(H/T – Owen)
When the McShame-Slimeroad Lieberal Protection Act was passed and signed, who seriously doubted that LeftStream Media outlets like the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel would encourage the Supreme Court to forget not only that freedom of speech is in the Bill of Rights, but that it comes before freedom of the press? Guess it’s time for a fisking, while I still can.
The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments Tuesday on a case having Wisconsin ties and national import. The outcome will decide the strength of the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign finance law. The court mustn’t weaken the one limited tool Congress has come up with recently to regulate campaign spending and to help ensure clean elections.
That’s funny; I seem to remember from my high-school civics class (I was probably one of the last to have a properly-taught one in the public-school system) that if there is a conflict between a law and the Constitution, the Constitution wins every time, regardless of whether the law “makes sense”. Further, as evidenced by the 2004 elections, McShame-Slimeroad did NOTHING to make the election cleaner.
That means the court should rule in favor of the Federal Election Commission and against Wisconsin Right to Life, a non-profit organization, which is arguing that it was lobbying, not electioneering, when it ran broadcast ads in 2004 that mentioned the name of U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, the Wisconsin Democrat and one of the law’s namesakes, who was running for re-election….
What part of “Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech…” doesn’t the idiotorial board understand? Is it “no”, or “abridging”? Let’s define both (from Dictionary.com). The second definition of the adjective version (the first is of “no” is, “Not at all; not by any degree.” The second definition of “abridge” is, “To cut short; curtail.”
Now, let’s rewrite that particular section of the First Amendment so that its plain-English meaning is clear – “Congress shall…not by any degree curtail the freedom of speech….”
…Other organizations that engage in politics – even groups that back a woman’s right to choose an abortion – are siding with Wisconsin Right to Life on this issue.
A blatant attack on rights sure makes strange bedfellows.
Were the ads merely a lobbying tool, then they could run during the blackout periods prescribed by McCain-Feingold. An organization is barred from using funds from its general treasury to air commercials naming candidates during the 30 days before a primary election and the 60 days before a general election.
The Wisconsin group’s commercials, which ran until Aug. 15, 2004, criticized the filibuster in the Senate of President Bush’s appeals court nominees and urged viewers to call Feingold and Sen. Herb Kohl, also a Wisconsin Democrat, and urge them to oppose the filibuster. The group argues that the ads were trying to affect voting in the Senate, not at the ballot box.
Let’s see; the ads addressed an issue up for a vote in the Senate, and mentioned both Senators. If Congress were even more dysfunctional than they are (and they may well be that dysfunctional), if they wanted to avoid public attention to controversial issues, they would simply wait until this “blackout” period to deal with them.
In reality, as the government notes, there’s no clear line between the two activities during election time. In fact, an announced goal of Right to Life in 2004 was Feingold’s defeat. Yet the ads were unrelated to that goal? Not hardly.
That is not germaine. They also had a vested interest in the outcome of the current vote, which was taken prior to the election. Further, Feingold did not have a primary opponent, so even if somehow I missed the “except during a campaign” exemption in the text of the Bill of Rights (or succeeding Amendments), the “blackout” would seem to not apply in this case.
McCain-Feingold sought, among other purposes, to plug a hole that allowed organizations to evade campaign law by running ads that pretended to deal with issues, not candidates. Instead of outright urging viewers to vote against an elected official, they would urge viewers to call that official and express how they felt on a particular issue. The viewers got the point. Were the court to rule in favor of Right to Life, these sham issue ads would make a comeback.
McCain-Feingold does permit third-party ads during the blackout period but by political action committees. Right to Life does have a PAC, but it lacked the funds to run the commercials in question, the organization argues.
You mean like last-second hit pieces on President Bush in both the 2000 and 2004 campaigns (the latter based on a bald-faced lie that likely would have gone uncorrected with the next “logical” step in McShame-Slimeroad, the regulation of blogs)? You mean like editorial endorsements in virtually every election? Those items are specifically protected under McShame-Slimeroad without newspapers and their kind having to register as PACs.
Yes, McCain-Feingold does restrict speech, but there is a balancing act required here. A democracy demands clean and transparent electioneering.
So the idiotorial board admits that the law is un-Constitutional. Let me rewrite those last two sentences a bit and see if the folks at 4th and State would still approve:
This federal bill does restrict the press, but there is a balancing act required here. A democracy demands clean and honest reporting.
I’ll bet they would be up in arms.
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