# The FEC throws up its hands and surrenders **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [May 3, 2015, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156 "2015-05-03T16:42:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2015, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/21 "2015-05-04T01:58:42Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > What law against political speech are you referring to? If the Koch brothers want to stand on the street corners and pass out flyers about their favorite candidates, they’re perfectly allowed to do so. No, actually, under that law overturned CU, they are not – anything that could help a candidate was defined as an “in-kind contribution” to that candidate and regulated as money. Including speaking for that candidate or against their components. Read my post above. If you get your news from the chronically misinformed progressivesphere, you need to be educated about what CU actually did. ---
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2015, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/22 "2015-05-04T02:00:54Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > Second of all, if you don’t think this country has a centuries-long challenge with politicians who honestly believed that blatant corruption was just the normal way of doing business, then you literally know nothing about past electoral systems. Of course politicians are corrupt. Why you would address this by limiting the speech of non-politicians instead of addressing corruption or actual monetary donations is the problem that makes me question your motives. > [@](#): > > There are limits to freedom of speech. The right to yell fire does not extend to promoting a dangerous panic. First of all, your analogy is bad and you should feel bad. [http://popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-hackneyed-apologia-for-censorship-are-enough/](http://popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-hackneyed-apologia-for-censorship-are-enough/) Second, the fact that “there are limits to free speech” does imply “any limit to free speech is allowable.” You are not doing a good job of fighting ignorance here. > [@](#): > > The right to political speech ought not extend to promoting a direct connection between political fundraising and official favors. Which has what to do with the CU law and Hillary’s stated intention to reinstate it? ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2015, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/23 "2015-05-04T02:07:32Z")
Do you think Michael Grimm should be in jail or not? ---
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2015, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/24 "2015-05-04T02:09:58Z")
It’s my understanding that he is in jail for tax evasion and labor law violations pertaining to a restaurant he owns. So “yes” with a qualified “what does this have to do with the thread?” ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2015, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/25 "2015-05-04T02:13:32Z")
How do you think his corruption was discovered? By an investigation into illegal campaign contributions. If your version of unlimited campaign donations were actually the law, odds are he never would have been investigated at all for his other forms of corruption. So you think the Feds never should have started an investigation into Grimm for accepting $10,000 in illegal campaign contributions, right? ---
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2015, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/26 "2015-05-04T02:16:12Z")
So we need to make political speech illegal so that we might uncover unrelated labor law violations committed by politicians who own restaurants? You are really bad at argument. REALLY bad. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2015, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/27 "2015-05-04T02:18:04Z")
Honestly now: is the reason you’re implying that the Feds should never have investigated Grimm a matter of Grimm being of the same political bent as you, or because you just don’t mind corruption that much? ---
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2015, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/28 "2015-05-04T02:44:40Z")
Do I really need to spell this out? The fact that violations totally unrelated to campaign finance were uncovered does not justify the law. Why don’t we make “being from New York” or “having a German surname” illegal? That would have also opened an investigation against him that ultimately found crimes unrelated to campaign finance. Do you seriously not understand the problem with your logic here? ---
**Author:** ![sleestak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/919ad9/32.png) [@sleestak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sleestak)\ **Post date:** [May 4, 2015, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/29 "2015-05-04T05:42:06Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > Honestly now: is the reason you’re implying that the Feds should never have investigated Grimm a matter of Grimm being of the same political bent as you, or because you just don’t mind corruption that much? Your logic sucks. The fact that an investigaction into unlawful act A uncovered crime B has fuckall to do with whether A ought to be illegal. It is like saying “They opened an investigation on Bob for possessing pot. They found out Bob is a serial killer. SEE POT SHOULD BE ILLEGAL!”. Really, it is that stupid. Slee ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2015, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/30 "2015-05-05T02:16:28Z")
If the police opened an investigation into someone on the basis of a legal and constitutional activity, and then fished around until they found something illegal, that would be outrageous. But the simple fact is that politicians who are corrupt in one way tend to be corrupt in other ways. That isn’t proof that unlimited fundraising ought to be illegal, of course. But it is a fact that Grimm would not have been investigated if not for campaign finance laws. I’m pretty sure there’s at least one person in this thread who would prefer that Grimm be a free man today. And my underlying point, since I guess I have to connect all the dots here, is that excessive money in elections is a corrupting influence, not a liberating one. What’s more, the Supreme Court ruled on April 29 that limits on fundraising by judges is not an infringement on their First Amendment rights. So, the idea that the First Amendment prohibits regulations of electoral campaigns is once again proven false. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2015, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/31 "2015-05-05T15:45:17Z")
> [@Haberdash](#): > > If you get your news from the chronically misinformed progressivesphere . . . And where do you get yours from – Fox, NRO, Breitbart, WND? :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2015, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/32 "2015-05-05T20:34:16Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > And where do you get yours from – Fox, NRO, Breitbart, WND? :rolleyes: I think I have heard of one of those things? From the text of the CU decision, from history books, from any amount of knowledge of the legal system, etc. Read the post and let me know if anything’s actually disputable. Or, you know, just keep shouting “FOX NEWS! RACISM!” at anyone who intrudes on your bubble, I’m not your mother. ---
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2015, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/33 "2015-05-05T20:40:45Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > If the police opened an investigation into someone on the basis of a legal and constitutional activity, and then fished around until they found something illegal, that would be outrageous. This has nothing to do with the unsoundness of your argument (or really, with the distinction between “regulating the flow of money” and “regulating speech” that you chose to respond to with your argument that’s both unsound and irrelevant). It’s clear that you definitely don’t understand the basic logical problem in play here, so there’s no point in discussing that any further. > [@](#): > > What’s more, the Supreme Court ruled on April 29 that limits on fundraising by judges is not an infringement on their First Amendment rights. So, the idea that the First Amendment prohibits regulations of electoral campaigns is once again proven false. No one has argued that “the First Amendment prohibits regulations of electoral campaigns.” The argument is as follows: 1. Laws which define speech as money in order to regulate speech in fact are, and in fact should be, prohibited by the First Amendment. 2. The law overturned in CU which the Democrats on the FEC and the Hillary Clinton campaign have pledged to reinstate was such a law; such as law in fact is, and in fact should be, unconstitutional. Congress can regulate donations of actual money as much as they want, Constitutionally speaking. The only issue there is what sort of regulation is believed to be wise. The argument “it’s good to just make things illegal willy-nilly because then we might be able to investigate more people and find out that they underpaid restaurant workers” is a stupid fucking argument. It would be a stupid fucking argument no matter what you were arguing for – laws against murder or laws against kidnapping or laws against anything else that presumably we all support. The fact that you have chosen to apply it to laws against political corruption is basically irrelevant. So, there are two issues at play here: \*What sort of regulation on the flow of money to campaigns is something that we as participants in democracy and intelligent people debating things want to see? \*Laws regulating speech are not “regulations of the flow of money” and are an impressible abrogation of the First Amendment; what does it mean when Democrats support such laws? Your intentional confusion of the two to claim that anyone standing behind the slam-dunk First Amendment reasoning in CU must either oppose or deem unconstitutional any and all restrictions on the flow of money is not logical and not, in fact, true. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2015, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/34 "2015-05-06T00:29:25Z")
> [@](#): > > 1. Laws which define speech as money in order to regulate speech in fact are, and in fact should be, prohibited by the First Amendment. And laws which define money as speech in order to prevent regulation of money should similarly be prohibited. ---
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2015, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/35 "2015-05-06T00:34:18Z")
Which kind of laws are the Democrats on the FEC, in this thread, and in the Hillary Clinton campaign pushing? Who is pushing for the second? Who argues this besides fantasy targets in the minds of people who get their news from comedy shows? ---
**Author:** ![Stormcrow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/0ea827/32.png) [@Stormcrow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stormcrow)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2015, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/36 "2015-05-12T20:58:48Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > And laws which define money as speech in order to prevent regulation of money should similarly be prohibited. It occurred to me the other day - if money is speech, then is taxation censorship? ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2015, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/37 "2015-05-14T23:34:36Z")
The point of democracy is to take money out of the process. The whole fight for self-rule was about taking it away from certain rich guys. A democracy cannot function if some people’s political speech has more power than other people’s political speech. When the rich can speak more, that is a plutocracy. And don’t get into the BS about us being a republic, which just means not a monarchy and doesn’t preclude democracy, or a representative democracy, which is still about self-governance, via proxy. It all boils down to the rich and powerful gaming the system, and is one of the reasons I’m not so hot about our American system. Other democracies with a more powerful government seem to be able to stop this sort of takeover. ---
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 14, 2015, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/38 "2015-05-14T23:44:18Z")
So you’ve given up on pretending this is about anything other than regulating/banning speech you don’t like, then? At least you’re honest. ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2015, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/39 "2015-05-15T00:12:19Z")
> [@Haberdash](#): > > So you’ve given up on pretending this is about anything other than regulating/banning speech you don’t like, then? At least you’re honest. Of course, if the poor and middle class want their voices to be heard they should just write million dollar checks too. The fact that the don’t just means they have nothing important to say. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Haberdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Haberdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haberdash)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2015, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156/40 "2015-05-15T00:36:16Z")
You can’t ban people from speaking no matter what the consequence is. I don’t care if you think that it means “rich people speak more.” It wouldn’t matter even if it were true. Anyone who doesn’t get this has no business making pronouncements on what “the American system” is about. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-fec-throws-up-its-hands-and-surrenders/719156.md?page=3)