Who Are the "Tyrants"?

An extremely thoughtul piece by NYU journalism professor Jay Rosen which discussed how journalists should cover the Tea Partiers claim of “impending tyranny”. I’m not sure I agree completely with him that an objective journalist needs to say how ridiculous the claim is, but the discussion and comments are valuable and thought provoking.

In fact, it is the Tea Partiers who the ones who seek to impose a kind of tyranny by seeking to crush dissent from their views. For all their reverence for the Founding Fathers, respect for the First Amendment right of free expression (something quite important to the Founding fathers)–even if it is vigorously critical free expression, like the Revolutionary War anti-tyranny pamphleteers–seems to have escaped them. As soon as they see anything critical of them, they want to see it banned.

Shame on them. I guess we’ll see if anyone is craven enough to cave to them.