Getting a bit tense on the Democrat side now.

[TUMe]

Not about winning, we already know that.

Bernie says Hillary is not qualified.

Hillary had been asked if Bernie was qualified and gave an answer to the effect that he had not done his homework and didn't know what he was talking about.

Sen. Boxer says Hillary is the most qualified ever. Ahead of Washington I guess.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/bernie-sanders-hillary-clinton-is-not-qualified-to-be-president/

Barbara Boxer

✔ ‎@BarbaraBoxer


Bernie’s attack on @HillaryClinton tonight was beneath him. She is the most qualified person to ever run for POTUS. https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/717889936993751041 …

 

[URedskin54]

Bernie's answers in the Daily News were pretty staggering so I can't blame Hillary. I'm a little surprised he's going on attack, because I always saw his candidacy as a conversation driver rather than a real run for president. But Bernie also seems to have a bit of integrity so I wouldn't be surprised if he really dislikes her.

 

[aTUfan]

Most dems don't really like her.

 

[TU 1978]

Very few can support an unqualified, untrustworthy racist like Hillary.

Frog march her off to prison where she belongs.

 

[rabidTU]

I wike Hi-wa-wee!


Signed
Bonney Fwank

 

[eastcane]

Hillary is not a lovable candidate, but a Trump or Cruz candidacy will make her warmer and sweeter come November.

 

[aTUfan]

I keep hoping someone will throw a bucket of water on her and make her melt.

 

[astonmartin708]

I keep hoping someone will throw a bucket of water on her and make her melt.

That's far more likely to happen with Trump. The spray tan would paint his suit orange.

 

[aTUfan]

That's far more likely to happen with Trump. The spray tan would paint his suit orange.

DT will pay for his own tan,
hrc will create a government program to give her free brooms.

 

[rabidTU]

http://watchdog.org/241736/union-bernie-robin-hood

This is so hilarious. The lieberal idiots that do this have no clue to its significance.

As the legend goes, Robin Hood technically stole from the govt (who were the only rich people left in Britain) and gave back to the taxpayers Prince John had overtaxed to begin with. The taxpayers had been impoverished by the govt. But the lieberal Dumocrats have unknowingly morphed that into some attack on Wall Street and "big banks". Pretty funny that they have no understanding of the fable they are pushing in the media. What a bunch of dummies!

 

[aTUfan]

We have it today, but we call it charity. People donate what they want to charitable organizations. St Judes Hospital, SHRINES, ELKS, Scotish rite, the red Cross, the salvation army, churches, the heart association, community chest, . . .

And all these do a much better job than the government

 

[URedskin54]

I think it's probably pretty likely that the government is actually more efficient in that area than charities due to fewer overhead and employee costs. But there's also a questionable moral aspect of forcing someone to provide charity by stealing their earned income.

 

[aTUfan]

It costs the government (taxpayers) over $100,000.00 to create a $30,000.00 job.

 

[URedskin54]

I wasn't referring to jobs, I was referring to dispersal of cash to poor people. I haven't seen the stats, but it seems logical to assume that the govt, with its existing infrastructure, is probably able to do this more efficiently in terms of percentage of dollars going to recipients than a patchwork of non-profits. The govt doesn't do a great job of discriminating between the needy and others, but charities get defrauded as well. I would still rather have charity be voluntary and personal, but that doesn't mean i can't recognize there are pros and cons to each way.

 

[astonmartin708]

http://watchdog.org/241736/union-bernie-robin-hood

This is so hilarious. The lieberal idiots that do this have no clue to its significance.

As the legend goes, Robin Hood technically stole from the govt (who were the only rich people left in Britain) and gave back to the taxpayers Prince John had overtaxed to begin with. The taxpayers had been impoverished by the govt. But the lieberal Dumocrats have unknowingly morphed that into some attack on Wall Street and "big banks". Pretty funny that they have no understanding of the fable they are pushing in the media. What a bunch of dummies!

Now, the taxpayers have been impoverished by a government so bogged down in corporate interest that it's effectively corporations and industries that are controlling the government. If Bernie were to go after the golden-parachuting minority that controls our geopolitical and economic system it would be more akin to Robin Hood than say Reagan or Bush (I / II) who robbed the poor to give money and privelage to the rich.

Not that the Democrats have been great at giving to the poor either... but Bernie isn't a typical Democrat.

 

[URedskin54]

You should read the democratic socialists of America website. Pretty scary stuff actually. I was surprised, figured it would be just be promising a lot of free stuff. But they actually advocate for the elimination of privately owned corporations.

 

[astonmartin708]

You should read the democratic socialists of America website. Pretty scary stuff actually. I was surprised, figured it would be just be promising a lot of free stuff. But they actually advocate for the elimination of privately owned corporations.

I don't think they need to be eliminated, but we have to work on a way of getting big business out of government. They should, of course, be able to have opinions about what would be best for their various industries, but they shouldn't be able to mandate their own rules and regulations as they see fit.

 

[URedskin54]

Big business will never be out of government, particularly when you have media companies run by major corporations. You can limit campaign contributions, but then you give even greater outsized influence to corporate owned media entities.

 

[astonmartin708]

Big business will never be out of government, particularly when you have media companies run by major corporations. You can limit campaign contributions, but then you give even greater outsized influence to corporate owned media entities.

I think implementing a system similar to the UK where media exposure is limited for both parties as is campaign expenditure would be good. Of course the US has the problem of biased news media like Fox News and MSNBC vs one (more or less) unbiased entity in the BBC.

You're right, keeping corporate influence out of the media would be tough... but it's still better that corporate interests have to persuade millions of constituents with some sort of logic or rationale than one or two politicians with campaign contributions.

 

[URedskin54]

I think implementing a system similar to the UK where media exposure is limited for both parties as is campaign expenditure would be good. Of course the US has the problem of biased news media like Fox News and MSNBC vs one (more or less) unbiased entity in the BBC.

You're right, keeping corporate influence out of the media would be tough... but it's still better that corporate interests have to persuade millions of constituents with some sort of logic or rationale than one or two politicians with campaign contributions.

Limiting what groups of people say would no doubt require amending the first amendment. Especially since political speech is precisely the kind of speech it is most intended to protect. In England they don't have impediments like broad protection for freedom of speech and press.

I don't think media tend to influence through logic as much as they do through emotion and what they choose to cover and not to cover. It's not even just regular media organizations now though. Facebook and Twitter have far greater political power and power to sway public opinion than any other person or corporation. They reach way more people and can alter their algorithms so that people see only good stories about a candidate, only bad stories about a candidate, or no stories at all. The same goes for any political issue. For a lot of people social media is where they get all of their news. At least with Fox, CNN, or MSNBC you pretty much know what you're getting. Twitter and Facebook, if they want, can choose to persuade people in much subtler(and more effective) ways, and candidates might soon need large sums of money just to offset discrepancies in social media exposure.

 

[astonmartin708]

Limiting what groups of people say would no doubt require amending the first amendment. Especially since political speech is precisely the kind of speech it is most intended to protect. In England they don't have impediments like broad protection for freedom of speech and press.

I don't think media tend to influence through logic as much as they do through emotion and what they choose to cover and not to cover. It's not even just regular media organizations now though. Facebook and Twitter have far greater political power and power to sway public opinion than any other person or corporation. They reach way more people and can alter their algorithms so that people see only good stories about a candidate, only bad stories about a candidate, or no stories at all. The same goes for any political issue. For a lot of people social media is where they get all of their news. At least with Fox, CNN, or MSNBC you pretty much know what you're getting. Twitter and Facebook, if they want, can choose to persuade people in much subtler(and more effective) ways, and candidates might soon need large sums of money just to offset discrepancies in social media exposure.

Your first point is probably true, however; there is a problem with 24 hour purely partison news coverage. It's incredibly divisive. I don't know how you could get it through, but the Dutch Constitution actually acknowledges that problem as well as others:

"Article 7 of the Dutch Grondwet in its first paragraph grants everybody the right to make public ideas and feelings by printing them without prior censorship, but not exonerating the author from his liabilities under the law. The second paragraph says that radio and television will be regulated by law but that there will be no prior censorship dealing with the content of broadcasts. The third paragraph grants a similar freedom of speech as in the first for other means of making ideas and feelings public but allowing censorship for reasons of decency when the public that has access may be younger than sixteen years of age. The fourth and last paragraph exempts commercial advertising from the freedoms granted in the first three paragraphs.[109]

The penal code does have laws sanctioning certain types of expression. Such laws and freedom of speech were at the centre of a public debate in The Netherlands after the arrest on 16 May 2008 of cartoonist Gregorius Nekschot. On 1 February 2014, Dutch Parliament abolished the law penalizing blasphemy. Laws that punish discriminatory speech however still exist and are occasionally used to prosecute.

The Dutch Criminal Code § 137(c) criminalizes:[82]

… deliberately giv[ing] public expression to views insulting to a group of persons on account of their race, religion, or conviction or sexual preference."

 

[URedskin54]

Yes they acknowledge it, but what that describes is not really freedom of speech. Criminalizing things because people find them insulting....not a lot of protection there. I could only imagine how much speech the perpetually offended campus crowd finds insulting.

 

[astonmartin708]

Yes they acknowledge it, but what that describes is not really freedom of speech. Criminalizing things because people find them insulting....not a lot of protection there. I could only imagine how much speech the perpetually offended campus crowd finds insulting.

It doesn't pertain to any hate speech other than that of someone's race, religion, or sexual orientation. I'm not part of the PC police, but honestly there's no reason to make insulting speech about any of those matters. I guess you could say that comedians might have a problem, but I'm sure that would be worked out in courts since it would be clearly in jest and not for political reasons.

There's already not true "Free Speech" in this country. We have laws against libel and slander, and laws against speech that creates an imminent threat of danger, heck in several of the last few decades you would be beat up or locked up for even being suspected of having socialist / communist leanings. Maybe we should just amend the constitution to, "You have the right to free speech but not the right to be an asshole"

 

[URedskin54]

No you absolutely have a right to be an asshole. People should self-censor and be respectful, but should not be censored by government just because they say mean things.. The problem is that depending on your point of view practically anything can be considered hate speech. Half the things Bill Maher says when he's not joking could be considered hate speech depending on who you are. He's alternately brutal to both Muslims and Christians depending on the day. What is a purely honest political opinion to one person, is hateful to another person.

Your second paragraph lumps a lot of different things together that are totally unrelated. I get that your point is that there are a certain few restrictions on speech that have to do with harming people or their reputations. However, that's a long way from banning certain speech because it hurts someone's feelings. The whole point of that part of the first amendment is to protect the kind of speech that people don't like or find offensive. I loathe Westboro Baptist, but I don't want them punished for their hateful language. Locked up for having socialist or communist leanings? Please point me to where we have codified in law that it is ok to lock someone up for expressing support for the communist party.

 

[aTUfan]

I still can't believe that hrc who should have been a shoe in for the nomination, isn't.

She has met the enemy, and they are not republicans.

 

[astonmartin708]

No you absolutely have a right to be an asshole. People should self-censor and be respectful, but should not be censored by government just because they say mean things.. The problem is that depending on your point of view practically anything can be considered hate speech. Half the things Bill Maher says when he's not joking could be considered hate speech depending on who you are. He's alternately brutal to both Muslims and Christians depending on the day. What is a purely honest political opinion to one person, is hateful to another person.

Your second paragraph lumps a lot of different things together that are totally unrelated. I get that your point is that there are a certain few restrictions on speech that have to do with harming people or their reputations. However, that's a long way from banning certain speech because it hurts someone's feelings. The whole point of that part of the first amendment is to protect the kind of speech that people don't like or find offensive. I loathe Westboro Baptist, but I don't want them punished for their hateful language. Locked up for having socialist or communist leanings? Please point me to where we have codified in law that it is ok to lock someone up for expressing support for the communist party.

Read about the first red scare.

In 1919–20, several states enacted "criminal syndicalism" laws outlawing advocacy of violence in effecting and securing social change. The restrictions included free speech limitations.[8] Passage of these laws, in turn, provoked aggressive police investigation of the accused persons, their jailing, and deportation for being suspected of being either communist or left-wing. Regardless of ideological gradation, the Red Scare did not distinguish between communism, anarchism, socialism, or social democracy.[9]

You're right that someone taking offense to a statement is very subjective, but if the statement is inflammatory and in regards to their characteristics as a human being (race, religion, sex) I won't accept that. Specifically because of examples like the Nazi party where inflammatory speech was used against those very groups with no limitation. I don't think it's to much to ask to be civil towards your fellow man in those three cases. Say anything else about them that you want. In the case of Bill Maher, his rhetoric is most definitely satire. I do think that should be protected. It's kind of like the difference that the supreme court drew between adult materials and art... you know it when you see it.

 

[URedskin54]

Perhaps I was unclear. I was asking to name current laws. Of course in the past there have been plenty of laws that were unconstitutional. The sedition act was obviously a big one around the time you listed. This actually bolsters my argument that we need to maintain the strength of the first amendment so such oppression continues to be struck down by the courts.

As a matter of societal standards I will not accept the kind of statements you're talking about. As a matter of law I will absolutely defend them. You're conflating the two. Nazi Germany was a poor choice for an example for too many reasons for me to list. The inflammatory speech in Nazi germany wasn't the issue. It was the actions (and calls to action) in Nazi germany that were the issue. We have a system in place that punishes those kinds of actions and calls to action, but does not punish opinion. Bill Maher makes serious points that are completely non-satirical that a majority of both Christians and Muslims(and most other religious people) would consider hateful, and I'm glad there's no chance he'll be punished for it.

 

[astonmartin708]

Perhaps I was unclear. I was asking to name current laws. Of course in the past there have been plenty of laws that were unconstitutional. The sedition act was obviously a big one around the time you listed. This actually bolsters my argument that we need to maintain the strength of the first amendment so such oppression continues to be struck down by the courts.

As a matter of societal standards I will not accept the kind of statements you're talking about. As a matter of law I will absolutely defend them. You're conflating the two. Nazi Germany was a poor choice for an example for too many reasons for me to list. The inflammatory speech in Nazi germany wasn't the issue. It was the actions (and calls to action) in Nazi germany that were the issue. We have a system in place that punishes those kinds of actions and calls to action, but does not punish opinion. Bill Maher makes serious points that are completely non-satirical that a majority of both Christians and Muslims(and most other religious people) would consider hateful, and I'm glad there's no chance he'll be punished for it.

There would have been no calls to action AND no actions at all if Hitler weren't allowed to blame the suffering of the German people on the Jews, and the Gypsies, and the Slavs, and the Gays. He didn't just start by saying "we're going to kill all the Jews tomorrow at 3 PM". The calls to action didn't start until long after he had been campaigning about the plight of the romantic German cause and how the various non-arians were working against it.

Just because the Klu Klux Klan gets away with hate speech doesn't make it right. It doesn't make it ethical. Just because the law says "you can say whatever you want about the spics, the ******s, the waps, the Micks...." It doesn't mean that the law is correct. If there's nothing constructive to society about what you're saying, you shouldn't be saying it.

 

[aTUfan]

who is in charge of defining and regulating "hate speech"?

 

[URedskin54]

I anticipated that would be your exact argument, and I already rebutted it in my answer. We make a distinction between opinion and calling for violence/violence. We punish one but not the other for good reason. You can make the argument "allowing someone to state ______ offensive opinion could lead to _____ which could lead to something really bad" for almost any subjectively offensive statement, whether factual or not. And as I said, the Nazi comparison is ridiculous for a million other reasons. Not the least of which is that we have a constitution and structure of government that provides a number of other additional protections to people, rather than a dictatorship. And again you could argue that allowing certain opinions, pro communist speech for example, could lead to eventual dictatorship down the line, but that is not sufficient cause to ban speech.

Yes it is right that the Klan gets away, legally, with "hate speech." They should be mocked and shunned by society, but should never be legally punished so long as they don't advocate violence. The law is correct. I'm actually a bit shocked at the authoritarian impulse coming from the left these days. Different agendas and enemies, but philosophically consistent with a Trump view of the role government.

 

[aTUfan]

What is the penalty for "hate speech".

 

[astonmartin708]

I anticipated that would be your exact argument, and I already rebutted it in my answer. We make a distinction between opinion and calling for violence/violence. We punish one but not the other for good reason. You can make the argument "allowing someone to state ______ offensive opinion could lead to _____ which could lead to something really bad" for almost any subjectively offensive statement, whether factual or not. And as I said, the Nazi comparison is ridiculous for a million other reasons. Not the least of which is that we have a constitution and structure of government that provides a number of other additional protections to people, rather than a dictatorship. And again you could argue that allowing certain opinions, pro communist speech for example, could lead to eventual dictatorship down the line, but that is not sufficient cause to ban speech.

Yes it is right that the Klan gets away, legally, with "hate speech." They should be mocked and shunned by society, but should never be legally punished so long as they don't advocate violence. The law is correct. I'm actually a bit shocked at the authoritarian impulse coming from the left these days. Different agendas and enemies, but philosophically consistent with a Trump view of the role government.

Here's my question to you... Do you seriously think that the system we have now is the best our society can do? You seriously think that quelling the use of racial slurs in public, or rhetoric that blames some negative circumstance on a specific group without logic or evidence would lead to the loss of people being able to voice their political views?

Is this supposed to be the world's endgame?

It's clear that our system isn't perfect as it is. That's why we're having this discussion. I want to see an iteration of society that has evolved past a broken republic, or a authoritarian communist state.

 

[URedskin54]

You seriously think that quelling the use of racial slurs in public, or rhetoric that blames some negative circumstance on a specific group without logic or evidence would lead to the loss of people being able to voice their political views?

Common sense suggests yes. When you give government power to decide what is acceptable opinion, inevitably the realm of acceptable speech will get narrower and narrower and will be at the whim of public opinion. We already have a pretty good sample from campuses showing what would happen if you gave the people who want hate speech laws that kind of power. Shutting down mainstream conservative thought is their game, and any opinion they don't like is hate speech. If we're going to punish people for blaming negative circumstances on a specific group without logic or evidence, we may have to lock Bernie up.

 

[lawpoke87]

Looking back at history I have a hard time believing that there are those who want to ban or even limit free speech. The problem of course is that such limitations have been used throughout history as a way to stifle opposition when speech content is objectionable to those in power. Lots of short sighted people on this subject who fail to realize the protections afforded by our freedoms and that next time it might be speech with which they agree with which is sought to be banned.

 

[TUMe]

Astonmartin, I think you are completely wrong but I completely support your right to say it.

 

[astonmartin708]

Common sense suggests yes. When you give government power to decide what is acceptable opinion, inevitably the realm of acceptable speech will get narrower and narrower and will be at the whim of public opinion. We already have a pretty good sample from campuses showing what would happen if you gave the people who want hate speech laws that kind of power. Shutting down mainstream conservative thought is their game, and any opinion they don't like is hate speech. If we're going to punish people for blaming negative circumstances on a specific group without logic or evidence, we may have to lock Bernie up.

Your argument is a slippery slope fallacy. I don't support the means or method used to subvert free speech on a campus like Missouri. I'm not advocating the demise of all political thought, just of blatant bigotry.

As for Bernie I assume you are referring to his war on wall street... There is some logic and some evidence behind his argument that they created an economic collapse and no one was ever punished for it.

 

[astonmartin708]

Looking back at history I have a hard time believing that there are those who want to ban or even limit free speech. The problem of course is that such limitations have been used throughout history as a way to stifle opposition when speech content is objectionable to those in power. Lots of short sighted people on this subject who fail to realize the protections afforded by our freedoms and that next time it might be speech with which they agree with which is sought to be banned.

Please Read:

It is widely accepted that you cannot yell “fire” mischievously in a crowded place or directly incite violence (although you can urge “revolution” in the abstract until you’re red in the face). But are there other limits, in particular in cases where the words in question would endanger not life and property but merely people’s feelings? Would restraints on some controversial speech cast a pall over all discourse?

This issue also carries implications for debates about other constitutional rights, such as those that surround the proposed “ground zero” mosque or government eavesdropping in the name of the global war on terror.

The court is weighing the free expression protections claimed by the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan., and its pastor, the Reverend Fred W. Phelps. They believe that America has aggrieved the Almighty by tolerating homosexuality and that He is expressing His wrath by taking our sons in battle in Iraq and Afghanistan. To express approval of this divine punishment, they display placards at the funerals of our fallen warriors, saying “thank God for dead soldiers.” (The deceased needn’t have been gay; any soldier’s burial will do to make their point.)

Some families into whose wounds the Westboro church’s antics have poured salt have brought suit. The case may revolve around special laws governing behavior at funerals. But it raises deeper issues. If speech can be restricted at funerals, why not at other special moments?

“A broad coalition of media organizations and First Amendment scholars . . . . say ruling against the church would undermine the core protections of the First Amendment,” reports The Washington Post. And The New York Times argues that “it is in the interest of the nation that strong language about large issues be protected, even when it is hard to do so.”

But what is the reasoning behind this position? The Times notes that the court previously affirmed the right of Nazis to parade through Skokie, Ill., and upheld the antics of Hustler magazine. Yet few would say that the Nazis, Hustler, or the Westboro church’s fulminations somehow enrich us. Rather, the essential argument is the “slippery slope” analogy. If we countenance some constraints on freedom, why not others? Where does it end?

This argument has canonical status, but does it make any sense? The Times has little patience for this logic when the gun lobby advances it regarding the second amendment. The right to a gun needn’t mean the right to own an assault rifle.

Speech rights are far more important than gun rights (there are free societies without the latter; none without the former), but as a matter of narrow logic, it is hard to see why banning demonstrations at funerals is more of a slippery slope than banning assault weapons.

Moreover, a wealth of political history suggests that the slippery slope is a phantom. Almost all European countries ban “hate speech” and many ban Holocaust-denial. This goes against the American grain, but those countries have not sacrificed any other freedoms as a result.

Or consider West Germany. The Americans and Germans who framed the Basic Law of the Bonn Republic worked in the terrible shadow of Hitler’s destruction of the Weimar Republic, Germany’s only prior democratic experiment. They were also in uncomfortable proximity to Soviet-run East Germany. So they banned both the Nazi and Communist Parties on the grounds that they were totalitarian movements, aiming to destroy democracy itself. Far from turning into a slippery slope, under this system freedom took hold in Germany at long last and apparently forever.

What about America’s experience? The ambit of tolerated speech has grown relentlessly wider. In the realm of obscenity standards, we have gone from Lady Chatterly, to bare breasts, to full frontal, to pictorial gynecology. If there is any slippery slope, it seems to be tilted in the opposite direction from the one invoked by conventional wisdom. Were the court to uphold some constraints on speech, that would merely put us back to some earlier point in the unfolding of American free speech standards. When we were at that point, whatever and whenever it was, we did not slide downward to dictatorship but forward to where we stand today. Where is the danger?

I can think of no example in which rights disappeared down a slippery slope. Yes, the Communists used “salami tactics” in subjugating Eastern Europe, but the progressive loss of freedom was scarcely unforeseen. The Kremlin was bent on imposing its model of totalitarianism one way or another on the countries its troops occupied; the salami slices merely made the going smoother.

The slippery slope peril is a myth, much like the libertarian bogeyman that the welfare state will lead to dictatorship. In practice, European and other countries have infringed economic freedom without any loss of political freedoms. And they have also constrained speech in ways that most Americans (including me) wouldn’t do but with no further loss of freedom. A sovereign, self-governing people is capable of drawing lines.

To argue by imagery and analogy, as does the conventional wisdom apotheosized by the Times, rather than by logic and history, is, you might say, to step onto a slippery slope at the bottom of which lies lots of freedom of thought but very little thinking.

 

[lawpoke87]

"I can think of no example in which rights disappeared down a slippery slope."

I could not disagree more with that statement. What is the first thing dictators do when they seize power? Take control of the media and speech. Those advocating the speech police are not arguing against speech soley at sensitive events like funerals. Rather, they are supporting a ban on certain speech with which they fail to agree.

The Fire in a Public Theater example is often used as it would result in an immediate panic and extremely dangerous situation. The closest I can think of late would be the BLM group advocating the killing of police officers which was then followed by the execution of several shortly thereafter. While I disagree with that type of violent message I support their right to the speech however hateful it might be.

 

[astonmartin708]

"I can think of no example in which rights disappeared down a slippery slope."

I could not disagree more with that statement. What is the first thing dictators do when they seize power? Take control of the media and speech. Those advocating the speech police are not arguing against speech soley at sensitive events like funerals. Rather, they are supporting a ban on certain speech with which they fail to agree.

The Fire in a Public Theater example is often used as it would result in an immediate panic and extremely dangerous situation. The closest I can think of late would be the BLM group advocating the killing of police officers which was then followed by the execution of several shortly thereafter. While I disagree with that type of violent message I support their right to the speech however hateful it might be.

If America were to fall to a dictator, they would take the whatever speech we had anyways... That's quite an unlikely scenario considering our political system. What's the closest we've been? Lincoln? FDR?

 

[lawpoke87]

If America were to fall to a dictator, they would take the whatever speech we had anyways... That's quite an unlikely scenario considering our political system. What's the closest we've been? Lincoln? FDR?

Doesn't necessarily have to be a dictator. A political party who is in control of the three branches of government and the SCOTUS could ban or limit opposition party speech under these scenarios to either maintain or further their political power. The majority could also use such laws to silence the views of minorities. Lots a dangers in limited free speech.