Soldiers do not need protection from free speech: The tee shirt roundup

I am sure I am not the only one who saw the irony in this purely political action. The legislature should be ashamed of themselves for not standing up for the Constitution. The Arizona Republic has the good news here . Here is a previous post about the issue that I did not publish:

There are bills making their rounds of state legislatures to protect dead soldiers names from being reprinted without the family's permission. The EVT has this article. There are so many issues surrounding this action. First, it is fairly inconsequential except to a few families that are actually concerned about this and of course the politicians trying to score political points. These sorts of bills always make me uncomfortable because they seem blatantly unconstitutional. It is sort of ironic that a soldier whose duty is to not only defend and protect his country, but also the Constitution would be singled out for protection that violates the constitution. Now, I know that most people are not a libertarian as I am. I believe that most Constitutional rights are pretty absolute. Among these rights, political speech maybe the most protected. This bill seems to be a clear violation of freedom of speech. Given that, why are so many legislators willing to vote for it. Is it simply political fear? Or is it that they know it is so likely to be overturned? Both? How do we build a culture that tolerates the free exercise of every one's rights? The simple fact is that it is easy to say America is a free country, but it is quite another thing to continue to believe in freedom when you find someone doing something reprehensible (not that company in Flagstaff is doing anything wrong in my book). Having said all of that, I
would be mad as Hell if my son or daughter died in Iraq and someone was using their name for a political purpose that I found offensive. Ultimately, we as citizens have to learn to have a thicker skin when it comes to political disagreement.