Memo to Congress: It's called freedom of speech

Syndicated columnist and commentator Charles Krauthammer said on Fox News that the objection to reading the Constitution aloud by many on the left "is truly astonishing."

He said that in the 1960s, "Liberals got in trouble for being on the wrong side of the flag," and are now in danger of being on the wrong side of the Constitution, which he called "the essence of America."

For liberals to think there's an advantage in dismissing the public reading of the document "is real bad politics," Krauthammer said.

Theresa Cao was arrested for "conduct intended to impede, disrupt or disturb sessions of Congress." Is it a freedom of speech issue? If so, isn't it ironic that the disturbance came during the reading of the Constitution in the House of Representatives?

Memo to Congress: It's called freedom of speech

Defense counsel takes on case of woman arrested for gallery comment

By Bob Unruh

January 20, 2011 ~ 1:00 am Eastern

© 2011 WorldNetDaily

The woman who burst out with "except Obama" when New Jersey Democratic Rep. Frank Pallone was reading in Congress the Constitution's requirement that the president be a "natural born Citizen" was simply exercising her free speech rights, according to a law team representing her.

THERESA CAO

"This case is not about President Obama's eligibility for office or Theresa Cao's affiliation with the birther movement – it's about free speech in its purest sense," said John W. Whitehead, president of the Rutherford Institute.

Whitehead told WND he's helping Cao defend against charges she violated a congressional code against conduct intended to impede, disrupt or disturb sessions of Congress, for which she faces potential fines of up to $500 and/or six months in jail.

"The sad irony here is that Ms. Cao was arrested for exercising her constitutional right to free speech at the very moment that Congress was making a show of reading aloud the Constitution," Whitehead said.

"One can't help but wonder whether Congress actually understood anything that they read," he said.

As WND reported, Cao was arrested Jan. 6 by Capitol police, given a court date and then released. She told WND in a telephone interview after her release, while she was standing in front of the Hart Office Building near the Capitol, that the only hope for the United States is a return to the faith of the Founding Fathers.

And that direction, she said, is opposite from the one Obama is leading the nation. Cao contends Obama is moving America toward "socialism," citing his health-care plan and the takeover of private banks, insurance companies and car companies.

She said she had come to the U.S. House chambers to see the launch of the new Congress under the leadership of the Republicans. She was overwhelmed, she said, when the Constitution was being read, which came about as part of an effort by the new GOP majority to return the nation to its founding principles.

Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., was reading Article II, Section 1, regarding the requirement that the president be a "natural born Citizen," when she burst out, "Except Obama."



"Literally if this question of the natural born citizenship, if this question does not get answered, then I am allowing a tyrannical dictator – the spirit of the anti-Christ, the new world order system that has their plans right this second to collapse the U.S. economy, and we know their plan, the new world order system's plan is to literally destroy humanity," she told WND at the time.

THERESA CAO PROTESTING AT THE WHITE HOUSE

Whitehead told WND it's a troubling sign of the times in the U.S. when someone is arrested for saying a couple of words when the response from the House was a much greater disruption.

The Rutherford Institute statement said the House was engaged in the "symbolic gesture" of reading the Constitution "to acknowledge that the United States is a nation of laws, not men."

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