Dinesh D’Souza Tells Hannity Indictment Could Be ‘Payback’ for Anti-Obama Film

Dinesh D’Souza, the conservative commentator and filmmaker who was indicted last month on charges of campaign finance fraud spoke out for the first time about his legal troubles on Fox’s Hannity Friday night. His defenders have spent the last few weeks wondering aloud whether D’Souza’s indictment was some kind of retribution from the Obama Administration for his film, 2016: Obama’s America, but now it was his turn.

“Now, remember,” Hannity said before introducing D’Souza, “his indictment comes after the IRS harassed conservative groups last year and after the disgraced tax agency recently placed extra scrutiny on a group of conservatives in Hollywood.” As CNN reported last June, the IRS also targeted “progressive” groups.

Asked by Hannity if he believes he was targeted for his conservative beliefs, D’Souza said, “I will say that the film, 2016, was a film that does seem to have gotten under President Obama’s skin,” citing a “rant” against the film on Obama’s website, presumably referring to this repudiation of the film on by Obama’s 2012 Truth Team. “Whether this is a kind of payback remains to be seen.”

Before moving on, Hannity said the Obama Administration is “certainly targeting conservatives,” adding that it’s “been pretty well proven.” The host did not ask D’Souza any questions about the nature or veracity of the campaign finance violations with which he has been charged.

That the possibility exists that revenge/intimidation motivation for this prosecution is undeniable.
I wouldn’t want to volunteer anyone to go through this - but there is a way in which D’Souza could try to turn Obama’s attack against him.
The McCain-Feingold “law” was upheld in McConnell v. FEC soon after it was foolishly/irresponsibly enacted and signed into law. The SCOTUS ruling in McConnell was a 5-4 decision, with Kennedy, Scalia, and Thomas in dissent. IOW, all it would take would be for those three justices - and Roberts and Alito - to rule against “Campaign Finance Reform” to put paid to that unconstitutional mess once and for all (or until the Democrats get to name a replacement for one of the aforementioned - which, please God, will be never).
Why is “Campaign Finance Reform” unconstitutional? Because it contradicts the First Amendment.
Do not marvel that a law intended to gut the First Amendment would be promoted by journalists who give lip service to the First Amendment - they don’t mean it. The Constitution outlaws titles of nobility in the U.S., and the First Amendment rules out priestly political offices in the US - and yet, journalists promote themselves as - and sincerely think of themselves as - a superior class to whom rights are due which are not available to you and me. Journalists acquired that sense of entitlement over the century and a half since they have been joined at the hip by wire services in general and the Associated Press in particular:
People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices. - Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations
The intent and effect of “Campaign Finance Reform” is to enhance the influence of journalists at the expense of the political parties. That supposedly would be OK if journalists were objective - but the interests of journalism are different from the public interest. I will readily grant that journalists are interested in interesting the public, but that is quite different from “the public interest.” Most of what is in the paper is there to interest the public - but very little of it is reports of things which are in the public interest.
Did a house burn down yesterday? That will be reported, that will be news. OTOH on any given day enough work was done on enough houses that, on average, the number of houses completed per day dwarfs the number which burn down - absent a catastrophe such as a war. The public interest is in building houses; the public is interested if one burns down.
It is in the public interest that, as Theodore Roosevelt famously asserted,
"It is not the critic who counts . . . the credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena . . . who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds . . .
But journalists interest the pubic precisely by conducting themselves as critics and second guessers.
But it actually does not matter whether journalists are objective or not. The First Amendment is not founded on that premise, but on the basis that the people have a right to listen (or decline to listen) to anyone who wants to talk to them, on mutually agreeably terms. That certainly does nothing to assure that only people who are objective will speak, and much to assure that people who are not objective will speak. Or write.
As to the issue of technologies more modern than the printing presses extant in 1788, their existence would have come as no surprise to the framers of the Constitution. Indeed, Congress is explicitly given authority to create the Patent Office "To promote the progress of science and useful arts.” The specific implications of such technologies could in principle create a need for a change in the First Amendment, of course - but then, what is Article V of the Constitution for, anyway?
In conclusion, the Constitution articulates our right to freedom of speech and press. Freedom of the press is freedom to spend money on technical means of making your opinions accessible to the people to try to persuade them of what you want them to do. Membership in a private organization such as the Associated Press does not increase that right, and lack of membership in the AP does decrease your rights, or Dinesh D’Souza’s, under the First Amendment. Nor does the fact that you, or Dinesh D’Souza, do not own a printing press yet. Your money is no dirtier than that of The New York Times.

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