Scary Court Rulings
June 26th, 2007The Supreme Court is starting to make me really scared. The balance has definitely shifted and the conservatives are firmly in control. I find it ironic how current conservatives can twist our liberties to fit their needs. They did get it right on the one hand with yesterday’s rulings. Clearly the Campaign Finance Reform provision that disallowed issue ads was/is unconstitutional (see story at the New York Times). If people have the money to broadcast their message so be it - our first amendment right is our most precious and the key to our successful democracy.
The court then turns around and says that a student can’t display a banner at a school function reading: “Bong hits for Jesus.” The court reasoned that the school had a right to protect students from messages encouraging illegal drug use. Does this mean they also ahve a right to curb speech encouraging students to acts of civil disobedience? This is a very slippery slope we’re on. Once you begin to regulate speech in any fashion we begin the long slide towards despotism.
What is really scary are the comments made by Justice Thomas. “I join the Court’s opinion because it erodes Tinker’s hold in the realm of student speech, even though it does so by adding to the patchwork of exceptions to the Tinker standard,” Thomas wrote in his concurrence. “I think the better approach is to dispense with Tinker altogether, and given the opportunity, I would do so.”
Tinker was a decision by the court in the 60’s that said “students do not shed their right to free speech at the schoolhouse door.”
Read some more here at the Student Press Law Center and .
Hello World!
June 25th, 2007Here I will post my random musings about the world. Things that I really enjoy are cooking (and eating, of course), music, computers, internet, politics, dogs etc.
Since this blog will be all over the place, I hope you enjoy!