http://www.msn.com/en-my/news/world/philippines-leader-duterte-to-journalists-dont-fk-with-me/ar-BBtPQeH?li=BBr8Hnu

The 71-year-old leader, who will remain mayor of Davao City until he is sworn in as president on June 30, told journalists on Thursday evening that they “think too much of themselves.”

Duterte has come under fire for his recent suggestion that members of the press are not protected by freedom of expression laws. “Just because you’re a journalist, you are not exempted from assassination if you are a son of a bitch,” he said at a press conference on Tuesday, where he also got into trouble for catcalling a female reporter.

At least 77 journalists have been killed in the Philippines since 1992, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists. More than 60 percent of those killed were political reporters.

Duterte’s threatening comments prompted Reporters Without Borders to call for legal action against the future president and urge the Philippine media to boycott his press conferences until he apologizes.

“You idiots do not threaten me,” he said Thursday, daring reporters to stop covering him. “Make this trip your last in Davao City.”

For reasons that aren’t quite clear, the United Nations also fell victim to the incoming president’s profanity-loaded rant on Thursday.

“That’s the trouble here, they’re always raising fears about this or that United Nations convention,” Duterte snapped when asked an unrelated question about the foreign media. “[The U.N.] can’t even solve the Middle East carnage … couldn’t even lift a finger in Africa … shut up, all of you.”

Duterte is no stranger to bad press. He drew international condemnation for saying he would have liked a turn raping a “beautiful” missionary who was gang raped and murdered in a prison riot in Davao City.

He has also made headlines for his open support for extrajudicial killings and for calling the Pope a “son of a whore.”

Confronting backlash from senior members of the Catholic Church on Monday, Duterte’s response was short but not so sweet: “Don’t fuck with me.”

Our Donald Trump on the killing of reporters:

http://www.cnn.com/2015/12/18/politics/donald-trump-praises-defends-vladimir-putin/

One day after Putin called Trump a “bright and talented” and the “absolute leader of the presidential race,” the Republican presidential front-runner returned the compliments, hailing Putin as a “leader” and pointing to his high favorability numbers in Russia.
“He’s running his country and at least he’s a leader, unlike what we have in this country,” Trump said when asked by “Morning Joe” Republican host Joe Scarborough about Putin’s alleged killing of journalists and political opponents.
“I think our country does plenty of killing also, Joe, so you know. There’s a lot of stupidity going on in the world right now, a lot of killing, a lot of stupidity,” he said.

On freedom of the press:

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/feb/26/trump-pledges-curb-press-freedom-libel-laws-first-amendment

Speaking at a rally in Fort Worth, Texas, on Friday, shortly after accepting an endorsement from New Jersey governor Chris Christie, Trump pledged if elected president to “open up our libel laws so when [newspapers] write purposely negative stories … we can sue them and make lots of money”.

This move, he said, would mean that “when the New York Times or the Washington Post writes a hit piece, we can sue them”.

Since the American revolution, freedom of the press has been a key principle in American public life, with truth long established as an absolute defense to any accusation of libel.

The first amendment states that “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press”. It is a foundation stone of democracy in the United States.