In January, Jon Lovitz made some comments about the President that some felt were disrespectful. He did what any modern media person would do when criticized about a comment they made; he took to Twitter to try and defend himself. In one response he said the following:

When people make controversial comments, the big fallback is to claim those that criticize them is their freedom of speech is being trampled on. What these folks have to be reminded of again and again is their freedom of speech isn't being violated. They can criticize all they want, but it is the freedom of others to talk back. You don't get a pass because you are a celebrity or think your voice has weight over others. Just as Lovitz is able to call the President a derogatory name without consequences, so can people criticize what he says.

While he would still have a weak argument, if Lovitz where Ted Nugent, who insinuated that he would kill the President if he was re-elected, and was visited by the Secret Service, Lovitz might have a leg to stand on by claiming his freedom of speech rights were violated. He would still be in the wrong because free speech doesn't give you the right to cry fire in a crowded theater and it doesn't give you the right to threaten to kill the President.

If Lovitz wanted to know what is as close in this country as a violation of one's freedom of speech, ask Bill Maher. No, I'm not talking about his recent comments about Sarah Palin or Anne Romney, which I might add he can do because of freedom of speech and he has been criticized by them, but let's go back to 2001 when his TV show Politically Incorrect was on ABC. He was a late night ratings winner, people clamored to be on his show and then he said this:

When he made that comment, people lost their minds. It was akin to what happened to Rush Limbaugh when he commented on the student for three days, only we have to remember that when Maher made the comment, we are in the early stages of the Internet, there was no Facebook, cell phones and texting weren't as prevalent as they are now. There was a bitter, old fashioned backlash to his two sentence statement and he eventually lost his job. At that time, if you said anything against America, against the tragedy of the event and the lives of lost Americans, you could lose your job.

It could be easy to joke that Lovitz doesn't have a job to lose, but the reality of his situation is, despite his argument, isn't censorship and isn't a violation of his freedom of speech. People are only responding to his comment, expressing their own freedom of speech.