For years, we have discussed the alarming shift in the Democratic party on free speech with candidates running on pledges to censor opposing views and politicians supporting blacklisting and censorship on social media. Many citizens oppose such efforts to restrict their rights under the First Amendment, but are unaware of the work of their representatives to limit free speech. Now, a filing in the Supreme Court supporting censorship efforts by the Biden Administration has supplied a handy list of the anti-free speech states for citizens.
The 5th Circuit previously ruled in Missouri v. Biden that administration officials “likely violated” the First Amendment and issued a preliminary injunction banning the government from communicating with social media companies to limit speech.
Not surprisingly, the state of California is leading the effort to get the Supreme Court to reverse a decision enjoining the government from censorship efforts. California has long sought to impose speech limits on doctors, businesses, and citizens to silence opposing viewpoints.
However, 23 Democrat-led states joined this ignoble effort in signing on to the brief of California Attorney General Rob Bonta. The brief lauds past efforts of these states to combat “harmful content” on the Internet and to protect the public from “misleading information” through partnerships with social media companies.
So here is the list to see if you are residing in an anti-free speech state:
Arizona
Colorado
Connecticut
Delaware
Hawaii
Illinois
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Nevada
New Jersey
New Mexico,
New York
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
Vermont
Washington
Wisconsin
District of Columbia
Here is the brief: Amicus Brief for NY et al in Support of Petitioners
Is the omission of California an error?
Sad Sad Sad the way our Country is going. Its like we are all on the Titanic going down and there is nothing we can do about it. All the life boats are gone and the water is above our knees. I’ll see you at the bottom.
Jesus is the only answer. This has been foretold about in the Bible! Here’s an easy one to watch for: Isaiah 17:1 says, “The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.” And in Isaiah 17:14, we are told that it will happen overnight. These are specific things we can watch for. There is a Tribulation predicted in the Bible as well. That isn’t far off. But before the Tribulation, the TRUE believers in Jesus Christ will be removed from the earth. They are likely going to say it was “Project Blue Beam”…aliens. I hope you are in Christ!
You are correct! Christ is our only answer to this mess!
Idealogy over facts!
Our education system pushing idealogy over facts is very dangerous. The key to a successful business, is fostering an open communication system using the best idea based on data, not what you feel. Our greatest assets are people, this cult like behavior promoting cancel-culture over facts, will hurt our country. Watch this video!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8xWOlk3WIw
How Claudine Gay Canceled Harvard’s Best Black Professor. (mini-doc)
There is a simple solution to the case before Judge Doughty: All government communication with the media companies impinging on content moderation must take place in the public domain, including the funneling of communication through intermediary organizations. It is the secret, covert interaction to influence content moderation that gave rise to this lawsuit. Let public watchdogs surveil these interactions.
Then, in regards to violations of the public domain rule, enforcement should be based on Civil Torts with fast due-process courts. The 1st Amendment is a feckless piece of aspirational idealism without rapid-response enforcement.
It must be done via Civil Court, since government prosecution of violations posits an obvious conflict-of-interest escape-hatch. These Courts must be rapid-due-process, since the infospace moves at a fever pitch, and justice delayed is justice denied. The 1st Amendment is only as effective as are the deterrent certainties for violating it.
If every case has to go to the Supreme Court, the bottleneck delays will render enforcement flaccid — we need a civil court process at the District level where juries of 12 citizens decide the facts and apply the public domain rule.
Punishments meted out by juries for government employee and surrogate defendant violations of 1A should include lifetime bans on public service employment / contracting, revocation of pensions, public apologies, and financial judgments where appropriate.
It would be nice to still believe in a benevolent government or santa clause. But sure as every hurricane is a climate change canary in the coal mine, any word that your shitty rag mask is gonna prevent you from getting/transmitting covid, which is a death sentence for all except 99.5% of people that get it, or that discussing hunter’s crack habit and brokering of government largess, anything potentially damning to the idiots behind the green curtain will surely become national security issues or some other thing that keeps that info away from anyone lest they potentially harm themselves.
I think every government communication, email, phone call, conversation should be recorded and made public – all of it. The only case this should be abridged is if we are under attack, in the US – that’s it. No attorney-client privilege for government officials and every financial decision must be published 2-weeks before it is executed. Remember, democracy dies in darkness, as our own government likes to bludgeon us with. Screw these worthless government actors, seriously.
Every organization needs a modicum of privacy to be willing to explore ideas. If there were no privacy, creative ideation would freeze up. That said, if we can afford a well-defined, limited layer of deliberative privacy to govt. agency people, then all their other communications would be public domain (sunshine laws). Very importantly, that would include all lobbying (legislative or administrative advocacy). For the first time, lobbyists would have to publish their “asks” in advance of interacting with govt. officials, and face the blowback if not aligned with public interest.
This country was set up with The People managing their public servants. We can’t become cynical and throw in the towel (i.e., let them get away with incompetence/lethargy/corruption). Yet, we need to respect the young adults who go into govt. service for the right reasons…to serve the public broadly (as opposed to an identity group). Our core institutions have slid into some unhealthy practices — those must be repaired. If we adopt the “trust but verify” mindset of Pres. Reagan, we can still achieve good govt. But, not if people sit back and give up. Then, corruption becomes their expectation, govt. officials sense it, and are emboldened to act corruptly. There is no room for defeatism among average people if we want to “keep” our republic. And, I assume we all do.
No. The government has no business trying to moderate content…anywhere.
“California has long sought to impose speech limits . . .”
First government controls man’s body, via economic regulations. Then it controls his mind (e.g., “speech limits”).
Totalitarian dictatorship is merely a matter of time.
Hey, where’s all those Confederate states?!
Yeah, what about those Confederate states? They show up at the top of every survey on bad health and education yet they’re totally absent from Turley’s list.
Right. That’s why people are moving there.
The potential for an American Civil War in the 21st century is growing at a furious pace, and those in a position to reverse that growth aren’t doing very well at it. The last generation that had a chance to know what the concept of ‘freedom’ is would possibly be the Generation X’ers. Those are the men and women who today, in their late 30’s, 40’s and into early 50’s, and those who are older than that, are the last great hope to save America from this looming Civil War — and it won’t just be a cold war — it could get ‘hot,’ even very hot.
I ask Anonymous on behalf of the Founders of this great nation, explain why the voters exerting their will over public servants is insufficient to manage the policy conflicts we face in this century. Explain why only violent civil war will suffice to bring desired change. And explain how the flames of unhinged zealotry unleashed by civil war would thereafter be quenched, and a return to normal order be brought about. Wouldn’t the same gnarly problems of self-governance have to be confronted and solved?….wouldn’t those who prevailed in war at the point of a gun refuse to put down their guns and start compromising with opponents?
If the same messy process of collaborative self-government awaits after civil war, why not just skip the paroxysm of murderous rage, and buckle down to that ultimate task?
Are those who envision civil war fantasizers and romanticists who wouldn’t know how to begin reestablishing freedom with order? Are they resigned to a police-state dictatorship (restoring order without freedom)? Would freedom be redefined by grouping people into loyalists vs. dissenters? How different would that system be from how things operate in Russia, China, Iran and Cuba?
Not having the ability to answer these questions, the mere suggestion of hot civil war is fanatical and irresponsible. Note how it is spoken from behind the veil of anonymity. This is what JT defends as free speech?
….ideation of violent conflict-resolution with only an angry hindbrain guiding it?
Americans have inalienable rights. These are rights that can’t be taken away by the government even if its controlled (questionable) by people that are fairly (questionable) voted into office.
“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”
Anon: When the “civil war” is raging, you’ll be the life of the party, I’m sure.
Turley’s ‘Free Speech’ Standards Ignore Women’s Health
States with 6 week abortion bans:
TX, LA, MS, AL, GA, SC, AR, TN, KY, WV, IN, ND, ID, OK, MO.
In these states, emergency physicians are banned from telling women they should seek abortions even when the woman’s health is endangered.
We have recently seen a number of high profile cases in Texas where the health of female patients required abortions as soon as possible. Yet in all those cases, hospitals were forced to send the women home after telling them their conditions weren’t serious enough to justify an abortion.
But in Turley’s Fox News universe, a pregnant woman near death is not entitled to frank medical advice. So ‘free speech restrictions’ magically don’t apply!
How is abortion ” health” ??? Either pro or con the rhetoric by the left shows how little proof or logical arguments they can produce
Well, if medical professionals are saying that it’s not urgent enough to require an abortion….you just killed (no pun intended) your argument right there. It is obviously not a “women’s health” issue at that point. There is no excuse to murder another human being because they inconvenience you. If that were the case, the divorce rate in this country would drop and the mortality rate would increase overnight.
Ask women in gaza, ukraine, yemen, and russia about the health decisions of the biden administration.
“We have recently seen a number of high profile cases in Texas where the health of female patients required abortions as soon as possible. Yet in all those cases, hospitals were forced to send the women home after telling them their conditions weren’t serious enough to justify an abortion.”
So where are you lying here, the first sentence or the second?
Texas is a state with a Handmaid’s Tale style of government.
Yet people flee california for it all the time, makes you wonder why they’d do that. What is your take on CA’s style of government?
Moron.
Hey Moron @Anon: Texas is a state whose AG, Ken Paxton, risks women’s lives by making it against the law for a woman to leave Texas for a medically necessary abortion and for those who assist her on the journey, they too are law breakers. Very Handmaid’s Tale. Have you read the novel?
The concerning thing about CA is it’s housing crisis and high cost of living. Thus the exodus. Or so I hear. I don’t live there.
If you live in Texas, you must be happy with the population increase. Live long and prosper. Tell Gov Abbott to quit sending migrants to sanctuary cities.
Are you talking about Planned Parenthood taking pregnant 13-year-old children to Kansas for an abortion without telling the parents or getting their permission?
Planned Parenthood, subsidized by government funding, is providing soup-to-nuts care that includes doctors’ notes to schools, transportation, hotels, and abortion (to minors) while hiding everything from the parents.
Anonymous: +1000!
States With Greatest Number Of Banned Books
TX: 438, FL: 357, MO: 315, UT: 150
S.C: 109, PN: 27, ND: 27, MI: 18, VA: 11 TN: 4
Texas, Florida, Missouri, Utah and South Carolina have by far and away the most banned books. Yet these states don’t even make Turley’s list of states with ‘free speech restrictions’. How is that???
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1310288/school-book-bans-us-by-state/
………………………………
Apparently Turley never thought of using book bans as a criterion in rating ‘free speech’. It wasn’t part of his Fox News methodology.
The books are not banned and you know it. Appropriate content for children is the issue. Be honest for a change.
A pedophile, an incel, a person with no moral compass, no sense of purpose in life, does not care about honesty, never mind the harm they inflict on others. If pushing sexually charged books in front of minors helps accomplish their evil, then clearly that is what they will work towards. Problem is our culture no longer recognizes evil. See the travesty of Hamas killing Jews with American university admins and tenured faculty celebrating the anti-Semitism
Know God = Know Peace
No God = No Peace
“No God = No Peace”
Nice bumper sticker.
Too bad it evades the centuries of bloody religious wars.
Within the last 24 hours right outside your home, within a 1000 mile radius, scores of individuals suffered grave injustice by perpetrators who had 2 arms, 2 legs, blood running through their vasculature, and were likely human species. Some say you are a human being, hence the injustice incurred by those individuals is a reflection on you because they are your kind
the XX Century alone produced more murders by atheist govt leaders than all centuries combined prior to the XX Century
Had you studied at a university, which were invented by the Catholic Church in the middle-ages, you might have acquired analytical skills. Plato would have argued you make the Sophists look like geniuses.
“the XX Century alone produced more murders by atheist govt leaders than all centuries combined prior to the XX Century”
That communists murdered more people is not a resounding endorsement of religion’s barbaric history.
“. . . the Catholic Church in the middle-ages . . .”
If you were honest about the Church’s history (in the *dark* and middle ages), you would acknowledge the widespread *ignorance* that it caused.
Sam, why don’t you compare two countries, Russia and Spain. Stalin killed 9 million people over a few short years (some claim up to 60 million.)
In Spain over 200 years the Catholic Church killed around 32,000
“In Spain over 200 years the Catholic Church killed around 32,000”
Murder is not the only measure of an ideology’s barbarism. And it is obscene to whitewash murder on the grounds that: We murdered fewer than did the other butchers.
And why look just at Spain? Why not look at the centuries of religious wars?
“Murder is not the only measure of an ideology’s barbarism.”
Sam, it isn’t, but the murder rate of 300 to one is a good indicator of barbarism. Do you wish to argue that as well?
“And it is obscene to whitewash murder on the grounds that: We murdered fewer than did the other butchers.”
Yes, but the number of murders over 200 years leads to an average of 160 per year. Chicago, run by primarily immoral leftist non-religious folk, has a murder rate of 2-3X as high.
Since you wish to hinge your argument on something other than the slaughter of human beings, go ahead, let’s hear it along with the numbers, but do so without permitting selection to turn the results.
“And why look just at Spain? Why not look at the centuries of religious wars?”
Because the religious wars of the past were mainly about control and power, not solely about religion, religion dominated at one time, at least in the Western world (One might find a higher death rate with secularism in the Eastern world.) Secularism was prominent in the twentieth century. Why not make a comparison of the twentieth century to all other centuries? At least 100 million were killed (maybe double that), so let us hear your rhetoric based on the scientific principles used when fact-finding.
“Within the last 24 hours . . .”
A page from the communist playbook: To distract people from the irrational *ideas,” deflect. The only difference is that the communist’s diversion is more intelligent.
you mean books that aren’t in public schools but can be purchased / read outside of schools? hardly a ban
Here we go again with fishwings’ attempts to correlate the schools’ right (not right, but responsibility) to protect their students from creepy pedophilia, child sexualization, and sexual degeneracy so loved by the left.
Again, can my kids carry a gun into a school? Nope, so your kid can’t be exposed to your sexual degeneracy. Are those 2A or 1A infringements – not according to any one sane or without degenerate proclivities, but here we go again with broken record.
Keep making lefties look creepy, maybe you’ll lose some of those white females that have to choose between abortions and protecting their kids once they are born. Freak.
Neil,
Well said and spot on.
Have you seen the new aclu advertisements that use a black actor to try to make the same case as fishwings – unbelievable, these people will never stop going lower and lower in their march to indoctrinate the masses.
The aclu is officially a garbage organization. I am embarrassed to say I ever supported those now bottom-feeders.
Context matters. Those books are not “banned”. They were deemed inappropriate to be presented to children in schools. They are not restricted in colleges. You argument is tantamount to saying that “R” rated films are banned. They are restricted. Words matter.
Important Relevant News to This Topic: “Legal scholar Jonathan Turley becomes latest ‘swatting’ victim after false report of shooting at his home,” by Victor Nava (New York Post, December 29, 2023)
https://nypost.com/2023/12/29/news/legal-scholar-jonathan-turley-becomes-latest-swatting-victim/
Left out Kalifornia
“harass the liberal commenters on his blog’.
Mommy Turley, please make Estovir/Tom stop skull f*cking me!!!——-turdrunner
This is hilarious. The little kunt thinks commenters on a blog can be harassed. Poor little liberal commenters. WTF dude, who’s really acting like a child. Grow a pair you nutcase.
And so stupid too. If i had magic IP’s, why are my posts still up weeks later? I
Get this straight turd layer. You started this. You started with the so-and so is so and so, 18 times a day, months ago. Your only purpose was to disrupt the conversation. You do it to everyone who posts something you dont like. Today it was poor Mary. And then you whine like a little bitty b*tch ass twat about bullying. Irony always lost on libtards like you.
Now you can choose to act like a f*cking human, or you can keep getting treated like the sorry POS that you are.
Anonymous, Here is the blog civility policy.
https://jonathanturley.org/civility-rule/
And here is my proverbial dick for you to suck, mr concerned jackwad.
Mr. “proverbial dick” is a vulgar embarrassment to himself.
Anonymous, you’re the worthless piece of sh$t.
Thats estovir to you, turdrunner
I am not a worthless piece of shit. Your response demonstrates a lack of civility and a limited vocabulary. Work on it.
REGARDING ABOVE:
This shrieking twit is Tom/Estovir. He’s the creep who keeps writing about ‘steaming turds’ and guys getting ‘cornholed’.
Someone keeps naming all his puppet commenters and it’s driving Tom/Estovir out of his mind.
You see, Tom/Estovir imagines himself as the shock jock ‘hosting’ this blog. But lately nothing’s going according to script. So he keeps having these online tantrums.
Tom/Estovir is also: Thinkthrough, James, Jimmy, Upstate Farmer, Iowa2, Edward Mahl, Hullbobby, Guy Ventner, Margot Ballhere, N.N., Shakdi and many, many more.
It is idiocy to pretend that you know who anonymous posters are or what aliases other posters use.
It is also useless, and with near certainty error.
This is true regardless of your politics.
Posts claiming that Alias X is really Alias Y are all meaningless noise.
They are with near certainty wrong,
and even if you are lucky enough to be correct,
They are still completely meaningless.
John Say,
That is why I just scroll past them all.
The failure of those on the left to behave civilly is not a justification for the rest of us to do so.
I greatly appreciate the efforts of many here to eviscertate left wing nut posters using facts, logic and reason.
To expose their lies, hypocracy, failure to consider the consequences of their actions,
As well as their constant use of fallacious arguments – particularly ad hominem.
‘
I completely understand the anger at those who refuse to engage in good faith debate, or who refuse to behave civilly.
But lets not join them.
Speaking of higher education, Harvard University of the “Poison Ivy League” retains an abject fraud and plagiarist, one even more egregious than the proven plagiarist, fraud, and philanderer, Martin Luther King, the one and only, Claudine Gay.
______________________________________________________________________
DR. CAROL SWAIN
YOU HAVE GOT TO UTTERLY LOVE THIS BRILLIANT BLACK WOMAN.
I DO!
“Well, if Claudine Gay was a White male or female, or even a Black conservative, she would have been fired by now.”
“The penalty normally for plagiarism at that level is that you lose your position, but most people would resign. “
“She plagiarized my work as well as several other people.”
“It’s my understanding that 20 instances of plagiarism was found in her dissertation and publish words.”
“There’s no way you can’t know it. My book won the highest prize in the profession and two other national prizes.”
“It was cited by the US Supreme Court and numerous lower court decisions. There’s no way that Claudine Gay, her committee members, her reviewers, and other people didn’t know that she was drawing on my research.”
“Harvard University is morally bankrupt and we see this at every turn.”
“Now they have themselves in a conundrum where they’re trying to redefine what is plagiarism. I believe they’re doing this because they don’t want to fire their first ever Black president, someone who was clearly a DEI appointee.”
“For me, as a person who became a Black conservative, not citing my work had long term consequences because your statue in political science and in any other fields pretty much depends on how much you have cited your citations.”
“If you have someone that’s as prominent as she became and they have research out there, and they are not acknowledging the similar work in the area, that damages you because you don’t get the number of citations you would have gotten.”
“The scandal is indicative of a larger problem with diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives on college campuses.”
“It’s not following the Constitution. It’s very dangerous.
“It’s harming people and racial and ethnic minorities are the ones that are harmed most. I think that people need to realize that critical race theory, diversity, equity and inclusion programs are not necessary.”
“[The] White progressives [backing Gay at Harvard have caused irreparable damage].”
– Dr. Carol Swain
____________________
‘[Harvard’s governing body…found Gay responsible for ‘a few instances of inadequate citation,’ and that Gay is requesting corrections to address those instances. The statement also included a statement of support for Gay, claiming she ‘is the right leader to help our community heal and to address the very serious societal issues we are facing.’”
– Harvard University
INSANELY LONG POST AHEAD
Right below you’ll see a post by Tom/Estovir under the name ‘Chris Webber’. Said puppet is trying to bury a post further down telling us that Tom/Estovir is posing as ‘Mary’.
Don’t even try troll. Tell Darren to look at the server. I’m logged in as me. I have not logged out as me all night. My account is linked to my website and social media profiles both business and personal. You can take your demonic lies, and go f@# yourself.
]
Stooge, your post is just five thousand words of nothing. It’s like piles of mulch on top of a sinkhole.
Hey turdrunner, use tour name man. Stop being a kunt
If a post’s positions are error – make the argument.
Chris Weber is his own individual person.
So is Estovir, Tom, John Say, Mary, TiT, OLLY and many others to include myself.
You can’t even read my name right, much less understand the post you’re trolling.
The irony of your trolling that post, is incredible. It shows just how incredibly ignorant you trolls really are.
Turdrunner the coward kunt is back again tonight, spewing his paranoid delusions about everyone is Estovir.
He is such a skanky little pussy he wont even use his turdrunner handle anymore.
“Mommy, that Estovir/Tom guy is f*cking me in the ass again!!!!!!”
—-turdrunner
Communist Colorado has gone Full Red Guard.
Governor Polis is an extreme threat to freedom. He even has paintings of Demons hanging in his office.
I am thank goodness, so I’ll say this.
One would think this blogs comments area section being the professors would be prolific with real people and personalities from all over the spectrum.
After all the professor is probably one of the most renowned constitutional scholars in the US today. He’s been seen for over a decade on the mainstream media, testified before congress, is a member of one of the most prestigious law schools in the nation and he writes for numerous large mainstream and other publications.
People want to hear what he has to say. And they want to be able to say things to him, share their ideas, opinions, questions. He’s a fascinating fatherly figure to millions in this world of quackery and partisan punditry.
So naturally one would expect to see comments from scholastic figures and students dotting the pages of the comments sections. We should be seeing authors and actors involved in the political spectrum sharing their ideas and opinions in here. One would expect to see peers and pundits, politicians and peasants, all in here together like the social media spectrum it was intended to be. Where an exchange of differing ideas and opinions could be shared with the professor and his students, etc in a widely read widely frequented format.
But we see none of this.
Instead all we see and have seen for the last decade since I first started coming in here, are the same small handful of keyboard characters, all hidden behind made up names with no tie to the real world, and the rest of the millions of comments are made by completely anonymous trolls who could comprise one or several individuals of various affiliations or even a collection of AI bots.
All we see and have seen for over a complete decade, is a never ending gaggle of cackling clowns clobbering each other from their keyboards and collectively jumping on any real commenters who come in to express any opinion at all.
And I don’t mean “commenting to them”. I mean trolling. And of the worst kind.
I mean piling on one after the other, with endless rapid fire attacks, insults, challenges, questions, demands for “evidence” for things easily googled and well known in the public spectrum, taking sections of your words while omitting the words that go along with them so as to change their meaning, knowingly omitting well known facts, etc and just do this over and over one to the next in a never ending barrage so that its impossible to keep track of who or what you are talking to or even about.
This continues endlessly until any single normal individual is statistically overwhelmed unable to keep up with machinegun spray this small collective of googling goons launches at them and they finally go away.
Which is why there is no one of substance in here, just trolls.
Which is why there are no interesting discussions with interesting people, media figures or otherwise.
Its why no one can come here and expect to see one of Turley’s counterparts or opponents respond to him in here.
Its why I or anyone else can’t come in and see the thoughts of a well known attorney legal pundit or local scholar or speaker, in response to one of the professors posts.
Its why everyday people cannot see the responses of a public person, or entertainer, or legal analyst or anyone one else for that matter, to one of the professors positions.
Its because they will all be immediately insulted, attacked, trashed and badgered off the blog by the anonymous band of mealy-mouthed mice that haunt these hallowed halls.
And the reason they can do that is because they do it from in secret. Make no mistake about it. It would not happen if it were otherwise.
They would not be able to continually launch these endless never ending attacks day in day out, year in year out without exposing their allegiance’s and affiliation’s and motives if it were not from behind a veil of anonymity. Because no one has that much time on their hands other than paid hacks, quacks and moms-basement trolls and law school dropouts living on unemployment.
No one has all day, every day every week every month every year to spend 12 to 14 hours a day badgering their partisan counterparts and any newcomers unfortunate enough to stumble in. And that’s what I’ve seen these guys doing year in year out, every time I pop in from month to month and peruse the comments section back a few weeks. Every time. Nothing but the same endless round-robin ring-around-rosy romper-room of rodents running around ranting at each other waiting for someone “new” to pop in so the can gang up on him. Its quite a spectacle if you observe it in the big picture. Of course mice see in the small frame.
If people knew who they were then they’d be exposing their allegiances. And that’s’ why they hide.
Not for fear of any political retribution. This isn’t some sanctuary for political outcasts. This is a trolls rats nest.
They’re here for one thing, for the purpose of political trolling and silencing dissenting voices.
Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not talking about myself. Sure they did and do it to me but I could care less, I’m an infrequent visitor and when I come in I give it back to them in kind. I talk to people the way they talk to me. And if they lie and omit and troll me while patronizing me with pleasantries, I call that out right away. I’m on that like white-on-rice.
And I’m all for the professors position on “allowing” anonymous posts. I wholeheartedly agree with the position that “in some circumstances” “some” people need to speak anonymously to be protected from power.
Our very Bible was written that way at one time. Authors spoke anonymously at times and referred to people in the anonymous, such as the infamous “666” label for the antichrist which was actually a reference to Nero. Speaking out against Nero wasn’t advisable at the time. He had a tendency to illuminate his garden parties with pot-ash covered Christians who got too vocal in their opposition to him.
So I fully concur with the reasons behind his allowing anonymous posts however this is not that.
It’s just unfortunate that it turned into a handful of subversive trolls tackling and taking over this blog which could have been so good, … simply because they’re allowed to continuously hide behind a perpetual wall of anonymity.
I’m not saying people should be forced to post publicly or that anonymity isn’t warranted in certain cases. And I realize there are certain jobs that restrict a persons ability to speak freely on social media, something the professor is a vocal opponent of for obvious 1st amendment concerns.
But for most of us, its not.
So none of that explains this cesspool of turd jokes and insults that this place has turned into, which drives away any real figures or persons from commenting.
These are NOT some few public officials or others concerned about making a political statement that they can’t because they’re prohibited by their work. And its not some poor persecuted whistleblowers trying to make some important public disclosure that were they to do publicly might put them in jeopardy.
This is the same group of keyboard partisan hacks that’s been here from the onset, over a decade with the majority hiding behind anonymous handles and the others hiding behind made up persona’s, many having two or more, … leveraging their anonymity to control the dialogue and silence any outside voices that dare wander in, while making it an anathema to any interesting public or media personalities and figures, celebrities’, pundits, politicians, public officials or scholastic groups. They avoid it like the plague, which is a fitting word for what this group has done to this blog.
The very limited argument that “certain” individuals need to be protected so they can speak free from authoritarian retribution or persecution just doesn’t apply to this group of cackling clowns. That’s not who they are, and that’s not what they’re doing.
The principal is an honorable one, but the practice here has turned into a calliope of the same crap going around day after day after day with no hope of anything ever remotely resembling an intelligent legal, political or educational discourse between a wide and diverse group of both public and private figures like we see in plenty of other forums, from ever occurring here.
Anyone who enters immediately gets the rapid fire badgering by the keyboard klan in sequence with a never ending series of omissions and lies and half truths to keep them responding with links and “proof” of things that are common knowledge then ignoring when they do and then disappearing while some supposed “new” personality picks up where they left off, starting all over again with the same already answered questions and challenges until finally the person just gives up and goes away. So any “real person” with a real social media profile and a real life in public that doesn’t involve political partisan punditry or quackery, .. just gets shouted down and out until they go away.
That’s why there isn’t one single real verifiable profile in this entire blog other than the professors.
Not one. Not one in real life person in all these years. And that’s why.
The evidence of that claim, is self evident and documented in millions upon millions of comments over more than a decade for anyone to peruse.
The obvious irony being this is the exact same thing that the professor is constantly decrying in the universities and public square. The shouting down of outsiders and dissenting voices. He decries it in weekly posts. This week too.
Yet, amazingly, the exact same sort of silencing goes on in here in his own blog on a daily basis.
I mean its his blog, and I understand his reasoning.
But look at what it could have been. Sadly it could have been so good.
Think about it, this could have been the professors law and scholarly version of Twitter or “X” where a wide array of real people exchanged opinions arguments and ideas.
This could have been its own social media platform where real people could come in and discuss and argue real opinions instead of the round robin of troll attacks and insults that controls this blogs comment section.
Who knows, maybe Joe Rogan might could stop in and leave a comment or ask the prof a question. Maybe Jordon Peterson might want to stop in to say hi (he’d have a field day with this group on a couch) .
Maybe Candace Owens or Ben Shapiro might pop in every week and interact with the professor and the crowd on hot topic issues, and real people could interact with real personalities like they do on forums and social media platforms in other places, only here it would be the professors issues and topics being discussed.
Think about it.
Maybe from time to time we’d hear from Hollywood actors or comedians, love em or hate em they make for interesting discourse and we want to hear from all sides, which is why talk shows have a diverse guest list and not a stagnant one.
Maybe Jon Stewart or Bill Maher might pop in. Maybe Russell Brand might want to challenge something or ask a question or some person in the media being attacked may want to speak up or out.
Maybe public officials or political candidates might chime in from time to time. Who knows, maybe even a SCOTUS member like Amy Coney Barrett (who is a woman among women) might chime in and say something, or Ted Cruz, or Don Lemon. Maybe “anyone” might chime in, were it a place where such a forum is encouraged.
So maybe it could be that. And the professor would have a real success. A legal scholars blog that he could be proud of the comments sections and the wide and diverse array of both private and public citizens that frequent it.
Maybe.
But not here. Not this way. Not ever. The fact it hasn’t happened in over a decade of readership growth is proof of that.
This tight knit circle of keyboard carrion has killed any chance of that as is evident day in and day out.
I know, I’ve been coming in infrequently from time to time over more than a decade, and I’ve seen the exact same figures along with the exact same B-company of anonymous trolls who mysteriously always show up as if on que to champion either side by hurling cheap infantile insults and words like “Turd” to elevate the discussion …
But its not millions of people. Millions of comments. But its a handful of anonymous trolls making them.
I seem to recall the professor promulgating recently something like millions or tens of millions of comments, ..whatever, … but yes a lot of comments, but all made by the same small group of venomous spitting spatting spewing vipers. And no one else.
So the very irony of the professor being the stalwart champion against the “shouting down” of others to silence dissenting views yet here in his own blog, his own and honorable albeit demonstrably misplaced allegiance to the concept of anonymity to protect free speech has not only allowed but facilitated that very thing.
Not for me, I’m not talking about myself. I could care less.
I seldom engage the anonymous cacklers, and when I do its not for long then I move on and pay it no heed, since I’m seldom in here as I have a job and a life and while I read this blog weekly when there’s something I’m interested, I seldom comment. When I do its usually like this on or around the holidays along with the occasional weekend or snowstorm comment where I am home not working. So it’s not me this observation is about. Its about all the millions of interesting fascinating figures that could be in here every week, both public and private, were it not so.
We can rest assured Candace Owen or Jordan Peterson isn’t coming in here to listen to the array of fart jokes and turd comments, insults and heckling co-mingled with partisan trolling. They’ll not touch it with a ten foot totem-pole. Nor will anyone else of any substance.
That’s not my fact. That’s a fact that’s self evident and has been for over a decade within the comment sections of the forum.
Until the professor figures out a way to encourage his fans to come out of hiding and try engaging each other like real life human beings, then all we will have in the comments section is the puppet show we’ve been watching reruns of for the last 10 years.
And a quick correction, text got truncated.
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That was supposed to read “I am in a FREE SPEECH state thank goodness.”
We don’t censor down here. Not yet anyway.
Chris Weber
First, go f*ck yourself. Second, that was one huge steaming turd. I stopped reading after it made its first circumnavigation of the toilet bowl.
@ Chris Weber:
I agree with almost everything you’ve opined on here but you could have said it in 1/4 the space. You did yourself no favors by writing a repetitive missive.
That said you do err by “Gilding The Lilly” with definitive statement that, while perhaps largely true, are not at all absolutely true, such as:
“But we see none of this.”
“Which is why there is no one of substance in here, just trolls.”
“They’re here for one thing, for the purpose of political trolling and silencing dissenting voices.”
“That’s why there isn’t one single real verifiable profile in this entire blog other than the professors. Not one. Not one in real life person in all these years. And that’s why.”
The irony of you sitting here pretending you don’t know its about you, is laughable.
Keep cackling, troll.
…or did your parents name you JibberJabber?
As Harry Hu used to say, … “Amazing….”
Wow! You just lost ALL credibility. Pot meet kettle.
Wrong. You didn’t even READ my comment, TROLL.
if you had, you’d know its NOT about insults.
You said I should shorten it, obviously to meet your shortened attention span but no, your problem is troll, you’re talking and not reading.
You need to READ the comment you’re responding to. My response to you has zero to do with the credibility of my post or myself.
The post is about TROLLS HIDING BEHIND HANDLES like JIBBERJABBER.
Idiot.
“Comment” you say???
@ Chris Weber: It would be nice if instead of doing exactly what you claim I am doing you provide a few example of my acting like a Troll. You can’t. That notwithstanding, anonymous political writing (even insulting) is as old a America itself. But perhaps you’re just too much of a foolish Troll to bother education yourself: try looking up “Cato’s letters” in Google for a start.
By the way, until you prove to all of us reading your “Trolling” insults that you really are someone named Chris Weber (how ya gonna do the eh?), I recommend you reexamine your honesty before you call anyone else an Idiot.
Never mind Chris – I found you on my fist shot at the Maine Sex Offender Registry as Christopher Leroy Webber : https://sor.informe.org/cgi-bin/sor/step5.pl?id=1062
Nice touch changing the spelling of your surname to Weber. Clever move genius.
Of course I post this in jest – But it serve its purpose as an illustration of why anyone with half a brain uses a pseudonym when posting to sights like this.
You’re scum for even suggesting it. And your excuse is nonsense. People confront one another every day on Facebook, Truth Social, Rumble, Twitter (X) etc using their real names and profiles.
You’re a moral coward hiding behind an anonymous handle because if you posted as yourself you’re ashamed of what you write.
F*ck you and your name chris weber. How about a state, city and dob to go along with it, since your horseh!t name says nothing.
Are you the ex basketball player?
This is not formal debate or a legal brief, your criticisms – even if valid accuse Weber of Jaywalking while increasingly the blog devolves into posts abort excrement – literally.
Self styled moral north star for the rest of the world has spoken.
What a moron.
Says the troll who knows when he’s reading about himself.
It’s worth keeping in mind that the decisions of the States, including California, to join with California Attorney General Rob Bonta in his brief represents only the position of these various State’s Executive Branches. I imagine in at least some of these state the Legislative and/or Judicial branches would oppose such a move. One can live in hope at any rate.
Primarily they reflect the positions of State AG’s – many of which are elected independently of the Executive.
That said it is still very disturbing that any state would weigh in on idiocy like this.
While I personally do not beleive that our first amendment protections are broad enough.
A long legal history of free speech as well as a long excreble history of government attempts to limit it should advise against States arguing for Censorship.
One hundred years ago Justice Brandeis opined that the remedy for bad speech is always more speech.
The history of government efforts to restrict speech has ZERO good examples.
Tom/Estovir Writes:
“Dennis takes time out from cornholing his nephew to bring us 2 day old news again.
If you would come up for air more Dennis, maybe u would t be so far behind, pardon the pun”.
……………………………….
This is Professor Turley’s idea of free speech: ‘Letting some 8th Grade bully harass the liberal commenters on his blog’.
Turley can always claim he has no relationship with the Blog Stooge. And that is quite possible. Perhaps Turley is really the victim as well. Perhaps the Blog Stooge has technology that allows him to keep changing IPO addresses.
But it’s peculiar that Turley makes no effort to delete these repulsive, gay-centric posts. Too many of these each day gives the blog a decidedly sleazy look. And that reflects on Turley!
As for Tom/Estovir, and all his puppets, he comes across as a repressed homosexual who has trouble processing his true desires. So Tom/Estovir remains at a stage where all these gay references are still just ‘insults’ flung at other men.
REGARDING ABOVE:
Aidan Maese-Czeropski: “Drill, baby, drill”
Not repressed homosexual Svelaz: “not fair, you himbo!”
🤣
Turdrunner hates Turley and everything about this blog. He is the only reason i come here. Its not about Dennis. Its about you turdrunner. And i will be here after you are gone.
Pedophilia is not about being gay, homophobe. U should know this. If you are really that ignorant, ask dennis, he’ll fill you in.
Not Tom or Estovir, paranoid delusional kunt
The only liberal on this blog is Turley.
There are progressives, there are conservatives, libertarians, there are lots of just plain idiots.
But there are no other liberals.
Is Turley’s idea of Free speech ‘Letting some 8th Grade bully harass the liberal commenters on his blog’.
Yes, because that is what free speech means.
We bar speech that is illegal conduct – ordering someone to murder another.
We bar persuasive speech when it incites violence, the incitement is clear, immediate, and certain.
We bar threats of violence with the same conditions.
We bar an increasingly narrow range of obscene speech.
Be bar an increasingly broad range of adult content involving or directed towards children.
Those are pretty much the only instances in which government can a priori restrict, punish or censor speech
Interesting to see Arizona on the list. Thank you fellow Zonies for electing Democrats to run Phoenix and Tucson and allowing Katie Hobbs to become Governor with a Biden style campaign, tagging along everyone except the Treasurer. I hate what California exfill has done to destroy my State. I came here to get away from Michigan. Now California and Illinois have moved here. It really sucks. Libertarians and Republicans are still alive in the rest of the State. And we don’t like the Califorication of our State. Somehow, they just can’t resist tinkering with the new residence.
Please send the Army and Marines to take back once-great California.
Illegal deportation is not worse than illegal immigration.
Illegal deportation is not worse than illegal invasion.
Illegal deportation is not worse than MASS INSANE “ASYLUM” FRAUD.
I like the cut of your jib.
I live in one of those states that when I moved here 20 years ago was free state run by conservatives. We have been californicated like so many others on that list.
MARY is Tom/Estovir posing as a woman.
Tom/ Estovir is also: James, Jimmy, Upstate Farmer, Iowa2, Shakdi, dgsnowden, Ralph Chappell, Edward Mahl, Guy Ventner, N.N. and many, many more.
Turdrunner is a coward little pedophile posing as anonymous.
Signed
Tom/ Estovir,James, Jimmy, Upstate Farmer, Iowa2, Shakdi, dgsnowden, Ralph Chappell, Edward Mahl, Guy Ventner, N.N. and many, many more.
Not just some Democrats, both parties have anti-free speech factions.
George W. Bush established “Free Speech Zones” on taxpayer streets because free speech was interfering with his photo ops.
Bush also created “No Constitution Zones” for any citizen residing or traveling within 100 miles of any national border. If you do the math, the majority of the entire U.S. population (about 330 million) live in a “No Constitution Zone”. Federal officials can search any person, house or auto without a judicial warrant citing immigration enforcement.
Republican Attorney General, John Ashcroft, spent about $7000 of our hard earned tax dollars to purchase a curtain to coverup a female nude statue (taxpayer owned statue) located in the U.S. Department of Justice.
Republicans censor also!
But but but, wuttabout…?