Category Archives: First Amendment Under Attack

South Carolina Government Attempts To Intimidate Dixie Chicks Into Giving A Free Concert For Troops (Huh?)

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Is this for real? Is South Carolina trying to force the Dixie Chicks to show up for a free concert so they can be booed and hissed by their former military fans.
I’m shocked I tell you. Shocked. Surely this is unconstitutional.
Don’t do it girls! Start your tour from somewhere else, if need be. Sounds like they’re crazy in South Carolina anyway.
You could probably sell out here in San Francisco for a week straight.
We’ll stand behind you and your constitutional right to speak your mind!
(And you’re pretty good at playing them instruments too.)
(S.C. State) House Resolution H 3818

A HOUSE RESOLUTION
TO REQUEST THAT THE DIXIE CHICKS APOLOGIZE TO THE MILITARY FAMILIES IN THE STATE OF SOUTH CAROLINA AND THE UNITED STATES FOR THE UNPATRIOTIC AND UNNECESSARY COMMENTS MADE BY THEIR LEAD SINGER BEFORE THEY BEGIN THEIR UNITED STATES TOUR ON MAY 1, 2003, IN GREENVILLE, SOUTH CAROLINA, AND TO REQUEST THAT THEY PERFORM A FREE CONCERT FOR TROOPS AND MILITARY FAMILIES IN SOUTH CAROLINA AS AN EXPRESSION OF THEIR SINCERITY.
Whereas, the Dixie Chicks are a popular and influential country music group from Texas; and
Whereas, before a recent London concert, Natalie Maines, the lead singer of the Dixie Chicks, said that she was ashamed that the President of the United States is from Texas; and
Whereas, members of the United States Armed Forces are outraged at the anti-American sentiment expressed by the Dixie Chicks; and
Whereas, there is a large military presence in the State of South Carolina, whom the Dixie Chicks have offended by their comments; and
Whereas, before the Dixie Chicks kick off their United States tour in Greenville on May 1, 2003, the House of Representatives and the people of South Carolina request that Natalie Maines apologize and that the group perform a free concert for the South Carolina servicemen and women and their families.

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Democracy Defended And Eventually Silenced On Fox News

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Here’s NY Congressman Gregory W. Meeks (D) sticking up for protesters’ rights to express themselves — while being overpowered — literally, a la microphone levels and camera angles — against one of the many nameless ranting talking heads on the FOX network.
(If anyone can identify this guy from Fox, I’ll be happy to cite him accordingly. It’s just that he didn’t seem to care about telling us who he was, and Fox didn’t seem to care about giving us his name during over 10 minutes of programming from the guy, so I figured, “why should I care? He’s just making it up as he goes along, without any regard to accuracy or the thoughts and feelings of anyone else.” Not much of a “news” man. Not sure what else I expected from Fox…)
Meeks also brings up that the protesters are largely rising up against a policy of pre-emption, and uses the situation in Northern Iraq with the Kurds and the Turks as an example of why this policy is not one we want other countries to start following. The talking head calls this scenario “fantasy-land” and accuses Meeks of going off of the subject.
Notice how Meeks is quickly replaced with Republican Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R) as soon as touchy material like what a “democracy” means enters the conversation.
Audio – Gregory Meeks Sticking Up For Democracy On Fox (MP3 – 6 MB)
Gregory Meeks Sticking Up For Democracy On Fox (Small – 11 MB)

My Mistake. Natalie Actually Did Apologize

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How sad.
McCarthyism lives!. It worked then and it works now.

Statement from Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks
March 14, 2003
“As a concerned American citizen, I apologize to President Bush because my remark was disrespectful. I feel that whoever holds that office should be treated with the utmost respect. We are currently in Europe and witnessing a huge anti-American sentiment as a result of the perceived rush to war. While war may remain a viable option, as a mother, I just want to see every possible alternative exhausted before children and American soldiers’ lives are lost. I love my country. I am a proud American.”

The Only Apology You’ll Be Hearing From Natalie Maines

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An Apology From Natalie Maines

But now, thanks to the thousands of angry people who want radio stations to boycott our music because criticizing the President is unpatriotic, I realize it’s wrong to have a liberal opinion if you’re a country music artist. I guess I should have thought about that before deciding to play music that attracts hypocritical red necks…
And most important of all, I realize that it’s wrong for a celebrity to voice a political opinion, unless they’re Charlie Daniels, Clint Black, Merle Haggard, Barbara Mandrell, Loretta Lynn, Ricky Skaggs, Travis Tritt, Hank Williams Jr, Amy Grant, Larry Gatlin, Crystal Gayle, Reba McEntire, Lee Greenwood, Lorrie Morgan, Anita Bryant, Mike Oldfield, Ted Nugent, Wayne Newton, Dick Clark, Jay Leno, Drew Carey, Dixie Carter, Victoria Jackson, Charleton Heston, Fred Thompson, Ben Stein, Bruce Willis, Kevin Costner, Arnold Schwartzenegger, Bo Derek, Rick Schroeder, George Will, Pat Buchanan, Bill O’Reilly, Joe Rogan, Delta Burke, Robert Conrad or Jesse Ventura.

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William Rivers Pitt: Arrest Me

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Arrest Me By William Rivers Pitt for truthout.

Crazy, right?
Ask Andrew J. O’Conner of Santa Fe, New Mexico if it sounds crazy. Mr. O’Conner, a former public defender from Santa Fe, was arrested in a public library and interrogated by Secret Service agents for five hours on February 13th.
His crime?
He said “Bush is out of control” on an internet chat room, and was arrested for threatening the President.
Ask Bernadette Devlin McAliskey of Ireland if it sounds crazy. She was recently passing through Chicago from Dublin, where she passed security, when she heard her name called over a loudspeaker. When she went up to the ticket counter, three men and one woman surrounded her and grabbed her passport. McAliskey was informed that she had been reported to be a “potential or real threat to the United States.”
Bernadette Devlin McAliskey has spent the better part of her life struggling for the Irish nationalist cause. She did not lob Molotov cocktails at police. Instead, she became a member of British Parliament at age 21, the youngest person ever elected to that post. In 1981 she and her husband were shot by a loyalist death squad in their home. She has traveled to America on a regular basis for the last thirty years, and has been given the keys to the cities of San Francisco and New York.
Upon her detention in Chicago last month, McAliskey was fingerprinted and photographed. One of the men holding her told her that he was going to throw her in prison. When she snapped back that she had rights, she was told not to make the boss angry, because he shoots people. “After 9/11,” said one officer, “nobody has any rights.”

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Crux Of The Dixie Chicks Situation

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This situation just goes to show that it was the Music Programming layer of the system, not the listener layer, that pulled the Dixie Chicks from station playlists over Natalie’s statements.
That’s the issue here: programmers took it upon themselves to censor the Chicks before listeners had a chance to say anything. That’s where the McCarthyism parallel kicks in. The Chicks got blacklisted by a few key people within a Monopolized Media: not by infuriated listeners.
Many thanks to Dale Carter, programming director at KFKF/Kansas City for rethinking the situation and speaking out on this important issue!

Country Radio Still Weighing Chicks Controversy

One major market programmer removed the Chicks from his station’s playlist but changed his mind after considering why Americans have fought previous wars. In a letter to listeners posted on the KFKF/Kansas City Web site, program director Dale Carter wrote, “Our soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines are over there fighting for our rights — and one of those is our Constitutional right to express an unpopular opinion. The longer this has gone on, the more I had visions of censorship and McCarthyism. Two wrongs don’t make a right. I agree with the 80 percent of you who abhor what Natalie said in London. On the other hand, I believe in the Constitution.”

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Dixie Chicks Under Attack For Expressing Their Views Against The War

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The Dixie Chicks have been blacklisted out of major radio rotation for expressing their views about the Shrub.
So when you’re calling the radio stations to request the new Beastie Boys and John Cougar Mellencamp Anti-war songs, you can also let them know that you’d appreciate hearing some Dixie Chicks!
Dixie Chicks pulled from air after bashing Bush

Country stations across the United States have pulled the Chicks from playlists following reports that lead singer Natalie Maines said in a concert in London earlier this week that she was “ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas.”
Station managers said their decisions were prompted by calls from irate listeners who thought criticism of the president was unpatriotic…
One station in Kansas City, Missouri held a Dixie “chicken toss” party Friday morning, where Chick critics were encouraged to dump the group’s tapes, CDs and concert tickets into trash cans.
Houston country station KILT pulled the band’s records from its playlist — at least temporarily — after 77 percent of people polled on its Web site said they supported the move.
“We’ve got them off the air for right now,” said Jeff Garrison, program director at KILT, which is owned by Viacom’s Infinity Broadcasting Corp.
“People are shocked. They cannot believe Texas’ own have attacked the state and the president,” Garrison said.
Lead singer Maines said in a statement she felt the president was ignoring the opinions of many in the United States and alienating the rest of the world by pushing for war with Iraq.
“We’ve been overseas for several weeks and have been reading and following the news accounts of our government’s position. The anti-American sentiment that has unfolded here is astounding,” Maines said…
The Chicks have the number one country album in the United States on the Billboard charts called “Home” and the No. 1 single with “Travelin’ Soldier”, which is about a U.S. soldier who fought in Vietnam.

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Daily Show On Last Week’s Peace T-shirt Mall Arrest

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Perhaps you heard about last week’s story where a citizen was arrested for wearing a “Give Peace A Chance” T-Shirt in an upstate NY shopping mall.
If not — here’s the poop, Daily Show Style.
Daily Show On Peace T-shirt Mall Arrest Part 1 of 2 (Lo-res 9 MB)
Daily Show On Peace T-shirt Mall Arrest Part 2 of 2 (Lo-res 9 MB)
Daily Show On Peace T-shirt Mall Arrest – Parts 1 and 2 (Lo-res 17 MB)

Cheney Attacks First Amendment

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Dick and his wife don’t like a cartoon of the misses.
Trouble is, parody is supposed to be legal in our “free” country that supposedly comes complete with “free speech” (courtesty of the First Amendment).

White House insists satirist remove image lampooning Lynne Cheney from Web site
By Larry Neumeister for the AP.

An Internet lampoon of Vice President Dick Cheney’s wife is no laughing matter at the White House, which has asked a satirist to remove pictures of her — complete with red clown noses — from his Web site.
But the New York Civil Liberties Union struck back Wednesday on behalf of John A. Wooden, 31, threatening a lawsuit to protect his First Amendment rights to parody the White House and Bush officials on his site, whitehouse.org.
The official White House site is whitehouse.gov.
Cheney counsel David S. Addington warned Wooden’s Chickenhead Productions Inc. that Lynne V. Cheney’s name and pictures — altered to show her with a red clown’s nose and a missing tooth — could not be used to make money without her consent, and asked Wooden to delete the photos and “fictitious biographical statement about her.”
Instead, Wooden cautioned Web site visitors that the vice president “wishes you to be aware … that some/all of the biographic information contained on this PARODY page about Mrs. Cheney may not actually be true.”
And, it added, the editors of the Web site were “confident that any rumors about Mrs. Cheney formerly being a crystal meth pusher are 100 percent likely to be absolutely untrue. Similarly, any stories about her penchant for licking brandy Alexanders off the hirsute belly of her spouse are all lies, lies, lies!”

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