QUASHING SPEECH IN THE CITY BY THE BAY

The lyrics to the old Tony Bennett tune, "I left My Heart in San Francisco" will have to changed, now that San Francisco's Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) authority has started playing foot-loose and fancy-free with our Nation's constitutional free speech rights. This past Thursday, BART officials shut down cell phone communication services at the downtown rail stations to prevent people from coordinating a protest rally. The planned rally was intended to protest against the actions of BART police officers who shot a man on a station platform on July 3rd of this year.

I appreciate that BART officials are tasked with the job of facilitating travel by citizens from point A to point B, but that's no justification for engaging in Gestapo-type free-speech suppression that typically happens in third world countries and dictatorial regimes. And just because England recently stooped to such low-level behavior doesn't mean BART officials have to follow suit. I thought America was supposed to be above all that; apparently, I was wrong!

When our government agencies start interfering with the right of citizens to communicate with one another, and to peacefully assemble, our long-cherished First Amendment right to freedom of speech is placed in serious jeopardy.

Tony Bennett may have left something in San Francisco, but it wasn't his cell phone!