Savage Banned From U.K.

No Big Ben For Him

TALK RADIO NETWORK host MICHAEL SAVAGE was one of 16 people "named and shamed" by the U.K. government as banned from entering the country for behavior that the country will not tolerate. The government's list called SAVAGE, listed under his real name of MICHAEL ALAN WEINER, "Controversial daily radio talk-show host. Considered to be engaging in unacceptable behaviour by seeking to provoke others to serious criminal acts and fostering hatred which might lead to inter-community violence. His views on immigration, Islam, rape and autism have caused great offence in the U.S."

Home Secretary JACQUI SMITH told morning television show GMTV TUESDAY morning, "I think it's important that people understand the sorts of values and sorts of standards that we have here, the fact that it's a privilege to come and the sort of things that mean you won't be welcome in this country. Coming to this country is a privilege. If you can't live by the rules that we live by, the standards and the values that we live by, we should exclude you from this country and, what's more, now we will make public those people that we have excluded. We are publishing the names of 16 of those that we have excluded since OCTOBER. We are telling people who they are and why it is we don't want them in this country."

Among others on the list were anti-gay KANSAS preacher FRED PHELPS and his daughter SHIRLEY, YUNIS AL-ASTAL of HAMAS, former KU KLUX KLAN grand wizard STEPHEN DONALD BLACK, and JEWISH LEGION leader MIKE GUZOFSKY, as well as several Islamic preachers linked to terrorism. The names of six others were withheld due to concerns about national security, and an additional 79 were not named.

Savage: I'll Sue

In an interview with the SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE's CARLA MARINUCCI, SAVAGE said that he is exploring a lawsuit against the British government for lumping him in with the others on the list, saying, "Today it's me. Tomorrow it's someone else. My first reaction is, this can't be happening ... that the land of the Magna Carta has now become the land of the mini-Carta."

"This lunatic (SMITH)... is linking me up with Nazi skinheads who are killing people in RUSSIA, she's putting me in a league with HAMAS murderers who kill Jews on busses," said SAVAGE. "I have never advocated violence ... I've been on the air 15 years. My views may be inflammatory, but they're not violent in any way.... She has painted a target on my back, linking me with people who are in prison for killing people. Does she not think people might hunt me down?" He sais that he has no idea how he ended up on the list and asked, "Is it the government's investigation? Who did this? If she didn't draw it up, who did?"

TRN Draws Parallels To Treatment Of Churchill Before War

"Considering the historical position of past liberal British administrations, radio personality MICHAEL SAVAGE finds himself in the best of historical company with WINSTON CHURCHILL, based on the position that the GORDON BROWN government has taken towards SAVAGE today," read a statement attributed to a spokesman for TALK RADIO NETWORK published by syndicated columnist BEN SHAPIRO. "WINSTON CHURCHILL claimed that in the years leading up to WORLD WAR II, he was banned from the BBC for a period of up to eight years. He was put into political exile where he was labeled 'an extremist' at a time his voice and free speech was needed most. This attempt at marginalizing SAVAGE and SAVAGE's free speech is no less egregious than what CHURCHILL experienced in the hands of CHAMBERLAIN's government. It simply validates how history does repeat itself when history’s lessons are not learned by leaders of the modern age.

"The American way is sustained by the lynch pin of freedom of speech. TRN's position towards all of its hosts is that of the classical liberal who says, 'even though I might disagree with you completely, I will fight to the last breath to defend your right to speak freely.' Sadly, the BROWN government veers away from this, abandoning BRITAIN's principles and departing from the position of its own people."

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