OCF, thanks, I did not know that.

I agree, L.C., that your are correct and that as currently construed this is a matter of employment law.  What I'm saying, in essence, is that I think the "spirit of the First Amendment" should make us all err on the side of more speech, rather than less, and to oppose speech with which we disagree with more speech rather than with a more heavy-handed action on the part of the relevant power structure whenever possible.  I know that I'm in the minority as a First Amendment extremist, but I even support the right of JSF to call me names and say that I'm out-of-touch in the enlightened 21st Century, or worse.  

Now, to bring this back to another relevant topic broached a few posters up, I fully support the right of EMU to drop football! 

This was why I viewed the rant as relatively tame, compared to some I have heard. It was clearly a general rant, and not directed to a specific person. If he was using this kind of language to demean a specific person or persons, I would have viewed it the way you do, but to me it sounded more like he was rambling and ranting in general. Because it was general, rather than specific, I think EMU had some flexibility in how they chose to deal with it.