It used to be that frivolous libel lawsuits and economic boycotts were the ways to punish the media for doing their job of reporting news. That's what happened to me in my newspaper publishing career.

These methods of retaliation were effective in causing economic hardships for media owners, not the editors and reporters, who were employees only.

With the recent Annapolis, Md., mass murders of five newspaper employees in their own newsroom, including an advertising salesperson, the danger has become one of personal safety for all media employees.

This strange twist is very troubling. It appears that new laws are needed to treat physical intimidation of media employees just the same as intimidation of law enforcement employees, lest our freedom of speech rights be compromised ... and that would be a tragedy for America.

(This is part of an occasional column written by Uncle Irvin. As always, the column is the opinion of Uncle Irvin, and is not a news story.)