So if I understand you correctly, you are saying that no one who donates money to a political campaign receives or expects to receive any special favor from said politician after an election?
Your analogy of marketing products with running political campaigns is interesting in so many ways but this analogy has little to do with the concern expressed by those who oppose this ruling.
I'm sure there are people who do expect favors. Harry Reid didn't become a multimillionaire by only being a humble public servant.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Completely doable.
Re: rent alone, have you seen the maps of how many full-time jobs a minimum-wage worker (e.g., college student) needs to afford rent for one small apartment?
Sure, it's easy if you can live with mommy and she pays your rent and all your expenses and feeds you. But those aren't the people we're talking about here.
Would your wife's life have turned out better if none of those things happened? Sure. But she might not be married to you, and that would be worse, right?
Argument from negative consequences.
$8,000 x 70% after tax = 5,600. $8,000 + 3% inflation = $8,240 year 2, $8,487 year 3, $8,741 year 4 = $33,469. $5,600/year x 4 years = $22,400. Working gets you only 2/3 of what you need to cover tuition alone.
Not including books, fees, meals, transportation, rent, etc.
You can work more during summers.
Heck, you could work more than 20 hours a week.
You could get a job for more than $8/hr.The figure I quoted included fees and estimated book cost.
Completely doable.
Man if this fictional person is so good at getting whatever job they want with however many hours and however much pay they desire, why are they going to college at all!?
And did you seriously leave rent out of your equation?
EDIT: You can work more than 20 hours a week if you want to be a C student maybe. When I was in college, in addition to 15 hours of classes, I had lab work that took a minimum of 8 hours every week. The times for the lab had to be scheduled at the beginning of the semester first come first serve. I had more than one session from midnight to 8 am before having a 9 am class. And then there is the time allotted for studying and assignments.
If you so adamantly refuse to accept that there are people who just don't have it as good for you for any reason other than being a bad person, I'm not going to keep wasting my time trying to explain reality to you.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
If money = free speech, why does it cost money? Can one have "more" 'free speech' than someone else?
Free speech becomes an oxymoron when it must be bought.
If money = free speech, why does it cost money? Can one have "more" 'free speech' than someone else?
Derek, for you . . . sure.
You've had enough life lessons to be able to get one more free speech than everyone else. But just one. No coming 'round next year asking for another.
Exactly, this is why people take issue with the ruling. It is BECAUSE big money = special favors. The bigger the money the greater the influence that individual or group has. To believe any different is to be naive. The staggering number of examples of this in action in the US are so numerous we could dedicate an entire website to them much less a Paizo thread.Money does not equal free speech, it reduces free speech by drowning out the voices of those who do not have money. It is not the end all be all but simply another (powerful) tool of the rich to get what they want at the expense of the rest of us.
Money equals free speech is as comical to me as stating that a Corporation equals a Person.
I do not see it as a Democrat versus Republican or a Right versus Left issue, it is a Rich versus Poor issue.
But then why did it not work in Harry's case? After all, he got his deals prior to yesterday's decision. Gosh, it's almost as if those laws don't work except to keep incumbent politicians in office.
Man if this fictional person is so good at getting whatever job they want with however many hours and however much pay they desire, why are they going to college at all!?And did you seriously leave rent out of your equation?
EDIT: You can work more than 20 hours a week if you want to be a C student maybe. When I was in college, in addition to 15 hours of classes, I had lab work that took a minimum of 8 hours every week. The times for the lab had to be scheduled at the beginning of the semester first come first serve. I had more than one session from midnight to 8 am before having a 9 am class. And then there is the time allotted for studying and assignments.
If you so adamantly refuse to accept that there are people who just don't have it as good for you for any reason other than being a bad person, I'm not going to keep wasting my time trying to explain reality to you.
Oh no, you had lab work for 8 hours a week! What a crisis! I took 18 credit hours a quarter for 2 years straight (no breaks), and still managed to work. Yes it was tough. Lots of things are tough. Life is tough.
And there are people who don't have it as good as I do. Never said there weren't. I'd ask you to reread my arguments, but I suspect you'll whip out another strawman instead.
I see. The existing laws aren't strong enough, so therefore we should remove them.Good argument.
Or maybe those laws never worked in the first place.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
$8,000 x 70% after tax = 5,600. $8,000 + 3% inflation = $8,240 year 2, $8,487 year 3, $8,741 year 4 = $33,469. $5,600/year x 4 years = $22,400. Working gets you only 2/3 of what you need to cover tuition alone.
Not including books, fees, meals, transportation, rent, etc.
You can work more during summers.
Heck, you could work more than 20 hours a week.
You could get a job for more than $8/hr.The figure I quoted included fees and estimated book cost.
Completely doable.
In-state tuition at my local land-grant college is about $12k. Books are another 1k/year easily. I live in low-income housing (subsidized in part by the city) and I make all my own meals, and share a car with my girlfriend. Basically, I live extremely frugally, and my total bills every month are about $1k. During the school year I work 15 hours a week on weekends because I need every night of the week to study, but I make about $12/hr, well over the minimum wage that most students make, so I've been fortunate there, and I work full time (or more than if I get overtime) in the summers, usually while taking a summer class (not included in that 12k/yr tuition figure).
So let's recap: $13k/yr tuition and books + (by a VERY conservative estimated MINIMUM) $12k/yr=$25k/yr total. If I worked full time THE ENTIRE YEAR, thus not allowing for any study time at night, after taxes I would still not make enough to survive. I mean, unless I take out student loans, which I wouldn't qualify for if it weren't for federal assistance, I'd have to take out a minimum of $10k/yr at the current interest rates of about 7%, unsubsidized so I'd be accruing interest while going to school and after 4 years I'd owe $55k-ish. Bare freaking minimum.
In-state tuition at my local land-grant college is about $12k. Books are another 1k/year easily. I live in low-income housing (subsidized in part by the city) and I make all my own meals, and share a car with my girlfriend. Basically, I live extremely frugally, and my total bills every month are about $1k. During the school year I work 15 hours a week on weekends because I need every night of the week to study, but I make about $12/hr, well over the minimum wage that most students make, so I've been fortunate there, and I work full time (or more than if I get overtime) in the summers, usually while taking a summer class (not included in that 12k/yr tuition figure).So let's recap: $13k/yr tuition and books + (by a VERY conservative estimated MINIMUM) $12k/yr=$25k/yr total. If I worked full time THE ENTIRE YEAR, thus not allowing for any study time at night, after taxes I would still not make enough to survive. I mean, unless I take out student loans, which I wouldn't qualify for if it weren't for federal assistance, I'd have to take out a minimum of $10k/yr at the current interest rates of about 7%, unsubsidized so I'd be accruing interest while going to school and after 4 years I'd owe $55k-ish. Bare freaking minimum.
You'd have to give up gaming and posting on the Paizo forums.
I hope you chose your major wisely.
Maybe you should take a semester off to build up some cash. Maybe you should look at less expensive schools.
Maybe you shouldn't be going to college. It's not for everyone, you know. Just ask Bill Gates.
But that's still no reason to arbitrarily limit someone else's free speech rights.
Why bring up Harry Reid? Why not Newt Gingrich? Are you under the impression that only Democrats are corrupt and not Republicans?
Your response really does not address what I said at all. I am saying that this ruling works to increase not decrease the chances that people with great wealth will have even more influence in the political system. Exactly what are you saying because it is not clear to me?
Are you saying that the ruling is fine because it will not increase the chance that those great wealth will have greater influence in the political system?
Because I'm more familiar with Harry than Newt. Don't get your kilt in a twist.
I'm saying this ruling is fine because of the plain language of the Constitution. If you want the language changed, then work towards a Constitutional Amendment.
Why would I have to give up gaming and posting? Frequent study breaks actually INCREASE your capacity to learn and make the time you spend studying more fruitful. Sometimes just doing more of something results in less output. That's something I've learned from the economics classes I've taken, which is my major.
And I wasn't complaining, merely showing you how it's really not feasible to do as you suggest working part time at minimum wage to pay for college...withOUT outside assistance. I've been fortunate enough to qualify for grants and scholarships due to my economic status. Opportunities that wouldn't exist without the big bad gub'ment stepping in.
However you got that I was making an argument for limiting free speech from that I'll never know.
Let me ask you, if money=speech, why can't I pay my rent with a recital of my one-man show "Meatrace: An Exploration in Dance"?
Man if this fictional person is so good at getting whatever job they want with however many hours and however much pay they desire, why are they going to college at all!?And did you seriously leave rent out of your equation?
EDIT: You can work more than 20 hours a week if you want to be a C student maybe. When I was in college, in addition to 15 hours of classes, I had lab work that took a minimum of 8 hours every week. The times for the lab had to be scheduled at the beginning of the semester first come first serve. I had more than one session from midnight to 8 am before having a 9 am class. And then there is the time allotted for studying and assignments.
If you so adamantly refuse to accept that there are people who just don't have it as good for you for any reason other than being a bad person, I'm not going to keep wasting my time trying to explain reality to you.
Oh no, you had lab work for 8 hours a week! What a crisis! I took 18 credit hours a quarter for 2 years straight (no breaks), and still managed to work. Yes it was tough. Lots of things are tough. Life is tough.
And there are people who don't have it as good as I do. Never said there weren't. I'd ask you to reread my arguments, but I suspect you'll whip out another strawman instead.
Yes if you'll recall, I said I worked as well. So that would total me at 23 hours of school for 2 years (I took summer classes but not 23 hours worth) and still managed to work.
It was tough. And had I not had a support structure, loving parents, a state and federal government willing to help out, it would have been impossible. Even though I was working. If you'll remember, the point was that the idea of working your way through college is dead. And that still stands as true.
You didn't say there weren't people worse off than you, but you very strongly implied that if they were, it was their own damn fault.
"Strawman", you keep saying that, it does not mean what you think it means.
Let me ask you, if money=speech, why can't I pay my rent with a recital of my one-man show "Meatrace: An Exploration in Dance"?
Because despite your awesome, nay, god-like ability to do a triple spin while balancing on an ice chest and keeping time to "Blurred Lines," no one wants to pay to see it.
Or maybe you can monetize it. Record it and throw it up on U-Tube. Make sure you do the commercialization option. If you get enough views, they'll start sending you a check.
Tell me, where in the Constitution does it say that money equals speech?
As I mentioned above, Supreme Court decisions have held that yes, in fact, money equals speech.
I did a whole post about it above. You should go back and read it.
If you can't be bothered to do that, I can't help you.
|
OK, hopping in because Doug's college cost quotes are so freaking out of whack it is not funny.
Instead of running with anecdotal costs, here's the average in state public university yearly costs for 2013-2014 from collegedata.com
tuition and fees: $8893
housing and meals: $9500
books: $1207
personal and transportation: $2580
Total: $22180 per year
And you have a job paying $8/hr ... which would require over 2770 hours to meet the yearly total BEFORE taxes ... which would be over 69 weeks working 40 hours a week ... I guess you expect them to work 60-80 hours per week through their entire summer break, huh Doug? Oh wait ... at 80 hours per week for 3 months and 20 hours per week for the rest of the year, you're still looking at only around 1800 hours ... best to not sleep then.
As to the main point of debate, money does NOT equal free speech. To vigorously defend the idea means you must have absolute faith in the SCOTUS and consider them to be beyond the capacity of making truly boneheaded and idiotic rulings (corporations being people is another one), be trolling for effect, or be looking at the world from a point of view completely alien to what I would consider common sense (but as the saying goes common sense is not all that common).
In-state tuition at my local land-grant college is about $12k. Books are another 1k/year easily. I live in low-income housing (subsidized in part by the city) and I make all my own meals, and share a car with my girlfriend. Basically, I live extremely frugally, and my total bills every month are about $1k. During the school year I work 15 hours a week on weekends because I need every night of the week to study, but I make about $12/hr, well over the minimum wage that most students make, so I've been fortunate there, and I work full time (or more than if I get overtime) in the summers, usually while taking a summer class (not included in that 12k/yr tuition figure).So let's recap: $13k/yr tuition and books + (by a VERY conservative estimated MINIMUM) $12k/yr=$25k/yr total. If I worked full time THE ENTIRE YEAR, thus not allowing for any study time at night, after taxes I would still not make enough to survive. I mean, unless I take out student loans, which I wouldn't qualify for if it weren't for federal assistance, I'd have to take out a minimum of $10k/yr at the current interest rates of about 7%, unsubsidized so I'd be accruing interest while going to school and after 4 years I'd owe $55k-ish. Bare freaking minimum.
You'd have to give up gaming and posting on the Paizo forums.
I hope you chose your major wisely.
Maybe you should take a semester off to build up some cash. Maybe you should look at less expensive schools.
Maybe you shouldn't be going to college. It's not for everyone, you know. Just ask Bill Gates.
But that's still no reason to arbitrarily limit someone else's free speech rights.
See meatrace, college is easy if you let someone else dictate to you exactly how, when, and where to spend your finances and time.
But DWS has shot himself in the foot. "It's not for everyone" So for people that college is not for, should they not have an equal platform for speech as those who do go to college? Since money = speech and college = money, you are giving more speech to those who go to college while yourself acknowledging that not everyone should. Why do you want to take their rights away?
NOTE: In my state, if you take a semester off they cut off your state sponsored scholarship.
Let me ask you, if money=speech, why can't I pay my rent with a recital of my one-man show "Meatrace: An Exploration in Dance"?Because despite your awesome, nay, god-like ability to do a triple spin while balancing on an ice chest and keeping time to "Blurred Lines," no one wants to pay to see it.
Or maybe you can monetize it. Record it and throw it up on U-Tube. Make sure you do the commercialization option. If you get enough views, they'll start sending you a check.
But you just said money=speech. What you're talking about is money being EXCHANGED for speech. Things that can be exchanged for one another are not one another. For example, I can exchange a goat for a bushel of oranges.
Gots!=Oranges.
Yes if you'll recall, I said I worked as well. So that would total me at 23 hours of school for 2 years (I took summer classes but not 23 hours worth) and still managed to work.
It was tough. And had I not had a support structure, loving parents, a state and federal government willing to help out, it would have been impossible. Even though I was working. If you'll remember, the point was that the idea of working your way through college is dead. And that still stands as true.
You didn't say there weren't people worse off than you, but you very strongly implied that if they were, it was their own damn fault.
"Strawman", you keep saying that, it does not mean...
If I didn't say it, I didn't say it. If you choose to apply further meaning to the words that I write than what I actually write, you're guilty of assumption.
You should really stop assuming what I think. My words are pretty clear.
Yes if you'll recall, I said I worked as well. So that would total me at 23 hours of school for 2 years (I took summer classes but not 23 hours worth) and still managed to work.
It was tough. And had I not had a support structure, loving parents, a state and federal government willing to help out, it would have been impossible. Even though I was working. If you'll remember, the point was that the idea of working your way through college is dead. And that still stands as true.
You didn't say there weren't people worse off than you, but you very strongly implied that if they were, it was their own damn fault.
"Strawman", you keep saying that, it does not mean...
If I didn't say it, I didn't say it. If you choose to apply further meaning to the words that I write than what I actually write, you're guilty of assumption.
You should really stop assuming what I think. My words are pretty clear.
Now you're just being disingenuous. Your words are clear, and you were clearly saying that anyone who isn't rich must have messed up somewhere. That. Is. Not. True.
But DWS has shot himself in the foot. "It's not for everyone" So for people that college is not for, should they not have an equal platform for speech as those who do go to college? Since money = speech and college = money, you are giving more speech to those who go to college while yourself acknowledging that not everyone should. Why do you want to take their rights away?
You have the same platform for free speech as anyone else in this country. The laws apply equally.
You appear to want a special exception for people of an arbitrary means.
You also assume college = money, and then want to try to twist my argument into something I didn't say.
Great job. If you want a conversation, perhaps you should stop.
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
|
Of course, apparently the minority feels that you can speak, only when the community believes you should.. link.
I'll take a lack of contributions over the collective telling me what I can say, thank you very much.
But you just said money=speech. What you're talking about is money being EXCHANGED for speech. Things that can be exchanged for one another are not one another. For example, I can exchange a goat for a bushel of oranges.Gots!=Oranges.
So if you believe money doesn't equal speech, you should have no problem with removing campaign contribution limits completely.
Awesome.
As to the main point of debate, money does NOT equal free speech. To vigorously defend the idea means you must have absolute faith in the SCOTUS and consider them to be beyond the capacity of making truly boneheaded and idiotic rulings (corporations being people is another one),
Moreover, it would mean things like their decision on Obamacare are right and just and he should stop whining about it.
But you just said money=speech. What you're talking about is money being EXCHANGED for speech. Things that can be exchanged for one another are not one another. For example, I can exchange a goat for a bushel of oranges.Gots!=Oranges.
So if you believe money doesn't equal speech, you should have no problem with removing campaign contribution limits completely.
Awesome.
Your logic doesn't follow.
If money is not speech, then money can (and perhaps should) be regulated, as to what it can be spent on. Free speech should have as much leeway as possible since it is a constitutionally guaranteed right, whereas money is not a right and can thus be regulated.That regulation, as the constitution establishes, is up to our duly elected legislators, which we all get to vote on.
If money=speech then goats=oranges.
Now you're just being disingenuous. Your words are clear, and you were clearly saying that anyone who isn't rich must have messed up somewhere. That. Is. Not. True.
Then let me clear it up for you.
Anyone who isn't rich, isn't rich. Anyone who is broke, should probably work to get their life straigtened around so that they're not broke.
Anyone who messes up (and we all mess up) is human.
Anyone who messes up and doesn't learn from that is probably going to remain broke.
And no amount of government help will cure that. There's decades of proof, and generations of citizens who are living examples.
Why do you wish to perpetuate and increase poverty?
The only way to decrease poverty, and enhance equality, is through socialism.
Why are you promoting socialism?
But DWS has shot himself in the foot. "It's not for everyone" So for people that college is not for, should they not have an equal platform for speech as those who do go to college? Since money = speech and college = money, you are giving more speech to those who go to college while yourself acknowledging that not everyone should. Why do you want to take their rights away?
You have the same platform for free speech as anyone else in this country. The laws apply equally.
You appear to want a special exception for people of an arbitrary means.
You also assume college = money, and then want to try to twist my argument into something I didn't say.
Great job. If you want a conversation, perhaps you should stop.
I assume nothing. The evidence for college leading to increased income is overwhelming. DO you disagree with that?
As for special exceptions:
In audio there is this thing called compression. We use it to bring up the quiet parts of a track to the volume of the loud parts. It puts them all on the same level. If we use amplitude as an analogy for spending, then when we don't limit it, the loud parts will get louder and louder and you will never ever hear those quiet parts. But if we institute limits and compression it raises those quiet parts up to the same playing field. It allows you to hear everything going on in the song. The loud parts aren't being cheated other than that they no longer get to drown out the quiet parts. But the quiet parts gain the ability to be heard. No one loses everyone wins.
And the thing is, compression works by turning down the volume on loud things and then bringing up the volume on the new master. We limit campaign spending and bring everyone onto the same level and the whole thing rises as a result. Finance laws can argued to limit the speech of wealthy individuals without equating money and speech. However an argument can be made that without them we hurt the speech of the non wealthy. Even if you don't necessarily agree with that, what does it matter if the alternative has no downside?
And no, I do not have the same platform. I am not rich enough to buy commercial airtime. That is a platform that due to my wealth is off limits to me. If however, like minded individuals could each individually contribute towards such an endeavor, we could afford it together. And without spending limits we could all equal the amount a single donor is willing to spend. So 1 person's speech = a multitude of people's speech. Why should it not be each person's speech has equal impact?
|
|
But you just said money=speech. What you're talking about is money being EXCHANGED for speech. Things that can be exchanged for one another are not one another. For example, I can exchange a goat for a bushel of oranges.Gots!=Oranges.
So if you believe money doesn't equal speech, you should have no problem with removing campaign contribution limits completely.
Awesome.
Hmmm ... let me think if I can come up with an off the wall analogy for you that may resonate.
If you run with the assumption that money = speech (as you have asserted), then speech is, in essence, a commodity. Now, commodities have a limit to availability: each year only so much oil can be pumped, only so much coffee can be grown, only so much gold can be mined, etc. Such limits affect the price of the commodity.
So if speech is indeed a commodity, then it has a limit to its supply. In practice, for this discussion of campaign contribution limits be removed, that limit would be the amount of time available on radio, television, pick-your-flavor-of-media. If there are no limits in place, and I were a multi-billionaire who decided to support some complete nutcase for whatever office it was he or she was running for, I could contribute enough money to buy up all the speech available and have it play nothing but Copa Cabana or Escape (aka the Pina Colada Song), during all the available broadcast slots, thereby stiffing all free speech but my own.
From what you have been arguing Doug, it sounds as if you think this would be a good thing. I personally feel that if you give "free speech" only to those who can afford to have it, you are killing the first amendment and replacing it with the freedom for paid speech.
Then again, I think that all campaign contributions to specific parties and candidates should be illegal, that if you want to support the democratic process you do so by donating to a single fund that is used to finance fair elections with all candidates an equal financial footing. But then again, I could be the crazy one.
Now you're just being disingenuous. Your words are clear, and you were clearly saying that anyone who isn't rich must have messed up somewhere. That. Is. Not. True.Then let me clear it up for you.
Anyone who isn't rich, isn't rich. Anyone who is broke, should probably work to get their life straigtened around so that they're not broke.
Anyone who messes up (and we all mess up) is human.
Anyone who messes up and doesn't learn from that is probably going to remain broke.And no amount of government help will cure that. There's decades of proof, and generations of citizens who are living examples.
Why do you wish to perpetuate and increase poverty?
Loaded question. You're also flatly wrong. Anyone who is broke and does work to get their life straightened out and remains broke anyway, what of them?
If government help doesn't work, why are the majority of people on welfare on it less than two years? If government assistance keeps you from having to decide between food and gas in your car (and it so often does), how is it perpetuating poverty?
Your logic doesn't follow.
If money is not speech, then money can (and perhaps should) be regulated, as to what it can be spent on. Free speech should have as much leeway as possible since it is a constitutionally guaranteed right, whereas money is not a right and can thus be regulated.That regulation, as the constitution establishes, is up to our duly elected legislators, which we all get to vote on.
If money=speech then goats=oranges.
If money is not speech, then any limit on money will not affect free speech (since they're independent of each other). So, removing the limit on money will not affect speech at all (since they're independent of each other). Therefore, in order to have a more efficient system, all the contribution limits should be abolished, because no matter what the contribution limit, free speech won't be impacted.
Thank you folks, I'll see you next week! Tip your wait staff and bartenders.
I just wanted you to reiterate what you said so that I understand you clearly. In your opinion, if the Supreme Court makes a ruling then that ruling is both wise and moral and should not be questioned. That must be what you are saying. So you don't really have an opinion either way as to whether the ruling is proper or improper because it is unnecessary in light of the fact that the Supreme Court is ok with it.I am wondering what YOU believe, not what the Supreme Court believes.
Let's examine some other Supreme Court cases shall we?
Dred Scott v. Sanford , 60 US 393 (1857). The Supreme Court holds that African Americans, whether slave or free, could not be American citizens and therefore had no standing to sue in Federal Court.
Korematsu v. United States , 323 US 214 (1944). The Supreme Court holds that Executive Order 9066, which ordered Japanese Americans into internment camps during World War II regardless of citizenship, was constitutional.
So would you agree that the Supreme Court ruling in these cases are just fine as well?
BTW, I have been quite gracious in my responses, I expect the same treatment from you. Assume you are standing right in front of me when you are talking, I can assure you, you would not be rude to me were this discussion held in person. Basically, I am saying I don't like the tone of your last sentence.
Repeated rulings by the Supreme Court do, in fact, start to make a moral argument. If you want to cherry pick single decisions and assume I agree with them, I can't stop you. But there's that whole "assume" thing again.
You didn't read what I wrote. I suggested you do that. If you assume I'm rude, that's your assumption and I really can't do anything about that. If we were face to face and you thought I was rude, my suggestion would be to walk away and take a minute to reevaluate your emotional state.
Your logic doesn't follow.
If money is not speech, then money can (and perhaps should) be regulated, as to what it can be spent on. Free speech should have as much leeway as possible since it is a constitutionally guaranteed right, whereas money is not a right and can thus be regulated.That regulation, as the constitution establishes, is up to our duly elected legislators, which we all get to vote on.
If money=speech then goats=oranges.
If money is not speech, then any limit on money will not affect free speech (since they're independent of each other). So, removing the limit on money will not affect speech at all (since they're independent of each other). Therefore, in order to have a more efficient system, all the contribution limits should be abolished, because no matter what the contribution limit, free speech won't be impacted.
Thank you folks, I'll see you next week! Tip your wait staff and bartenders.
Do you actual read what you write before you post it. It was established a while back on this thread (and a LOOONG time ago in the real world) that even though money isn't speech it still has the ability to impact it. Where are you getting this notion that it can't? If I shoot someone I'm impacting their ability to exercise their free speech, but that doesn't make my bullets speech any more than money is (and no less I'd argue). You're making a non sequitor.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
If money is not speech, then any limit on money will not affect free speech (since they're independent of each other). So, removing the limit on money will not affect speech at all (since they're independent of each other). Therefore, in order to have a more efficient system, all the contribution limits should be abolished, because no matter what the contribution limit, free speech won't be impacted.
Thank you folks, I'll see you next week! Tip your wait staff and bartenders.
Except that we've already done this dance.
Money is not speech, but it can be EXCHANGED for speech, or to silence others as it is indeed being used. Thus we can regulate how money is exchanged for political speech in a way that will maximize your and my ability to exercise our own without some big union or corporation or billionare drowning out our voice.The silly argument you put forth here suggests two things. 1) That you are perfectly aware of the corrupting influence of money on politics, as the alternative to your argument would be arguing in my favor.
2) That you've run out of ideas where to go rhetorically, since money isn't speech and we both know it.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
If money is not speech, then any limit on money will not affect free speech (since they're independent of each other). So, removing the limit on money will not affect speech at all (since they're independent of each other). Therefore, in order to have a more efficient system, all the contribution limits should be abolished, because no matter what the contribution limit, free speech won't be impacted.
Thank you folks, I'll see you next week! Tip your wait staff and bartenders.
Except that we've already done this dance.
Money is not speech, but it can be EXCHANGED for speech, or to silence others as it is indeed being used. Thus we can regulate how money is exchanged for political speech in a way that will maximize your and my ability to exercise our own without some big union or corporation or billionare drowning out our voice.The silly argument you put forth here suggests two things. 1) That you are perfectly aware of the corrupting influence of money on politics, as the alternative to your argument would be arguing in my favor.
2) That you've run out of ideas where to go rhetorically, since money isn't speech and we both know it.
"We're going to need a cleric over here! Make sure he prepared Create Water. We got a VICIOUS BURN!"
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I'm assuming you mean "does not equal."
Correct.
In which case, you're at odds with multiple decisions from the Supreme Court.
I'm aware of that, but it's beside the point. I'm not debating legality. If all you care about is legality, why are we even having this conversation? The SCOTUS upheld the ACA.
As for which sides spends the most? I don't give a crap. The solution to our problem is to get money out of politics, not add more.
You are advocating for plutocracy in the guise of "freedom."
Except that we've already done this dance.
Money is not speech, but it can be EXCHANGED for speech, or to silence others as it is indeed being used. Thus we can regulate how money is exchanged for political speech in a way that will maximize your and my ability to exercise our own without some big union or corporation or billionare drowning out our voice.The silly argument you put forth here suggests two things. 1) That you are perfectly aware of the corrupting influence of money on politics, as the alternative to your argument would be arguing in my favor.
2) That you've run out of ideas where to go rhetorically, since money isn't speech and we both know it.
Power corrupts.
That you think money helps or hinders doesn't matter. If you think it does, you need to start advocating for a Constitutional Amendment.
First off I never assumed you agreed with them, what I...
I'll quote myself: Repeated rulings by the Supreme Court do, in fact, start to make a moral argument.
I believe that if YOU want to change the plain language of the Constitution, you need to advocate for an amendment.
Until then, the plain language of the Constitution clearly says "free speech shall not be infringed by laws." The Supreme Court has upheld that speech does, in fact, relate to money.
Therefore, if you say "we need to stop 'the rich' from giving money,' what you're really saying is you see nothing wrong with limiting free speech. I initially laid out how ridiculous this looks when applied to other rights guaranteed by the First Amendment.
If you wish to continue to look ridiculous in light of all this, you are free to do so.