The Pakistani Spectator

Would you please tell us something about you and your site?

But I am a Free Speech attorney and a law professor.  My site began as simply a place where I would post class materials for my students.  However, as I began commenting on the materials, it took on a life of its own.

Do you feel that you continue to grow in your writing the longer you write? Why is that important to you?

Like anything, the more you write, the better you are at it.  This is important to me because I am a free speech advocate – and keeping people informed is the best defense against tyranny.  In the United States, we once enjoyed the highest level of freedom in the world.  We no longer have that honor because our citizens have become complacent and uninformed.  If I can keep one extra citizen informed, it was worth every moment I spent writing.

I’m wondering what some of your memorable experiences are with blogging?

The mail I get from people whose cases I write about – when mainstream journalists have ignored their case.

What do you do in order to keep up your communication with other bloggers?

I keep in active contact with a network of others who advocate for free speech and other constitutionally guaranteed rights.
What do you think is the most exciting or most innovative use of technology in politics right now?

Youtube.

Do you think that these new technologies are effective in making people more responsive?

Unfortunately, no.  I think that it is making politicians more bland.  They cant take chances anymore, lest a short clip of something they said comes to be taken out of context and used against them.

What do you think sets Your site apart from others?

I am a Free Speech Lawyer and a Law professor, but first I was a journalist.  I understand that you can’t write entries that are so long that the reader loses interest (or has to get back to work!).  I also try to write to educate, but also to serve as a resource for other lawyers fighting the same battles that I fight.

If you could choose one characteristic you have that brought you success in life, what would it be?

I remember that you must love what you do, and have fun doing it.

What was the happiest and gloomiest moment of your life?

Happiest – my wedding day (May 17, 2008!).  Gloomiest, Dec. 30, 2006 – when my best friend was killed.

If you could pick a travel destination, anywhere in the world, with no worries about how it’s paid for - what would your top 3 choices be?

Rome
McMurdo Station, Antarctica
Lhasa

What is your favorite book and why?

1984 – because of the simple theme that joy and sexual freedom is preferable to totalitarianism.

What’s the first thing you notice about a person (whether you know them or not)?

Their eyes.  It says a lot about a person.  That is why I use mine as the header on my blog.

Is there anyone from your past that once told you you couldn’t write?

No.  Nobody.  Never.

How bloggers can benefit from blogs financially?

I don’t know.  Do you have any hints?

Is it true that who has a successful blog has an awful lot of time on their hands?

No.  I have very little time on my hands.  I *make* time to blog.  It also helps that I am an insomniac.

What role can bloggers of the world play to make this world more friendlier and less hostile?

The more free speech and exchange of ideas from people to people, without big media corporations filtering and framing the issues, the more we will all understand that whether we come from Louisiana or Lahore, we “regular people” are much more alike than those who formerly stood as the only gatekeepers of information and communication.

Who are your top five favourite bloggers?

In no particular order, here they are:
http://sexualintelligence.wordpress.com/
http://markskatz.com/justiceblog/
http://blog.simplejustice.us/
http://www.bakelblog.com/nobodys_business/
http://www.volokh.com

Is there one observation or column or post that has gotten the most powerful reaction from people?

http://randazza.wordpress.com/2008/04/23/hunt-club-swingers-parties-and-freedom-of-association/
That one had 20,000 visits in about a week.
But this one, despite its call for compassion, generated a lot of hate mail
http://randazza.wordpress.com/2008/03/05/compassion-for-david-motari/

What is your perception about Pakistan and its people?

People who used to be our friends, but who have suffered under totalitarian governments and who are now in a struggle for their national soul, which may yet be kidnapped by religious fundamentalism.  I do not specify “Islamic” fundamentalism.  I believe that all organized religions are merely tools to divide people who should be friends and love one another.

Have you ever become stunned by the uniqueness of any blogger?

Jon Katz.

What is the most striking difference between a developed country and a developing country?

How developed countries seem to believe that their peoples’ lives are worth so much more than the lives of those in the developing world.  3,000 americans died on 9/11.  That was a terrible tragedy.  However, 100,000 people died in the developing world when the Tsunami hit.  Most Americans consider the tsunami to be a mere trivia question now.

What is the future of blogging?

It will eventually be co-opted and destroyed.  It takes too much power from the powerful and links too many real people together.  I don’t know how they will ruin or destroy it, but they will.

You have also got a blogging life, how has it directly affected both your personal and professional life?

Professionally it has been wonderful.  Clients have contacted me from it.  Personally, wonderful too!  Lots of old friends who I lost contact with found me again because of my blogging.

What are your future plans?

I have found my niche.  Professionally, I expect little to change .  Personally, just to love my wife and daughter until they just burst with my adoration.

Any Message you want to give to the readers of The Pakistani Spectator?

Only people insane enough to think they can change the world ever actually succeed in doing so.

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