I’ve read a bunch of editorials like this and this blog post from the Washington Post’s Jo-Ann Armao in the last couple of days. It makes me marvel that people with so little understanding of the first amendment can be in journalism. Of course, with the quality of journalism for the last decade, perhaps I shouldn’t marvel. No one is infringing Limbaugh’s free speech rights. There’s nothing “unamerican” about this as the Jackson Sun put it. This is the free market that conservatives worship at its finest. The NFL doesn’t want to alienate customers. Whether it would be Limbaugh himself (almost certainly) or his detractors–all exercising their free speech rights–having him as a part owner in the league would do that. The market spoke when it made Limbaugh the very wealthy drug addict that he is today. Likewise, it spoke when the NFL made a business decision not to invite him into their owner’s club. That’s why a lot of us don’t worship the market the way conservatives do. There’s no appeal to fairness or anything other than the bottom line.

A couple of days ago, Michael Moore gave a speech at Public Citizen’s HQ in DC. The whole thing is about 18 minutes with another 12 minutes where he takes questions. It’s worth a watch and you can find it here. But my favorite bit from it comes well into the speech part and it is this:

“To the Democrats in Congress, who don’t quite get it: I want to offer a personal pledge. I - and a lot of other people - have every intention of removing you from Congress in the next election if you stand in the way of health care legislation that the people want. That is not a hollow or idle threat. We will come to your districts and we will work against you, first in the primary, and, if we have to, in the general election. You don’t think so? You think that we’re just going to go along with you because you are Democrats?

You should think again. This is the No. 1 domestic issue on people’s minds right now. It’s the No. 1 cause of bankruptcies in this country. Medical bills. It’s the No. 1 cause of foreclosures in this country. Medical bills.

We will organize the thousands of people in your district who have suffered as a result of this cruel health care system that we have - we will organize them and we will come after you and we will remove you from office. Make no mistake about that. You had better get behind the President. If you think you were afraid of a few people at a town hall meeting, you haven’t seen anything yet. And let me just say, there are some people in this room, if you remember back to the election of 2000, that are fairly reckless individuals when it comes to politics. They don’t really care - when they see a hypocrite, when they see somebody who’s turned their back on the people who put them into office, they will be relentless, relentless in working against you. Even if it means that the Democrat doesn’t win.”

I still think that voting for Nader was an irresponsible act in 2000. Look at our Supreme Court today for my answer as to why. It’s the same answer I gave at the time. But knocking out some Democratic congressman and senators can be a powerful act and often has been in the last hundred years in this country.