Today's Hoot

Julian Sanchez at Reason - Undue Influence: Closing the First Amendment "Loophole"

The British philosopher Bertrand Russell once quipped that philosophy was the art of starting from premises too trivial for anyone to contest and arriving at conclusions too outlandish for anyone to accept. Had he lived to see the Supreme Court's recent ruling upholding core provisions of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act, he might have said something similar about jurisprudence—if not for the fact that so many people seem perfectly eager to accept the outlandish conclusions.
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Of course, the ultimate loophole is the First Amendment itself. As long as "special interests"—that is to say, anyone with a particular issue they're specially concerned with—can broadcast their views to the public, the public may be inclined to vote in accordance with those views. And the threat of depriving politicians of their God-given right to hold office may well give those special interests "undue influence on an officeholder's judgment."

I therefore propose a solution that would, I hope, make Bertrand Russell proud. We must close the First Amendment loophole once and for all, and recognize that constitutional protection of "free expression" should be reserved for copies of Hustler, as the Founders intended, not extended to such dangerous frivolities as the expression of political views.

And, as usual, the laugh's on us.