the problem is an “actual malice” standard protects only the one side of the political spectrum that restrains itself from more creative commentary, and that’s not fair.
@interfluidity I'm familiar with what the "actual malice" standard is, but I'm struggling to understand what you're trying to say here. Can you please expound?
@LouisIngenthron here in Florida, a Republican proposal would significantly narrow the scope of the 'actual malice' standard and make defamation suits much easier. more liberal-minded people point out mockingly that the party most prominently hoping for protection under that standard is Fox News, in its case against Dominion. 1/
@LouisIngenthron but it occurs to me that Republican vulnerability is arguably the point: R commentators lie so freely that the standard is weak protection protect them, while almost everyone else can speak as freely as they like (which might include insults but few actual-malice lies) about a broad array of Republican actors. so better, from a Florida Republican perspective to gut the standard for everyone, to, um, relevel the playing field. /fin
@interfluidity That's an interesting perspective. So, essentially, because they're being held accountable for lying on purpose, they want to hold their opponents accountable for "lying" by accident. It's like a more egregious repeat of the "Twitter is banning more conservatives" outrage.
In my mind, the motivations for this move seem much simpler, though... Republicans don't think Dems are competitive in our state, so they have no fear about consolidating power, because they don't think they'll ever have to give it up again.
@LouisIngenthron we just moved to Florida. i'm not usually overly troubled by political grandstanding, i've enjoyed living in both red and blue states. but the latest parade of Republican proposals really goes beyond my comfort level. my wife really likes our new home, hates in when i talk this way. i hope that trends reverse or at least the fervor pauses so the matter doesn't have to come to a head between us. /fin
@interfluidity At least the federal courts have had a pretty good history lately of slapping down Florida Republicans' more egregious attempts to subvert the constitution.
Pretty sure this is just going to keep getting worse until November 2024. Then it'll either start getting better slowly... or get much, much worse very quickly.
Until then, they're just going to keep putting on a big enough show to generate enough outrage to make the national media to raise his profile.
@LouisIngenthron i think that's exactly right. it's all an outrage game until then, i think that's going to have to be our time horizon for decision-making.
unfortunately the federal courts may not serve as effectively as a check as they have until now, given the current constitution of its apex.
( we need to reform that https://www.interfluidity.com/v2/7964.html )
@interfluidity TBH, even at the SCOTUS level, I'm pretty happy with 1A jurisprudence at the moment. Kavanaugh has been on the record as understanding why S230 is important and Thomas showed serious reticence to mess with it in the Gonzalez v Google hearing. If anything, I'm more worried about some of the more liberal justices on that particular issue.
And the lower federal courts have not been pulling their punches, especially the one with the Stranger Things paragraph.
@LouisIngenthron 1A jurisprudence is a broad field. narrowing NYT v Sullivan is a longstanding conservative shibboleth, which Thomas and Gorsuch have gone on record to express interest in revisiting.
(Our substantive views on S230 probably diverge, but though I’d like to see it substantially reformed, I think that should be a legislative rather than judicial exercise.)
This court is definitely strong on the 1A jurisprudence surrounding treating anonymous money as speech!
@LouisIngenthron i think you are right. it was just a too-clever by half notion that crossed my mind and I thought a bit funny. Republicans dominate the court system here as well as the other branches, so weak defamation protection means they can prosecute their critics, but their own conduct will somehow usually slip by. 1/