Fred Speaks Out And Plans A Visit

Fred Thompson is making the rounds, both on the blogosphere and in person.

His latest missives have covered some interesting topics.

First, he writes about Queen Elizabeth, Sir Salman Rushdie, and free speech:

In 1989, when Rushdie was first threatened with death by the Islamic regime in Iran, it was for saying far less critical things about Muslims than he’d said about American Christians. Since then, he's become a much stronger critic of Islamic intolerance and authoritarianism. Rushdie defended, for example, the publication of the Danish cartoons and has called for ending the oppression of women in Islam.

While Queen Elizabeth doesn't actually select those who’ll be knighted, lending her name to the honor is symbolically powerful. She and the honors committee who have put the "Sir" before Rushdie's name had to have known that it would provoke anger among those who believe Islam should be protected from criticism. Furthermore, Rushdie had to have known that accepting the honor would prompt renewed and serious calls for his murder -- and it has.

Already, Britain's Home Secretary John Reid has responded to a Pakistani government minister's comment that Rushdie’s knighthood justifies a suicide bombing on the writer. Standing by the knighthood, Reid reminded his international audience that the West tolerates movies made by Monty Python and Mel Gibson even if they offend Christians and Jews. Reid said that, "in the long run, our protection of the right to express your views in literature, argument (and) politics is of over-riding political value to our societies."

And for that, I say, “God Save the Queen.”

Hear, hear!

And then he brings up a subject near and dear to my heart, health care. Or in this case, how not to structure health care in our nation.

Should we try to follow the example of Canada and the UK, as some in Congress have called for us to do, all we will do is wreck our health care system much as it has been in both the aforementioned countries. All a national health care system will do is hurt the very people it is intended to help, increase costs, and make ever less care available to everyone except the very rich, just the opposite effect it was intended to have. It seems that the liberals in Congress are incapable of learning from the mistakes of others. Heck, they're incapable of learning from their own mistakes.

And last, but not least, an inside source reminded me that Fred Thompson will indeed be in New Hampshire this Thursday to speak at the Senate Republican PAC Reception at the Bedford, NH Wayfarer Convention Center. He'll arrive in Manchester at mid-afternoon and attend the reception for a meet-and-greet and then some speechifying.

Welcome to New Hampshire, Fred!