And down he goes … a victory for free speech

So CBS acts (finally). Women, African Americans and other reasonable people have exercised our/their freedom of speech and won.

The people who claim to hate Don Imus’ message but defend his right to say it on radio and TV airwaves misunderstand what “free speech” means. Imus was and is free to say whatever he likes on any street corner in America. But he doesn’t own the airtime he occupied, any more than a newspaper writer owns the newshole that holds her story.

There are three kinds of content in a typical newspaper: editorial or news, which is supposed to be objective and factual, written without personal or corporate biases; opinion or commentary, which expresses the views of an individual or the newspaper owner/management; and advertising, in which someone pays for space to express whatever opinion or information they want, within some bounds. TV news channels’ content can be similarly characterized.

Imus could theoretically buy airtime and run a commercial that says virtually anything that’s not obscene. If stations refused to sell him the time, he could run it on YouTube. Our free-market version of freedom of speech doesn’t give anyone an inherent right to free airtime — or free newsprint – except possibly in the case of some candidates for public office.

Cindi Andrews