Unless I have recently turned to straw, I don’t think I or anyone else here has said this. Political speech is not banned here. Political advertisements on television are prohibited (as are many other kinds of televisual advertisement even in the US, incidentally).
I don’t see the statement as hyperbolic. The question at hand is literally true the way I worded it.
I don’t see how your statement is appropriate. What’s wrong with the wording of the 1st ammendment? I can only see somoene having a problem with it if their goal is to limit speach.
they will still have a free speech.
One mayor point is that the political parties with most money can afford to buy most time on tv - and this is WRONG. What’s worse is that the tv-channels don’t bother to air political debates because the money lays in political commercial.
One other thing is that politicans in tv-commercials delivers a message that they will not be “critizised” for online. They can deliver their propaganda without anyone questioning their opinion.
excactly, thank god there are at least one sensible english speaking country on earth.
Americans just don’t get it!
I have a problem with “free” speecg in regards to deliberate misrepresentation of facts.
How often have we heard the following scenario in an ad:
"Do you know that Congressman Schmoe voted against aiding senior citizens five times?
Schmoe - bad for Seniors - bad for your community!
Paid for by Citizens for Smedley."
Turns out Schmoe voted against a bill that would have aided seniors in some way,
but also had provisos to give some corporate welfare as well. So Schmoe voted against it.
I believe this sort of ad should be illegal. One is being deliberately misled about how Schmoe feels about aiding senior citizens. It’s basically a quote out of context.
I would have no qualms about stopping any ad of this nature.
The reason I called it hyperbole is because of your implication that the first amendment is the only way to protect free speech. Which is evidently not the case. And as usual in this type of argument, it’s conveniently overlooked that the first amendment is restricted in various ways - such as libel laws. Do you see these as a threat to the constitution?
Semantics. You could use the same silly word games to ban any other type of speach.
We’re not blocking speach, we’re simply blocking groups from protesting because…
We’re not blocking speach, we’re just blocking certain anti-government web pages because…
We’re not blocking speach, we’re just banning political bumper stickers because…
The fact of the matter is that political speach is exactly what is being targeted by the OP. It’s precisely the type of speach that the founders were trying to protect when the wrote the 1st ammendment and it couldn’t be written any clearer, IMO.
Mudslinging campaigns are an American tradition dating back to the days of Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, and the rest of the founding fathers. Heck, I imagine it predates them but since we’re talking about the US I suppose we can stop there. Mudslinging is as American as mom, apple pie, and baseball.
So these rules wouldn’t apply to cable television or satellite broadcast.
I don’t really see a need to limit political ads on television. Is it true that whoever buys the most TV ads wins? Did the Clinton campaign pay more for television advertising in 1992 and 1996 then the Bush Sr. or the Dole campaigns?
Propaganda is all about convicing someone else to your way of thinking. That sounds like freedom of speech to me.
We’re talking about the United States which means we have to bring in the 1st Amendment. How France, Great Britian, or Israel places heavy restrictions on political television ads has little bearing with how we could do it under our laws.
How would we limit the number of political ads on television? I don’t recall electing the FCC so I don’t really like the idea of them telling us what political ads can or cannot be broadcast.
Marc
I realize that I have an American point of view, but I’m really trying to understand the position of the Europeans here that TV advertisements are not political speech. I just can’t come up with any way to look at it that doesn’t make my head explode.
If you can come up with a way to explain that one to me, I think it would help bridge the gap here. From Americans’ point of view, the free speech clause in the First Amendment to our Constitution was put in specifically to prohibit the government from restricting the expression of political ideas, and TV advertisements are exactly that. All those other things, like foul language and nudity, which you always hear about in relation to free speech, are talked about because they’re at the fringes of the First Amendment, and we have to decide as a society what’s in and what’s out. But TV advertisements are considered by everyone here to be the core of that clause.
Debaser, how do you post to these boards five hours in advance? That’s a neat trick. I read your post (“Semantics. You could use the same…”) before I posted mine, but yours is stamped five hours after mine.
I’m not really getting you here about other ways to protect speach besides the first ammendment. Are you suggesting that we trash the first ammendment and then re-write some new law that is somehow different? If so, why?
I don’t see things like libel, copywrite or public safety as nearly as much of a threat to free speach as the subject of the OP.
Libel laws are a civil matter. If you say something about me that I can prove damages me and is not true I can seek compensation from you.
Copywrite laws are designed to protect the works of the creator. It prevents people from profiting by stealing my words, art or song.
Public safety laws like not yelling “fire” in a crowded theater are to protect citizens from danger.
Any of these three examples could be a violation of free speach if taken to certain extremes. However, with all of them speach is not the primary focus of what the law is banning. In none of these examples is speach being banned just because of the danger of the words being said!
When you talk about banning all political ads from TV, the danger you are trying to protect the viewer from is the speach itself. You aren’t trying to prevent the theft of someones work. You’re not trying to prevent a panic in a crowded theater. The danger this law is protecting us from is the speach itself. You have decided that the public hearing this speach is a bad thing and that it needs to be blocked. This makes the violation of the first ammendment much more deliberate and blatant.
Very well put.
This is equally true of copyright. Remember, you don’t have to profit to violate copyright. Copyright law says that it’s so dangerous to repeat certain speech that another person has written, without his permission, that he must be allowed to ban others from speaking it - and not because it’s dangerous to the public at large, but because it’s dangerous to that one person, the original author.
In contrast, those who believe money has a detrimental effect on political campaigns can point to a far greater danger. A corrupt campaign doesn’t just hurt one person, it hurts everyone who has to live with the results of that campaign.
Television is simply one medium for political speech - a medium that happens to belong to we-the-people. Just as banning profanity on TV doesn’t prevent you from saying “fuck” elsewhere, neither would banning political ads on TV prevent you from expressing or seeking out political ideas elsewhere.
What’s this about “fringes”? The First Amendment doesn’t distinguish between different types of speech; it doesn’t give some words, or some photos of people, more protection than others. Foul language and nudity are talked about because they’re unpopular among some vocal groups, and unpopular speech is exactly what the First Amendment is designed to protect - popular speech doesn’t need protection.
That’s the same reason we’re talking about political speech: some people believe swearing and nudity are such hazards that they should be banned from TV; some believe political ads are such a hazard that they should be banned from TV. (Some even believe repeating someone else’s speech without his permission is such a hazard that it should be banned from every medium.)
The First Amendment implications of those bans are the same, IMO - we must weigh the potential benefit against the amount of speech that will be limited. A ban on political TV ads would limit more speech than a ban on nudity and profanity, but it’d provide more benefit as well. It would limit less speech than copyright (and in only one medium), and still provide more benefit.
Now, look. I’d be satisfied if the First Amendment were really interpreted as it’s written, that is, preventing any infringement on the freedom of speech. No bans on profanity, libel, or slander; no copyright; and so on. It’d be a radical change, but I like the principle. But unfortunately that’s not how it works today. We’ve already decided that restrictions are OK; now we have to decide which ones.
The real problem is of course that these political ads work. Not that you can do anything to the voting process to cure the disease of the easily swayed, not-so-critical thinking voter.
That reminds me: I hope all of you who are so upset about limiting political ads are equally upset about the “free speech zones” set up by this administration at campaign stops.
They’re not blocking speech, they’re simply blocking groups who hold a certain viewpoint from speaking anywhere near their intended audience…
Mr2001, that’s a, uh, unique view of the First Amendment you got there. Fortunately, no one in a position of importance ascribes to it.
Care to quote the part of my post you’re responding to, so I can have some idea what the hell you’re talking about?
I was deeply honored that one of the greatest cartoonists of the 20th century had decided to post here, until I realized that Don Martin the MAD guy was a) American and b) had died in 2000. 
Although he did have political points of view almost as risible as the OP’s sometimes. At first I thought the OP lived in a swing state and was being bombarded by ads right and left, but now that I see he’s Yurpeen I’m sort of humbled that’s he’s so annoyed on our behalf.
Look, it may seem strange to outsiders, but the political ads are a venerable tradition here and date from a time when y’all had kings and emperors that really ran stuff. Here’s a good exhibit that goes from Washington to Bush II–if you think ads are bad now, you should see what Lincoln and Cleveland and such went through! Too much speech is better than having laws restricting it; there are also still newspapers and websites around that constantly critique the ads, and truth squads out there to help us sort it out.
As offensive as the ads sometimes are (there’s some thoughtful and well-considered ones out there too) the idea of the authorities, any authority, restricting the time and content of them is MUCH more offensive to most Americans.
I’m not worried about the content of the ads so much as the fact that it turns political campaigning into a money game. Ban all the ads, or require TV networks to give free equal time to all candidates, or whatever… just as long as candidates are able to spend their time formulating policies for everyone instead of sucking up to rich donors.