t want abortion - they want a world that accepts them and their bodies. They are part of a grassroots movement that has coalesced into Women’s Forum Australia - an independent women’s think tank that undertakes research, education and advocacy in a wide range of social, cultural, economic and health issues affecting women, including abortion. The membership is growing daily.

Awesome, common sense commentary. Thanks Ms. Ewing.

Related: Culture Jam for Life’s Freedom of Speech special report