Where to start? It seems like new developments about domestic spying are coming every hour. Before we get ahead of ourselves, here’s a good AP piece which will give you some background about how we got to this point. Glenn Greenwald & Ewen MacAskill from The Guardian broke the story and revealed the identity of the whistleblower, Edward Snowden while Barton Gellman & Laura Poitrus of The Washington Post had the breaking story of the metadata mining program, “PRISM”. Here’s the link to my take on metadata gathering.
Category: free speech
Tiananmen Square massacre anniversary
For almost 2 months in 1989 tens of thousands of protesters led by university students occupied Tiananmen Square in Beijing. The protests were triggered by the death of Hu Yaobang, a former Communist Party General Secretary who was forced to resign for his positions on reforming the party . The students were also demonstrating against corruption in the government, for workers’ rights, and for freedom of speech and the press. On June 3, 1989 the Chinese government ordered martial law and cracked down on the protesters in Tiananmen Square, killing an unknown amount (estimates range from the hundreds to thousands). Here’s an article about some survivors from yesterday’s Washington Post.
At the time I was living and working in Los Angeles. I can still remember sitting at my drawing desk at home when the news started broadcasting those horrifying images from Beijing. 
Associated Press
Senator McConnell, defender of Free $peech
The Senate minority leader has a column in the Washington Post today where he describes himself as “…a longtime defender of the First Amendment”. I did manage to avoid spraying the keyboard with my morning cup of coffee. The only free speech Mitch McConnell has ever been concerned with is the campaign contribution kind.
IRS targeted tea party groups
As if the Benghazi story wasn’t enough to keep Congress in hearings until 2016, we have the Justice Department seizing AP phone records and the IRS targeting conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status. The targeting of any group or individual based on ideology is outrageous and goes against everything our First Amendment stands for. However, it would have been nice if the same people who are criticizing today would have been as vocal after 9-11 and during the Iraq War. I don’t remember Senator Mitch McConnell taking to the Senate floor to defend anti-war protesters or denounce then Attorney General John Ashcroft. I also don’t recall McConnell challenging former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer for what he said in response to Bill Maher’s comments about 9-11 or defending the Dixie Chicks when they were widely criticized for their comments about President Bush.
Bob Mankoff, cartoon editor of The New Yorker
Look who wandered into Lexington, Virginia:
Actually, Bob Mankoff was in town to speak at Washington and Lee University about humor and cartooning. Brett Koth (creator of Diamond Lil) and I had talked to a W&L class earlier and then joined Bob and his host, Prof Julie Woodzincka, for lunch. Bob told some great stories about cartoons which never were printed in The New Yorker. I had just been talking about cartooning, censorship, and “drawing the line” with students in Julie’s class so it was interesting to hear what The New Yorker would and wouldn’t accept in a cartoon.
Texas governor Perry attacks Ohman cartoon
Last week the Sacramento Bee published this Jack Ohman cartoon:
Governor Rick Perry, who obviously doesn’t understand the point of the cartoon, felt the need to write to the newspaper and demand an apology. Jack eloquently responded to the governor’s letter here.
Texas Lt. Governor Dewhurst added his thoughts on twitter:
A couple of colorful tweets from readers who don’t care for the cartoon:
Jack’s a big boy. He can handle criticism; it comes with the job. The sentiments above are not the problem. However, he has been receiving threats -which is not ok. I don’t care what people think the cartoon says or doesn’t say, everyone has the right to express an opinion without fearing for one’s life, editorial cartoonists included. If you’re angry or offended by a cartoon, you have every right to criticize it- write a letter to the editor, tweet your outrage, draw your own cartoon. What you don’t have the right to do is threaten or intimidate people for what they say or draw.
For those people people who are still confused I suggest taking a look at our First Amendment (it’s right before that Second one).