It sure as hell ain't beautiful music.
in Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 (1969), the United States Supreme Court held that the First Amendment did not permit. . .
. . .a State to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action. [T]he mere abstract teaching . . . of the moral propriety or even moral necessity for a resort to force and violence, is not the same as preparing a group for violent action and steeling it to such action.
(internal citations omitted) ...come on and jump...
Clarence Brandenburg was a leader in the KKK in Ohio. He contacted a TV reporter and suggested that the reporter cover a Klan rally. Coverage of the rally included speeches with references to getting revenge against blacks and jews, as well as the politicians who support and empower blacks and jews... only the speeches didn't put it nearly as mildly as I just did.
Brandenburg was convicted under an Ohio law that banned
"advocat[ing] .. . the duty, necessity, or propriety of crime, sabotage, violence, or unlawful methods of terrorism as a means of accomplishing industrial or political reform" and "voluntarily assembl[ing] with any society, group or assemblage of persons formed to teach or advocate the doctrines of criminal syndicalism."
But as we can see above in the first blockquote, the Supreme Court of the United States stuck down that law. The First Amendment carries some major weight, yo. Protecting speech we agree with? That's easy to get behind... but standing up for the rights of some nimrod racist?...well, as much as their speech might sicken us, the way to fight it isn't by banning it, it's with more and better speech.
So when Sarah Palin is out on the stump, riling up her base with loaded words, and the call and responce builds and builds to levels of hate too simillar to those klan rallies for comfort... she, and they, have that right. Even though Sarah Palin probably has no earthly clue about Brandenburg, and seems to think that Freedom of Speech is just a privilege,and not a fundamental freedom... she and her rageaholic followers are still entitled to that fundamental freedom, whether she belives in it or not.
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But just because a thing is not illegal, that does not mean that thing is right.
The law does not usually set the standard to which we should aspire, but rather sets a floor.. or a firewall... and says, beyond this you shall not go. You might have the right to go up to that line, but that doesn't mean we can't call out flirtations with crossing that line for what they are.... it's fighting speech with speech.
When Sarah Palin, cloaked in her reg'lur person robes, goes out and throws verbal grenades... conducting the sym-phony of anger... whipping up a frenzy among the worshipfull other reg'lur volks... she knows, or at least we should expect any candidate for high office to know, that this kind of rabble rousing and villification can push some at the margins to go from speech to action... but, as long as that action isn't imminent, the provocation is still protected speech.
But make no mistake, she (and to some extent, her sawed-off and grumpy running mate) are intentionally plucking those strings, and blowing those dog whistles... making an ugly music for their minions to play along with... and she, or at least someone writing her sheet music, has to know that one of those playing along, once playing that tune, might just go horribly, and tragically, off-key.
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and now, in the spirit of peace, thoughtfulness, beauty, and the finely-tuned Obama campaign,
I offer up the palette cleansing real Brandenburg Concerto: