Sunday, Oct. 22, 2017 | 2 a.m.
View more of the Sun's opinion section
View more of the Sun's opinion section
Today, freedom of the press is under assault by the president. He labels news that he does not like as “fake news.” He thinks the press publishes anything it wants to publish. He has no regard for the fact-checking and verification process involved in ethical journalism.
According to his supporters on the campaign trail, Trump was the one who “tells it like it is.” Now, he has the audacity to presume that he can revoke the FCC licenses of stations that are actually “telling it like it is.”
The FCC chairman does not speak out against Trump’s authoritarian tendencies. The president has a duty to stand up for constitutional order, rather than acting like a bullheaded, wannabe czar.
The most important purpose of the First Amendment is the protection against government punishment for saying negative things about the government. I shudder to think about what would happen to a North Korean citizen who took a knee during their anthem.
Trump’s tweets are fostering the cultural degradation of our country. He is trying to define the national political conversation with Twitter that is often inane and irrational. It is a carnival of flagrant and twisted affectation.
Trump wants free speech for himself but not for the press. The Constitution and the freedoms it is supposed to protect must remain intact. It is not worth forgetting freedom to justify Trump’s tweets.
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