I should’ve stayed in the mountains and off the grid. We get back yesterday evening to the news that North Korea’s fat little man is throwing more missiles our way, and a veteran NYPD officer was assassinated.

Meanwhile, CNN – still on their Russia! Russia! Russia! Anti-Trump Fake News kick, has declared that Freedom of Speech has limits. As Lisa wrote here, CNN got all butthurt about a GIF that President Trump retweeted. This GIF:

CNN dove even further down the rabbit hole.

First, they claimed that the gif was an actual threat of violence — or at the very least, would prompt violence from Trump supporters. This comes shortly after a Bernie Sanders-supporting, Trump-hating leftist attempted to assassinate dozens of Republican congresspeople, and CNN insisted — rightly! — that left-wing rhetoric wasn’t responsible for nut jobs committing evil crimes.

The reaction by the media and specifically many at CNN was, as Tucker Carlson pointed out, over the top. 

Death threats? Violent reaction? Are you kidding me??

I'm trying to wrap my head around idea that GIF posted was a death threat? Seems quite the stretch to me…

— Nina Bookout (@NDBook96) July 5, 2017

Everyone is talking about #CNNBlackmail, Thug journalism, and the fact that honest journalism is dead. But there’s a significantly larger issue at play here.

FREEDOM OF SPEECH.

CNN has the Freedom of Press under our First Amendment. They’ve been using that pretty well for quite a while. However, it’s also true that CNN and other members of the Fourth Estate have been engaged in Fake News as they’ve thrown journalism out the window in favor of political leftist bias. We’ve discussed their discredited stories here many a time in the last couple of years. Yet still, the media PERSISTS!

Needless to say, the fact that CNN blackmailed a guy into stifling his CONSTITUTIONAL right to Freedom of Speech should unnerve us all. Look again at what they coerced from the guy:

CNN is not publishing “HanA**holeSolo’s” name because he is a private citizen who has issued an extensive statement of apology, showed remorse by saying he has taken down all his offending posts, and because he said he is not going to repeat this ugly behavior on social media again. In addition, he said his statement could serve as an example to others not to do the same.

CNN reserves the right to publish his identity should any of that change. [Emphasis Added]

Rightly so, Americans are fighting back. They understand EXACTLY what that last line meant. It’s blackmail, it’s coercion, and it’s definitely stifling someone’s Freedom of Speech just because it made CNN look bad.

How about this?

Does that disturb you? It should. Does the above memes go too far? I don’t think so. I think they provide a strong argument as to how dangerous and wrong CNN’s blackmail actions were and are.

However, CNN is doubling down on their actions and it’s not pretty.

https://twitter.com/KFILE/status/882429541981052928?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Ftwitchy.com%2Fgregp-3534%2F2017%2F07%2F05%2Fcnns-andrew-kaczynski-fights-back-as-cnnblackmail-trends-nationally%2F

REALLY??!! What the hell did you expect him to say after you tracked him down and coerced him into that apology?

https://twitter.com/KFILE/status/882438606270410752?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Ftwitchy.com%2Fgregp-3534%2F2017%2F07%2F05%2Fcnns-andrew-kaczynski-fights-back-as-cnnblackmail-trends-nationally%2F

“Misinterpreted??!!” WOW. That’s one hell of a spin you got there Andy.  Especially when you consider this:

Geez, and here I thought Trump was the thin-skinned asshole.https://t.co/g92tLg46If

— David Burge (@iowahawkblog) July 5, 2017

Pretty much. Keep in mind that good ole Andy, when he was with Buzzfeed, got caught several times with his pants down from his willful spreading of Fake News. So, should we be surprised that he along with all of CNN is trying to put out the fire they made with even MORE gasoline? Yeah, NO.

Julian Assange of Wikileaks even thinks CNN went to far on this.

When Trump goes low CNN goes lower: threatens to dox artist behind "CNN head" video if he makes fun of them again https://t.co/Ka4R1fFEWa pic.twitter.com/82eWSmWtLf

— Julian Assange (@JulianAssange) July 5, 2017

When even Wikileaks says "nah, man you went too far." https://t.co/5Scanmkvr2

— Literally Not A Nazi (@Mellecon) July 5, 2017

Something else Wikileaks points out…

CNN just committed a crime violating § 135.60 of the New York criminal code "coercion" https://t.co/FwPPlczPRhhttps://t.co/AHQhjDS6ds pic.twitter.com/a7HAdMQQDV

— Julian Assange (@JulianAssange) July 5, 2017

The fact is, CNN has been so involved in a 24/7 battle against all things Trump that they’ve become the problem not the solution. They are engaging in threats and censorship. They want Freedom of the Press with ZERO limits, but happily threaten someone’s Constitutional right to Freedom of Speech because what was said struck a nerve and the President retweeted it.

All the excuses in the world won’t make CNN’s actions any prettier. They engaged in stifling Freedom of Speech and are celebrating it. They are wrong and we should, rightly so, call them out on it.