Jeff Darcy in Cleveland.com, February 9, 2017, writes that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was simply mimicking President Donald Trump in shutting down Senator Elizabeth Warren in expressing her opposition on the Senate floor to the nomination of Jeff Sessions to Attorney General. Darcy chronicles the Trump camp’s recent assaults on free speech and the media and writes, “The attacks on freedom of speech could be worse, of course. Trump’s political idol, Vladimir Putin jails, poisons and kills journalists and political opposition, like Senator Warren.”
After noting that McConnell used an obscure rule to silence Warren while reading a letter from Coretta Scott King, a rule not evoked against Republicans criticizing fellow Republicans, the Santa Rose Press Democrat argued, “What occurred on the Senate floor Tuesday had nothing to do with rules or decorum or hoary traditions. Warren raised an issue germane to Sessions’ qualifications for the powerful position he will fill, and she was stifled. It was an affront to free speech. For that, McConnell ought to be rebuked.” (The Santa Rosa Press Democrat, February 9, 2017, by THE EDITORIAL BOARD)
The Tyler Morning Telegraph, February 8, 2017, editorialized, “It’s always a mistake to try to win an argument by silencing the other side. There are far too many instances of that lately – on both sides of the aisle. It has seemed lately that political discourse is at a low point, but at least there’s been discourse. Silencing the opposition isn’t a way to prevail at discourse, it’s a way to end it. And that’s bad for everyone.”