The First Amendment Doesn't Guarantee Truthful Speech

The persistence of the improbable ‘fact', the bromide and the absolutely false premise in our daily media diet makes a mockery of our constitutional commitment to freedom of speech. Too often what passes for news coverage and the air time given over to divergent opinions become platforms for radical flame throwers.

After Tuesday's speech, on Fox, Sean Hannity was firing questions at a Democratic member of Congress. "Answer my question" he kept saying as he tried to get the man to acknowledge "nine-thousand earmarks" in the projected budget, obviously not something the guest was prepared to address. For his part, Hannity was not inclined to admit that Republicans accounted for almost half of them. As Republican Senator Ensign has said, ‘there are some worthy projects in those earmarks'.

On PBS, conservative columnist, David Brooks, agreed the president delivered a timely, well-constructed, inspiring speech and was visibly shaken at the inept, vapid response delivered by Louisiana Governor, Bobby Jindal. As MSNBC's Keith Olberman had suggested prior to the evening's speeches, Jindal would probably be forced to spin toward the old-time conservative party line and that he did.

Resorting to the fiscal responsibility argument and criticizing the recovery package for being more about spending than stimulus, Jindal reworked the usual Republican themes. Inexplicably, he included a curious reference to individual rescue efforts that were hampered in the wake of Katrina by insurance requirements and regulations - - as if the federal government's failure to act paled in the face of what locals could have achieved if it were not for regulatory excesses. Though many inside and outside the party describe Jindal as a rising star there were no flashes of brilliance Tuesday night.

What is most amazing, as Republicans strive to regain their footing, is how ill-prepared the party is to address national concerns with a fresh set of ideas and how often they resort to gimmicks, deception and intolerance. Claims that no-one read the stimulus bill are absurd. Most of it had surely been read. In the end all that was required was to review changes made during the reconciliation process. Likewise the constant repetition by members of Congress and their mimics in the media that the recovery bill contains a provision granting ACORN billions of dollars has taken on a life of its own even though it is a complete fabrication, fraught with racial innuendo.

The fact is that the country, for the most part, has moved on. Informed young people, especially, don't embrace the politics of division and find it difficult to understand why racial differences are an issue. They are willing to listen to what politicians are saying and, if skin color is an obvious visual state, it isn't the defining reason for them to support or reject a candidate. In fact some in this relatively new group of voters are frankly astonished at attempts to make race a factor in elections.

Yet the obvious implications of the chimpanzee cartoon in The NY Post, for example, like yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, are dismissed by some who refuse to concede the effects of such a caricature - - its dangerously inflammatory message and its attempt to diminish the status of a segment of our population and the president himself. Apparently, some in our midst don't want hatred and prejudice to die, perhaps because they have been useful political weapons. Being white was that one thing that allowed some people to feel superior when they were otherwise inferior. In the absence of ideas and logic, racial animosity could be counted on as a reliable club with which to batter opponents.

It is the left-behind folks who continue to use the subtle and not-so-subtle stereotypes that served their purposes in earlier times. An email picturing watermelons spread across the White House lawn came with the message "no Easter egg hunt this year". No doubt, Republican Mayor Grose of Los Alamitos, CA, who sent the e-mail, thought it amusing. Don't politicians who find this sort of thing funny realize how out of touch they are, how insulting their world view is and how damaging their foolishness is to their party? Or does this stuff still resonate with that swath of bigots and knuckle draggers who can be counted on to fold such garbage into their personal set of Republican values?

It may be that a visionary leader and a better informed, more receptive citizenry will carry us beyond our small-minded past and lead us to a period of enlightenment. A more conscientious media wouldn't hurt either.