RE: [Leica] Freedom of the press? WAS (something else)

["B. D. Colen" <bdcolen@earthlink.net>]

I have no idea what the specific conditions are in those other
countries. But even given my total ignorance, I'll put the best of the
U.S. media - and the freedom of the press in this country, up against
that in, oh, say Latvia, any day of the week.

I know it's fun to bash the U.S. - God knows there's a great deal of
legitimate basis for bashing us. But this one is waaaaay of the mark.
For what now seems like the 99th time - "freedom of the press" has to do
with what the press can and can't publish. And in this country the press
can publish any news it can find. Does the government try to hide
things? Of course - this Administration in particular. But that isn't a
legitimate measure of press freedom. The legitimate measure is what
happens when the media gets a hold of those things the government
doesn't want to know - at that point can it be stopped from making them
public? And in the U.S., the answer is NO - unless the government can go
to court and convince a judge that publication of the material in
question poses an immanent threat to national security. And that is
sooooo hard to do, that the government has only attempted - and failed -
to do it in a tiny handful of cases in recent history.

Now - is the U.S. Army of Occupation in Iraq interfering with
Al-Jazeera's doing its legitimate work? I'm sure it is. But that is NOT
a measure of U.S. freedom of the press; it is a measure of this
Administration's perversion of what America has always wanted to stand
for. ;-)

B. D.

- -----Original Message-----
From: owner-leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us
[mailto:owner-leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us] On Behalf Of Jacques
Bilinski & Barbara Bradbury
Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2003 3:46 PM
To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us
Subject: Re: [Leica] Freedom of the press? WAS (something else)


> I would argue that the U.S. does have the most 'free' press in the 
> sense that there is NO government imposed prior censorship.

Oh, I get it now. There is a large group of countries all tied for first
place:  USA, Timor, Iceland, Costa Rica.... Latvia, etc (but not
France).
:)


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