Daily Archives: July 3, 2017

(Where have we seen that sort of thing before Russia maybe?)

Or when the White House plays so many games with its press briefings, taking them off camera and placing conditions on how and when they can run or, in the case of its rare, unrestricted live briefings, using them to falsely accuse the news media of dishonesty?

For those who cherish a robust free press, its hard to feel much like partying after witnessing how some cheered Representative Greg Gianforte, Republican of Montana, for body slamming a reporter for The Guardian, Ben Jacobs. His sin: asking unwelcome questions.

The he had it coming camps celebration of the violence against a reporter seemed out of step with Mr. Gianfortes own response. He ultimately apologized, pleaded guilty to assault and pledged a $50,000 donation to the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Then again, it wasnt out of step with President Trump, whose weekend tweet appeared to promote violence against CNN which, some argued, violated Twitters harassment policies certainly undercut Mr. Gianfortes message of contrition.

Yes, America, all of the attacks against something so central to your identity must have you in quite the birthday funk.

The likely reaction in anti-press precincts to a column like this one will be that mainstream journalists think theyre above reproach, which is nonsense.

When a real news organization makes a mistake, it takes action, as CNN recently did when it retracted an article about the Russia investigation, saying the article had not received the proper vetting. Three people lost their jobs.

The Trump administration torqued it into supposed proof that CNN and much of the rest of the news media including The New York Times and The Washington Post are fake news.

It was a powerful reminder to journalists everywhere to take the extra time to get it right, to make sure that the processes that ensure editorial quality and accuracy remain intact and strong.

The stakes are higher now, as the anti-press sentiment veers into calls for more action against journalists, if not against journalism itself.

Look no further than the new National Rifle Association advertisement. In it, the conservative radio and television star Dana Loesch angrily describes how they whoever they are use their media to assassinate real news, contributing to a violence of lies that needs to be combated with the clenched fist of truth.

Given that the ad was for a pro-gun group, this sort of thing tends toward incitement, Charles P. Pierce wrote in Esquire. (Added context: The N.R.A. chief Wayne LaPierre recently called academic elites, political elites and media elites Americas greatest domestic threats.)

The Fox News host Sean Hannity has urged the Trump administration to force reporters to submit written requests in advance of the daily White House press briefing, which, he said, should be narrowly tailored to specific topics the administration wants to talk about.

Mr. Hannitys good buddy Newt Gingrich went one better, suggesting that administration officials fully close the briefing room to the news media, which he has called a danger to the country right now.

Whats most extraordinary in all of this is how many people calling for curtailments on the free press are such professed constitutionalists and admirers of the founders.

The founders didnt view the press as particularly enlightened, and from the earliest days of the republic it certainly wasnt. (To wit, a passage in The Aurora, an early publication, described George Washington as the source of all the misfortunes of our country.)

But they drafted the founding documents to enshrine press freedom for good reason. As the Stanford University history professor Jack Rakove said in an interview last week, James Madison was most concerned about a misinformed publics acting on misplaced passions, and saw the press as an antidote. Were he alive now, Mr. Rakove said, Madison would be worried by the idea of government whipping up or exploiting what he called badly formed passions.

Sure, there were the occasional stumbles, like the short-lived Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, which banned false, scandalous and malicious writing about the government, but they led to stronger free speech protections.

So this, our 241st birthday, seems just the time to invite some of our forebears to remind us including those at the top of the government why a free press is so important.

Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech. Benjamin Franklin, 1722

There is nothing so fretting and vexatious, nothing so justly terrible to tyrants, and their tools and abettors, as a free press. Samuel Adams, 1768

The freedom of speech may be taken away and, dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep, to the slaughter. George Washington, to officers of the Army, 1783

Nothing could be more irrational than to give the people power, and to withhold from them information without which power is abused. A popular government, without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy; or, perhaps both. James Madison, 1822

There is a terrific disadvantage not having the abrasive quality of the press applied to you daily, to an administration. Even though we never like it, and even though we wish they didnt write it, and even though we disapprove, there still isnt any doubt that we couldnt do the job at all in a free society without a very, very active press. John F. Kennedy, 1962

Since the founding of this nation, freedom of the press has been a fundamental tenet of American life. There is no more essential ingredient than a free, strong and independent press to our continued success in what the founding fathers called our noble experiment in self-government. Ronald Reagan, 1983

Power can be very addictive, and it can be corrosive. And its important for the media to call to account people who abuse their power, whether it be here or elsewhere. George W. Bush, 2017

Jaclyn Peiser contributed reporting.

A version of this article appears in print on July 3, 2017, on Page B1 of the New York edition with the headline: Celebrating Independence As Free Press Is Besieged.

Read more here:

Independent Press Is Under Siege as Freedom Rings - New York Times

Dr. Leif Nelson, who worked on the development of the LUKE arm, said that the number of people who had lost arms relative to those who had lost legs was too small to spur private research and development. Thats when Darpa, along with the Department of Veterans Affairs, funded studies to develop the latest prosthesis. They in turn were able to enlist private companies, working with Dean Kamen, who invented the Segway.

Sensors, similar to the ones found in smartphones that automatically sense when the screen has been flipped, were strapped to a persons feet, enabling arm control by moving the foot side to side or back and forth. And for those who had lost an entire arm, motors at shoulder level enabled people to lift their arms above their head. The next step, Dr. Nelson said, was to develop on-skin sensors that would detect nerve signals and translate them into specific movements.

This is the first device that intuitively moves multiple joints at one time, he said. With other technology, you had to use the hand, then stop. Use the wrist, then stop. It wasnt fluid.

The arm, which will be commercially available through the manufacturer Mobius and sold to civilians too, will cost in the low six figures, though pricing is being worked out, officials said. An initial order of 10 has been placed for veterans.

Mr. Downs and Mr. McAuley were chosen as recipients based on medical necessity and because they participated in the research that led to the LUKE arms development.

Mr. McAuley, 70, who lives in Richmond Hill, Queens, where he cares for his mother, spent most of his post-military life without a prosthetic arm. I did one-armed stuff, he said. I tied my tie with one arm. I tied sneakers with one arm. I typed with one finger. I was strictly a one-sided person.

He participated in Darpas research project, he said, not so much for himself but to help others. Its given me hope for the future, he said. Its not that I want to be remembered, but I would like this to be an inspiration for people down the road.

Mr. Downs, a former Veterans Affairs official who lives in Maryland and is now a consultant to the Paralyzed Veterans of America, had long used a hook arm. But his new prosthesis will finally let him do tasks that require greater dexterity or the ability to hold his hand close to his face.

The symbolism of getting his new arm this weekend was not lost on him.

When you lose an upper extremity, you lose your independence, your ability to take care of yourself, he said. When you lose your independence, you lose somewhat of your dignity as a human being because you have to depend on others to comb your hair, go to the bathroom. With a prosthetic limb, your independence and dignity are returned to you. This is freedom, let me tell you. When I dont have my arm on, I think I am disabled. But when I have this arm on, I dont think Im disabled.

A version of this article appears in print on July 3, 2017, on Page A15 of the New York edition with the headline: For Two Veterans, a Freedom Restored for Independence Day.

Excerpt from:

For Two Veterans, a Freedom Restored for Independence Day - New York Times

U.S. President Donald Trump waves at the Celebrate Freedom Rally in Washington, U.S. July 1, 2017. Photo by Yuri Gripas/Reuters

WASHINGTON President Donald Trump vowed to support and defend religious liberty, telling a gathering of evangelical Christians that the threat of terrorism is one of the most grave and dire threats to religious freedom in the world today.

We cannot allow this terrorism and extremism to spread in our country, or to find sanctuary on our shores or in our cities, Trump said Saturday night at a Celebrate Freedom concert honoring veterans. We want to make sure that anyone who seeks to join our country shares our values and has the capacity to love our people.

The evangelical megachurch First Baptist Dallas and Salem Media Group sponsored the event at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. First Baptist Pastor Robert Jeffress was a strong backer of Trump during the 2016 campaign.

The event at times felt like one of Trumps signature campaign rallies, with the president promising an adoring crowd that America would win again and prompting cheers with attacks on the news media.

The fake media tried to stop us from going to the White House, but Im president and theyre not, he said.

READ NEXT: Trump vows to repeal political limits on churches

Trump appeared on a stage decorated with a massive American flag. Choirs performed The Battle Hymn of the Republic and other hymns and debuted a song with the lyrics make America great again Trumps campaign slogan.

Besides speaking to the events religious theme, Trump renewed his campaign promise to always take care of Americas veterans.

Not only has God bestowed on us the gift of freedom, hes also given us the gift of heroes willing to give their lives to defend that freedom, he said.

Overwhelming support from evangelical voters helped propel Trump to victory in 2016. Since he took office, Christian conservatives have been overjoyed by Trumps appointment of Justice Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court and his executive order ordering the IRS to ease up on a rarely enforced limit on partisan political activity by churches.

Trump was spending the pre-Independence Day weekend at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, but traveled back to Washington for the event.

More:

Trump vows to support and defend religious freedom in US - PBS NewsHour

BBC News

Press freedom 'under threat' in new Myanmar - BBC News BBC News Under the military junta that ruled Myanmar for nearly 50 years, the media were tightly controlled. But after a quasi-civilian government took over in 2011, many ... Journalists call for media freedomMyanmar Times all 7 news articles »

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Press freedom 'under threat' in new Myanmar - BBC News - BBC News

More than 200 years ago, the young United States was learning to walk in its freshly won freedom and the Constitution born of it. Our experiment in self-governance, based on the idea that our Creator endowed all of us with certain inalienable rights as reflected in our Declaration of Independence, was unique in the history of the world.

Among these rightswhich we recognize are not given by government but granted by Godis our right to religious freedom. Its importance is signified by the fact that it precedes all the other rights listed in the amendments to our Constitution.

In our early years, imperfect to be sure, as a nation we nevertheless persisted and advanced to embrace the ideal of religious freedom articulated in the First Amendment to our Constitution. That we are still governed by the same Constitution after more than 200 years is itself a miracle, and speaks to the vigilance Americans have exercised and must continue to exercise to guard our freedom.

Generations later, hostility to religion in the public square of the United States has grown significantly. The changes may seem incremental until one compares the social situation at the time of our founding with our present state. Religion was embraced then, and is censored now. It was esteemed at that time; these days it is often disparaged.

From militant atheist hostility to the presence of religious symbols in public and expressions of religious belief by government actors, to government hostility to religious beliefs regarding sexuality, the overall climate for the religious believer is one of apprehension at best. Indeed, some have lost their jobs or been financially penalized due to their beliefsright here in the United States.

To track and address these troubling developments, Family Research Council released a report in 2014 titled Hostility to Religion: The Growing Threat to Religious Liberty in the United States. It documented accounts of hostility toward faith in the United States today, defined in four areas: (1) Suppression of Religious Expression in the Public Square; (2) Suppression of Religious Expression in Schools and Universities; (3) Censure of Religious Viewpoints Regarding Sexuality; and (4) Suppression of Religious Expression on Sexuality Using Nondiscrimination Laws. That catalogue of violations, spanning over ten years, contained 90 incidents.

Many would likely suspect that religious freedom troubles have grown worse during the past three years. They would be correct. Just this past week, we released the updated 2017 report, which showsconservatively estimateda 76 percent increase in overall religious freedom violations documented over the past three years.

The last two sections, dealing with human sexuality, have seen a 114 percent surge. These types of incidents were already on the rise, and the Supreme Courts decision in Obergefell v. Hodges only accelerated the trend. If one reads through the last two sections, many cases will be familiar from the news and cultural discussion. Among those featured is the story of Jack Phillips, the Colorado baker who was sued after he obeyed his conscience and politely declined to create a wedding cake for a same-sex wedding ceremony. The Supreme Court accepted his case for review just several days ago, and will decide it during the next term.

The first step toward action is information. We hope this report will serve as a resource for those who wonder about the state of religious freedom in America. It can also be useful to those who wonder where the evidence is when others cite a trend of religious freedom violations. With this information, our representatives can respond appropriately. Concerned citizens can engage with the media and in their communities. Certainly, our religious freedom problems could be much worse. But our goal is not to get to that much worse place.

When Communism began to spread during the beginning of the twentieth century, many ignored or brushed off concerns as relatively mild, especially in light of other concerns at the time. Only when it was too late and the grip of authoritarian regimes was strong did many realize the horror and carnage that the ideology had wrought worldwide. This is clear in hindsight but was not so apparent at the time.

Our country has been blessed with a long history of freedom. On its birthday, it is appropriate to be thankful and reflect on how we can guard against the suppression of religious freedom we do see now before it is too late. If we Americans can acknowledge the troubling trends now, and work to reverse them while we still have the freedom to do so, we will have a future America that embraces liberty and remains free for all.

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Report: Attacks On America's First Freedom Increased 76 Percent In Three Years - The Federalist