[Simon Hunt]

I know it's off topic, but, John, would you mind saying what you mean that the British are "freer" than the Americans?

[John Whitworth]

Freer do say and do what we think. The tolerance of eccentricity. This is becoming less the case than it was when I was young when black Americans had to sit at the back of the bus and all that and teachers on American campuses were forbidden to discuss the Vietnam war, but I think it is still true. But perhaps it is not. I deprecate not being able to say certain words if I choose to, I must say. Does the Constitution allow you to say them? And I would like to be able to smoke in a public house. Can you do that?

[Kevin Rainbow]

Freer is not always better.

Americans, however, are freer to bear arms and it shows in the frequency of gun-crimes in the US.

And I would like to be able to smoke in a public house. Can you do that?

You can't do that here either. It isn't being "freer" for the person who is unduly, against his will, subjected to such a harmful substance. I don't want the freedom to be subjected to harmful substances against my will. To be free from being such is a much better, and healthier, freedom.

[Richard Meyer]

Of the many statements of yours I’ve read over a long period of time, John, there’s only one that I totally agree with—an observation you’ve made repeatedly about yourself: you are shallow.

It’s comical how you take any half-baked notion that comes out of your head as truth or reality. In your last post you wrote: “teachers on American campuses were forbidden to discuss the Vietnam war.” Where in the hell did you come up with that! It may be some such oddball case can be dredged out of the records of the time, but the fact is the Vietnam War was widely and hotly debated in American schools, both high schools and universities. In fact, many college professors across the country were leaders and organizers of campus war protests. I was there. I lived it and saw it. And the national debate about that war increasingly became the dominant focus of the media.

There’s no end to the ill-informed, crazy crap you generate in these political and historical discussions. My only suggestion is that you start wearing a pointy cap with bells.

Richard

[Michael Cantor]

Richard beat me to it on the Vietnam war. John, you've got to stop reading that Murdoch crap. Or at least stop repeating it.

[Roger Slater]

John, you may have managed for 1000 years without a constitution, but don't forget that a few hundred of those years featured serfs and monarchs. And let's also not forget that it was the wonderful "freedom" the colonies enjoyed as part of Britain that caused them to rebel and write the Constitution in the first place.

Leaving aside the pros and cons of written versus unwritten constitutions, the US actually had no real choice but to write it down. It's not all freedom and stuff, but nuts and bolts. They had to decide on things like having three branches of government, two houses of the legislature, etc. They couldn't simply opt for waiting 1000 years for these things to evolve. And even when it comes to the freedom stuff, since they were forming a new government and had to write down what they were forming, it would have been foolhardy of them not to at least try to articulate some of the guiding principles.

[John Whitworth]

Michael and Richard, it was my wife, who worked on a campus (UCLA) in California in 1967, who told me. I am sure you would not be so intrepid and ill bred as to call her a liar. And I read the Daily Telegraph, not a Murdoch rag but quite another.

Kevin, I could smoke in my pub for smokers and you could not smoke in yours for non-smokers. Then we would all be happy, wouldn't we?

People have become very intolerant I find.

[Richard Meyer]

No, John, I do not question your wife’s veracity. I even mentioned in my post that most likely an example of what you claim could be dredged up. It’s a big country and all sorts of things happen and have happened, including on college campuses. But, as you so often do, you make an isolated pronouncement and serve it up as an unqualified universal truth. And your statement “teachers on American campuses were forbidden to discuss the Vietnam war” is just such an inaccurate and gross generalization. Your wife’s experience was not the norm during the late 1960s on college campuses across this country. Quite the contrary.

Richard

[RCL]

John, I happened to be teaching in the English Department at UCLA in 1967 and we spoke against the war daily, suffered gas attacks, and the roaring of helicopters above our classrooms as acts of intimidation. I watched a cop break a colleague's arm and other colleagues beaten and arrested during peaceful demonstrations. We had frequent "Teach-ins" about the war. Where was your wife hiding?

[Julie Steiner]

Oh, never mind.