The repression of the first amendment, and the alternatives to censorship.

Americans used to appreciate the First Amendment. We had a real soft spot for the idea that speech should be safe from the interference by those in power. The first of our rights, freedom of _expression, was fundamental to how we defined ourselves as a nation and as individuals. Sometime in the mid-1980s, we began to hear angry citizens announce that they no longer believed that the freedoms of speech are being used the way the forefathers had intended. People were voicing their opinions and views, which were rabble-rousing the nation. Something had to be done, and that something was shut…