We could also ban 527's from political activity. We should also require that 50% of the money a candidate raises come from within the district they seek to represent.Bad idea. Very bad idea.
We don't need less free speech. That is not the answer.
The 527 "loophole" doesn't just apply to the dhimmi's. The good people can use it too. So let's use it. Let's do it.
We don't need more draconian anti-speech laws. We need to stand up and speak.
We could also ban 527's from political activity. We should also require that 50% of the money a candidate raises come from within the district they seek to represent.Very bad idea. We don't need less free speech. That is not the answer.
The 527 "loophole" doesn't just apply to the dhimmi's. The good people can use it too. So let's use it. Let's do it.
We don't need more draconian anti-speech laws. We need to stand up and speak.
The way to understand the First Amendment, and to understand which government policies violate it, is to ask questions about newspaper publishing:If there is no restriction on the source or quantity of money which may found a newspaper, and if requiring newspapers to be objective would be unconstitutional and absurd, by what logic is it possible legally to prevent a newspaper from being associated with a political party, being sponsored by a political party, or even being a political party?
- Does money invested in a printing press have to come only from an existing print operation? Can it be illegal for a newspaper to incorporate and sell stock to people who are not journalists? To the contrary, money to be invested in a newspaper can come from a poor man frugally saving his money, or from a shipping tycoon or from a gas station owner.
- Does a newspaper have to earn a profit, and does it even have to charge a fee for its product? No, a newspaper can be free, and it can operate at a loss - may become a sinkhole of money for its investor(s), and may finally go bankrupt.
- Is a newspaper required by the First Amendment to be objective? To the contrary, the First Amendment means that a newspaper does not have to be objective.
- If the government did attempt to require newspapers to be objective, would it be possible for any newspaper to meet that standard? No - for the simple reason that
Half the truth is often a great lie. - Benjamin FranklinSince nobody ever can know, much less print, the entire truth, it would be impossible to ever prove the negative than any given report was not tendentious in omitting some fact from the report.To operate a newspaper is to exercise a constitutional right, and in no sense a duty. I cannot be required to found a newspaper, and I cannot be required to continue to operate a newspaper if once I have founded or otherwise acquired it. I can sell it, to anyone. Including, to the only other newspaper in town. Newspapers are free to collude with each other; it cannot be legally prevented. One newspaper can conspire with another to each assert that the other is objective, without evidence. Newspapers are free.
Newspapers are free. If newspapers have any motive to do so, they can operate in league with each other just as much as two major league baseball teams do - competing within agreed boundaries, and otherwise colluding with each other. They can form a joint operation to share rights to news stories amongst themselves. They can all join one guild. Newspapers are free.
Newspapers are free. If each of them has the same motive to select the same sort of story for front page emphasis, for inclusion in the body of the paper, or for systematic omission from any mention, they all can behave in the same way - and and if the result is that they all exhibit the same political tendency, they can do so without restraint. Newspapers are free.
Newspapers are free. They can compose, or subscribe to an existing,
Code of Ethics which they publish and/or post on their office walls. They can even make an effort to adhere to such, if they choose. Or not. Newspapers are free.If newspapers are free to do all of the above, and if they have motives to do any or all of the above, there is not the slightest reason to be surprised, or offended, at any evidence (no matter how strong) that they actually do so. In fact, if they have motive as they have opportunity, it is only rational to assume that they will routinely do it. Just as bears are in the woods, and bears have motive to drop excrement - and probably do so there.
The proofs of newspapers' political tendency which Ann Coulter presents in her books - Slander certainly, but also in Treason and Godless - should not surprise us. The only reason it does, is because we have been taken in by a massive propaganda canpaign.
What does that mean in relation to Campaign Finance regulation? It means that all such regulations are unconstitutional. But it also means something else. It means that when broadcasters ape - nay, amplify - The New York Times and other newspapers in order to produce broadcast journalistism which is "in the public interest" appeal to such example is no evidence at all of conformance with the public interest. It may interest the public - and since that is a motive of The New York Times, it probably does - but that is different and often antithetical to the public interest.
Broadcasting exists because of censorship of the many so that the transmissions of the few can be recieved over a broad area. Broadcast Journalism is illegitimate.
I agree -- we should be able to fight fire with fire and use the 527's the way the dems do.
Unfortunately, no Republican is willing to fund a 527 because the laws are so vague (as in, "freedom for me, but not for thee") and the penalties so severe that getting involved with one is a sure ticket to being lawyered into bankruptcy.