Patriotism might at one time have been the last refuge of a scoundrel, but methinks this is no longer true. With modern America being characterized more by political correctness than patriotism, screams of “racism” may now be that last refuge. And joining the ranks of scoundrels, populated by reverends sans congregations and other assorted guttersnipes, is one Gerardo Sandoval, San Francisco Supervisor.
What has earned Sandoval his yellow stripes is his introduction of a government resolution condemning radio talk show host Michael Savage for what Sandoval calls “defamatory language . . . against immigrants.”
Here is what happened. In response to a week-long fast embarked upon by 35 students and illegal aliens who were burning a few calories for amnesty, Savage quipped, “I would say, let them fast until they starve to death, then that solves the problem.” Now, I’m not sure why Sandoval latched onto this particular comment – maybe his immigration lobby masters called in a favor – but it certainly got his dander up. He responded by saying, “The intolerant and racist comments of Michael Savage demand a strong condemnation”; he then labeled them “symbolic of racism and hatred” in his resolution.
One might first note the calculated imprecision of Sandoval’s terminology, for at issue here are not immigrants, but illegal immigrants. More to the point, there was no racial component in Savage’s statement. Perhaps Sandoval wishes to imply otherwise, but illegal immigrants hail from a variety of different nations and ethnic groups, and I should also mention that some of the abstemious activists were probably white native Americans. Thus, it wasn’t any kind of consanguinity that united them, but only stupidity and perhaps a desire to shed some pounds.
Then, I just may know a wee bit about asceticism, and I have never known the practice of fasting to be peculiar to a given race. As for hatred, I think it is love of country that inspires one to risk reputation and limb to defend his nation. On the other hand, it’s not a stretch to say that advocating policies threatening our culture, sovereignty, freedom and prosperity just might be motivated by hatred of everything for which America stands.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Bill Bowman
You guys need to chill. Savage has the right to say what he wants, and Sandoval has the right to introduce whatever resolution he wants. If all the Supervisors felt the same way, they have the right to approve the resolution. And by the way, the resolution simply "condemned" Savage's comments. It does not call for his job.
As an aside, I find it interesting that in your instructions for posting comments, you note that "Personal attacks are not allowed," yet you have absolutely no problem with making personal attacks in your column.
Hypocrite, much?
2 - Sassy McGee
Sandoval is an America-hating, white-male-hating far-left doofus who could only be elected in a city as intellectually retarded as San Francisco. I used to love the city, and lived there for years, but had to escape becuase it is truly governed by lunatics and overrun with freeloading hedonistic freaks. Tolerance taken too far -- well, except for tolerance of conservative thought. Such a shame.
3 - Dave Nalle
The comments policy is set by the publisher and has nothing to do with the content of individual articles.
Dave
4 - Dr Dreadful
Well, woe is me. The Supervisor of San Francisco, an official with about as much national significance as a used match, tells Michael Savage to shut up. I guess we all need to whitewash the windows and stock up on those emergency food kits from Costco, since clearly the world is about to end.
It'a always been beyond me why you Americans have to elect people like municipal supervisors anyway. No-one knows who the hell the people on the ballot paper are when it comes to positions like this, so it just comes down to whichever candidate got their name onto more campaign signs, who could be any old idiot. It's farcical. Can you imagine if corporations elected their staff rather than hiring them based on merit?
5 - Gen Jack D. Ripper, USAF (Ret)
When radical Muslims sneak a nuke into the Port of Oakland, Mr. Sandoval and his constituency of perverts, Maoists, neo-Bolsheviks, illiterate 3rd world aliens and drugged-out street rabble will be blown away. Problem solved. America will do just fine without them, without Rice-a-Roni and without bad sour dough bread.
6 - Dave Nalle
But won't Jerry Brown usehis psychic powers to stop the terrorists?
Dave
7 - STM
Selwyn (made up name?) Duke said: "In most parts of the world - Western Europe, Canada and Australia, just to name a few - Savage and many others would be criminally charged for expressing their opinions."
Hmm, here I am sitting in Sydney, Australia, where our inherited right to free speech has been protected at common law for over 200 years and for over 1000 years elsewhere, seeing Selwyn Duke expressing more rubbish about the free-speech rights of Americans. He is only right up to a point: You can be charged for hate speech (you know, like inciting people to criminal behaviour, just like you can in the US), but I've never seen it happen for expressing an opinion.
Another isolationist right-wing American with no real experience of the world outside Doodad County or the Ivy League belt expressing an opinion about which he knows nothing.
But I also have a view about rights, and it's backed up by another amendment to the US constitution - the right not to be vilified or treated like an outcast in your own country outweighs the right to say whatever you like, a "right" that has never in fact existed under American law (ask any US lawyer).
Perhaps that's just the same place we've reached by a different route, where Australia's hate-speech laws pick up the slack in relation to the misguided notion that it's OK to say anything if it serves your ends - a point upon which Joe Stalin and Adolf Hitler would have been in total agreement. It's doubtful that's what the framers of the constitition would have intended in regard to the 1st amendment, a point also backed by the courts in the US.
I'll say again Selwyn: bollocks. You might fool some of the people etc, but most of us know exactly where you're coming from.
Cite, next time - this is an international site, which means you really can't get away with bullshit.
8 - ray thomass
God Bless Michael Savage
9 - Dr Dreadful
I wonder if Michael Savage is related to this fellow?
10 - Magikthrice
Michael Savage has won a battle for free speech. But there is a lesson in this for Michael Savage to learn, and to take to heart. Savage complains that hardly anyone in talk radio came to his defense. If he would stop scratching his head long enough, he would know why. I believe all the name calling and berating of other talk radio personalities he does on his own show has finally caught up to him. Would you support a man who would just as soon act like a total buffoon with his name calling? Examples of Savage's name calling are Hush Bimbo, The Golfer, The Empty Golf Bag, The Leprecaun, Sean Vanity, etc, etc. His favorite target always seems to be Rush. If it weren't for Rush, talk radio and the New Media might not exist today.
For someone who claims to be conservative in nature, there are times Savage doesn't act like one. I believe most of the name calling by Savage to be an effort to increase his own dwindling listenership. And his listenership is dwindling. Back in the winter of 2005, Savage boasted of an audience of 12 million listeners a day. By the summer of 2005, Savage was boasting of an audience of 8 million a day. Recently on Savage's website, he now boasts of 10 million listeners a week. Is it any wonder? Do people really want to hear Savage savage other conservative talk show hosts? I turn him off when he starts into those worthless name calling diatribes. I can guarantee millions of others do, too.
Savage himself could be savaged, and has been savaged in the past for having such low life guests on his show as Chuckles the Clown Schumer during the DPW furor. As everyone knows, Schumer is in the back pockets of the Mafia and union thugs. That was the only reason why Chuckles the Clown was against DPW leasing US ports in the first place. Savage had to close down his own personal Yahoo Email account over Schumer. He was flooded by his listeners over having an idiot like Schumer on his show in the first place.
Perhaps Savage will learn from his mistakes, but I doubt it. He will no doubt continue the name calling, thinking he will always be able to stand on his dwindling audience of listeners.
Yet I applaud Savage on his victory over the true haters who inhabit our country. I would only say to Savage now is the time to show all of your talk radio colleagues some over due respect. Perhaps then he will find them more willing to come to his aid. But can he learn new tricks in time?
11 - RJ
Great article. Thanks!
12 - Hobart Stinson
How wrong you are, Bill Bowman, how wrong you are. The SF Board of Supervisors are the government. They are paid by the taxpayers and are assigned to do the PUBLIC duty. Their resolutions represent the PEOPLE and are official statements. The supervisors CANNOT "pass whatever resolution they want." Could they pass a resolution condemning Bill Bowman's comments on "blogcritics.org"? Of course not.
No, the government "shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech,or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble ...". Please read and remember that. It applies at all levels of government, not just the federal.
13 - JB
Michael Savage is absolutely right. He is being assailed, as are the rest of us if we took the time to look up, by a pack of left-wing jackals who would run him out of the broadcast studio as quickly as they could. If they could.
It is only through the outrage of the public, that's US, that protetcts the constitutional rights of Michael and all the rest of us.
As for hate speech laws: I say balderdash on them. In the United States there CANNOT be such a thing as hate-speech laws under our consitution. NO ONE has the right to FEEL good. NO ONE has legal protection for his/her FEELINGS. We already have laws against libel, you cannot publically impeach another's reputation. That's exactly where Sandoval went wrong. Sandoval has the right to express a contrary position to anyone else's, but he CANNOT use his government position to call for a public protest against a private citizen. Savage has a good legal case against Sandoval.
But that's trivial anyway. The overarching issue is Sandoval and the illegal-alien advocates are trying to force us to accept federal criminals, the illegal aliens, who are overrunning the United States in numbers that exceed ten million, and climbing. Will we stand by and allow that? We cannot! Illegal is illegal. Our nation cannot absorb another ten to twenty million illegals. That's not all, there must be a hundred million poor people in Central and South America that all would love to enter the United States illegally if they knew they could make more money and improve themselves. Shall we let it happen?
NO! Stop the illegals now. Don't let the lobbyists for illegals intimidate us: Michael Savage today, you tomorrow, the entire U.S. government next month. Stop them now. Michael Savage uses harsh rhetoric because he is simply mad as hell! Well, there are a lot of us who are mad as hell too! When people get mad their lips loosten up and they say what's on their minds.
God bless Michael Savage, he speaks for millions of citizens, and I hope he continues doing so on his radio program.
14 - RJ
the government "shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech,or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble ...". Please read and remember that. It applies at all levels of government, not just the federal.
Yep. The Supreme Court has ruled that the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment requires that state and local governments, and not just the federal government, also abide by the Bill Of Rights. This is called the legal doctrine of incorporation.
15 - Jeffrey Silberman
Ironically, Michael Savage has a history of race-baiting, in this case, Jew-baiting rhetoric:
and
in which Savage baits media pundit David Brock as "Brock-STEIN")
Two more quotations that may interest you:
"Now, let's go a step further. I have a bill in my hand; a one dollar bill. It says "In God We Trust." That's next from the verminous Brooklyn College lawyers, isn't it? Go down South and have a 'tee-hee' over the goyim. Laugh at the goyim. Go down there and take away the crosses and they can't touch you, huh, Mr. Cohen? Hee-hee-hee. Mr. Cohen? And you wonder where anti-Semitism comes from. Let me strip the mask off of it for you today because if you think I'm going to mince words, you are mistaken. It comes from situations like this- when you have a New York Jew like Cohen going down South into the heartland of Christianity and stealing the religious symbols from Christians. You are not going to hear it anywhere else. It's so shocking, you don't even believe you just heard it. No one in the media has the guts to say what needs to be said. They're all going to make this a dancing on the head of the pin argument. They're all going to make it a little legal argument, and go onto to the next thing and sell you a piece of garbage on their television or radio show, but let me tell you something, there's a lot more at stake than a radio show. The future of this nation is at stake today. And I am not going to sit on the sidelines and have a little gentlemanly conversation. I said it like it is." (11-13-2003 Savage Nation Radio Broadcast) (Richard Cohen is an attorney from Virginia)
"When are you liberals going to wake up to the fact that a knife is at your throat, and you are going to still believe these Leftists who are screaming about civil rights: 'It sounds problematic to me,' said ACLU attorney Mark Nobody-BERG. 'If there is evidence to involve any of these 50 people in a crime, they should be targeted for investigation, but if people are being placed on a list because of something they have done in the past or someone they have associated with, an officer looking for a pretextual reason to stop them, that strikes me as wrong.' I think you ought to put Mark Nothing-BERG in prison pre-emptively." (12-12-2002 Savage Nation Radio Broadcast)(other examples of Savage's appending "berg" to a Jewish broadcaster's name in order to underscore their Jewishness include NPR's "Terry Gross-BERG" (1-10-2004) and CNN's "Wolf Blitz-BERG" )(See also
I would be delighted to e-mail the audioclips of the above quotations as well as the quotations cited in the above articles, particularly, the "hooked-nose" anti-Semitic racial slur.
16 - STM
JB: "As for hate speech laws: I say balderdash on them. In the United States there CANNOT be such a thing as hate-speech laws under our consitution. NO ONE has the right to FEEL good. NO ONE has legal protection for his/her FEELINGS."
You are wrong and hugely misguided. Go back and read the constitution in its entirety (including the 9th amendment and possibly even investigate the broad-spectrum anti-discrimination interpretation of the 14th amendment).
The US constitution, contrary to popular belief, in fact does NOT offer wholesale protection against hate speech or allow citizens to say whatever they like in certain situations without fear of retribution, especially where such action might lead to a subsequent criminal action. It may, however, be defensible. But that won't stop you being charged and possibly convicted. Such speech, especially if it impugns reputation or endangers livelihood or standing, may also, as you point out, be actionable in a civil case, malice aforethought or lack of being key. Still, it seems to me that you don't fully understand the real implications nor potential implications of your own laws.
The first amendment has never offered carte-blanche protections against misguided "say what you like" interpretions of the law - never. In interpreting it, too, most experts see the meaning as being about allowing more speech, not allowing more noxious speech - although with more leeway than some other countries (though not all). The US government is also a signatory to international anti-discrimination and human-rights agreements that were designed to counter such things as hate-speech. They were signed by a number of countries (and for which some amendments were made in a nod to the US and its first amendment rights. However, in substance they don't differ greatly to those signed by other developed countries. The US was a prime mover of the agreements, too).
Nevertheless, if we're relying on the constituition as a clear guide here, the 9th amendment is very clear: the Constitution should never be taken or assumed to be the only law of the United States. It's there in black and white, as an instruction, for all those who can be bothered to look and who are interested in an understanding of their own law that goes beyond a grade-school history class view designed to support an untenable, racist position.
17 - STM
It's probably worth noting here too that such champions of free speech and human rights as Adolf Hitler and Joe Stalin also thought it OK to make comments based solely on race, class, political belief and culture, without regard to their impact. But somewhere in a free, democratic/representative society governed by rule of law, there has to be a line drawn in the sand between freedom and responsibility. Best that Selwyn and his ilk look for that now, as there IS potential for strife.
18 - daryl d
I used to listen to Michael Weiner (that's his real name) all the time. His rhetoric has become too predictable and like most wingnut extremists, he just hates for the purpose of hating.
That said, his comments were not, at all, racist. How do we get idiots like Sandoval into office?
19 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Unfortunately little Michael
WeinerSavage is a self-hating Jew. I don't listen to his broadcasts (I have better things to do with my time than try to download his trash) but his comments attacking "liberal" Jews (who are often, but not always just as self-hating) strike me as the kind of thing a bent weiner would do...20 - Frank White
Listen up you pot smoking communists, Doc Savage is the truth. The day is not far off when the treasonous dogs that try to Silence free speech will hang from the streetlights as a warning to all who seek to destroy this country from within.
21 - Dr Dreadful
"Treasonous dogs"?
Who talks like that?
Not that I'm complaining, you understand - we need more pirates on this site.
Now, who gets to walk the plank first?
Arrrrrr!!!
22 - WIN
STM
You are the one who is hugely wrong. Even as you claim to be anti-hitler you support laws devoted to squashing free speech. In the U.S. there simply CANNOT be laws restricting freedom of speech. Government is specifically forbidden to do so yet you keep coming up with the same lame tired old liberal argument of comparing the right to free speech as being equal to hitler speech which is absurd. Why do liberals always fall back on comparing everybody to Hitler who disagrees with them? Hate crimes and Hate speech laws are unconstitutional. It's plain as day when it says no laws shall be passed abridging freedom of speech. And your point about illegal immigrants not wanting to feel like outcasts in their own country outweighs free speech is ridiculous because this is NOT their country at all! Hence the term 'illegal immigrant.' You're essentially saying people who aren't even supposed to be here should be given greater legal standing over legal citizens. The problem with leftist arguments such as yours is that they ignore convienient things like the facts and law.
23 - brucebruce
bomb meca
24 - Nancy
Avast, ye treasonous dogs-! Wow! Picturesque English has sure gone downhill in the past 300 years, arrrr. We could use some classy, good old phrases like that some more. That's why I love it when STM talks 'strine'.
25 - Apollo
Spitzer uses the state police to go after a political threat...here by the board of supervisors...
This is what we have come to expect from democrats.
You must be tolerant of everything and everyone, unless you are conservative and then you must be wiped out, shut down, fired and taken off the air. Your ideas are hateful because I don't like them....wahhh.
In regards to the "undocumented workers" I wonder what work Jose Carranza
(the Peruvian national in the U.S. illegally and who was previously charged with raping a 5-year-old girl who pleaded not guilty Friday in the execution-style slayings of three young college students) was here doing? There are tens of thousands of Jose Carranzas in America. They are illegal aliens. They do not belong here, their crimes do not belong here, only the people who they killed belong here. How many more of our brightest and best will be slaughtered at the altar of La Raza to the God of multiculturalism before we stop importing murderers, drug-dealers, rapists and thieves?
If I used a fake social security card or identity to get a job, I would be arrested and correctly convicted of identity theft.
Do not help criminals.
Support your police. Support the border patrol.
have a nice day...