Campaign Finance - The Supremes Have Spoken

[kentucky bucky]

What part of "Congress shall pass no law" don't they understand? This is the scariest and most under reported tragedy there has ever been. Bush isn't perfect and this bill proves it . I support him on almost every other topic, but this one flabbergasted me.

 

[Monkeyleg]

Waitone, I was just describing the situation right now as it pertains to each party. Now that the SC has handed down a decision that effectively repeals the First Amendment, we'll see attorneys from both parties studying how to circumvent the new law.

Let's face it: prior to 1974, you could give all the money you wanted to a candidate. Along came Nixon, and some folks said "why, there oughta be a law!" And so there was, needed or not.

In 1996, we had monies flowing to both parties from the Chinese, drug dealers, Indonesian special interests, rich former singers like "Babs," and other assorted scoundrels. In many cases, these donations violated the 1977 campaign finance laws. Along comes Saints McCain and Feingold, who get the masses to shout, "why, there oughta be a law!" No matter that existing law was already broken. It was time for a new law that would make a crime more of a crime.

It's no different than laws against murder. How many ways can you make murder more illegal before people stop committing murder?

I know I'm ranting to the choir here. It's just that it's enraging to watch the destruction of the most perfect political document in history, all in the name of TV facetime and PR stunts.

 

[Justin Moore]

It's just that it's enraging to watch the destruction of the most perfect political document in history, all in the name of TV facetime and PR stunts.

Yes, yes it is. And I point of fact, I saw almost NO stories about it today. Plenty about Micheal Jackson, and the bimbo from NBC's "Average Joe".

I'm enraged, trust me

 

[OF]

CNN had a little article buried on their web site for one day. It made no mention of any Constitutional issues or anything of substance at all. It was 100% "What a great thing this is to finally get money and corruption out of politics! Hooray!"



- Gabe

 

[TallPine]

"What a great thing this is to finally get money and corruption out of politics! Hooray!"

What they meant was:
"What a great thing this is to finally silence those who disagree with us! Hooray!"

 

[Bruce H]

Corruption or the appearance of corruption. This is the part that should scare the hell out of everybody. If a judge labels a group or party corrupt or having the appearance of being corrupt can they be shut down and allowed no speech? What else is burried in this 298 page monster?

 

[Obiwan]

I think the law stinks

I have no respect for Congress for passing it.

I am sorry that the President signed it

But I am absolutely sickened that the Supreme Court upheld it.

There is a certain political reality to the bill....go against it and you look like a crook.

The Supreme Court was the one group that could have "safely" blown it away without looking like they had their hands out.

So I understand how it could happen...since M/F were stupid enough to start it...it was probably doomed to succeed.

But I have to admit ...it is a little lame to blame this on the President....

Plenty of people could have stopped it.

And since we have already been told that "reasonable restrictions" make sense for the 2A....

Why is anyone surprised

 

[DaveB]

Hypothetical (I swear).

You live in a big city. That city has one newspaper. Everyone reads that newspaper.

The paper is owned by a corporation that has an interest in making money in the same city.

The newspaper prints news and opinion that is favorable to the interests of the owners of the corporation, and against other interests.

Now the corporation buys the local radio station, and the local cable channel, and all news that reaches the city's residents from 'local sources is therefore controlled by that one corporation.

Please explain to me how this is free speech, 'cause it doesn't look 'free' from where I sit.

db

 

[Jeff White]

Face it Bush LIED !!!!!

Obiwan said;

But I have to admit ...it is a little lame to blame this on the President....

No the president takes all the blame. He campaigned against this bill. He said he wouldn't sign it in the form it was in when it passed. Yet he signed it anyway. All of his apologists said that it was a brilliant political move. That he knew it was unconstitutional and the Supreme Court would nullify it when challenged. Well what is the brilliant political strategy now?

Jeff

 

[longeyes]

Bush seems determined to cast aside his core constituency, or to take them for granted. If he's not a lefty he's doing a damn good imitation of one. For everything he's done to advance Constitutional principles and liberty, he's done two things to take us backward.

Now we're hearing that indeed this White House is paving the way (see below) for another amnesty, coupled, no doubt, with a Social Security give-away later on.

I'm fed up.


----------------------------------------------------------

White House verifies immigration review


By Jerry Seper
THE WASHINGTON TIMES



The White House yesterday said a new immigration review is under way that could lead to amnesty for millions of illegal aliens living and working in the United States.
Confirmation of the review came during a White House briefing, just two days after Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said during a town hall meeting in Miami that the government had to "afford some kind of legal status" to the 8 million to 12 million illegal aliens in the country.
"We've taken steps to improve border security — significant steps, I might add; have made great progress there. We've taken steps to improve the immigration infrastructure," said White House spokesman Scott McClellan. "Those are some foundations for moving forward on a more orderly, safe and humane migration policy.
"And this is a matter that really is under review at this point. We continue to look at it," Mr. McClellan said.
Mr. Ridge, during a question-and-answer period after his Miami speech, said he would not support granting citizenship to illegal aliens now in the country "because they violated the law to get here," but the government needed to "determine how you can legalize their presence" and then institute an immigration enforcement policy to prevent future illegal entries.
His comments drew harsh criticism from some congressional sources and immigration opponents.
Rep. Tom Tancredo, Colorado Republican and chairman of the Congressional Immigration Reform Caucus, said Mr. Ridge should resign if he is unable or unwilling to enforce existing immigration laws. He said the secretary's comments would "open a floodgate" of illegal aliens "trying to sneak into the United States in order to be first in line for amnesty."
Dan Stein, executive director of the Federation of American Immigration Reform (FAIR), questioned what security interests of the United States were being served "by granting legal status to people whose identities cannot be confirmed and who already have shown an unwillingness to observe U.S. law?
"The law has to be respected before you grandfather in the very people who disrespected it," he said.
Various amnesty bills are pending in Congress, although none has been scheduled for debate or a vote.
Congress approved an amnesty program in 1986, granting legal status to 2.7 million illegal aliens then in the country. The program contained increased enforcement and penalty policies aimed at ending illegal immigration, although the illegal alien population in the United States today is more than twice the total in 1986.
Mr. McClellan said Mr. Bush "has always been a strong believer that America should be a welcoming society. We are, after all, a nation of immigrants, as he often points out."
He said discussions with Mexico on a new amnesty proposal were ongoing prior to the September 11 attacks, but were halted.
Mr. Bush and Mexican President Vicente Fox had agreed to consider granting permanent residency, or green cards, to as many as 3 million Mexicans living illegally in the United States.
Mr. McClellan also said that although some people had interpreted Mr. Ridge's comments as "some broad amnesty discussion," it was not that at all.
"He's very involved in, obviously, overseeing border security and immigration matters, now under the new Department of Homeland Security," he said. "And I think he's been looking at the issue of the large number of illegal immigrants we do have in the country and looking at those that could be threats and those that are here for other reasons.
"And so, he's just talking about the realities that we are facing now," he said.
Asa Hutchinson, Homeland Security's undersecretary for border and transportation security, also defended Mr. Ridge's comments, saying they simply reflected ongoing debate in Congress over the immigration issue.
"Secretary Ridge addressed it very honestly yesterday, engaged in that debate, but clearly this administration has not taken a firm policy position on that and the debate continues," Mr. Hutchinson said.

 

[Bob Locke]

I have no respect for Congress for passing it.

I am sorry that the President signed it.

But I am absolutely sickened that the Supreme Court upheld it.

Let me get this straight: Of the three branches of our government, only the SCOTUS is actually charged with upholding the Constitution? Why are they more to blame than the Congress or the White House?

There is a certain political reality to the bill....

So if the polls tell Bush that he needs to sign the AWB back into law, and he does it, are you gonna give him another free pass due to the "political reality" of the situation?

What you basically said here is that it's okay to sell out the Constitution if it will help keep you in a favorable light with the public.

How much gutting of the Constitution are you willing to live with if it means four more years of Bush?

The Supreme Court was the one group that could have "safely" blown it away without looking like they had their hands out.

No, Bush could have stood up and said that the bill, in the form presented to him, violated the right of the American people to exercise free speech, and he could have sent it back to Congress for more work. He'd have looked like a defender of speech on the matter, and would have actually upheld his oath of office at the same time.

Such a concept, that upholding your oath of office thing. Remember when a man's word actually meant something? And you know as well as I do, that if you'll lie about the little things, you'll lie about the big ones, too.

GWB is no friend of the Constitution, nor of those who still believe in it. Bill Clinton committed perjury, and we called for his head. GWB colludes with the Congress and the SCOTUS to undermine one of the most fundamental rights in the Constitution and he gets a free pass from the majority of his supporters.

But I have to admit ...it is a little lame to blame this on the President....

Yeah, good point. I mean, we all saw the gun being held to his head as he signed a bill that he stated had un-Constitutional provisions in it. His hands are as pure as snow. Totally faultless.

You know, we used to deride the Democrats for their blind devotion to Clinton, and rightly so. The "cult of personality" that followed him across the country was sickening.

Guess what? It's back. Only now it's okay because Bush is "our guy", and it's okay if "our guy" bends us over and has his way because he uses a little lube and the Dem's don't.

Un-freakin-believeable.

 

[Monkeyleg]

DaveB, what you described is not hypothetical at all. Here in Milwaukee there's only one newspaper: the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. The only other "newspapers" are the little daily-shopper coupon types, or a couple of very small underground papers.

So, there's really just one print outlet in town.

Journal Communications also owns the largest of the three TV stations, and one of the largest radio stations.

It also owns many of the state's small-town newspapers, as well as radio and TV stations, and is buying up more on a weekly basis.

And Journal Communications has an agenda--political as well as financial--that they pursue.

Now, they're even freer to pursue that agenda.

 

[ravinraven]

A note on style.

Writing style, that is. No I'm not a linguist. I once lost a job as an English teacher for telling a class that the word innuendo was Italian for Preperation-H. [thanx, Foster Brooks]

Anyway. Somewhere in these many wonderful threads generated by SCOTUS's selling out of the first amendment, someone wrote "Congress, SCOTUS and POTUS....." That was inartistic! So I consulted my super bunny brain and suddenly realized that the congress in Washington DC is a Bicameral Legislature. It's the Bicameral Legislature Of The United States. BLOTUS. So. Now we should say BLOTUS, POTUS and SCOTUS. The First Lady is known as FLOTUS. In Hitlary's case, the term became FLOTSOM.

So we have BLOTUS, POTUS and SCOTUS and what are they doing? They are Smashing Constitutional Rights Every Way. They SCREWUS.

There! That should straighten things out.

Thanx for your time.

ravinraven

 

[seeker_two]

Well said, raven...

 

[243_shooter]

Watch the news, the most important current event seems to be the flu spreading, during flu season no less! even got to listen to one doctor feverishly explain that it was spread by close contact, and sneezing, who would have though?

In a sane society I would think that the supreme court taking the constitution apart would make the news... sodomy is a constitutional right apparently, which they adamently uphold, but free speech isn't...

The most frightening part of the whole deal is that 99% of the people I know either don't understand the implications, or don't care.

Could be I'm taking it out of proportion, but it seems to me that if freedom of speech falls, all is lost.. Check-mate against freedom you could say.

I suspect this will shift the decline of society into high gear.. Long live rome

Leo

 

[longeyes]

The silence on the trashing of the First Amendment is indeed depressing and ominous. But not so surprising. The media is all about Jacko, Laci, Ryan and Trista, Paris, Kobe, and Dru, and they are only reflecting what the largest segment of the American public is all about. How many people are educated enough or interested enough to care about political speech or to have any themselves worth communicating? Have you tried political discourse with a liberal lately? Emotion, not reason, rules. Meanwhile, we have handed America over to the "experts"--be it in education, social welfare, law, what have you--over the last several decades. That leaves us more time to focus on shopping and orgasms. Why worry about whether the Bill of Rights is more shadow than substance or whether the borders are de facto open or China is producing twice as many engineers a year as we do? Chill out and lighten up and rock on. Too much of America is an Addict Nation and may, frankly, be unsalvageable. I think the time for building ramparts and finding allies has arrived.

 

[Waitone]

No surprise electronic media is quiet. CFC handed a great big slice of power to the electronic media. Unless changed, from now on the Rathers, Jennings, and Brokaws of the world will be the exclusive arbitrator of political discourse 30 / 60 days before an election. Why on earth would they go into wall to wall analysis to blow the whistle on themselves. It is best to let the ignorant, uninformed peasantry sleep.

That's the bad news. Good news is the law will take effect in the 2004 election. Limitations will be fresh on everyone's mind. I expect there will be a fair amount of "***" once we hit the 60 blackout period. Education on what BLOTUS, SCOTUS, and POTUS hath wroght will begin.

Yes the peasantry is sleeping and ignorant but that don't mean tomorrow is the same as today. This SCOTUS decision screams for adjustment.

 

[Dan from MI]

Thank you Justice O'Connor. You senile POS old hag.

And an F YOU goes out to Breyer, Stevens, Souter, and Ginsburg as well.

And another F You goes out to McCain and Feingold, and those who voted for this.

And a double F YOU goes to Carl Lenin and Debbie Stabmenow, my two Sinators who I have never voted for, EVER.

And one goes out to George W Bush, who I DID vote for. While I like his foerign policy, I am disapointed with his domestic policy to say the least, and I'm a Republican.

Kudos to Mike Rogers, my rep though. He voted right.

 

[Intune]

Waitone nailed it. The "people" will never notice... Bah!