I’m shocked, shocked, to discover that this administration doesn’t give a damn about the Bill of Rights.
16 thoughts on “First Amendment?”
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I’m shocked, shocked, to discover that this administration doesn’t give a damn about the Bill of Rights.
Comments are closed.
Yeah, but it has dick to do with the First Amendment. The goal here is continued infantilization of the nation, plus preventing some of those embarassing questions of competence, judgment, conflict o’ interest et cetera with which the Administration has been annoyed recently.
See, a lobbyist is a professional. He knows a particular business (chemicals, aviation, trucking, whatever) inside out, and is trusted by them to represent their views. He also, of course, knows Washington inside and out. He knows where the bodies are buried, so to speak. He can’t easily be bamboozled by a load of doubletalk from a Senator or Executive Branch official.
Naturally such people are trouble. They can, and probably would, ask some embarassing and pointed questions if they were allowed to participate in meetings with Administration equerries. Say, Chairman Dodd, what about that sweet loan deal you got from Countrywide? How is that consistent with what you’re saying today? What are the real rules here, hmm? That stuff can prove embarassing.
Much better if the archangels of The One, dispatched to deliver us sinners from the darkness of our own making, can deal only with amateurs, with people who will gape and blink at their glory, take what they say at face value, only ask ignorant questions.
Pardon me if I’m wrong, but I was under the impression that the First Amendment was about freedom of speech – not freedom of bribery.
Well the Cheney rule was Lobbyists only, preferably
Rangers only….
> Pardon me if I’m wrong,
The first 10 times, sure, but we’re well past that. (Yes, some lobbyists bribe, and this won’t affect that. Some lobbyists don’t, and this will. And, lobbyist doesn’t mean what FC thinks that it does.)
I’m beginning to wonder if FC is a journalist.
FC,
If you have evidence of bribery, you have an affirmative duty to turn over that evidence to law enforcement officials.
Otherwise, you could become an accessory after the fact.
Based on the regular news reports it sounds like the DC law enforcement agencies are pretty busy dealing with the problem.
So what about the “freedom” of speech of people and groups who can’t afford professionals to work on their behalf then?
So what about the “freedom” of speech of people and groups who can’t afford professionals to work on their behalf then?
That question makes no more sense than asking “…what about the ‘freedom’ of speech of people and groups who can’t afford their own newspaper?”
Hint: Freedom of speech has nothing to do with what one can afford.
Rand, it makes no more sense. It also makes no less. On a closely related subject, “freedom of the press” means very little to someone who has neither a press nor access to one.
“freedom of the press” means very little to someone who has neither a press nor access to one.
Maybe access to the press is difficult outside the US. Otherwise, the ability to produce and publish written thoughts and ideas is available to many people, very cheaply. If anything, the only problem with “press”, is that we don’t press inked plates together to print. Otherwise, “freedom of the press” protects the liberty enjoyed by people like Rand, who owns his own blog that publishes his written thoughts and ideas. It also protects those who comment here.
So what about the “freedom” of speech of people and groups who can’t afford professionals to work on their behalf then?
Ah? Can you name such a group? Go ahead, try. Keep in mind, now, that if there are a million of you sad poor voiceless folks, you can each contribute $1 a year, and for $1 million a year, you can hire some pretty fancy lobbying.
That’s the point you know. That’s exactly why groups like the Sierra Club or unions or whatnot hire lobbyists. They pool their resources and use those resources to hire an expert to represent them full-time in D.C. Someone who learns the ropes, learns where to go, to whom to talk, and how to present the message best.
There’s a very good reason every politician in Washington is on the anti-lobbyist bandwagon. Lobbyists are effective. They hold Congress’ feet to the fire. They represent the voice of a big chunk of constituents very effectively, and the Congressthing can’t easily get away with betraying their interests.
Congressmen would be much happier if the only access voters had to them was direct, e.g. each individual writes or e-mails or telephones. They can easily brush off or bamboozle such uncoordinated amateurish response if they need to.
But then they’ll be less money and corruption in Washington, right? Ah ha ha ha. Let’s take Barack Obama as the New Model of 21st century politician. He has professional fund-raisers on his team, instead of you (the citizens) having professional fund-donors on yours. His slick media operation raises $100 million, $20 at a time, from 5 million separate uncoordinate individuals, whose voice afterwards is (not surprisingly) incredibly ineffective. (Just ask yourself how afraid Obama is of the people who funded his primary campaign, the promises to whom he made he’s all broken — answer: not at all.)
The money will still be there. It’s just that all the control will be on governments side, and none on the citizen’s. Government will be dominated by fund-raisers working for politicians, instead of (to the extent it is) fund-donors working for groups of citizens. Sounds lovely! Gah.
That question makes no more sense than asking “…what about the ‘freedom’ of speech of people and groups who can’t afford their own newspaper?”
Hint: Freedom of speech has nothing to do with what one can afford.
Never said it did. I was responding to Carl Pham’s comments as was FC. Although, to be fair to Carl, he is actually merely posting the logical conclusions drawn from the link you posted. Which renders your response here something of a non sequitur.
Ah? Can you name such a group? Go ahead, try. Keep in mind, now, that if there are a million of you sad poor voiceless folks, you can each contribute $1 a year, and for $1 million a year, you can hire some pretty fancy lobbying.
There are sooooooo many logical and conceptual problems with this paragraph that I don’t know where to start.
But let’s stick with the economic. Let’s say every single adult uninsured American citizen chipped in a dollar for a pro-universal healthcare lobby (we’ll hand wave away the logistical and cost problems of actually figuring out who can handle the money, gather it, manage it, and pay for this “pretty fancy lobbying”) you’ll have, if everybody actually chips in, you’ll have somewhere between $20M and $50M.
A little Googling (actually MS Live Search) shows that in 2006 the medical industry in the US spent $326M in lobbying the federal government.
And that, according to the same article (http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/357/8/736) doesn’t include the money spent by those industries on election donations.
Now, I’m naive on these things, but if $1M can buy some “pretty fancy lobbying” I’m pretty sure that $100M can buy something better.
Don’t those numbers alarm you? In the slightest?
Note: That was a rhetorical question.
Daveon, what are you assuming? That the highest bidder owns the government, period? Doesn’t matter the quality of the ideas presented? Congressmen and Executive staff really are the ultimate in corruption — they don’t care what ideas you and your competitors bring, all they do is weigh both of your satchels of cash, and whoever’s weighs the most wins?
That doesn’t sound like you. It sounds more like me, an inveterate distruster of government power.
I thought you believed government were good guys — motivated mostly by noble motives, who make decisions about what programs to support, cut, enlarge, eliminate et cetera based on the principles involved, and the information they have about how it affects who.
And, therefore, that the problem with lobbyists is that their groups got “heard,” and the others were entirely silent — unheard. That, say, your uninsured people didn’t get any relief from Congress not because Congress was totally bought and sold by some other lobby, but because they just weren’t heard, because Congress didn’t realize what was going on with them, because the poor schmoes couldn’t afford to hire a lobbyist to present their point of view.
In which case, as I’ve pointed out, this is nonsense. Anybody sufficiently numerous can get heard. $10 million will get you heard. It isn’t enough, no, to buy every Congressman a weekend ski trip to Telluride.
But isn’t it your position that simply being heard is enough, in the hallowed halls of Washington, if you’re on the side of angels? Why do you need to be (1) heard, (2) right, and (3) he who spends the most cash? Are you really going to stick to the proposition that government officials and Congressmen are so venial and inherently corrupt that whoever brings the most money to the game wins?
If you are — well, welcome to the club! We’ve got jackets.
Post-Script:
This is funny:
we’ll hand wave away the logistical and cost problems of actually figuring out who can handle the money, gather it, manage it, and pay for this “pretty fancy lobbying”)
Wake up, Rip. It’s the 21st century! Barack Obama raised half a billion dollars in $20 chunks. The only conclusion we can draw from the fact that you don’t know how it could be done is that you won’t be hired to do it.
People with money have an advantage. This is news? You imagine there is some way to neutralize this which is fair?
Uh huh.
They want to add laws. I want to remove laws. They should be required to write the ninth amendment on a blackboard for as long as it takes, until they begin to understand it. Hint: The ninth encompasses the first.
> So what about the “freedom” of speech of people and groups who can’t afford professionals to work on their behalf then?
What about them?
Surely no one is foolish enough to believe that restrictions will somehow give them voice.
So, the argument must be something like “if you stop the powerful from speaking, the less powerful will be heard”.
While that sounds nice, in practice it doesn’t work. Restrictions work to further disadvantage the less powerful because the powerful have more resources to deal with restrictions.