Thinking About Free Speech

I had just started in radio and I was still working for another company that… well… lets just say that they had reservations about me being on the air and sharing my opinions. Because of their objections, they demanded (and got) me to use a radio nom de guerre. It was a name that was not my first choice (Herb Focaccia), but reflected my perceived role at the station.

I was supposed to report on sports and fill in a a news guy. The demand was NOT a violation of my first amendment rights. It didn’t offend me or cause me any actual heartburn. Later I would make it clear – AFTER I left the other company for full time radio – that it was not my real name, which led to two interactions with listeners that still make me… if not smile, at least remind me that Lincoln was absolutly correct about who can be fooled, at least some of the time.

All that said, there are things about the first amendment on my mind today.

When the Party that tells you to your face, “We support and defend the constitution. Please give us money and your vote,” has a leading candidate – by some polls running second in the race for the nomination – who tells you that she doesn’t give two cents about the first amendment if it stands in the way of what she wants, you have a problem. If it was isolated case, you’d shrug it off as a mistake. when she repeats it, you have to presume that she means it.

The bigger issue is that we the People have no clue what it means to have freedom of speech or association or the press or even of conscience. In our society today, there is, led by the politicos, a move towards supporting free speech that we like, and condemning all others.  And zero understanding that just because YOU choose to believe something, there is no requirement that I must share your belief…

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