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It's a good bet that the conversation in the Supreme Court break room the morning after the president's State of the Union speech was about Obama's drive-by distortion of its ruling in Citizens United v. FEC. Predictably, the spin at The Washington Post and Chicago Tribune was "Alito Disparages Obama's Supreme Court Criticism." Where else but in the Bizarro World of Obama's branch offices at the Post, Trib, and MS-NBC could we find such a polar opposite version of "reality"? Like their champion, these media corporations are extremely vexed that the Court leveled the playing field for all corporations and...

A major provision of the “Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002″, aka McCain-Feingold, was largely dismissed by the Supreme Court on January 21, 2010. President Obama’s reaction was swift and almost comically over the top. -... We are going to talk with bipartisan Congressional leaders to develop a forceful response to this decision. The public interest requires nothing less.Uh-oh! Whenever they use the term “bipartisan” you know they’re trying to sucker us. It’s become as transparent as their disingenuous names for bills like the so called “Stimulus” which was supposed to fund “shovel ready jobs” and instead went to non-existent...

In 2000, Senator John McCain asked me to campaign on his behalf for president. I was honored to do so. I remember traveling to South Carolina to act as a one-man truth squad and doing countless television interviews for John. It was a tremendous experience and, as we all know, John came up short. But as always, he fought hard for what he thought was right. But the John McCain I supported for president in 2000 is not the same John McCain I’ve watched frustrate conservatives time and again as our senator. He still fights hard, all right, but too...

MANCHESTER – U.S. Rep. Paul Hodes, D-N.H., said yesterday he intends to introduce a proposed constitutional amendment to overturn a controversial U.S. Supreme Court decision last week that removed corporate and other special interest campaign spending limits. "The upcoming election in New Hampshire should be decided by the people of the Granite State, not special interests with unlimited cash," said Hodes, who is a candidate for the U.S. Senate. "Washington is broken, and this will only make business as usual worse." Hodes said he has been "fighting to stop the power of money in politics and now, after consulting with...

Senate Democrats, taking a cue from President Obama, are ripping into Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito for his understandable (and understated) display of disagreement with the president's misrepresentation of a recent court decision. During last week's State of the Union Address, recall, Obama launched into an unpresidential attack on the court's upending of the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance act. Obama incorrectly claimed the ruling -- in which Alito joined the 5-4 majority -- would permit foreign corporate campaign contributions in US elections.

In his State of the Union address, the president of the United States called out the Supreme Court by name for sharp condemnation and egged on his congressional supporters to jeer its recent decision: "Last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law to open the floodgates for special interests—including foreign corporations—to spend without limit in our elections. Well I don't think American elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities. They should be decided by the American people, and that's why I'm urging Democrats and Republicans to pass a bill that helps...

A broken clock...

That has to be the only reason he is opposing the Supreme Court decison. Come 2011, here come the wave of political ads against Obama(if he decides to run again)and the Republicans will have a field day considering his record now and no sign of any significiant economic improvement for 2010. Can you imagine if 8 or 9 prominent Republicans run? It would resemble what will happen come November 2010.

Sen. Orrin Hatch said Wednesday that President Barack Obama was out of line to use his State of the Union speech to criticize the Supreme Court while six of its members sat nearby. "Taking on the Supreme Court like he did, I thought it was kind of rude," said Hatch, a Utah Republican and former chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. "It's one thing to say that he differed with the court but another thing to demagogue the issue while the court is sitting there out of respect for his position." Obama called on Congress to "correct" the court's decision...

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...

The Supreme Court has ruled that corporations may spend freely to support or oppose candidates for president and Congress, easing decades-old limits on their participation in federal campaigns....

From the Live Blog: Erin Miller: Justice Kennedy writes for the Court. 10:01 Erin Miller: Reversed in part, affirmed in part, and remanded

The Supreme Court announced at the close of arguments on Wednesday that it will hold a special session Thursday morning, presumably to issue decisions. Such special sessions are quite unusual, leading many to suspect that the court will release its long-awaited decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, a major campaign finance case.

J.D. Hayworth yesterday took to the airwaves to pummel Grant Woods for filing a complaint with the FEC against the talk show host and potential Senate candidate. Woods alleged Hayworth is pulling in $540,000 a week in corporate in-kind contributions from KFYI/Clear Channel for using his show as a campaign platform. The response came in true talk show form as Hayworth called Woods an “ambulance chaser” who cashed in on a tobacco settlement lawsuit that was sold as a public health measure. “You’re even lower than some bacterial forms of algae, and that’s saying something,” Hayworth said, before chiding Woods...

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WASHINGTON – Independent advocacy groups will be able to spend more money to try to influence federal elections under a decision Friday from a federal appeals court that overturned rules limiting nonprofits' campaign spending. Three judges of the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington agreed with Emily's List, a nonprofit that backs women Democratic candidates who support abortion rights, that the regulations limited free speech rights. The Federal Election Commission enacted the rules in 2005, after concerns were raised about the amount of unlimited "soft money" contributions used to fund attacks in the 2004 election. The FEC said nonprofits would...

The First Amendment, as rewritten under the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law: "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, except if it is funded by a corporation, unless it is a media corporation, or if the speech occurs just prior to an election, unless it is in the form of a book, which, even though the law covers books, too, the Federal Election Commission would never apply that law to books because we say so, though we said something entirely different a couple of months ago." In an apoplexy of righteous indignation over...

WASHINGTON.Last March, during the Supreme Court argument concerning the Federal Election Commission's banning of a political movie, several justices were aghast. Suddenly and belatedly they saw the abyss that could swallow the First Amendment. Justice Antonin Scalia was "a little disoriented" and Justice Samuel Alito said "that's pretty incredible." Chief Justice John Roberts said: "If we accept your constitutional argument, we're establishing a precedent that you yourself say would extend to banning the book" -- a hypothetical 500-page book containing one sentence that said "vote for" a particular candidate. What shocked them, but should not have, were statements by a...

A central pillar of federal election law appeared to be crumbling Wednesday as government lawyers faced tough questioning at a special Supreme Court hearing about whether limitations on corporate and union campaign spending violated the First Amendment right to free speech.

High court tackles 'Hillary: The Movie,' again It's 'not a musical comedy,' Justice Stephen Breyer says of the film WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court signaled Wednesday it may let businesses and unions spend freely to help their favored political candidates in time for next year's elections. In a case that began with a movie attacking Hillary Rodham Clinton, newly seated Justice Sonia Sotomayor jumped right into the questioning. She appeared skeptical about taking the far-reaching step of lifting the ban, a move urged on the court by a lawyer for a group that made the 90-minute movie that sought to...

The selective muzzles applied by the McCain-Feingold law. BY DAVID N. BOSSIE The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides that "Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech." The Framers' clear intent was first and foremost to protect political speech. Today, in a rare summer session, the Supreme Court will hear arguments as to whether it should overrule two previous, and in my opinion incorrectly decided, rulings on political free speech. Namely, the justices will decide whether or not to allow Austin v. Michigan State Chamber of Commerce and a significant section of McConnell v. Federal...

The Supreme Court considers government controls over speech. The Supreme Court is hearing arguments today regarding Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. The case could decide what political speech is prohibited by federal campaign finance laws. To put it simply, campaign finance laws constrain free speech. This showdown provides the high court with an opportunity to make clear that it's not the proper role of government to limit how much is being spent on campaigns or by whom. The controversy of the day is over a film released during the 2008 presidential campaign. "Hillary The Movie" didn't expressly advocate that...

The Supreme Court on Wednesday will hear arguments from campaign finance reform advocates and opponents in a case many insiders say will be the most significant decision in more than 35 years. The case the court will hear, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, has the potential to overturn key elements of campaign finance law that prevent corporate spending on elections, a move that would open the door to millions of dollars that could not be spent previously. “This is the biggest case in campaign finance law, really, since Buckley v. Valeo in 1976,” said Rob Kelner, a partner at...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court appears poised to wipe away limits on campaign spending by corporations and labor unions in time for next year's congressional elections in a case that began as a dispute over a movie about Hillary Rodham Clinton. The justices return to the bench Wednesday — nearly a month early — to consider whether to overrule two earlier decisions that restrict how and when corporations and unions can take part in federal campaigns. Laws that impose similar limits in 24 states also are threatened. The court first heard arguments in March in the case of whether...

THE Supreme Court seems poised to reshape cam paign-finance law, affirm ing fundamental First Amendment rights by overturning restrictions on corporate political speech when it rehears Citizens United v. FEC next Tuesday. At issue is whether the government can ban distribution of a political documentary, "Hillary: The Movie," produced by Citizens United, a conservative group that received some corporate funding to make the film. The government argues that it can -- relying on a 1990 case, Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce, that upheld a state law banning corporate political spending, and McConnell v. FEC, the 2003 case that upheld...

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court will cut short its summer break in early September to hear a new argument in a momentous case that could transform the way political campaigns are conducted. The case, which arises from a minor political documentary called “Hillary: The Movie,” seemed an oddity when it was first argued in March. Just six months later, it has turned into a juggernaut with the potential to shatter a century-long understanding about the government’s ability to bar corporations from spending money to support political candidates. The case has also deepened a profound split among liberals, dividing those who...

With the battle over ObamaCare heating up to white-hot temperatures -- which promise to become even hotter in the fall -- I became a little curious today to see who the heavy hitters are, donations-wise, to Democrats in their fight to keep all those un-American, well-dressed mobs currently invading August town halls across the country from seizing the reins of power in a coup d’état of astounding proportions. … Naturally, the top spot's occupied by our favorite group of folks; the lawyers. For 2008, they somehow managed to rub two nickels together -- to the tune of 126.8 million dollars...

The Republican National Committee is asking a federal court to restore the ability of national parties to raise unlimited amounts of money and to spend it to help elect state-level candidates. The case focuses on hotly contested governor’s races in New Jersey and Virginia. The 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign financing law (PL 107-155) does not allow national parties to give money directly to state candidates. The RNC wants to change that so it can expressly back the party nominee for governor, advertise and send out mailings on behalf of state or local Republican candidates and make get-out-the-vote calls. The law also...

<p>Decades of lawmaking and court decisions restricting the flow of cash into U.S. elections are on the verge of coming undone, placing President Barack Obama in the unexpected position of presiding over the possible demise of the modern campaign finance regime.</p>

Pair Try to Force Naming of More Commissioners. BY DAN EGGEN Seven years after their landmark campaign finance legislation became law, Sens. John McCain and Russell Feingold are reuniting under the banner of spending reform at a time when restrictions have come under fire both in the courts and at the embattled Federal Election Commission. McCain (R-Ariz.) and Feingold (D-Wis.) announced this week that they were blocking the appointment of Democratic union lawyer John Sullivan to the FEC until President Obama agrees to fill two other open panel seats. The two senators, who co-sponsored legislation in 2002 that banned "soft...

The campaign finance dream team of Sens. Russ Feingold and John McCain is reuniting to block President Barack Obama’s first appointment to the Federal Election Commission and to push him to shake up the embattled agency. In a surprising move that invokes memories of a bitter skirmish during Obama’s annihilation of McCain in last year’s presidential election, Feingold (D-Wis.) and McCain (R-Ariz.) have placed a hold on the FEC nomination of Democratic labor lawyer John Sullivan, POLITICO confirmed Tuesday. Their hold could reverberate in Congress, the White House, the 2010 midterm elections and beyond. In a statement issued in response...