Alex Bennett, allow me to introduce you to the First Amendment

I occasionally listen to Alex Bennett on Sirius Left, but this morning the liberal commentator was over the top, even for him. He started out by saying that Scooter Libby should be set free.

Really? That's completely absurd, but I'll have more on that in a separate post in a minute.

What annoyed me even more than Bennett's Libby comments, though, was his take on Ann Coulter. Yesterday, three newspapers, The Oakland Press in Michigan, The Mountain Press in Tennessee and The Lancaster New Era in Lancaster, Pa. announced they were dropping Ann Coulter's column.

Bennett went on to say that "I'm not going to defend Ann Coulter's comment, but I'll defend her right to say it." Fair enough, and I agree with that point. Hold on, though.

He then proceeded to question the newspapers' veracity in removing Coulter's column from their pages. That's ridiculous and absurd.

Yes, we live in a free country with a free press, and Coulter has the right to spew her tripe, but the media is under no obligation to publish or disseminate her tripe. The media's refusal to do so is not censorship!

Bennett reasoned the papers were wrong by no longer publishing her column, using "freedom of the press" as a justification for his reasoning.

By that rationale, why isn't David Duke's column running The New York Times? (If, in fact, the bigot has one.) Papers and media outlets can and should have editorial standards. The three papers above, while minor, decided that Coulter's speech and beliefs weren't aligned with their own.

Coulter has plenty of other avenues to get out her messages of hate, including her Website.

Bennett doesn't understand freedom, democracy or the First Amendment.

What annoys me most of all is that this whole brouhaha is precisely what Coulter wants. Every time she says something stupid like this, her book sales go through the roof, and she laughs all the way to the bank.

The next time she writes a book, there will be plenty of conservatives who will ogle her, snatch up her book at $24.95 a pop, and babble, "You're right, John Edwards IS a faggot!"

Pathetic and sad.