Freedom of Speech and McCain t-shirt

A man wearing a McCain-Palin T-shirt during a Philadelphia celebration on election night was arrested, cuffed and stuffed into a police cruiser, and supporters said it was for no more than wearing the endorsement of the GOP nominees for president and vice-president.

Although the man protested that he didn't want to cause any trouble, officers manhandled and arrested him, the video posted on YouTube shows.




The tape opens explaining that the man was wearing a McCain T-shirt at a street celebration in honor of president-elect Barack Obama's election victory.

The audio says police told the man to leave the area and he declined. At that point, the video picks up.

The video depicts officers holding the man's chest as he says, "I'm not trying to cause any trouble."

The police then shove the man as the Obama crowd jeers.

"You know what? Don't tell him no more. Don't tell him no more. Just lock him up," an officer states.

While the man is standing off to the side of the celebration, two officers grab him and shake him up, twist his arm behind his back and cuff him.

The crowd circles the man, chanting, "Oh-Bah-Mah! Oh-Bah-Mah!"

"This man was arrested for going into a crowd of Obama supporters post-election wearing a John McCain-Sarah Palin T-shirt," the audio explains. "The officers asked him to leave, he refused … then he was assaulted by officers. Now he's being put into a patrol car.

"This is what we can expect, no freedom of speech," the narrator comments.

WND has reported on previous law enforcement crackdowns on opponents of Obama, including a Kansas case in which a man wrote to a woman he met at his church about his opposition and within 15 minutes found police on his doorstep.

WND also reported when prosecutors in Missouri announced plans to crack down on any campaign ads they viewed as wrong about Obama. The prosecutors claimed someone had to set the record straight and they were going to do it. Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt responded by characterizing the public officials' formation of Obama "truth squads" as nothing short of "police state tactics."

"St. Louis County Circuit Attorney Bob McCulloch, St. Louis City Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce, Jefferson County Sheriff Glenn Boyer, and Obama and the leader of his Missouri campaign Senator Claire McCaskill have attached the stench of police state tactics to the Obama-Biden campaign," said Blunt. "What Senator Obama and his helpers are doing is scandalous beyond words, the party that claims to be the party of Thomas Jefferson is abusing the justice system and offices of public trust to silence political criticism with threats of prosecution and criminal punishment."

Some critics have forecast a crackdown on free speech during the upcoming Obama administration, fueled by Democrats' stated desire to re-adopt the so-called "Fairness Doctrine" that would effectively restrict or eliminate opinion on the broadcast airwaves from radio talk icons like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity.

And a hypothetical letter from a "Christian from 2012" released by evangelical leader James Dobson's political activist group Focus on the Family Action warns of an attack on public free speech.

The letter, called "Letter from 2012 in Obama’s America," "looks back" on how "the Bible can no longer be freely preached over radio or television stations when the subject matter includes such 'offensive' doctrines as criticizing homosexual behavior. The Supreme Court agreed that these could be kept off the air as prohibited 'hate speech' that is likely to incite violence and discrimination."