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:: MAX BLACK ::

"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." --C.S. Lewis

"The Swiss pocket knife of conservative thought on the web..." - Eli Kardrakian

"Bookmark Max and dump your subscription to the newspaper; if you don't have a birdcage you really don't need it anyway..." - Shirley St. James

:: Wednesday, November 29, 2006 ::

Why Jeff Jarvis is one of my favorite bloggers:

"Here's someone else who doesn't understand what blogs are. [Bloggers] are people talking. Do you suggest you should regulate the speech of people over the phone and set up a complaints commission to deal with that? Or on the street? Or in bed? It's conversation, fool. Believe it or not, bloggers don't want to be newspapers. They want to talk. That's not controllable and that is precisely why it has exploded and why the deposed controllers in media and regulation are so scared of it. But codes and commissions are not the answer. Listening is. If you don't like what you hear, click away and reply because you can now, without having to go through a commission to do so". [Emphasis mine, ed.]

It's not hate speech these busy-bodies, er, hate. It's free-speech they hate. Gladly, guys like Jarvis understand the distinction and have the leverage and cache to move the debate in the proper direction. Will the gatekeepers get it? Apparently, the jury's still out.

:: Max 5:41 PM [+] ::
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