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State Dept. does not like freedom of speech

aps

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The Bush Administration talks about spreading democracy in Iraq, which includes freedom of speech. Yet, it will not allow anyone to represent the United States overseas who has expressed criticism of the war in Iraq. He claims that people can disagree with the policy, but he clearly does not mean that.

State Department using ideological litmus tests to screen speakers
BY WARREN P. STROBEL AND JONATHAN S. LANDAY
Knight Ridder Newspapers


WASHINGTON - The State Department has been using political litmus tests to screen private American citizens before they can be sent overseas to represent the United States, weeding out critics of the Bush administration's Iraq policy, according to department officials and internal e-mails.

In one recent case, a leading expert on conflict resolution who's a former senior State Department adviser was scheduled to participate in a U.S. Embassy-sponsored videoconference in Jerusalem last month, but at the last minute he was told that his participation no longer was required.

State Department officials explained the cancellation as a scheduling matter. But internal department e-mails show that officials in Washington pressed to have other scholars replace the expert, David L. Phillips, who wrote a book, "Losing Iraq," that's critical of President Bush's handling of Iraqi reconstruction.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercu...s/13314503.htm

Awwww, poor Bush--he can't take a wittle bit of cwiticism, although it should not surprise me because he hasn't given a speech about the war to a non-military croud.
 
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