A Test Case for Freedom of Speech

Charles Krauthammer writes:

The mob is trying to dictate to Western newspapers, indeed Western governments, what is a legitimate subject for discussion and caricature. The point is who decides what can be said and what can be drawn within the precincts of what we quaintly think of as the free world. The mob has turned this into a test case for freedom of speech in the West. What is at issue is fear. The unspoken reason many newspapers do not want to republish the cartoons is not sensitivity but simple fear. They know what happened to Theo van Gogh, who made a film about the Islamic treatment of women and got a knife through the chest with an Islamist manifesto attached.