![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bedsitter23My favorite news story of the last month (non-Pitbull category) is from Ohio.
The state recently passed a law which bans lying in a political campaign.
I get it. I mean it seems on the surface, something everyone can get behind, like say, people should be nice to each other.
Reality isn't that simple though, and if one thing we know- it's that politicians lie. It's up there with death, taxes, and Cher's career as certainties.
The Ohio law makes it a crime to make knowingly or recklessly false statements about political candidates that are intended to help elect or defeat them. Complaints, which can be filed by anyone, are heard by the Ohio Elections Commission, which makes preliminary determinations and can recommend criminal prosecution. The first offense could lead to six months’ imprisonment, the second to disenfranchisement.
Makes perfect sense, right? We have seen enough dirty campaigns. We don't like it. We have terms like 'swift boating'. Surely, that should be stopped,
But let's look at the law- which also applies everyone according to the Ohio Attorney General, which means blogs, facebook, etc..
Of course, you probably know where this is headed. Lying has always been frowned upon, if not outright banned; but what's a lie?
A Conservative Group wanted to take out a billboard against a Democrat contender that said "Shame on Steve Driehaus! Driehaus voted FOR taxpayer-funded abortion.”
Driehaus cited the law and the Billboard company refused to run it.
The anti-abortion group is using the logic that Driehaus voted for the Affordable Care Act which according to their logic was a vote for taxpayer-funded abortion. The ACA is confusing enough and that great 'taxpayer funded abortion line' isn't true, though certainly ACA is murky enough as it is.
Still, you can see where this is going. Where do you cross into a "lie"? Also at what point (as the Attorney General contends) does that is become unconstitutional and violate the First Amendment.
Whether vague, a damned lie, an exaggeration or a lie that you believe to be true, does the law apply to such statements as "Rush Limbaugh is a fat idiot', "Obama hates America", or "After he was shot, Reagan opposed Gun Control like a Boss (Ho ho!). is it free speech?
The Supreme Court says "Yes". Thank God, because I lie in my blog all the time.
The Supreme Court says the law banning lying in political campaigns as unconstitutional and lying protected speech.
Now, this is a good story as it is, I suppose; and it gains some from the fact that the Court used Stephen Colbert in it's decision on what truth actually is; but the reason I am sharing this story is because while this was all going on, PJ O'Rourke and the Cato Institute delivered a 24-page brief to the Court to defend lying as free speech.
While it is certainly true, that I don't know if i want to live in a world where politicians can't lie; and even if I did, it would be easier to change the stripes on a zebra, or convince birds not to migrate in winter. It is as O'Rourke points out a fabric of America.
His brief stats out with the All-Timers
He hits the history of mudslinging- JQ Adams vs Andrew Jackson (the "slave-trading, gambling, brawling murderer") the Grover Cleveland illegitimate children claim (Ma, ma, Where's Pa), all of the Obama stuff (born in Kenya, Muslim, etc) and the Sally Hemmings problem (an accusation made against Jefferson which would have been condemned by this law if it was applicable at that time, because the truth took two centuries to come out)
O'Rourke ends the brief with a comment about "truthiness" with a line about how Colbert and Jon Stewart will have more of an influence on keeping politicians honest than the Ohio Election Commision ever could.
if you read one legal brief all year (and I may just read the one), make sure it is this one. Well worth your time for gems like this about the All-American nature of lying politicians and why we must fight to protect it.
The state recently passed a law which bans lying in a political campaign.
I get it. I mean it seems on the surface, something everyone can get behind, like say, people should be nice to each other.
Reality isn't that simple though, and if one thing we know- it's that politicians lie. It's up there with death, taxes, and Cher's career as certainties.
The Ohio law makes it a crime to make knowingly or recklessly false statements about political candidates that are intended to help elect or defeat them. Complaints, which can be filed by anyone, are heard by the Ohio Elections Commission, which makes preliminary determinations and can recommend criminal prosecution. The first offense could lead to six months’ imprisonment, the second to disenfranchisement.
Makes perfect sense, right? We have seen enough dirty campaigns. We don't like it. We have terms like 'swift boating'. Surely, that should be stopped,
But let's look at the law- which also applies everyone according to the Ohio Attorney General, which means blogs, facebook, etc..
Of course, you probably know where this is headed. Lying has always been frowned upon, if not outright banned; but what's a lie?
A Conservative Group wanted to take out a billboard against a Democrat contender that said "Shame on Steve Driehaus! Driehaus voted FOR taxpayer-funded abortion.”
Driehaus cited the law and the Billboard company refused to run it.
The anti-abortion group is using the logic that Driehaus voted for the Affordable Care Act which according to their logic was a vote for taxpayer-funded abortion. The ACA is confusing enough and that great 'taxpayer funded abortion line' isn't true, though certainly ACA is murky enough as it is.
Still, you can see where this is going. Where do you cross into a "lie"? Also at what point (as the Attorney General contends) does that is become unconstitutional and violate the First Amendment.
Whether vague, a damned lie, an exaggeration or a lie that you believe to be true, does the law apply to such statements as "Rush Limbaugh is a fat idiot', "Obama hates America", or "After he was shot, Reagan opposed Gun Control like a Boss (Ho ho!). is it free speech?
The Supreme Court says "Yes". Thank God, because I lie in my blog all the time.
The Supreme Court says the law banning lying in political campaigns as unconstitutional and lying protected speech.
Now, this is a good story as it is, I suppose; and it gains some from the fact that the Court used Stephen Colbert in it's decision on what truth actually is; but the reason I am sharing this story is because while this was all going on, PJ O'Rourke and the Cato Institute delivered a 24-page brief to the Court to defend lying as free speech.
While it is certainly true, that I don't know if i want to live in a world where politicians can't lie; and even if I did, it would be easier to change the stripes on a zebra, or convince birds not to migrate in winter. It is as O'Rourke points out a fabric of America.
His brief stats out with the All-Timers
“I am not a crook.”
“Read my lips: no new taxes!”
“I did not have sexual relations with that
woman.”
“Mission accomplished.”
"If you like your health care plan, you can keep it"
"If you like your health care plan, you can keep it"
He hits the history of mudslinging- JQ Adams vs Andrew Jackson (the "slave-trading, gambling, brawling murderer") the Grover Cleveland illegitimate children claim (Ma, ma, Where's Pa), all of the Obama stuff (born in Kenya, Muslim, etc) and the Sally Hemmings problem (an accusation made against Jefferson which would have been condemned by this law if it was applicable at that time, because the truth took two centuries to come out)
O'Rourke ends the brief with a comment about "truthiness" with a line about how Colbert and Jon Stewart will have more of an influence on keeping politicians honest than the Ohio Election Commision ever could.
if you read one legal brief all year (and I may just read the one), make sure it is this one. Well worth your time for gems like this about the All-American nature of lying politicians and why we must fight to protect it.
After all, where would we be without the
knowledge that Democrats are pinko-communist
flag-burners who want to tax churches and use the
money to fund abortions so they can use the fetal
stem cells to create pot-smoking lesbian ATF agents
who will steal all the guns and invite the UN to take
over America?
Voters have to decide whether we’d be
Voters have to decide whether we’d be
better off electing Republicans, those hateful,
assault-weapon-wielding maniacs who believe that
George Washington and Jesus Christ incorporated
the nation after a Gettysburg reenactment and that
the only thing wrong with the death penalty is that it
isn’t administered quickly enough to secular-
humanist professors of Chicano studies.
