Just pointing out the obvious: When Pakistan’s government banned Facebook over “Everybody Draw Muhammed Day”, this was not an act of self-defense. I really dislike reality television game shows, but I don’t need to ban them, because I can just not watch them. No, Pakistan’s government banned Facebook because they knew that people _did_ want to see it, and the thought of other people doing what they wanted was more than they could bear. It was bullying, pure and simple, the act of one group preemptively punishing another for not holding the same things sacred.

And now I’m thinking about NYC’s salt restrictions, activists fighting to legally prevent Walmart from putting a store in their town, the DOE’s war on high-flow showerheads, opposition to gay marriage,…