Kristi Noem's stupidity is an existential threat
“Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech.” — Benjamin Franklin
The Trump administration just refused to allow an Australian writer entry to America because he’d penned articles on his personal blog critical of the administration’s support for the Netanyahu government’s Gaza policies.
Whether you support or oppose those policies, this should shock every American.
George Orwell noted, in his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four: “The Thought Police are always watching. The only safe way was to think nothing, to know nothing, to believe nothing.”
Are we there yet?
Throughout my lifetime, American politicians of both parties have been outspoken in defending the right of people to speak their minds, regardless of their positions.
Echoing the quote often misattributed to Voltaire — “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it” — elected officials from Lincoln to Goldwater to Reagan have pointed to our First Amendment rights of free speech as a bedrock of the American ethos.
A strong nation that believes in its principles isn’t afraid of criticism. If anything, the embrace of dissent is the steel in the spine of our nation. As the First Amendment to our Constitution says: “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…”
Yet now we have officials who are examining the writings of people flying into the U.S. and using those writings — when critical of Trump or his friends — to harass travelers or even deny them entry into the country.
Alistair Kitchen is a 33-year-old Australian who spent six years in New York at Columbia University getting his Masters Degree. His Substack blog, “Kitchen Counter,” explicitly called out the university and both Republican and Democratic politicians for approving of Trump arresting students based on their speech.
That, apparently, was enough of a crime to keep him out of the U.S. when he tried to enter the country recently for a two-week visit to friends in New York.
https://www.rawstory.com/raw-investigat ... 672385807/