I have been reading both The Washington Post and The Washington Times online for the past 3 years. I do not remember why I picked those two papers, but it was probably because I knew I would get one liberal paper and one conservative paper in the same town and it would be interesting to compare how the two report the same stories.

Over the years, I have occasionally read The New York Times, but mostly I have stuck with the two Washington papers.

The Washington Post is definitely a Liberal paper, but they have had very reasonable takes on issues lately. That counts for something in my book.

Today, The Washington Post has an op-ed by Michael Kinsley about The New York Times and how they selectively view the First Amendment. It is a must read.

I hate campaign finance laws. I understand why Congress feels the need to limit spending for campaigns in an effort to make them “more fair”. But telling me that I cannot spend my own money, in any amount I wish, to push for the candidate that I want is an infringement on my First Amendment right to free speech. The First Amendment reads:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

So, if I want to petition the government for redress or grievances, I am going to have to do something, such as advertisements, pamphlets, and meetings. Those things cost money and if the grievance I am petitioning against is the incumbent Congressman, then that means I have the right to campaign for his opponent. If I want to spend my entire life savings, I am free to do that. How can the Supreme Court say that you can limit how much an individual or a corporation can give to a candidate with a straight face concerning the First Amendment? It is beyond me.

Says Mr. Kinsley:

To give journalists such special privileges you have to define who is and who is not a journalist. That is harder to do in the age of the Internet. One reason for the explosion of hostility toward Miller and the Times is the resentment of the blogosphere. Blogging is, if anything, more like the kind of pamphleteering the Framers had in mind when they guaranteed “freedom of the press” than are the New York Times or The Washington Post. But if everyone with a blog or an e-mail discussion board is a journalist, who isn’t?

We must work to prevent the McCain-Feingold unconstitutional restriction on free speech from including blogs and the internet in general.

The court’s equation of money with speech is the despair of biens-pensants everywhere, but especially at the New York Times. A Times editorial called the state of Vermont “laudable” (an adjective that exists only in newspaper editorials) and declared that “the absence of [spending] limits gives an unfair advantage to wealthy candidates, who can spend vast amounts of their own money.”

That last point is obviously true. Unfortunately, it should be equally obvious that limits on spending for speech are limits on speech, both in intent and in effect. You can’t use money to buy votes directly in this country, for the most part. Having more money is an unfair advantage only to the extent that it is spent on sending a louder or more persuasive message. The government can and should do many things to make the softer voices louder. But when it tries to make the louder voices softer, it is reducing speech, which is unconstitutional.

Funny how simple it all is once you take all the passion and partisanship out of it, “when it tries to make the louder voices softer, it is reducing speech, which is unconstitutional.” How can the Supreme Court NOT understand that?

Yet the Times believes that its First Amendment right to speak includes a right (for journalists only) not to speak when subpoenaed in a criminal investigation. Meanwhile, it cannot see how a right to speak includes the right to spend money on speech.

As many have pointed out over the years, the Times might feel differently about a law that limited how much any one person or organization could spend putting out a newspaper, although that, too, would reduce the “unfair advantage” of some players over others. As a matter of fact, various legislative attempts to limit campaign spending invariably include an exemption for the news media, just to avoid that whole thicket. But this would be an excellent moment for the Times (and The Post and the other MSM) to reconsider all their various pleas for special treatment.

Very well said Mr. Kinsley. Very well said indeed. I really do hope that the Supreme Court gets its head out of it’s arse long enough to see that limiting who can say and who can spend during a campaign is a direct infringement on the First Amendment.

If campaign finance laws spread to blogs, then you will have to arrest me, because I am going to write what I feel about candidates up through Election Day. You may fine me and take my house or you may even lock me up, but I will believe to my dieing day that I have the fundamental right to write and say what I want about particular candidates. If that means old fashioned pamphlets and fliers, then so be it, but if it means using my blog to push for or against a candidate, I HAVE THE FUNDAMENTAL RIGHT.