(NaturalNews) As CNN is now reporting, the U.S. government has issued a  new rule that would make it a felony crime for any journalist, reporter,  blogger or photographer to approach any oil cleanup operation,  equipment or vessel in the Gulf of Mexico. Anyone caught is subject to  arrest, a $40,000 fine and prosecution for a federal felony crime.
CNN  reporter Anderson Cooper says, 
"A new law passed today, and back by  the force of law and the threat of fines and felony charges, ... will  prevent reporters and photographers from getting anywhere close to booms  and oil-soaked wildlife just about any place we need to be. By now  you're probably familiar with cleanup crews stiff-arming the media,  private security blocking cameras, ordinary workers clamming up, some  not even saying who they're working for because they're afraid of losing  their jobs."Watch the video clip yourself at  NaturalNews.TV: 
http://naturalnews.tv/v.asp?v=203The rule,  of course, is designed to restrict the media's access to cleanup  operations in order to keep images of oil-covered seabirds off the  nation's televisions. With this, the Gulf Coast cleanup operation has  now entered a weird 
Orwellian reality where the news is shaped,  censored and controlled by the government in order to prevent the public  from learning the truth about what's really happening in the Gulf.
The  war is on to control your mind
If all this sounds familiar, it's  because the U.S. government uses this same tactic during every war. The  first casualty of war, as they say, is the truth. There are lots of war  images the government doesn't want you to see (like military helicopter  pilots shooting up Reuters photographers while screaming "Yee-Haw!" over  the comm radios), and there are other images they do want you to see  ("surgical strike" explosions from "smart" bombs, which makes it seem  like the military is doing something useful). So war reporting is  carefully monopolized by the government to deliver precisely the images  they want you to see while censoring everything else.
Now the  same Big Brother approach is being used in the Gulf of Mexico:  Criminalize journalists, censor the story and try to keep the American  people ignorant of what's really happening. It's just the latest tactic  from a government that no longer even recognizes the U.S. Constitution  or its Bill of Rights. Because the very first right is 
Freedom of  Speech, which absolutely includes the right to walk onto 
a public  beach and take photographs of something happening out in the open,  on public waters. It is one of the most basic rights of our citizens and  our press.
But now the Obama administration has stripped away  those rights, transforming journalists into criminals. Now, we might  expect something like this from Chavez, or Castro or even the communist  leaders of China, but here in the United States, we've all been promised  we lived in "the land of the free." Obama apparently does not subscribe  to that philosophy anymore (if he ever did).
So how does  criminalizing journalists equate to "land of the free?" It doesn't,  obviously. Forget freedom. (Your government already has.) This is about 
controlling  your mind to make sure you don't visually see the truth of what the  oil industry has done to your oceans, your shorelines and your beaches.  This is all about keeping you ignorant with a 
total media blackout  of the real story of what's happening in the Gulf.
The real  story, you see, is just too ugly. And the government has fracked up the  cleanup effort to such a ridiculous extent that instead of the  "transparency" they once promised, they're now resorting to the threat  of arrest for all journalists who try to get close enough to cover the  story.
Yes, this is happening right now in America. This isn't a  hoax. I know, it sounds more like something you might hear about in  Saudi Arabia, or Venezuela or some other nation run by dictators. But  now it's happening right here in the USA.
As Anderson Cooper  reported on CNN:
"Now the government is getting in on the act.  Despite what Admiral Thad Allen promised about transparency just nearly  a month ago.
Thad Allen: "The media will have uninhibited  access anywhere we're doing operations..."
Anderson Cooper: The  Coast Guard today announced new rules keeping photographers, reporters  and anyone else from coming with 65 feet of any response vessel or booms  out on the water or on beaches. What this means is that oil-soaked  birds on an island surrounded by a boom, you can't get close enough to  take that picture. Shot of oil on beaches with booms? Stay 65 feet away.  Pictures of oil-soaked booms uselessly laying in the water because they  haven't been collected like they should? You can't get close enough to  see that. Believe me, that is out there. But you only know that if you  get close to it, and now you can't without permission. Violators could  face a fine of $40,000 and Class D felony charges."See the  video yourself at: 
http://naturalnews.tv/v.asp?v=203Welcome  to the (censored) club
All I can say to CNN is: 
Welcome to the  club! This kind of censorship, intimidation and tyranny has been  going on for decades in the field of health, where the Orwellian FDA has  treated the entire U.S. public to a nationwide blackout on truthful  health information about healing foods and nutritional supplements. CNN  has never covered that story, by the way. Most of the mainstream media  has, in fact, gone right along with censorship of truthful health  information by the FDA and FTC.
Now they're suddenly crying wolf.  But where was the media when the FDA was raiding nutritional supplement  companies and arresting people who dared to sell healing foods with  honest descriptions about how they might help protect your health? The  media went right along with the cover-up and never bothered to even tell  its viewers a cover-up was taking place.
You see, even CNN is  willing to tolerate some Orwellian censorship, as long as its  advertisers are okay with it. The only reason they're talking about  censorship in the Gulf of Mexico right now is because oil companies  don't influence enough of their advertising budget to yank the story.
Censorship  is not okay in a free society
I like the fact that CNN is finding  the courage to speak up now about this censorship in the Gulf, but I  wish they wouldn't stay silent on the other media blackouts in which  they have long participated. Media censorship is bad for any nation, and  it should be challenged regardless of the topic at hand. When the media  is not allowed to report the truth on a subject -- any subject! -- the  nation suffers some loss as a result.
Without the light of media  scrutiny, corporations and government will get away with unimaginable  crimes against both humanity and nature. That's what's happening right  now in the Gulf of Mexico: A 
crime against nature.
Obama  doesn't want you to see that crime. He's covering it up to the benefit  of BP. He's keeping you in the dark by threatening reporters and  photographers with arrest. How's that for "total transparency?"
The  only thing transparent here is that President Barack Obama has violated  his own oath of office by refusing to defend the Constitution. By any  honest measure, in fact, these actions, which are endorsed by the White  House, stand in direct violation of the U.S. Constitution. And that  means this new censorship rule in the Gulf, which suspends the First  Amendment, is unconstitutional. It also means those who decided on this  rule are 
enemies of freedom.
They are the ones who should  be arrested and hauled off to federal prison, not the CNN reporters who  are trying to cover this story.
The seeds of tyranny
The  loss of life in the Gulf of Mexico isn't the only catastrophe taking  place here, you see: Now we're losing our freedoms while our government  tries to intentionally blind us all from the truth of what's happening  on our own public beaches.
When those who seek truth are branded  criminals by the government, it is only a matter of time before that  government expands its criminalization labeling to include anyone who  disagrees with it. 
These are the seeds of tyranny, and Obama is  planting them at your doorstep right now.
What BP did to the Gulf  Coast, Obama is now doing to your freedom.