"Congress shall make no law ... abridging the freedom of speech."
http://www.law.emory.edu/FEDERAL/usconst/amend.html#art-1
When those words were written in 1789, the Founding Fathers weren't thinking about protecting child pornographers, taking money from citizens by threat of force to give to "performance artists", banning Christmas displays by New York City schools, or pretty much anything said or written in defense of NAMBLA (thanks, ACLU). Those words were written primarily to protect what they lost under English rule, what they fought and won a war to take back: the freedom of political speech. The freedom to criticise, discuss, praise or damn the government as they saw fit, without fear of arrest. They enshrined it in the very first amendment to the Constitution, to make certain that their descendants would not have this precious freedom curtailed. However, in a stunning slap in the face to our once-cherished freedom of speech, that's exactly what Congress did. And this week, the Supreme Court of the United States, supposedly devoted to ensuring that no law passed would violate the Constitution, let it happen when they upheld the McCain-Feingold law.
In a 298-page ruling issued by The Supreme Court, it was ruled that "corruption or the appearance of corruption" is sufficient justification to "regulate" our freedom of speech. That means we only lose some of it, not all at once -- isn't that comforting? By "corruption", they mean when an individual, corporation or special interest group makes a large donation to a candidate or party, and recieves preferential treatment in return. Let me work this out. If a candidate favors, say, the aims (pardon the pun) of the National Rifle Association, and they make a campaign contribution to him or her, and the candidate continues to favor them... that's corruption? No, but that's the appearance of corruption now, isn't it? And the appearance of corruption is all it takes to "regulate" it. Real corruption is when, say, President Clinton pardons tax cheat Marc Rich (who traded with Iran while they held American hostages) after his wife Denise gives $1.3 million to the 1996 Clinton-Gore campaign and the Democratic National Committee, $450,000 to the Clinton library, over $100,000 to Hillary's campaign and thousands of dollars in gifts to the Clintons. Corruption is when Hillary's brother Hugh is paid $400,000 to get Glenn Braswell (convicted of fraud and tax evasion) and Carlos Vignali (a convicted drug dealer) Presidential pardons, and succeeds. Now THAT'S corruption.
The fallout effect of this ruling will be felt as the campaign season of 2004 draws to a close. Try buying a television, radio or newspaper ad next September or October and see how far you get. No media ad can influence the vote within 60 days of the election by attacking or promoting any candidate. The problem with this ruling is that every talk show on ABC, CBS, NBC, and PBS is going to have a steady conga line of Bush-bashers and politically-active Liberals under the guise of "news". Newspapers and magazines are going to be jam-packed with "news" stories like "How Bush Is Destroying The Entire World And How (whoever) Can Save Us All". Advocates for President Bush, Republicans, and Conservatives will be left further out in the media cold than a Soviet-era Siberian gulag in winter. Sixty days of a steady stream of anti-Bush rhetoric to which the administration will be unable to publicly reply.
Thank you, members of the Supreme Court, for ensuring us a completely one-sided media blitz in the two months leading up to the 2004 election.
