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Since a lot of us are angry about the elections this week and have hinted at starting our own DIY revolution to make things right again (me included), you might want to take a look at this story that makes me shudder even more with anger. We must have a lot of Feds running around with nothing better to do than hassle bloggers. So much for that whole Freedom of Speech experiment.
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PROOF:
link: http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=31&aid=73550
Watch What You Say When Blogging
From the world of personal blogging comes a word of caution about what you write. On her LiveJournal blog, "Anniesj" recently wrote some quite nasty things about President George W. Bush (since removed). Annie writes: "We laughed, we ranted, we all said some things. I thought it was a fairly harmless (and rather obvious) attempt at humor in the face of annoyance, and while a couple of people were offended, as is typical behavior from me, I saw something shiny and forgot about it, thinking that the whole thing was over and done and nothing else would come of what I said."
It wasn't over. One evening this week, a Secret Service agent showed up at her mother's door in South Carolina "to talk to me about what I said about the president, as what I said could apparently be misconstrued as a threat to his life." While the agent quickly determined that she was no threat, it clearly spooked the amateur blogger.
The agent told her that the reason she was investigated was because the FBI received a report about her blog post.
I wonder if the Secret Service also sent an agent to visit the columnist for London's The Guardian newspaper, who wrote (and later apologized for) this about President Bush: "John Wilkes-Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, John Hinckley Jr, where are you now that we need you?"
--------------------------------
PROOF:
link: http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=31&aid=73550
Watch What You Say When Blogging
From the world of personal blogging comes a word of caution about what you write. On her LiveJournal blog, "Anniesj" recently wrote some quite nasty things about President George W. Bush (since removed). Annie writes: "We laughed, we ranted, we all said some things. I thought it was a fairly harmless (and rather obvious) attempt at humor in the face of annoyance, and while a couple of people were offended, as is typical behavior from me, I saw something shiny and forgot about it, thinking that the whole thing was over and done and nothing else would come of what I said."
It wasn't over. One evening this week, a Secret Service agent showed up at her mother's door in South Carolina "to talk to me about what I said about the president, as what I said could apparently be misconstrued as a threat to his life." While the agent quickly determined that she was no threat, it clearly spooked the amateur blogger.
The agent told her that the reason she was investigated was because the FBI received a report about her blog post.
I wonder if the Secret Service also sent an agent to visit the columnist for London's The Guardian newspaper, who wrote (and later apologized for) this about President Bush: "John Wilkes-Booth, Lee Harvey Oswald, John Hinckley Jr, where are you now that we need you?"
