Posted on 07/11/2009 2:30:24 PM PDT by Behind Liberal Lines
When it comes to the First Amendment, Team Obama believes in Global Chilling.
Cass Sunstein, a Harvard Law professor who has been appointed to a shadowy post that will grant him powers that are merely mind-boggling, explicitly supports using the courts to impose a "chilling effect" on speech that might hurt someone's feelings. He thinks that the bloggers have been rampaging out of control and that new laws need to be written to corral them.
"Although obscure," reported the Wall Street Journal, "the post wields outsize power. It oversees regulations throughout the government, from the Environmental Protection Agency to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Obama aides have said the job will be crucial as the new administration overhauls financial-services regulations, attempts to pass universal health care and tries to forge a new approach to controlling emissions of greenhouse gases."
Sunstein was appointed, no doubt, off the success of "Nudge," his previous book, which suggests that government ought to gently force people to be better human beings.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Are we supposed to be afraid of this? (No.) Isn’t the Obama administration over-reaching in so many areas, that its hold mindshare is already at risk? (Yes.)
This is just another attempt to distract us from focusing on battles we can win.
That is unusual. My family came from a communist country when I was a child and I found “global warming” radioactive from the first. I think there’s far less belief in it in the Eastern Europe which has had a recent encounter with communism than in the West, where tyranny seems to be a forgotten concept. In the Czech Republic only about 11% of people believe in global warming but, of course, there’s a special reason for that - the wonderful Vaclav Klaus who can not only see the truth but articulate it.
bump
<< ... escaped from communism but he’s swallowed environmentalism ... >>
I’d call that “spreading communmentalism,” not escaping it.
“Environmentalism,” by any other name, IS the new communism.
(Ask any Greenpeace founder!)
Brian Richard Allen
Los Angeles Califobambicated 90028
And the Far Abroad
Sunstein also believes that animals have the right to sue people ...
It is NOT the responsibility of the government to teach us to be better human beings. This is the height of arrogance on the part of Statists. Every tyrant since the beginning of time has tried to make better human beings. Hitler believed that was what he was doing when he exterminated a large number of Jews and other inferior beings. Stalin did it with his purge in the Soviet Union to about 40 million Russians. A good human being, in the Statist’s view, is one that supports the state without question. All others are bad human beings.
You must learn to love Big Brother, Winston. There is no room for haters.
“Sunstein was appointed, no doubt, off the success of “Nudge,” his previous book, which suggests that government ought to gently force people to be better human beings.”
It’s easy to criticize. I think we should offer some helpful suggestions such as perhaps the government should place some words on government buildings to enourage people to be better humans.
For example:
“Thou shall not murder.” or
“Thou shall not steal.”
I wonder if we could come up with, oh, maybe, another eight of those?
The chair is against the wall...John has a long mustache. I repeat, John has a long mustache.
“John has a long mustache” !!!!
Mon Dieu! Time to go set the charges!
The solution he suggested at the time was that every political website be required by legislation to supply links to opposing viewpoints, which were to be prominently displayed on the website's home page. The idea was laughed out of tech circles and went nowhere.
Sunstein is definitely a dangerous fellow, a government regulator par excellence and an enemy of freedom.
I walk around a lot now saying, “What are they thinking?” This is one of those times. I don’t understand how liberals - who will go to the wall to protect the free speech of pornographers - will do what they can to destroy free political speech. Political speech is the main type of speech our founders wanted to protect. What are they thinking?
Great comment, samtheman, but I fear thinking people - the principled ones - left the democrat party years ago. They don't remember the Berkeley Free Speech Movement.
I better suck up to my cats PRONTO! LOL!
If Kyle Smith isn’t blowing things out of proportion, this is truly frightening. Just imagine anyone critical of anthropogenic global warming theory. The debate truly would be over because any critics would be declared “wrong.”
OTOH, if Obama overreaches this much, the TEA parties will seem like, well, tea parties compared to the wave of anger that will wash over this nation.
Actually, they do remember the Berkeley Free Speech movement and are sticking to its principles which are: everyone is free to speak as long as they speak exactly what they are told by the leadership of the Left.
Despite the “mess” and the lack of a system, Sunstein says, “I do tend to know where things are.” He qualifies: “I know where everything important is, and I don’t usually lose things. But I have lost checks, made out to me, and I also find coffee cups and Coke cans in surprising places.” He does reorganize on occasion: “When it gets completely disgraceful, I improve it a bit. Usually I clean up a bit in the summer. Right now it’s gotten completely disgraceful, I guess.”
Very few items-ties and KitKat wrappers notwithstanding-in Sunstein’s office on the fourth floor of the Laird Bell Quadrangle are unrelated to his work. The “most unusual” set of items in the room, he says, “may be my CD collection, which features Inter Alia, Bob Dylan, Sheryl Crow, Liz Phair, Bruce Springsteen, and Shawn Colvin. Eminem can also be found here.”
And while his office may be disgraceful, his home, Sunstein declares, “is actually very neat. No mess at all. I keep it that way, partly for my 11-year-old daughter.”
Really interesting coming from a guy who wrote this in 2003...
Review Why Societies Need Dissent...shows that demands for lock-step conformity are wrong and uninformed thinking. Sunstein's important new study is filled with empirical evidence of the significance of opposition, found in his compelling explanations of the need for, and benefits of, disagreement. Sunstein reveals that, in fact, the influence of dissenters is for the better, be it with courts, juries, corporate boardrooms, churches, sports teams, student organizations or faculties, not to mention 'the White House, Congress and the Supreme Court...during times of both war and peace.' --John W. Dean (Los Angeles Times Book Review )
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