I rant and rave a lot about the problems in New Mexico government, but on the upside, I can’t imagine Land of Enchantment government officials successfully coming after web publishers to stifle free speech:
The website of the city government of Conneaut, a small town situated near Ashtabula, Ohio, which itself is in the North Eastern corner of the state, is apparently in the middle of being redesigned and during the time that the city page has been off the web, a local woman named Katie Schwartz had put on her website some pages detailing council members and city government.
But, Manager Schaumleffel is not pleased that everythingconneautohio.com has also featured posts critical of the city government in the past and he is determined to shut down some of the site’s content. As a smoke screen for his efforts, the Manager claims that people will be “confused” by the site and might think that the section detailing city government is the official city website.
The City Council upheld the City Manager’s decision by shooting down a motion that would have ordered Schaumleffel to rescind the letter and apologize to Schwartz. In this era of bigger government, this is something that we should all be watching very closely.