Commentary and analysis on American politics, culture, and national identity, U.S. foreign policy and international relations, and the state of education
- from a neoconservative perspective! - Keeping an eye on the communist-left so you don't have to!
In the decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, released just a few weeks ago, the judges pointed out that the First Amendment’s protection for freedom of the press “encompasses a range of conduct related to the gathering and dissemination of information,” and that citizens have the right to investigate government affairs and share what they learn with others. Judge Kermit Lipez also specifically noted that these protections don’t just apply to professional journalists. He said in his decision:
[C]hanges in technology and society have made the lines between private citizen and journalist exceedingly difficult to draw. The proliferation of electronic devices with video-recording capability means that many of our images of current events come from bystanders [and] and news stories are now just as likely to be broken by a blogger at her computer as a reporter at a major newspaper. Such developments make clear why the news-gathering protections of the First Amendment cannot turn on professional credentials or status.
We couldn’t have put it any better ourselves (although we have tried a number of times). The advent of social news-distribution tools like Twitter and Facebook, not to mention blogs and YouTube and other web services and social networks, have powered what Om has called a “democratization of distribution” that makes virtually anyone into a publisher.
From the outside, they looked like other recently built San Gabriel townhouses — two stories, Spanish style, with roofs of red tile.
Inside they were maternity centers for Chinese women willing to pay handsomely to travel here to give birth to American citizens.
Southern California has become a hub of so-called birthing tourism. Operators of such centers tend to try to blend in, attracting as little attention as possible.
But on quiet, residential Palm Avenue, neighbors had noticed an unusual number of pregnant women going in and out, and some complained about noise.
On March 8, code enforcement officials shut down three identical four-bedroom townhouses functioning as an unlicensed birthing center.
I spoke for a few minutes with these two beautiful young women. They were taking all kinds of pictures, and they asked me to help for a minute. It was a nice day.
“We don’t need more leaders. We need more followers. Wherever & however you can enter public life is ok.”
That tweet by Carol Coletta, president and CEO of CEOs for Cities, is a radical provocation in our age of the non-expert. The nation is gripped by the fantasy that the least-qualified, least-experienced among us make ideal leaders. Dissatisfaction — no, real anger — with the status quo, as opposed to informed ideas or policy experience, seems to define qualifications for public service.
America has never been united by blood or birth or soil. We are bound by ideals that move us beyond our backgrounds, lift us above our interests and teach us what it means to be citizens. Every child must be taught these principles. Every citizen must uphold them; and every immigrant, by embracing these ideals, makes our country more, not less, American.
We are a country bound by common political ideals (not grovelling grievances and a refusal to place American exceptionalism in its rightful place of international leadership).
RELATED: Glenn Reynolds has some great 4th of July photos here, here, and here.
