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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   31957 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 5, 2022

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This is an obvious fig leaf for attempting to control political discourse.

Attempting to trick people into not casting a valid vote is not "political discourse" any more than physically intimidating voters is political discourse, Do you maintain that the FBI has no valid role in preventing that? Whether what the FBI did in this case was an attempt to control political discourse is a different question than whether the FBI can legitimately seek to prevent this sort of election fraud in principle. Your claim that the answer to the latter question is "no", given that the activity in question is illegal, makes no sense. "This law enforcement agency has no valid role in enforcing the law that they are charged with enforcing" is a nonsensical claim.

Attempting to trick people into not casting a valid vote is not "political discourse" any more than physically intimidating voters is political discourse

These are two entirely different things. The FBI has no valid role in preventing the former, perhaps unless those attempting to do so are falsely representing themselves as government officials. Just talking shit like "hey, you can vote for CandidateThatSucks by text" is still protected by the First Amendment; physically intimidating voters is not.

And this was certainly not all the FBI was doing.

hey, you can vote for CandidateThatSucks by text" is still protected by the First Amendment;

I am afraid that I am going to have to ask for authority for that claim, because:

content-based restrictions on speech have been permitted, as a general matter, only when confined to the few “ ‘historic and traditional categories [of expression] long familiar to the bar,’ ” Id., at ___ (slip op., at 5) (quoting Simon & Schuster, Inc. v. Members of N. Y. State Crime Victims Bd., 502 U.S. 105, 127 (1991) (Kennedy, J., concurring in judgment)). Among these categories are . . . speech integral to criminal conduct . . . [and]fraud[.]

United States v. Alvarez, 567 U.S. 709 (2012). And see * Illinois ex rel. Madigan v. Telemarketing Assocs., Inc.*, 538 U.S. 600 (2003) (upholding a statute prohibiting fraudulent speech, but advising that a "[f]alse statement alone does not subject a [speaker] to fraud liability" unless there is also intent to deceive)

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