Using civil rights laws to circumvent the First Amendment

Robert Spencer shows how the Obama administration is contemplating using civil rights laws to circumvent the First Amendment.

According to Politico, Bill Killian, the Obama-appointed U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Tennessee, “is reportedly vowing to use federal civil rights statutes to clamp down on offensive and inflammatory speech about Islam.”

If this ever happens, it’s all over. If the U.S. adopts any kind of law criminalizing criticism of Islam, that would be the end of any resistance to jihad, as we will be rendered mute and thus defenseless against its advance. And while this possibility still seems wildly farfetched to most people, it must be borne in mind that the First Amendment does not automatically enforce itself. If those charged with guarding and protecting it are determined to do away with it, they can hedge it around with nuances and exceptions that will render it as toothless and essentially void as the Second Amendment already is in many major cities.

Do most Americans even know this is happening?

The seminar in Tennessee is just one skirmish in a long war. But it is a war that most Americans have no idea is even being fought. And as Lenin and the Bolsheviks demonstrated, that is how determined and organized minorities subdue larger but careless or indifferent foes. If the mainstream media were doing their jobs, Bill Killian and his little workshop would be front page news nationwide, and Killian would be facing extremely tough questioning about his authoritarian tendencies and the anti-freedom agenda he is pursuing. That he is not, and that the mainstream media are largely indifferent to this story, will only hasten its demise.