This is what we'll get if we follow the Europeans:

Author on Trial Over Islam Insult

Nonsense. First, despite our Constitution's FIRST AMENDMENT protections we've had book-bannings, prosecutions for blasphemy, libel, and and worse throughout U.S. history, so legal sanctions and attacks on controversial speech or writing in the U.S. would not be anything new, and certainly not "European."

Second, more than a few U.S. authors have had to deal with publisher censorship (Helen Caldecott, Michael Moore, etc. in just the past few years), so many dissenting books--especially from the Left--struggle even to get out. This kind of silencing is almost as chilling as lawsuits.

The trial of Houellebecq IS outrageous. I do strongly recommend his book THE ELEMENTARY PARTICLES. It is a grim, horrifying, brilliant book, with graphic sex, strange philosophy and an extended rant against the 1960s generation. Fascinating.

Nice try, W1865.

I'll confine my comments to England, which I know better than France. In England, they have libel laws that make it easier for, say, Elton John to sue the tabloid The Sun for printing lies about him. The Sun had said that Sir Elton was luring young boys to his mansion for cocaine-fuelled orgies. Now, that's not out of the realm of possibility with Elton, but in the case at hand, it was a pack of lies. As he was quoted as saying "The papers can call me fat, call me a poof, but they must never, never lie".

Of course, if the US applied this level of scrutiny to libel, W1865's beloved Ann "Mothra" Coulter would be spending 24/7 in libel court.