Free Republic

From the commentary in the mainstream media, I thought there had been a coup d'etat in Washington. The New York Times said what happened "strikes at the heart of democracy." The Washington Post quoted an authority who warned it "threatens to undermine the integrity of elected institutions across the nation." No, not the Scott Brown victory. The media were upset because the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that forbidding corporations and labor unions to spend money on political speech before elections is unconstitutional. A horrendous section of the abomination known as McCain-Feingold campaign-finance "reform" had bitten the dust. It was long...

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A full year into his presidency we suddenly discover what it takes to get Barack Obama all worked up. Not terrorism. In the president's estimation, a near repeat of the Lockerbie bombing Christmas Day wasn't worth remarking on until three days later. Not the risk of a fiscal doomsday. Only after 12 months of joint one-party rule to secure his place as the biggest-spending president in history does he call for a bipartisan spending-restraint commission and a spending freeze. Both the commission and the freeze don't come along until the fall at the earliest, if they materialize at all. But...

John McCain clings to more liberal positions than almost any other Republican in Congress. Whether encouraging economic suicide by standing against drilling in Alaska, putting the nation's security at risk by equating waterboarding with torture, demanding the shuttering of Guantanamo, joining hands with Ted Kennedy to open the floodgates of amnesty to illegal immigrants, nothing seems to satisfy his vanity more than hearing compliments from the leftist press after crossing over to the other side of the aisle. Now that the Supreme Court has declared much of his crown legislative jewel -- the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (McCain-Feingold) -- to...

It was rather incredible for Barack Obama to express outrage over the Supreme Court's pruning of McCain-Feingold's regulation of public financing and corporate campaign donations, since in June 2008 Obama became the first presidential candidate to forgo public financing in the general election, expecting that by doing so he could raise several millions more, much of it from the Wall Street and big-money interests that he now serially demonizes. The problem with Obama's hypocrisy is not just that, like most politicians, he does not do what he says, but that he fudges so vehemently and loudly and, to be candid,...

THE U.S. SUPREME Court has corrected a mistake it made in 2003, when it upheld a major flaw in the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform act of 2002. The reform measure, which the Times supported, made several important and positive changes in campaign finance law. It placed a ban on so-called soft money contributions — funds given to political parties and political action committees. Also, the act provided for quick disclosure of the source of all campaign donations and capped direct contribution to candidates. Unfortunately, McCain-Feingold went a step too far in abridging First Amendment free-speech rights by banning corporations and...

WASHINGTON (Dow Jones)--U.S. President Barack Obama used his weekly radio address on Saturday to assail a Supreme Court ruling this week clearing the way for corporations to spend freely on political advertisements, calling it a big victory for special interests and "devastating to the public interest." He added that his administration is working with Congress to develop a bipartisan legislative solution to override the ruling. "The last thing we need to do is hand more influence to the lobbyists in Washington, or more power to the special interests to tip the outcome of elections," Obama said in his address.

The White House war on Fox News heated up in early October. It culminated, after almost 3 weeks of harassment, in an unsuccessful effort to exclude Fox, a member of the White House press pool, from an interview with pay czar Kenneth Feinberg. In a successful pushback, members of the press pool unanimously refused to conduct any interview, unless Fox was included. The White House backed down. The language used to marginalize Fox was primarily “Fox is not a legitimate news organization” used by Gibbs on many occasions, and then Communications Director Anita Dunn’s “[T]he way we view it is...

Can the government suppress free speech critical of elected politicians? In the home of the First Amendment, that may seem an unusual question to pose. But that was the question before the Supreme Court this week, as it handed down a landmark ruling in the case of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. In a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court struck down a ban on corporations and labor unions using money from their general funds to produce and air campaign ads in races for Congressional and presidential races. Also overturned was a ban on corporations and unions airing campaign ads...

The Supreme Court yesterday confronted a fact in constitutional law that has been hard to justify: How is it that the First Amendment protects obscene speech, nude dancing and talk radio -- but permits Congress to shut down independent political messages from corporations and labor unions? Why do those groups get second-class status when politics, rather than, say, simulated child porn, is the topic? In the Citizens United case, Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for a five-justice majority, couldn't be clearer: The federal ban on such independent expenditures is unconstitutional on its face: "Speech restrictions based on the identity of the...

Lawmakers and reform advocacy groups are in a race against the clock to draft legislation that will put new restrictions on special-interest political cash before the midterm elections, after the Supreme Court stripped away limits on corporate and union contributions Thursday. The court ruled that corporations can spend unlimited money on ads urging people to vote for or against candidates, a position that also can be applied to Union. The court also struck down part of the landmark McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill that barred corporate- and union-paid issue ads in the closing days of election campaigns. Reaction to the decision...

The “First Principles” on which this country were founded are the principles that the Heritage Foundation works to advance everyday. In today’s landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision of Citizens United v. FEC, a conservative majority on the Supreme Court upheld some of the most important principles: the right to engage in free speech, particularly political speech, and the right to freely associate. It is no surprise that these rights are in the very first amendment in the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution. The Founders, who had fought a long, hard war with the English crown to establish our...

It looks like America, teetering as it was on the brink of a 'kinder, gentler' tyranny, has pulled back. Between the shocking election of Scott Brown in ploddingly-liberal Massachusettes, the overturning of much of McCain-Feingold's ban on election advertisements prior to elections, and the Russian disclosure that the Global Warming hoaxers were making up data, America emerged from this rather close call with a new direction. It appears that direction -- much to the consernation and dismay of the President and much of Congress -- is back to freedom. What made this possible? What forces drove back the blitzkreig of...

Score a big one for the First Amend ment. The US Supreme Court yesterday found that an activist group had every right to distribute a documentary critical of Hillary Clinton during the 2008 presidential primaries -- turning the landmark McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law on its head in the process. The 5-4 ruling also rolled back other campaign-finance statutes that predated McCain-Feingold -- meaning the government can no longer ban corporations and labor unions from spending money on activities and communications that support or oppose a candidate. Such laws, the court found, impose a "chilling effect" on political speech. Indeed, Justice Anthony...

The Supreme Court on Thursday rolled back a number of fundamental provisions in the campaign finance reform legislation known as the 2002 McCain-Feingold law. The high court's 5-4 decision will allow unlimited corporate and union funds to finance their political advocacy projects.

RUSH: Freedom is awaking from its coma today because of a huge, huge, huge Supreme Court decision -- huge. I cannot tell you how big this is. It's a 5-4 decision. The decision was written by Justice Kennedy. And what it does, it removes limits on independent expenditures that are not coordinated with candidate's campaigns. Meaning corporations and not-for-profits can spend any amount of money they want running ads and there's no limit as to when those ads can be run. So McCain-Feingold takes a huge hit today. Now, the question of campaign contributions directly to candidates was not part...

Supreme Court Drop-Kicks McCain/Feingold, Scores Victory for 1st Amendment. Obama preparing ‘Forceful Response’ Fans of the First Amendment can rejoice. In a 5-4 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court today struck down large portions of the abomination known as the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law, especially those aspects of the law that imposed restrictions on corporate spending on political issues. From The New York Times: WASHINGTON — Sweeping aside a century-old understanding and overruling two important precedents, a bitterly divided Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that the government may not ban political spending by corporations in candidate elections. The ruling was a...

These are dark days for Obama’s boss, unrepentant Nazicollaborator, George Soros. First the American people emphatically reject his socialized medicine project. Socializing the American health care system is one of the upper planks on the Soros manifesto. The same George Soros who told Steve Croft on 60 Minutes in 1992 that he had no remorse for his role in sending Jews to death camps now presents himself as the very soul of beneficence as he crusadesto exterminate terminally ill patients. “This brings me to that hotly debated subject, physician assisted suicide and euthanasia.” The compassionate Nazi collaborator wants us to...

Will the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision destroy American democracy? You might think so given the responses of its critics. The Citizens United decision, far from signaling the fall of the republic, strengthens the First Amendment and freedom of speech. Let's start with the facts of the case. Citizens United, a nonprofit political advocacy group, produced a film called "Hillary: The Movie" about the current Secretary of State, who at the time was a presidential candidate. The movie did not reflect well on Ms. Clinton but did not explicitly advocate her defeat in the 2008 presidential contest. Citizens United planned...

WASHINGTON—A divided Supreme Court struck down limits on corporate political spending, overturning two precedents in a ruling likely to affect campaigning in the 2010 elections. President Barack Obama called the decision a victory for big oil, Wall street and other interests, and said he would work with lawmakers to craft a "forceful response." The ruling underscored the impact of former President George W. Bush's two appointments to the court. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito joined the five-justice majority in ruling that a central provision of the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign-finance act violated the First Amendment by restricting corporations...