Democrats hide pet projects from voters

[GaryC 7]

Here's some info on it...

A provision in the McCain-Feingold law that requires candidates to personally declare their approval of any commercial calling for their election likewise covers radio, television and satellite broadcasts but not the Internet. And organizations whose campaign war chests are stuffed with large lump sums of unregulated soft money raised from special-interest groups will be able to spend with abandon on ads distributed by e-mail or posted on Web sites even though they will have to hold their fire in the broadcast media after Sept. 2.

One of the few political advertising regulations that reach Web sites is an FEC rule covering public communications by authorized campaign committees. Campaign messages posted on political committee Web sites or unsolicited campaign e-mails sent to more than 500 addresses must contain a note that the message was paid for by the committee. Other than that, all's fair in political ads on the Internet.

http://www.ojr.org/ojr/law/1094004108.php

Your leaving out the parts about not allowing political advertising 30 days before a primary and 60 days before a general election. You are also leaving out the restrictions regarding the ability to donate to candidates. As they say, the devil is in the details.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

There is legal precedent for libel/defamation, though it is notoriously difficult to prove. This is why film stars rarely, if ever sue US newspapers for libellous stories - but will actually wait for the story to be reprinted in Europe and prosecute a case over there.

New York Times Co. v. Sullivan

New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254 (1964), was a United States Supreme Court case which established the actual malice standard before press reports could be considered to be defamation and libel; and hence allowed free reporting of the civil rights campaigns in the southern United States. It is one of the key decisions supporting the freedom of the press. The actual malice standard requires that the plaintiff in a defamation or libel case prove that the publisher of the statement in question knew that the statement was false or acted in reckless disregard of its truth or falsity. Because of the extremely high burden of proof on the plaintiff, and the difficulty in proving essentially what is inside a person's head, such cases — when they involve public figures — rarely, if ever prevail.

[GaryC 7]

Here is an editorial that lays out what the McCain Feingold law is wrong.

McCain-Feingold law is a failure

SAN FRANCISCO (Map, News) - Well, so much for “getting rid of the corrupting influence of money on politics” — the basic aim of the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act of 2002, aka McCain-Feingold. That’s Russ Feingold, D-Wis., and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the presumptive front-runner for the 2008 GOP presidential nomination who raised “only” $12.5 million during the first three months of 2007. The Arizona senator trailed far behind former Gov. Mitt Romney, who raised $21 million and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani who raised $15 million, $10 million of which came in March alone. Among Democrats, Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., raised $26 million, former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards raised $14 million and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson raised $6 million. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., has not released his figures but is estimated to have raised about $22 million. Collectively, more than $125 million has been raised by the 2008 presidential candidates in just three months, with more than nine months to go before the first primary.

Think back to the days before McCain-Feingold became law. The biggest target of the law’s backers was the estimated $500 million in soft money contributed to political parties by corporations, individuals, labor unions and others. Just last year, Fred Wertheimer and Trevor Potter, two of the most ardent McCain-Feingold supporters, charged that soft money “ultimately turned into a $500 million national scandal and disgrace.” Now it looks like the presidential primary contenders will equal or even surpass that once-scandalous threshold long before the start of the general election campaign. We know little or nothing about what was promised by the candidates in return for this unprecedented flood of cash.

There is a distinction to be made between “soft” and “hard” money in politics, but the common denominator is the cash, the corrupting influence that McCain-Feingold’s backers sought to eliminate. Ever since Bill Clinton found creative new ways to channel foreign money into domestic politics, gathering and collecting from campaign donors has been raised — or lowered — to levels of sophistication and efficiency that would have amazed Boss Tweed. Despite McCain-Feingold, more money is flowing to candidates than ever before in American politics.

What McCain-Feingold did accomplish was opening the door for Congress to decide what is acceptable political speech. For the first time in American history, individual citizens cannot join with like-minded others as members of a variety of associations to buy a broadcast spot to criticize an incumbent congressman by name for 60 days prior to the November election. In other words, this terrible law has unleashed the most corrupting influence of all in giving career politicians the power of government to silence their critics. McCain-Feingold must be repealed.

http://www.examiner.com/a-665404~McCain_Fe..._a_failure.html

May I remind you that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Edited June 4, 2007 by Iniibig ko si Luz forever

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Is this the proposal?

[GaryC 7]

Is this the proposal?

Yes. As with a lot of laws it sounds good in theory but in practice there are unintended outcomes. I am totally opposed to any restriction on our 1st amendment rights. I would have rather seen a law that calls for total transparency of where the money comes from and who is spending it. (both hard and soft money) That would give the electorate the chance to see who is behind the ad and allows them to dismiss or take to heart what is said.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

McCain and Feingold also seriously damaged our First Ammendment rights by preventing ads which specifically mention members of Congress by name within 60 days of a general election, and 30 days of a primary. Voters should be able to hear what their representatives are doing.

I don't agree. Political ads should be about a politician spreading their message - letting voters know what it is that they stand for. The negative campaign ads stretch the truth at best about their opponent and the name of the game is if you can instill enough doubt in the voters about your opponent, they'll vote for you or not vote at all. I had a professor in college call it passive nihilism - people making choices not based on believing in someone or something, but as a reaction against something. Psychologically - it is very effective and that's why campaign strategists do it - but it comes at a cost to us all.

I see, restricting our first amendment rights to political speech is fine with you but wiretaps to combat terrorism is tearing apart our constitution? Is that fence that your straddling chafing yet?

Free speech doesn't protect someone from making defamatory claims about their political opponent, particularly without letting them have a rebuttal - that's where I see the problem with negative political ads - there is no way for those claims to be challenged except by making different ads and then the voter is left thinking they can't believe any of the candidates. Let them sling it out in the debates, but not through ads. It would be very costly for politicians to file libel suits against one another over false claims made in political ads, and it's rather slimy and slick to make exaggerated or false claims because regardless of whether those claims can be verified or not - the seeds of doubt have been planted into the minds of voters. That's not free speech in my book, just dirty campaigning.

You do realize how ridicules that sounds? Political speech has been this way since day one. None of this is new. Now you condone the restriction of one of our basic rights. Your selective outrage is very telling. I never want to hear you b!tch about Bush shredding the constitution again.

Gary, are you saying the making defamatory claims about a political opponent is protected free speech? And if you agree that it is NOT protected free speech - how do you enforce that duirng a political campaign? Do you want the candidates to be immersed in libel suits instead of trying to get their message out?

All political speech is protected. What one side considers defamatory the other side contends that it informing us of the other candidates past. I assume you are talking about Kerry and the swiftboats. While I didn't agree with those ads I do support their right to air it. We cannot start making judgment calls on what is legit speech and what isn't. There is to much at stake to start cutting back on our constitutional freedoms. I am serious here Steven, please take a close look at what you are stating here. This is our most valuable freedom and we cannot restrict it in any way or we risk loosing it all together. It isn't a partisan issue, it is protecting our very freedoms.

It's one of those those predicaments of Constitutional freedom. On one hand you want to protect someone's freedom of speech, while on the other hand, everyone deserves equal treatment under the law (14th Amendment).

Here is an example of where it becomes complicated...

A complicated legal case in California involves a Christian evangelist named Anne Lemen, who attorneys say is testing the limits of free speech, but not religious free speech. Rather, her case concerns whether comments she made that were ruled defamatory and false can be subjected to prior restraint -- that is, preventing speech before it has occurred.

A California trial court judge ruled that Lemen had made false statements about the Village Inn, a bar and restaurant on Balboa Island. Among those statements were her claims that the food is unsanitary, that illegal sex and drug activity take place there, and that the business is linked to the mafia. Lemen was ordered to stop making such remarks and not to videotape within 25 feet of the bar property. That court order is now being reviewed by the California Supreme Court.

Steve Crampton, a First Amendment law expert and chief counsel of the American Family Association Center for Law & Policy (AFA Law Center), says while Lemen's free speech is at issue, the court must examine the limits to that speech.

"I think the other side to the prior restraint argument here will be, it's not just the government coming in and barring speech before it's been made," Crampton says. "Much speech has already been uttered, and it's false and defamatory; and therefore, they're barring the repetition of false and defamatory speech," he asserts.

Lemen and attorney D. Michael Bush argued the case before the court last week, with the help of Duke University law professor Erwin Chemerinsky. Crampton says there are two major legal considerations to be weighed.

First, the court must consider whether the determination of falsehood on Lemen's statements may be a proper exception to the general constitutional rule of allowing free speech regardless of content, the pro-family attorney observes. "And then," he contends, "the question becomes, is the court's restraint, the order that bars certain speech, narrowly crafted to prohibit only that speech which is clearly beyond the pale."

In other words, Crampton explains, it must be determined whether the court's order is worded so as to restrain only the false and defamatory utterances while it otherwise allows Lemen to share her opinions. "Of course," the AFA Law Center spokesman adds, "opinions are wide open and ought to be allowed."

Crampton says he doubts the court will uphold the portion of the order preventing Lemen from videotaping within 25 feet of the bar on a public walkway. A ruling on the case is expected within the next few months.

http://www.onenewsnow.com/2007/02/free_vs_...speech_ca_h.php

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

I'm not sure why political speech, as far as defamation goes, should be treated different.

Defamation is defamation. Though as I pointed out - its extremely difficult to prove the "malicious intent" that defamation implies.

Edited June 4, 2007 by erekose

[GaryC 7]

McCain and Feingold also seriously damaged our First Ammendment rights by preventing ads which specifically mention members of Congress by name within 60 days of a general election, and 30 days of a primary. Voters should be able to hear what their representatives are doing.

I don't agree. Political ads should be about a politician spreading their message - letting voters know what it is that they stand for. The negative campaign ads stretch the truth at best about their opponent and the name of the game is if you can instill enough doubt in the voters about your opponent, they'll vote for you or not vote at all. I had a professor in college call it passive nihilism - people making choices not based on believing in someone or something, but as a reaction against something. Psychologically - it is very effective and that's why campaign strategists do it - but it comes at a cost to us all.

I see, restricting our first amendment rights to political speech is fine with you but wiretaps to combat terrorism is tearing apart our constitution? Is that fence that your straddling chafing yet?

Free speech doesn't protect someone from making defamatory claims about their political opponent, particularly without letting them have a rebuttal - that's where I see the problem with negative political ads - there is no way for those claims to be challenged except by making different ads and then the voter is left thinking they can't believe any of the candidates. Let them sling it out in the debates, but not through ads. It would be very costly for politicians to file libel suits against one another over false claims made in political ads, and it's rather slimy and slick to make exaggerated or false claims because regardless of whether those claims can be verified or not - the seeds of doubt have been planted into the minds of voters. That's not free speech in my book, just dirty campaigning.

You do realize how ridicules that sounds? Political speech has been this way since day one. None of this is new. Now you condone the restriction of one of our basic rights. Your selective outrage is very telling. I never want to hear you b!tch about Bush shredding the constitution again.

Gary, are you saying the making defamatory claims about a political opponent is protected free speech? And if you agree that it is NOT protected free speech - how do you enforce that duirng a political campaign? Do you want the candidates to be immersed in libel suits instead of trying to get their message out?

All political speech is protected. What one side considers defamatory the other side contends that it informing us of the other candidates past. I assume you are talking about Kerry and the swiftboats. While I didn't agree with those ads I do support their right to air it. We cannot start making judgment calls on what is legit speech and what isn't. There is to much at stake to start cutting back on our constitutional freedoms. I am serious here Steven, please take a close look at what you are stating here. This is our most valuable freedom and we cannot restrict it in any way or we risk loosing it all together. It isn't a partisan issue, it is protecting our very freedoms.

It's one of those those predicaments of Constitutional freedom. On one hand you want to protect someone's freedom of speech, while on the other hand, everyone deserves equal treatment under the law (14th Amendment).

Here is an example of where it becomes complicated...

A complicated legal case in California involves a Christian evangelist named Anne Lemen, who attorneys say is testing the limits of free speech, but not religious free speech. Rather, her case concerns whether comments she made that were ruled defamatory and false can be subjected to prior restraint -- that is, preventing speech before it has occurred.

A California trial court judge ruled that Lemen had made false statements about the Village Inn, a bar and restaurant on Balboa Island. Among those statements were her claims that the food is unsanitary, that illegal sex and drug activity take place there, and that the business is linked to the mafia. Lemen was ordered to stop making such remarks and not to videotape within 25 feet of the bar property. That court order is now being reviewed by the California Supreme Court.

Steve Crampton, a First Amendment law expert and chief counsel of the American Family Association Center for Law & Policy (AFA Law Center), says while Lemen's free speech is at issue, the court must examine the limits to that speech.

"I think the other side to the prior restraint argument here will be, it's not just the government coming in and barring speech before it's been made," Crampton says. "Much speech has already been uttered, and it's false and defamatory; and therefore, they're barring the repetition of false and defamatory speech," he asserts.

Lemen and attorney D. Michael Bush argued the case before the court last week, with the help of Duke University law professor Erwin Chemerinsky. Crampton says there are two major legal considerations to be weighed.

First, the court must consider whether the determination of falsehood on Lemen's statements may be a proper exception to the general constitutional rule of allowing free speech regardless of content, the pro-family attorney observes. "And then," he contends, "the question becomes, is the court's restraint, the order that bars certain speech, narrowly crafted to prohibit only that speech which is clearly beyond the pale."

In other words, Crampton explains, it must be determined whether the court's order is worded so as to restrain only the false and defamatory utterances while it otherwise allows Lemen to share her opinions. "Of course," the AFA Law Center spokesman adds, "opinions are wide open and ought to be allowed."

Crampton says he doubts the court will uphold the portion of the order preventing Lemen from videotaping within 25 feet of the bar on a public walkway. A ruling on the case is expected within the next few months.

http://www.onenewsnow.com/2007/02/free_vs_...speech_ca_h.php

Your mixing up two different things. Personal freedom of speech can be restricted. I.E. yelling fire in a theater or defaming someone. But political free speech is different. Because of differing political ideologically what is defamatory to one is shining the light of truth to another. It is dangerous to start regulating that because of the danger of one side or another can take control over what is considered something that can be restricted. Our right to express ourselves politically is not something that should be messed with. If you don't like what someone is saying in a political sense you have the right to ignore it.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

McCain and Feingold also seriously damaged our First Ammendment rights by preventing ads which specifically mention members of Congress by name within 60 days of a general election, and 30 days of a primary. Voters should be able to hear what their representatives are doing.

I don't agree. Political ads should be about a politician spreading their message - letting voters know what it is that they stand for. The negative campaign ads stretch the truth at best about their opponent and the name of the game is if you can instill enough doubt in the voters about your opponent, they'll vote for you or not vote at all. I had a professor in college call it passive nihilism - people making choices not based on believing in someone or something, but as a reaction against something. Psychologically - it is very effective and that's why campaign strategists do it - but it comes at a cost to us all.

I see, restricting our first amendment rights to political speech is fine with you but wiretaps to combat terrorism is tearing apart our constitution? Is that fence that your straddling chafing yet?

Free speech doesn't protect someone from making defamatory claims about their political opponent, particularly without letting them have a rebuttal - that's where I see the problem with negative political ads - there is no way for those claims to be challenged except by making different ads and then the voter is left thinking they can't believe any of the candidates. Let them sling it out in the debates, but not through ads. It would be very costly for politicians to file libel suits against one another over false claims made in political ads, and it's rather slimy and slick to make exaggerated or false claims because regardless of whether those claims can be verified or not - the seeds of doubt have been planted into the minds of voters. That's not free speech in my book, just dirty campaigning.

You do realize how ridicules that sounds? Political speech has been this way since day one. None of this is new. Now you condone the restriction of one of our basic rights. Your selective outrage is very telling. I never want to hear you b!tch about Bush shredding the constitution again.

Gary, are you saying the making defamatory claims about a political opponent is protected free speech? And if you agree that it is NOT protected free speech - how do you enforce that duirng a political campaign? Do you want the candidates to be immersed in libel suits instead of trying to get their message out?

All political speech is protected. What one side considers defamatory the other side contends that it informing us of the other candidates past. I assume you are talking about Kerry and the swiftboats. While I didn't agree with those ads I do support their right to air it. We cannot start making judgment calls on what is legit speech and what isn't. There is to much at stake to start cutting back on our constitutional freedoms. I am serious here Steven, please take a close look at what you are stating here. This is our most valuable freedom and we cannot restrict it in any way or we risk loosing it all together. It isn't a partisan issue, it is protecting our very freedoms.

It's one of those those predicaments of Constitutional freedom. On one hand you want to protect someone's freedom of speech, while on the other hand, everyone deserves equal treatment under the law (14th Amendment).

Here is an example of where it becomes complicated...

A complicated legal case in California involves a Christian evangelist named Anne Lemen, who attorneys say is testing the limits of free speech, but not religious free speech. Rather, her case concerns whether comments she made that were ruled defamatory and false can be subjected to prior restraint -- that is, preventing speech before it has occurred.

A California trial court judge ruled that Lemen had made false statements about the Village Inn, a bar and restaurant on Balboa Island. Among those statements were her claims that the food is unsanitary, that illegal sex and drug activity take place there, and that the business is linked to the mafia. Lemen was ordered to stop making such remarks and not to videotape within 25 feet of the bar property. That court order is now being reviewed by the California Supreme Court.

Steve Crampton, a First Amendment law expert and chief counsel of the American Family Association Center for Law & Policy (AFA Law Center), says while Lemen's free speech is at issue, the court must examine the limits to that speech.

"I think the other side to the prior restraint argument here will be, it's not just the government coming in and barring speech before it's been made," Crampton says. "Much speech has already been uttered, and it's false and defamatory; and therefore, they're barring the repetition of false and defamatory speech," he asserts.

Lemen and attorney D. Michael Bush argued the case before the court last week, with the help of Duke University law professor Erwin Chemerinsky. Crampton says there are two major legal considerations to be weighed.

First, the court must consider whether the determination of falsehood on Lemen's statements may be a proper exception to the general constitutional rule of allowing free speech regardless of content, the pro-family attorney observes. "And then," he contends, "the question becomes, is the court's restraint, the order that bars certain speech, narrowly crafted to prohibit only that speech which is clearly beyond the pale."

In other words, Crampton explains, it must be determined whether the court's order is worded so as to restrain only the false and defamatory utterances while it otherwise allows Lemen to share her opinions. "Of course," the AFA Law Center spokesman adds, "opinions are wide open and ought to be allowed."

Crampton says he doubts the court will uphold the portion of the order preventing Lemen from videotaping within 25 feet of the bar on a public walkway. A ruling on the case is expected within the next few months.

http://www.onenewsnow.com/2007/02/free_vs_...speech_ca_h.php

Your mixing up two different things. Personal freedom of speech can be restricted. I.E. yelling fire in a theater or defaming someone. But political free speech is different. Because of differing political ideologically what is defamatory to one is shining the light of truth to another. It is dangerous to start regulating that because of the danger of one side or another can take control over what is considered something that can be restricted. Our right to express ourselves politically is not something that should be messed with. If you don't like what someone is saying in a political sense you have the right to ignore it.

Well defamation isn't a matter of debate - but of fact. If you say without any factual basis that person X smokes dope and has a thing for children – that would reasonably be considered libelous and defamatory.

Still as far as the law goes it’s much more difficult to prove defamation as all comments (and I’m not just talking about political speech) are covered under the constitution as “fair comment”. That's the difference in US and European libel laws.

In Europe the onus is always on the "defamer" to prove that what they are saying is true, not for the victim to prove it false. If you are defamed in the US, you (the victim) have to prove not only that the accusations are untrue, but that the comments were published maliciously with a view to harming your reputation (usually you have to quantify those damages too).

That’s why there are so few successful defamation suits in the US, and explains why for example – Tom Cruise was able to successfully sue a UK newspaper for reprinting a story carried in a US publication which claimed that he was gay. Its also why Lord Archer was sent to prison for perjuring himself in a libel suit in 1987.

Edited June 4, 2007 by erekose