Let me give you some better examples (m) (archive)

There's a subtle but real distinction between "abridging" the act of speech and abridging the events leading up to the speech itself and I think that's what you are confused about. The Constitution only protects the actual act of "speaking" and not the events that lead up to the speech itself.

Let's say you are broke but want to publish your manifesto titled "Luxury Taxes Suck! - Why Luxury Taxes Should Be Repealed". Because you are broke you have no real way to make your text available to the public (short of standing on a street corner and reading it out loud). The government, however, is under no obligation to provide you the means to publish your text, even though in some sense this is a "abridgement" of your right to speech since without help you won't be able to make your text known to the public. So the government does not have to provide you, for example, with access to a printing press even though you might rant and rave that without such access you can't publish your text.

Let's say somehow you do manage to get your book published. At this point, the government can not say, "no you can not distribute this book" (well actually they can in a few special cases) cause *that* would be an abridgement of your right to speech. See the difference?

Let's take another example. Let's say you wanted to go to the Washington Mall and read your manifesto out loud by the Lincoln Memorial (couldn't find somebody to help you get it published). And again let's say you are broke. Again, the government is under no obligation to provide you with a means of travelling to the Mall, and in fact, assuming you somehow managed to get there, they can even impose restrictions on you giving a speech there by, say, requiring you first fill out a permit with the Parks & Recreation department and maybe even make you pay a fee. However, once all that is taken care of and you start giving your speech, they can't stop you from saying what you want (again, except for a few special cases) even if they don't like what you are saying.

Going back to your purchasing a car example. Let's say you wanted to paint "luxury taxes suck!" on a brand new BMW and drive it around town. The government is under no obligation to provide you with a BMW to paint this on (even though again that restricts your ability to "express" yourself) and in fact the government can make it more difficult for your to acquire a BMW to paint this on by requiring you pay taxes on your purchase such as registration and license fees and luxury taxes. However, once you've managed to acquire a BMW and paint it however you like, the government can't keep you from driving it around (unless they can prove that because of the words painted on the car, the car is a danger to the public).

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