Opus 2017-139: Headlines: French Fried Freedom

The Drudge Report takes us to an ominous article in The Independent.  It brings up the specter of censorship by the government and points out a significant difference between European values and America. 

France is having an election.  A group of hackers have been posting information about the “moderate” (read elite choice) candidate,  Emmanuel Marcon.  We have experienced the same thing in our elections.  If it isn’t hackers it is scurrilous advertisements the night before the election.  When our candidate is the target we are full of righteous indignation and demand that something be done about it.  When the other guy gets hit we tend to shrug and say, “That’s politics”.

France is doing something about it.  They are threatening to put journalists in jail if they publicize the content of the e-mails.  I will confess that there have been times when I would have welcomed that consquence.

We need to understand.  Either we have a free press or we don’t.  We do not need our government mimicking the French and passing laws on what the main stream media can publish and what they can’t.  The reason is that you can’t trust anyone to draw such lines.  It reminds me of the high moral ground that my students tend to take on honesty.  They say, “I never lie.......unless it is necessary.”  Would the French election commission have been so fast to drop the hammer if the expose were about Merine Le Pen?  Could we trust the Obama administration to draw the line without political calculation?

We need to deal with our press by not buying their publications, paying their fees or supporting their advertisers.  We do not need to go the European route of benevolent despotism. 

homo unius libri