The goose gets cooked as the fruit of evil faces justice.

[Tyr-Ziu Saxnot]

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-01-29/egypt-presses-terrorist-charges-against-al-jazeera-staff.html?cmpid=yhoo Egypt Presses Terrorist Charges Against Al Jazeera Staff


By Salma El Wardany Jan 29, 2014 5:12 PM CT

Egypt’s authorities pressed charges of joining a terrorist group against 20 staff members of the Arab television channel Al Jazeera, including an Australian, two Britons and a Dutch citizen.

The defendants, the rest of whom are Egyptian, are also charged with spreading false news that endangers national security and harms Egypt’s image, according to a faxed statement from the prosecution yesterday. It said they used two suites in a luxury hotel in Cairo as a media center to pursue those aims.

The prosecutors said the defendants “fabricated footage” to create “unreal scenes” and give the impression to the outside world that “the country is witnessing a civil war.” It said their efforts were intended to serve the interests of the Muslim Brotherhood, which was declared a terrorist group by Egyptian authorities last month.

The Brotherhood has been the target of an unprecedented crackdown since Egypt’s army toppled elected Islamist President Mohamed Mursi in July. Many of its top leaders are on trial, including Mursi, and hundreds of supporters have been killed by security forces as they protested the military intervention.

Al Jazeera is owned by Qatar’s ruling family, who are among the main supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood in the region, and backed Egypt with financial aid during Mursi’s one-year presidency.

The channel said the allegations against its journalists are “absurd, baseless and false.”

“This is a challenge to free speech, to the right of journalists to report on all aspects of events, and to the right of people to know what is going on,” it said in an e-mailed statement.

Al Jazeera said five of its journalists are in detention, and it hasn’t been notified about developments in the case. It said it now has no journalists reporting in Egypt. Couldn't happen to a better group of terrorist propagandists! -- :laugh::laugh::laugh:-- :clap::clap: --Tyr

[logroller]

Couldn't happen to a better group of terrorist propagandists! -- :laugh::laugh::laugh:-- :clap::clap: --Tyr
this is such a blatant suppression of free press…and you applaud it. I hope you're joking because that's a despicable act.

What makes our country great are its freedoms and you spit in the face of freedom when you defend these sort of actions. An affront to liberty anywhere is a threat to liberty everywhere. If you think it necessary and OK then don't bitch about the threat of China-- what you applaud here is standard practice there.

[Gaffer]

this is such a blatant suppression of free press…and you applaud it. I hope you're joking because that's a despicable act.

What makes our country great are its freedoms and you spit in the face of freedom when you defend these sort of actions. An affront to liberty anywhere is a threat to liberty everywhere. If you think it necessary and OK then don't bitch about the threat of China-- what you applaud here is standard practice there.

If this took place in this country I would agree with you. But this took place in Egypt, where there is no freedom of the press as we know it. The egytians are going after brotherhood members and supporters. Which includes it's propaganda arm al jezera. You know, the ones that filmed Americans soldiers being shot and blown up in iraq. And released video of bin laden and other AQ leaders giving morale speeches. Interviewing imams calling for jihad against the west. Ya know, that al jazera.

For good or bad, the egyptians are dismantling the brotherhood in egypt. And they are not hinder by the US Constitution. I have not heard of journalists from other networks being arrested and shut up though. There's a certain fellow in DC that would love to be able to do just this sort of thing. He's edging towards it.

[hjmick]

An affront to liberty anywhere is a threat to liberty everywhere.


Fixed it for you.


That was all that need be said.

[Tyr-Ziu Saxnot]

this is such a blatant suppression of free press…and you applaud it. I hope you're joking because that's a despicable act. :laugh2::laugh2::laugh2::laugh2: free press my ass! Al-zits has a pro muslim agenda and often applauds the murder of non-muslims. You daring to call them a free press when they support muslim terrorists groups is laughable. A damn propaganda arm for the Islamists and yet you try to compare them to the free press we once had here! Please show me your righteous condemnation when the Obama and crew attacked journalists here. Journalists that didn't carry his damn water. How quick and convenient it is to ignore those recent scandals. huh?--Tyr

[gabosaurus]

free press my ass! Al-zits has a pro muslim agenda and often applauds the murder of non-muslims. You daring to call them a free press when they support muslim terrorists groups is laughable. A damn propaganda arm for the Islamists and yet you try to compare them to the free press we once had here! Please show me your righteous condemnation when the Obama and crew attacked journalists here. Journalists that didn't carry his damn water. How quick and convenient it is to ignore those recent scandals. huh?--Tyr

Fox News has an anti-Muslim agenda and often applauds the murder of muslims. You daring to call them a free press when they support Israeli terrorists is laughable. A damn propaganda arm for right-wing extremists and yet you try to compare them to the free press we once had here! Please show me your righteous condemnation when Israel ordered attacks on journalists in Gaza. How quick and convenient it is to ignore those recent scandals.

[logroller]

:laugh2::laugh2::laugh2::laugh2: free press my ass! Al-zits has a pro muslim agenda and often applauds the murder of non-muslims. You daring to call them a free press when they support muslim terrorists groups is laughable. A damn propaganda arm for the Islamists and yet you try to compare them to the free press we once had here! Please show me your righteous condemnation when the Obama and crew attacked journalists here. Journalists that didn't carry his damn water. How quick and convenient it is to ignore those recent scandals. huh?--Tyr
Clearly you have a jaded understanding of the concept of a free press.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference, and impart information and ideas through any media regardless of frontiers"


Look it up-- it includes propaganda and biased reporting.

Here's a thread I started on free press--
http://www.debatepolicy.com/showthread.php?34389-A-court-gets-it-right-A-feel-good-ruling&highlight=feel+good+ruling
that's something to applaud IMO. Why don't you show me where I applauded the suppression of press.

[Tyr-Ziu Saxnot]

Clearly you have a jaded understanding of the concept of a free press.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference, and impart information and ideas through any media regardless of frontiers"


Look it up-- it includes propaganda and biased reporting.

Here's a thread I started on free press--
http://www.debatepolicy.com/showthread.php?34389-A-court-gets-it-right-A-feel-good-ruling&highlight=feel+good+ruling
that's something to applaud IMO. Why don't you show me where I applauded the suppression of press. I do not buy that. By that definition Nazi propaganda about murdering the Jews is just fine. By that definition all lies encouraging the oppression and murder of individuals and groups are allowed. That definition allows for chaos and no freaking standards. This is bullshat---

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights states: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference, and impart information and ideas through any media regardless of frontiers" It actually says anything goes because it allows for all forms of promoting tyranny. Allows for all forms of encouraging hatred. It misses that total freedom is chaos.. SURE EVERYONE HAS THE RIGHT TO THIER OWN OPINION BUT IT GETS MURKY WHEN SUCH IS ALLOWED FOR TOTAL UNFETTERED EXPRESSION. Civilization calls for standards that do not allow for promoting murder. What would happen here if one of our Newspapers called for the death of Obama on its front page (your definition allows for that)? Do you think nothing? Or do you think it could hide behind that broad definition and get by with it? In addition the crackdown on those Egyptian Al-Zits guys was not based upon their writings exclusively but primarily based upon their terrorist connections and activities. --Tyr

[Tyr-Ziu Saxnot]

I do not buy that. By that definition Nazi propaganda about murdering the Jews is just fine. By that definition all lies encouraging the oppression and murder of individuals and groups are allowed. That definition allows for chaos and no freaking standards. This is bullshat---
It actually says anything goes because it allows for all forms of promoting tyranny. Allows for all forms of encouraging hatred. It misses that total freedom is chaos.. SURE EVERYONE HAS THE RIGHT TO THIER OWN OPINION BUT IT GETS MURKY WHEN SUCH IS ALLOWED FOR TOTAL UNFETTERED EXPRESSION. Civilization calls for standards that do not allow for promoting murder. What would happen here if one of our Newspapers called for the death of Obama on its front page (your definition allows for that)? Do you think nothing? Or do you think it could hide behind that broad definition and get by with it? In addition the crackdown on those Egyptian Al-Zits guys was not based upon their writings exclusively but primarily based upon their terrorist connections and activities. --Tyr Read this-- I do not agree with it in totality but the point made is that the press can not be given total freedom because with no bounds it can easily use that all powerful power to destroy good, to destroy right and to destroy any culture. We are witnessing that now in our own nation. Some standards must exist or else the press can become a dictator itself simply by unification and pursuit of a single philosophy. A delicate balance must be maintained. -Tyr


http://johnohliger.org/artman/publish/article_16.shtml Freedom of the Press: Without Exceptions?

FREEDOM OF THE PRESS: WITHOUT EXCEPTIONS?
The text for my five minute sermon is drawn from the gospel according to A.J. Liebling, the renowned press critic for *The New Yorker* magazine. Liebling wrote: "The function of the press in this society is to inform, but its role is to make money.... Freedom of the press belongs to those who own one."

My answer to the question, Should there be exceptions to freedom of the press? is YES. There always have been, always will be, always should be exceptions to freedoms. Our belief in the total freedom to do what we want, when we want is a legacy of the illusion that we share in the all-knowing, all-powerful, but nonexistent, perfect Godhead. Our true freedom lies in partaking of those sweet liberties we engage in when we are in touch with that of the modest god in us all, or, if we prefer, the limited liberties in the context of our most conscientious efforts.

Our freedoms thrive on proper exceptions and limitations. Just as a poem achieves greatness within the limitations of the poetic form, so do our liberties serve us well when we know what we cannot do with them, when we find the minimal but important proscriptions that are right and agree to them democratically.

Total freedom of the press is apparently assured by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. But there is a proscription, an exception, a limitation, that is wrong in my view, in the body of the Constitution itself -- Section 8, Subsection (8) of Article I: "The Congress shall have power ... to promote the progress of Science and the useful Arts by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and inventions."

Noah Webster of dictionary fame is given credit by some for bringing about the only reference to a specific industry -- the publishing industry -- in the Constitution. The exclusive right through copyright gives a monopoly -- a government protected semi-monopoly -- to the press. It has helped make the press a tool, essentially, of the rich and powerful. Even though Thomas Jefferson and others were opposed to copyrights in principle, our subsequent Constitutional history has been bent because of copyrights, and parallel industrial trends, in ways that mainly limit the power of the press to those who thrive in large scale corporate, commercial, and bureaucratic enterprises.

What this means to me is that whenever you ask yourself if there should be exceptions to freedom of the press -- to censor obscenity, to protect national security, to award those who are libeled, for instance (none of which I favor) -- you need to be aware of these far more powerful and pervasive exceptions. Economic and political exceptions that severely limit our freedom of the press. Exceptions that help perpetuate the myth that the arrangement of bunches of words and/or pictures in newspapers, in books, or on television is a property right. It is not. Creativity stems from community and is not a property right at all. Henry Ford emphatically stated that no one person invented the automobile assembly line. So must we recognize that our language and our artistry is part of our common heritage in which the individual plays a real but small part.

What are the appropriate exceptions to freedom of the press? I don't know. I do know that I don't get excited when Mobil Oil claims it is losing its right to that freedom because it has trouble buying time on TV for a political commercial. I don't get worried when the *New York Times* is taken to court for publishing the Pentagon Papers, or when the *National Enquirer* is slapped with a large libel judgment for offending Carol Burnett. Those biggies have so much more freedom of the press than you or I do, or than the small *Progressive* magazine has, that I don't see how our minimal freedom is thus more undermined than it already is by those biggies' monopolistic practices.

I do know that as we are deciding what the appropriate exceptions should be we ought to consider doing away with the government protected monopoly granted to the press in the body of the Constitution and by subsequent trends. We ought to do away with it not by yet another amendment, but by moving away from the commercial and bureaucratic values that this monopoly promotes, and by moving toward better small scale communal approaches.

As a start, to discover the right exceptions we ought to recognize the basic connections between three types of questions: First, questions about the appropriate limitations on any freedoms; Second, questions about the appropriate limitations on the right of any human being or corporation to grow rich and powerful and privileged, while others have less wealth, or are weaker, or are less privileged; and, Third, questions about government power to protect the rich at the expense of the poor, or to protect the bureaucrat at the expense of the citizen.

I believe that all people are entitled to equal access to the natural resources of this earth in line with ecological principles. If so, then we can proceed to rethink what minimal limitations we wish to place on everyone's right -- and even more important -- on everyone's *ability* to print or to broadcast.
(Talk given by John Ohliger to Prairie Unitarian Fellowship, Madison, WI,
January 3, 1982)

[logroller]

I do not buy that. By that definition Nazi propaganda about murdering the Jews is just fine. By that definition all lies encouraging the oppression and murder of individuals and groups are allowed. That definition allows for chaos and no freaking standards.
By that definition, so too is speaking and spreading the truth allowed, and sowing opposition to such things. I find it hilarious that you would proffer Nazi Germany as support for your pro censorship position. I've seen the nazi-card played hyperbolically, but ne'er so hypocritically.
Let's just review similarities between Egypt and Germany.
Military dictatorship, rival political parties declared illegal, their members jailed and now journalists jailed for crimes related to disrupting the national unity.

Are there reasonable limits to free speech-- of course, but take a look at the countries (Turkey, China, Iran) who've a history of jailing journalists and you'll find more tyrannical governments, not less so. To contend that censorship is necessary to prevent such is what's bullshat. Such an argument is a tool of despots.

[logroller]

Read this-- I do not agree with it in totality but the point made is that the press can not be given total freedom because with no bounds it can easily use that all powerful power to destroy good, to destroy right and to destroy any culture. We are witnessing that now in our own nation. Some standards must exist or else the press can become a dictator itself simply by unification and pursuit of a single philosophy. A delicate balance must be maintained. -Tyr

'All powerful power'??? That's redundantly repetitive. :laugh: Pray tell, what is this singular philosophy? To destroy all that is good and right? Nothings to keep another from just printing things that support all that is good and right. Do you have that little faith in the righteousness of your beliefs that you must suppress those that dissent?

60 years ago that author would have been blacklisted as a communist; not to mention that the internet has made it possible for anyone with an internet connection to be published. But the article's irony and obsolescence aside, tell me more about these 'standards'; specifically, who are the angels who will be entrusted with their proper enforcement--the government? I'm pretty sure that the prevention of such, specifically, is why a free press was guaranteed in our constitution.