All Speech Is Not Free

To promote any illegal action is a crime

This newsletter is just random thoughts that occur to me as illogical concepts widely being propagated by current media. I often feel people are missing the conclusions their own arguments should be reaching. So these thoughts are attempts to make sense and encourage others to do the same.

If seditious conspiracy, or those who are the foot soldiers in that conspiracy,are tried and convicted of the of the crime of attempting to conspire to overthrow the United states government, and if it is a crime to promote and conspire and organize an overthrow of the United States, and to call forth people to attempt such an action through violent action or violent rhetoric, then please tell me why it is protected speech to continue to promote the idea, since the conspiring part of the crime is the speech part, is it not?

I suppose people might conspire through writing, and indeed, if text messages are ‘writings” they were certainly one of most prime methods of promoting the convicted conspirators, and one of the methods used to recruit actors for the conspiracy.

Now these people have been convicted of both conspiring and recruiting to overthrow the government and slightly over 1000 have been convicted as being those recruited and participating in said conspiracy.

To promote any illegal action is a crime and although law enforcement is often behind the actual action of the crime, the very promotion, “conspiring”, can be prosecuted and participants have been prosecuted and juries have convicted  people for conspiring to commit a crime before the crime occurs.  Ideally, the best way to prevent crime from happening is to detect it before it happens.  That, of course, was the premise behind establishing the Department Of Homeland Security, was it not?  To investigate and attempt to prevent terrorist attacks before they occurred because the Department of Justice (primarily) prosecuted crimes that had been perpetrated against the federal government.

So if this is the purpose of the department and they have more leeway in making arrests of those who may be suspected of planning terroristic actions so they don’t create large havoc and/or death, then why do we need the department to simply tell us domestic terrorism  is a bigger threat than foreign to American national security.  They already had labeled, before Jan 6,  the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers as domestic terrorist organizations, and the very mandate of the Dept. of Homeland security is to try to prevent terrorist organizations conspire and commit crimes of terrorism, then how can this mandate to prevent be carried out by waiting until after they commit terrorism (and coincidentally both the Proud Boys and Oath keepers had been involved in acts of violence (terrorism) against citizens of the United States prior to Jan. 6 ) So the question is why these organizations had not already been disbanded and its leaders prosecuted before January 6 ever occurred.

The answer is “free speech”.  But that is absurd.  The planning of a crime, and the hiring or recruiting of participants to commit the crime, is illegal and it is not covered by any free speech decision I have ever heard.

So if all of this is true, then why is promotion of “pardoning” convicted conspirators or those they recruited to carry out an attempt to overthrow the government covered by free speech?  What is a pardon?  It is not an exoneration or a reprieve or the overturning of a conviction, a pardon is just a permanent release from the responsibility of one’s punishment for the crime.  Pardons issued before a conviction , are an admission of having  committed the crime (as Steve Bannon did when he accepted his pardon before trial.) It’s no different than a plea of guilt, except that one suffers no consequencs or punishment for the crime.

Before Gerald Ford pardoned Nixon he had to put some pressure upon Nixon to sign an admission that he understood, by being granted a pardon, he was admitting to the crimes he was being pardoned for.  There probably would have been a lot less outcry and consternation if Ford had released Nixon’s signing that document that he understood that a pardon meant he was admitting he had committed the crime.  There was no need, but to many we confuse a pardon with an absolution.  It is not…. A pardon is a conviction but a release from any consequential punishment or repayment to society.  Trying Donald Trump might be a first for an ex-president, but convicting Donald Trump would not be.  Nixon admitted guilt and by accepting his pardon, he became a convicted felon, albeit, a non-imprisoned one.

So to pardon convicted seditious conspiracy, or to promote the pardon of them, can only have one consequential interpretation—the promotion that conspiring to overthrow the government  is alright to do, and therefore should have succeeded, not that the conspiracy and the attempt did not occur, but that the conspiracy and participation in the conspiracy was not a crime, and therefore it is alright to overthrow the government and you are being released in order to help us do the same thing over. It is in itself, a promotion that the crime should re-occur.

Free speech should include advocacy against the government.  It should include arguments that argue against belief in the governmental form.  But it does not include promotion or recruitment, and I am unaware of any governmental form that makes it legal to promote criminal activity, whatever that government has defined as criminal activity. .  So when Tucker Carlson, or anyone says that criminal activity—convicted criminals for participating in a violation of free speech by promoting and conspiring to commit a crime is to promote and further that crime.  They should be immediately arrested for that.  And so should Marjorie, Donald, and now Ron.

People say it is not political discourse to say that Jan. 6 was not a crime. Our justice system has convicted people for not only committing the crime but conspiring (through speech) that juries in America have said the very conversation, not just the actors, but the speechifyers have committed a crime.  Then make it so.

Or suffer the consequences.  My thought is Biden should direct Homeland Security to treat it as terrorist activity.  He needs to step to the podium and inform the American populace not about the fascist threat (hoping that is enough), but instead any promotion of criminal activity against the United States is criminal activity that is not covered by free speech and will consider it terrorism, and proponents of terrorism will be arrested and prosecuted.

If a candidate wanted to run a campaign prompting ending elections and establishing himself as king, sobeit, if elected.  If our juries are any indication, that is not what people would vote for if it presented itself in that way.  But what cannot be accepted is underhanded promotion of criminal activity, as somehow acceptable when that speech has been already deemed criminal.

Readers of my longer posts, I hope might be tempted to find some sense in these brief comments on issues I find confusing. Perhaps you will be able to give me some clarity, so feel free to comment or disagree. All comments should be open to everyone, paid and unpaid subscribers, as well as casual readers. I try to personally respond to all comments.