First Amendment

Ugh. Could Someone PLEASE Explain the First Amendment to Donald Trump? Quickly?

/ Jack Marshall / 31 Comments

This morning, I was simultaneously listening in on CNN (hyping Harris absurdly), MSNBC (well, you know) and Fox News, where the morning trio of hyper-partisan clowns were hosting Trump in a 30 minute phone monologue. First, I got a laugh when a CNN reporter commented on Harris having to navigate the complexities of Israel’s war with Gaza (Hamas). He actually said, first, “This is a major issue for Harris” and five seconds later that “Republicans are trying to make an issue out of this.” Yes, Harris was one of the first Democrats to call for a cease fire in Gaza, essentially making sure Hamas’s adverse consequences for slaughtering and raping Israel civilians on October 7 were minimal, but because she was only a VP at the time, and, after all, Kamala Harris, Idiot, nobody paid much attention to how irresponsible that position was. It is an issue, of course, but CNN will try “Republicans pounce!” even when everyone should pounce.

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Ethics and Constitutional Dunces: The 320 House Members (Mostly Republicans) Who Voted for the “Antisemitism Awareness Act”

/ Jack Marshall / 18 Comments

You know, or should, that your conduct is unethical and outrageous when it makes Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fl.) look good by comparison Gaetz voted against HR 690, as every member of the House should have since it is throbbingly unconstitutional on its face, no question, no argument, a flat out First Amendment violation. Gaetz told his followers on Twitter/X that he voted against the proposed legislation because it is a “ridiculous hate speech bill.”

“Antisemitism is wrong, but this legislation is written without regard for the Constitution, common sense, or even the common understanding of the meaning of words,” he wrote. Bingo. The bill, in weasel words remarkable even by recent Congressional standards, declares that “anti-Semitism” is a violation of title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (42 U.S.C. 2000d et seq.), and embraces an expansive definition of the term “adopted on May 26, 2016, by the IHRA, of which the United States is a member, which definition has been adopted by the Department of State; and… includes the “[c]ontemporary examples of antisemitism” identified in the IHRA definition.”

The IHRA definition includes examples of pure speech, and I would expect any junior in high school to know that these cannot be criminalized:

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There is Hope! Part 2, The Vindication of Waylon Bailey

/ Jack Marshall / 2 Comments

Waylon Bailey, the social media-user who was arrested by a Wuhan virus totalitarian idiot for making a joke and initially denied justice by a U.S. District Judge who doesn’t know the law, finally was awarded $205,000 in compensatory and punitive damages by a federal jury. It’s not enough, not even close, and the publicity the episode has received (virtually none) underlines that point.

These are the kinds of cases juries should address with $83 million in damages (just picking a number out of the air, there) to make the next Gestapo-inclined officer who considers punishing a citizen for exercising his constitutional rights think twice, or even three times. At least, however, Waylon Bailey was vindicated by our lately maladjusted justice system.

There is hope.

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Incompetent Elected Official of the Month: Oklahoma State Senator: Nathan Dahm, (R-Broken Arrow)

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

Senator Dahm has introduced Senate Bill 1837, the “Common Sense Freedom of Press Control Act.” Here are its main provisions:

“Each individual reporter, producer, writer, editor, or any other employee involved in the production of content distributed by a media outlet is hereby required to:

a. complete a criminal background check conducted by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation,
b. receive a license as prescribed by the Corporation Commission as provided in subsection C of this section,
c. complete a propaganda-free safety training course of no less than eight (8) hours as prescribed by the State Department of Education, which shall be developed in coordination with PragerU,
d. provide proof of liability insurance no less than One Million Dollars ($1,000,000.00), and
e. submit to quarterly drug testing for illicit substances to be administered by the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation”

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Ethics Quote Of The Month: The 5th Circuit Court Of Appeals

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

“We find that the White House, acting in concert with the Surgeon General’s office, likely (1) coerced the platforms to make their moderation decisions by way of intimidating messages and threats of adverse consequences, and (2) significantly encouraged the platforms’ decisions by commandeering their decision-making processes, both in violation of the First Amendment.”

—A three-judge panel of the The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in New Orleans, substantially upholding a lower court’s preliminary injunction in The State of Missouri et al v Joseph R. Biden, Jr., et al,

The Per Curiam opinion is here, and its legal and ethical clarity cannot be overstated. The Court wrote in part,

. . . On multiple occasions, the officials coerced the platforms into direct action via urgent, uncompromising demands to moderate content. Privately, the officials were not shy in their requests—they asked the platforms to remove posts “ASAP” and accounts “immediately,” and to “slow[] down” or “demote[]” content.

It is uncontested that, between the White House and the Surgeon General’s office, government officials asked the platforms to remove undesirable posts and users from their platforms, sent follow-up messages of condemnation when they did not, and publicly called on the platforms to act. When the officials’ demands were not met, the platforms received promises of legal regime changes, enforcement actions, and other unspoken threats.

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Ethics Quote Of The Month: Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky)

/ Jack Marshall / 90 Comments

I was literally going to start this post with nearly the exact same statement, except I was going to ask how many progressives and die-hard Biden defenders would have the integrity to condemn the revelation that Facebook and Instagram censored posts and changed their content moderation policies after unconstitutional pressure from the Biden White House.

Not that this should have surprised anyone; it certainly didn’t surprise me, Censorship, deception and suppression of news, facts and reality is how the current mutation of the Democratic Party rolls, and Big Tech and social media have joined the mainstream media as their enablers and accomplices.

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I THOUGHT This Issue Would Eventually End Up At The Supreme Court, And Here It Is!

/ Jack Marshall / 27 Comments

A federal appeals court in New York ruled in 2019 that President Trump’s Twitter account was a public forum from which he was powerless to exclude people based on their viewpoints. Judge Barrington D. Parker Jr. wrote for a unanimous three-judge panel of \ the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, “We conclude that the evidence of the official nature of the account is overwhelming…We also conclude that once the president has chosen a platform and opened up its interactive space to millions of users and participants, he may not selectively exclude those whose views he disagrees with.”

I wondered at the time if the ruling was a by-product of anti-Trump mania, and I still wonder if the same ruling would have been made had the sensitive official tweeter been Barack Obama. I confess to being torn on both the ethics and the law regarding the matter.

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Twitter Ethics: The Dilemma Of The Asshole Tweeter

/ Jack Marshall / 12 Comments

Behold the tweet sequence above from the Twitter user who calls himself “BullshitSquared,” who is all in a huff because Twitter’s bots flagged a content-free ad hominem joke tweet and he hasn’t had his privileges restored for a month. Now he’s quitting the platform. Good.

Musk has to somehow stop Twitter from becoming such a cesspool of obscenity, racism, sexism, homophobia, stupid comments and useless invective that nobody serious wants to hang out there. At the same time, he needs to avoid censoring content—actual opinions, facts, assertions and ideas. This sounds easy, but it is very hard. It might be impossible.

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On The Freedom Of Speech Front…

/ Jack Marshall / 11 Comments

Strangely, many of the same people who are claiming that democracy is hanging by a thread or two are also trying to fray a rather obvious thread, the right to free expression and free speech. Since that First Amendment thingy is a bear, they have to find ways around it that will stifle ideas, opinions and arguments that interfere with the “greater good”.”” (as they see it, natch). Or pretend the First Amendment “isn’t what it is” (#64).

Recent developments:

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More Evidence That The Public Is In Need Of Basic Education Regarding The Constitution And The Bill Of Rights…

/ Jack Marshall / 10 Comments

The online petition can demand until it is blue in the face, if petitions could be blue in the face, or had a face, for that matter.

The comments of the citizen in the video clip are 100% First Amendment protected speech. There is no valid argument to the contrary. Signatories of such a petition have announced that a) they don’t believe in free speech; b) they want the government to censor individual opinions they disagree with and c) they are unfit to participate or benefit from a democratic republic, preferring a totalitarian government provided its agendas aligns with those of the petition-signers.

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