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John Richard Kountz
August 23, 1972 - October 10, 2007

No more suffering. No more pain. Eternal rest. Forever peace.

So much for free speech

RIP, 1st Amendment of the Bill of Rights.

I recall a concept from many a sexual harassment training class that has relevance to the recent convulsive, faux "outrage" over Rush Limbaugh's comments that have been taken completely out of context purposely by those with an agenda. Like most of the non-chasing-your-secretary-around-the-desk types of harassment, this concept usually lurks in the nefarious, fuzzy, and undefinable gray areas of communication and interpretation, and for good reason.

The concept is this: It doesn't matter what the intent, meaning, or context of the words in question, all that matters is how did the other person (even if not directly involved in the conversation) interpret those words. Read that over again very carefully. It doesn't matter that Rush had repeatedly reiterated his meaning and his actual words. None of that concerns his critics. I guess we aren't allowed rights to our own thoughts and the meanings of our own words. Others now seem to be able to dictate to us the "correct" interpretation of our own words and thoughts.

For those of you who poo-poo this off as paranoid banter, think about it for a little bit. What happened to free thought and expression during the 1930's in Europe? In Russia? TODAY in places like China and Islamic countries? The people who are in charge today and who are grasping for MORE power and influence look to these places and philosophies as inspiration for controlling society and ultimately, YOU. As I've said before, it doesn't happen overnight; it happens incrementally over time and only affects a minority population in each incident, each building upon the last. Notice how smoking bans have led to other bans, because *x* is bad for you. Same thing with political correctness and free speech. The examples here are far too numerous to mention and YOU KNOW IT!

The Sheeple will go along with censorship and restrictions in free expression as long as it doesn't affect a large amount of people at any given time and it only affects the "bad" people who smoke, drink, eat fast food, go to church, are conservative, vote Republican, watch NASCAR, dare to wish people "Merry Christmas", and on and on - just not YOU of course. It's only a matter of time when an elite government busybody will ban or restrict something that DOES affect you, but your whining tantrums will only fall on my deafening ears. Don't say you haven't been warned.

You can tell my hiatus is over... Now to go bang my head for the next few days. Atlanta, here I come!