[E. Pluribus Unum]

Smells like libel.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Smells like libel.

In its 1964 New York Times v. Sullivan decision, the Warren Court assayed to obliterate the right of politicians ^{who do not go along and get along with the Journalism Establishment} to sue for libel. They were so enthusiastic it was a 9-0 decision with two enthusiastic concurrences. The court held that politicians and judges suing for libel basically amounts to censorship of the press. There are gaping holes in that logic:

1. the right to sue for libel is in the Constitution much more clearly than the “right” to abortion is. This is so because
   1. the Bill of Rights unambiguously did not intend to modify the rights of the people. The BoR was enacted strictly to establish the principle that the federal government has no right to do that. That is stated outright in the Ninth Amendment, is stated in the Second Amendment - and,

   2. the wording of the First Amendment was crafted not to change the laws against libel or pornography. It does not speak simply of “freedom of . . . the press”; rather it speaks of "the freedom . . . of the press.” The freedom of the press was the existing freedom of the press - not absolute freedom but freedom within accepted limits. Not freedom to print pornography, and not freedom to libel anyone. It should be obvious that a First Amendment which abolished the right to seek redress for libel would have been controversial, and might not have been ratified.

2. So, the right to redress for libel was recognized when the BoR was written and adopted - and constitutes a clear case of an unenumerated right of the people. And even government officials are people. Not only are they people who have a right to their reputations as they have earned them, but since their reputations reflect well - or ill - on their adherents, the adherents of political figures have a right to have the reputations of such figures reflect their actual characters rather than a traduced version thereof. Scope for libeling public figures is scope for evading the questions such figures might raise by means of ad hominem attacks.

3. The reality of “the media” was then, and is now, that the wire services have homogenized journalism. The AP “wire,” for example, is a virtual meeting of the preponderance of journalism outlets. That “meeting” has been ongoing unceasingly since before the Civil War. "People of the same trade,” Adam Smith asserted, “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.”

4. What “conspiracy against the public” has resulted from it? What else would you expect from journalists conspiring against the public but a massive, self-serving, propaganda campaign? Journalism collectively needs to be believed and thought reliable and important. Accordingly all journalists can be enthusiastic about the slogan, “All journalists are objective.” For journalism as a whole, the slogan is patently self-serving - and patently absurd. In reality, journalism is systematically negative. “No news is good news” because good news “isn’t news.”

5. Since journalists know that journalism is negative, the claim that “journalism is objective” amounts to a claim that “negativity is objectivity. And you show me someone who believes that, and I’ll show you a cynic. But the interesting thing about cynicism is that if you are cynical about “A,” and “B” is the opposite of “A,” then cynicism towards “B” is completely incoherent. To be cynical about “A” is thus to be naive about “B.”

6. The reality is that journalism is cynical about society, and consequently naive about government (which, per Thomas Paine legitimately, exists only to limit evil in society). The true definition of “socialism,” IMHO, is exactly "the combination of cynicism towards society and naiveté towards government.”

7. The Democrat Party has no principle inconsistent with simply going along and getting along with journalism. In consequence Democrats never get libeled, and Republicans routinely are libeled.

None of which was before the Court in the Sullivan case.