In September of 2000, Phil Coyle, then the Director of the DOD’s Office of Operational Test and Evaluation, testified in front of Congress about the national missile defense plan. In his testimony he was critical of the plan and included 50 recommendations on how the system should be tested and improved. Though the Congressional committee voted unanimously to enter Coyle’s [...]
Dear J. Robert Wills, Dean of the College of Fine Arts at Arizona State University, It has recently come to my attention that you and a few others (I’m sure the list will multiply endlessly) are responsible for censoring the work of several artists who, until recently, were slated to participate in an otherwise applause-worthy show titled "Democracy in [...]
AZ State University "Balances" Exhibition by Eliminating Art Critical of the Current Administration Phoenix, AZ Posted 8/23/2004 Democracy means open discussion, democracy means freedom to criticize the government, democracy means civic engagement…but for officials at Arizona State University, democracy means counter-balancing any criticism of the policies of the present administration with criticism of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry. As [...]
August 16, 2004 Mayor John W. Hickenlooper 1437 Bannock Street, Ste. 350 Denver, Colorado 80202 Dear Mayor Hickenlooper, The National Coalition Against Censorship, an alliance of 50 national non-profit organizations that collaborate to defend First Amendment rights, and the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado, have been alerted to the recent removal of several works of art from an installation [...]
by Tom Forsythe Free at last, or at least not saddled with over $2 million in battle costs. That's how much legal tender it took before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals wrote a scathing opinion that called Mattel's case against me potentially 'unreasonable and frivolous.' From the time Mattel sued me on August 24, 1999 up until that December [...]
Copyright legislation grows increasingly restrictive with remarkable regularity. Copyright was recently extended to 70 years beyond a creator's death for individuals and to 95 years since inception for corporations. As the argument goes, "fair use"—the provision within copyright law allowing commentary or satire about a protected work—adequately balances free speech requirements and the right of an author to profit from [...]