FYI Boys and Girls, as you sit at your government/corporate computers...

...you've got free speech rights and other things - but they don't really apply all that much to your government/company-provided gear...

An unknown number of Army civilian employees will be investigated in connection with the unlawful distribution of a chain e-mail that makes false accusations about Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

The e-mail appears to have originated at Fort Sam Houston, Texas, and was sent out by civilian individuals to potentially thousands of people who work for Army Medical Command, including soldiers.

I've received this email numerous times, all to my blog email, and none from a .gov or .mil address... and I believe it to be a scurrilous attack on Senator Obama, and a troubling portent of how political speech is going to go this year. Similar things are swirling out about Senator McCain, as well. And well, there's so much stuff out there regarding Senator Clinton reaching back so far that she is probably actually immunized. We simply just nod our heads at the latest rehash of whatever. Which is both bad, and good.

Keep in mind where you are posting from, and what you are sending out and about, campers. There's lots of rules binding us regarding tools we see as ubiquitous and interchangeable... so it's easy to get hoist on your own petard simply because you don't think about it.

The Army memorandum, which was first reported in the Boston Globe, stated: “Currently there is an e-mail floating around with the Subject line: ‘Who is Barack Obama.’ Like virtually all chain e-mails, this one is false.”

The investigation into the actions of the Army civilians will be conducted by the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, an independent federal investigative and prosecutorial agency that looks into allegations of illegal practices among federal employees and protects the merits of others, such as whistle-blowers.

“We are going to be opening cases,” said OSC spokesman Jim Mitchell, who could not speculate on the number of people who will be investigated because of the possibility that it may have been distributed to thousands of people. “My own feeling is that this is the tip of the iceberg.”

The whole story is available via the Army Times.