> Sheesh...careful what you say next time you fall in the river!

Indeed you should be, for moral and, I hope, legally enforceable reasons. I just deplore what this idiot did, and I'm mortified that it was a paddler who did it.

Lots of speech is not protected by the First Amendment (which, by the way, is one of my favorites.) Fraud is not protected. Slander is not protected, nor is the incitement to riot. Words can and do hurt, and the law recognizes this. Threatening someone, even if the threat is not carried out, constitutes assault. What this knucklehead did was an assault on the innocence of the children present, and I hope he is given the opportunity to pay his debt to society in some meaningful manner.

I'll bet he was a water-newbie.