Godless-- NOT!

The Bill of Rights

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech.

It seems to me that the First Amendment needs to be amended to more accurately reflect the realities of free speech in America. As it stands now, the amendment is a sham in that free speech is routinely squelched.

Freedom of speech is abridged in this country IF the speech deals with Christianity in a positive light.

Card-carrying liberals and the ACLU regularly block the rights of Christians to publicly express their beliefs.

No free speech for Christians.

From the Las Vegas Review-Journal:

She knew her speech as valedictorian of Foothill High School would be cut short, but Brittany McComb was determined to tell her fellow graduates what was on her mind and in her heart.

But before she could get to the word in her speech that meant the most to her -- Christ -- her microphone went dead.

The decision to cut short McComb's commencement speech Thursday at The Orleans drew jeers from the nearly 400 graduates and their families that went on for several minutes.

However, Clark County School District officials and an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union said Friday that cutting McComb's mic was the right call. Graduation ceremonies are school-sponsored events, a stance supported by federal court rulings, and as such may include religious references but not proselytizing, they said.

They said McComb's speech amounted to proselytizing and that her commentary could have been perceived as school-sponsored.

How?

That's ridiculous.

All that the school had to do was issue a disclaimer.

"We are not responsible for the views expressed by the Valedictorian."

Is that so difficult?

Clearly, it was her speech. The school didn't write it. How could it possibly be considered "school-sponsored"?

If McComb chose to speak about values in line with the church of Liberalism, I'm sure that would have been no problem for school officials to swallow.

If she used the podium to give a glowing review of The Da Vinci Code, there is no way the ACLU would have been involved.

If Christianity is being trashed, libs demand that those expressions must be protected. Christians have to tolerate the abuse.

Fine. The Constitution does not provide for the right to not be offended. Deal with it.

BUT, if Christians are expected to tolerate their beliefs being belittled under the protection of free speech, others must exhibit tolerance in allowing Christians to freely express their beliefs.

Before she delivered her commencement speech, McComb met with Foothill administrators, who edited her remarks. It's standard district practice to have graduation speeches vetted before they are read publicly.

School officials removed from McComb's speech some biblical references and the only reference to Christ.

..."I went through four years of school at Foothill and they taught me logic and they taught me freedom of speech," McComb said. "God's the biggest part of my life. Just like other valedictorians thank their parents, I wanted to thank my lord and savior."

...Allen Lichtenstein, general counsel for the ACLU of Nevada, had read the unedited version of McComb's speech and said district officials did the right thing by cutting McComb's speech short because her commentary promoted religion.

"There should be no controversy here," Lichtenstein said. "It's important for people to understand that a student was given a school-sponsored forum by a school and therefore, in essence, it was a school-sponsored speech."

Wrong!

School-sponsored forums and commencement addresses often contain views that promote a speaker's personal, and sometimes controversial, views.

Recent examples:

During a commencement address at Queens College, in reference to Chuck Schumer, Alan Hevesi said:

"The man who, how do I phrase this diplomatically, who will put a bullet between the president's eyes if he could get away with it. The toughest senator, the best representative. A great, great member of the Congress of the United States."

New York Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger treated graduates at the State University of New York -- New Paltz to an anti-Bush, anti-conservative rant that was considered a commencement address.

He said:

I’ll start with an apology.

When I graduated from college in 1974, my fellow students and I had just ended the war in Vietnam and ousted President Nixon. Okay, that’s not quite true. Yes, the war did end and yes, Nixon did resign in disgrace – but maybe there were larger forces at play.

Either way, we entered the real world committed to making it a better, safer, cleaner, more equal place. We were determined not to repeat the mistakes of our predecessors. We had seen the horrors and futility of war and smelled the stench of corruption in government.

Our children, we vowed, would never know that.

So, well, sorry. It wasn’t supposed to be this way.

You weren’t supposed to be graduating into an America fighting a misbegotten war in a foreign land.

You weren’t supposed to be graduating into a world where we are still fighting for fundamental human rights, be it the rights of immigrants to start a new life; the rights of gays to marry; or the rights of women to choose.

You weren’t supposed to be graduating into a world where oil still drives policy and environmentalists have to relentlessly fight for every gain.

You weren’t. But you are. And for that I’m sorry.

Are those instances of school-sponsored proselytizing? Do those comments qualify as, in essence, school-sponsored speeches?

In my opinion, Hevesi and Sulzberger certainly were promoting a religion -- Liberalism.

Espousing the values of the religion of Liberalism are considered appropriate free speech, while mentioning Jesus is out of line.

...District legal counsel Bill Hoffman said the regulation allows students to talk about religion, but speeches can't cross into the realm of preaching.

"We review the speeches and tell them they may not proselytize," Hoffman said. "We encourage people to talk about religion and the impact on their lives. But when that discussion crosses over to become proselytizing, then we to tell students they can't do that."

Is it school-sponsored proselytizing when lib views are rammed down students' throats via lib teachers and lib textbooks?

Everyday, students have to sit through that "preaching."

A 750-word speech by a student doesn't begin to compare with the kind of "preaching" that students were probably exposed to in one school day.

Were school officials so threatened by McComb's words, her references to Christ and Christianity, that they felt justified in attempting to censor her?

I don't know why there is this crusade to eliminate Jesus Christ from the public square. This sterile, godless environment that has been established in public schools is unreal. Why keep students in a godless bubble?

It's not reality. It doesn't prepare them for life in the real world, where references to God are everywhere.

..."People aren't stupid and they know we have freedom of speech and the district wasn't advocating my ideas," McComb said. "Those are my opinions.

"It's what I believe."

The beautiful irony in all of this--

Instead of hundreds of people hearing McComb's speech at the graduation ceremony, now millions are aware of it. She wasn't silenced.

She has a national forum to express the significance of Jesus Christ in her life. She's being interviewed by the national media.

In short, the microphone stunt failed miserably. It really, REALLY backfired. The school and the ACLU failed to censor her.

They failed. In fact, they promoted her message.

McComb stood up for her beliefs and her rights.

God bless Brittany McComb, and God bless America.

(I love truly free speech.)