What most of the recent hooha has been centered around are what is known as "free speech rights." In a nutshell, that means that all Americans, not just some, not just certain wealthy people, not just Democrats, not just Republicans, not just Christians and not just Atheists have endowed upon them the inalienable right to have their own opinions and to state them freely without repercussions. Much of what we see in the media is limited speech. By admission, most big time journalists are politically liberal. And that is their right. But there is also a necessary balance that must be served. When vast groups feel they are not being heard, confrontations occur. That is what happened with civil rights, gay rights and just about any other situation we have debated. So why then, considering the ACLU's constant mission to allegedly preserve free speech and the lipservice of the left to the idea of free speech, are conservative outlets, writers and pundits being forced into a type of journalistic purgatory? If you cannot listen to the opposition, then I would contend that your own grounding in whatever philosophy you espouse is weak and meaningless to you. We saw this idea, with the Big Lie making candidates appear to be mindless villains just because the churning entrails of the blogosphere says so. I have cautioned conservatives to avoid entering the type of debate that is a personal attack, but for many people having seen their friends, candidates and coworkers vilified, that is a difficult chore.
At any rate, the reason for writing this blog was that Ben Stein was fired from the New York Times. I am not sure what a conservative with an economics background was doing there in the first place, but I would think in order to at least pretend they gave the full scope of the political spectrum the NYT would keep a few token conservatives around. But as with so many other conservative, the NYT and its ancillary blogs, websites and such chose to create a type of aura that Stein was participating in conflict of interest situation with a company that he was a spokesman for. And to be additionally callous, they emailed the firing to his phone from someone that he had not met and did not know. Who is running the HR department at the NYT? Ron Burgundy? But as with all things, this too shall pass. I hope he writes a book detailing the idiocy that passes for reporting in liberal outlets. I also hope that if some writers, notably the idiot on Reuters, continue to defame his character that he follows up with a lawsuit.
Here's the column that Stein wrote outlining his fall from grace that began, oddly enough, with a column that was never published which criticized Obama. Are you sensing a trend here?
Excerpt:
"...But the two main things, as I see them, were that I started criticizing Mr. Obama quite sharply over his policies and practices. I had tried to do this before over the firing of Rick Wagoner from the Chairmanship of GM. My column had questioned whether there was a legal basis for the firing by the government, what law allowed or authorized the federal government to fire the head of what was then a private company, and just where the Obama administration thought their limits were, if anywhere. This column was flat out nixed by my editors at the Times because in their opinion Mr. Obama inherently had such powers..."
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