Astounding Scope

Government Claims Power to Ban Books and Speech

Cincinnati Times Union , July 1937 This is cherry-snipped, but it's obvious where Obama and Senate Democrats are heading.  One vote is all it will take to effectively strike the First Amendment by fiat.  JFC, I can't keep up with the pace of outrages this government is inflicting.   And yet  .....  Go figure “ On Mar. 24, the Supreme Court heard arguments in Citizens United v. FEC, the latest installment in an ongoing series of challenges to the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA), better known as McCain-Feingold. The group Citizens United produced a documentary critical of Hillary Clinton during her failed presidential campaign. (Citizens United also made a similar film about Barack Obama, though this lawsuit focused on the Clinton movie.) But when the group sought to market the movie through Video On Demand, the FEC blocked it. The FEC cited BCRA, which makes it a federal felony to fund any TV or radio broadcast that names a candidate for federal office in the thirty days prior to a primary election or sixty days prior to a general election, called the "blackout" periods. The Obama Justice Department defended the FEC's action with a team from the department's elite Solicitor General's Office. But that team was outmatched by the lawyer representing Citizens United, renowned former Solicitor General Ted Olson. Far more important than the specific facts in this case was the enormous scope of power that the Obama Administration was claiming under BCRA, an array so broad that the justices balked at the government's answers to their questions. The Obama Administration claimed that BCRA allows the federal government to ban a 600-page book if it mentions a candidate's name only once, a 90-minute movie if it mentions a candidate's name once, or even a toy action figure of a candidate. If the organization uses a single dime of its general funds to produce, promote or distribute any such materials during the "blackout" periods, it becomes a federal crime. The key justices in this case seemed astonished at the broad powers the Obama Administration was claiming under BCRA, and seem poised to rule 5-4 in favor of Citizens United. This would continue a steady trend over the past couple years, with moderate Justice Kennedy siding with the four conservative justices on issues of political speech. This will be the third BCRA suit in as many years, and should be decided by the same split as they others. The whole deal ”