Democracy and Censorship

 I am a Vietnam Veteran

I am retired from the workforce after 45 years

I am in my second marriage (if that really makes a difference)

I was born a Southern Tarheel

I currently live in East TN

In the 1960's, I attended college and while I was a flaming liberal in my heart, I was forced to listen to conservative points-of-view which despite the boredom had no impact on my thinking and beliefs at all.  In the 1980's, I earned an MBA and allowed my newly found conservative beliefs to control my liberal mentality but my liberal mentality was not completely altered, just modified a tad.

My time in the military eventually persuaded me that it was my responsibility to protect any and all Americans who wanted to voice their opinions even if they did not agree with me...  I believed that if an American wanted to burn the American Flag for whatever reason that they should be allowed the burn the American Flag...  no, "if" "ands" or "buts"...

I am totally opposed from the government or our news media holding back information from the public...  simply because they perceive that the public may not respond well...  or that the information will lead the public to riot.

The public should be allowed access to all information even if a riot results...  this is what it means to live inside a Democracy.  Our government takes the good with the bad.

When the news media withholds information from the public  because they do not want the public to know that information, it is even worse than the government holding back information from the public.  If the public is uneducated or uninformed then they are incabable of making intelligent, educated decisions, and therefor must rely on others to make those decisions for them.

When that happens, we are no longer living in a democracy...