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December 20 and 22, 2014, 10:00 a.m. Contents The Price of Free Speech What the University Owes Students The Values of Free Speech and a Proposal Pictures of Presidents "The Interview" Trailer and Pictures of "Art" Quotations from . . . President Barack Obama The Guardians of Peace (the Hackers' Threats) Sony Statement UI President Sally Mason Statement UI AAUP President Katherine Tachau Message First Amendment Alternatives to Law -- and Censorship: Professor Lawrence Lessig Mason Williams The University of Iowa should consider developing a course for entering undergraduates first semester that exposes them to the values underlying the First Amendment, the history of protest movements in this country and on this very campus.

-- Nicholas Johnson

The Price of Free Speech

So it is with free speech its a good idea, and also the law. With two distinctions from the law of gravity.

(1) The law doesnt always apply.

Although the First Amendment to our Constitution merely forbids Congress to make a law abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, the courts interpret congress to mean all government action things done by city councils, school boards, and yes, state universities like the University of Iowa. But that means the First Amendment gives you no protection from restrictions on your speech at the family dinner table, or in the corporate workplace.

Courts also permit governments to restrict freedom of speech in a variety of contexts how companies can advertise and label their products and new stock offerings, restrictions on sound trucks blasting messages throughout suburban neighborhoods after midnight, and a prohibition on airline passengers telling jokes as they pass through TSA security.

(2) And even when free speech is legally protected, its not free.

Speech is free like food is free in a Michelin four-star Paris restaurant. You tell the waitperson what you want, its presented before you, and you eat it. Only after the final cup of coffee, when youre preparing to leave, do you pay the price.

This speak-now-pay-later quality of free speech made the news recently from Iowa and California.

Read the original:
Threats and Sensibilities: Presidents Kim, Lynton and Mason

Rep. James Lyons

BOSTON -- Posting false advertisements online can be considered criminal harassment unprotected by the First Amendment, according to a Supreme Judicial Court decision Tuesday, which upheld the conviction of two people who directed "pranks" against an Andover lawmaker.

Rep. James Lyons, a Republican, was not yet a member of the House in 2008 when William and Gail Johnson enlisted their friend Gerald Colton to use personal information about Lyons and his wife to harass them, according to the SJC. Lyons had opposed the couple's plans to develop property abutting their home.

Colton advertised free golf carts at the Lyons' home, posted another ad offering "my late son's" motorcycle for sale with Lyons' phone number, and sent Lyons a message that said, "Remember, if you aren't miserable, I aint happy! Let's Play." William Johnson also committed the crime of falsely reporting Lyons to the Department of Children and Families for alleged child abuse.

In a ruling written by Justice Robert Cordy and released Tuesday morning, the SJC denied an appeal from the Johnsons and found the defendants' speech was not protected by the First Amendment. Cordy said the case is the court's first to consider the "type of conduct at issue here."

The case involves the use of the classified ad website Craigslist to steer unwitting people against a target.

The SJC found that though the "methods were indirect" the phony posts were "intended solely" to cause strangers to contact the Lyons.

"Where the sole purpose of the defendants' speech was to further their endeavor to intentionally harass the Lyonses, such speech is not protected by the First Amendment," the SJC wrote.

"I thought it was a very well written opinion and my wife and I are extremely grateful for the Supreme Court's decision in this case," Lyons told the News Service. "These people literally tortured my wife, my boys and myself, and to this day shown not one ounce of remorse."

Lyons, who was elected in 2010, said the Johnsons are no longer his neighbors and said both were incarcerated as a result of their convictions. The husband was sentenced to serve 18 months imprisonment and his wife was sentenced to serve six months, according to the SJC.

View post:
Court rules against couple who cyber-harrassed Andover rep.

Zhang Jinran

China Daily

Publication Date : 23-12-2014

China's top legislature will review the first amendment to the Law on Air Pollution Prevention and Control since 2000.

The amendment is a necessary move to improve the national campaign to control air pollution, which has more sources today, the environmental protection minister said on Monday.

"The previous amendment is not effective in controlling current multiple pollution sources, and isn't working in ongoing efforts," Zhou Shengxian said on Monday while handing in the new draft to the National People's Congress Standing Committee.

The new draft was finished amid growing calls throughout the country for controls on air pollution, he said.

Based on the ministry's annual report on air quality, only three of China's major 74 cities in 2013 had air pollution within acceptable national standards. The average number of days with smog in the country in 2013 was 35.9, the most since 1961.

Coal-consumption sources contribute more to air pollution than they did 14 years ago, with such sources now including industrial production, Zhou said.

Read more:
China gets tough over smog

Freedom of speech /first amendment
Sony pulling a tasteless error in production judgement.

By: LAUNCH TM NETWORK

See more here:
Freedom of speech /first amendment - Video

#39;This is Pearl Harbor on the First Amendment
Legal analysts Alan Dershowitz and Jeffrey Toobin respond to movie theaters and SONY pulling the film "The Interview"

By: Cnn News Rt

Read this article:
'This is Pearl Harbor on the First Amendment - Video