The First Amendment, WaPo, and Native Americans

We’ve been hearing a lot from journalists and newspapers about the First Amendment of late. "It’s under assault! They’re coming after the journalists! Defend the First Amendment!" Now I don’t want to dismiss those complaints (and will return to Phelps’ article in the near future).

But it goes without saying that, when the same newspapers crying about their First Amendment rights shut down the voice of their reader, the proclaimed concerns about the First Amendment begin to ring hollow. And it’s in the treatment of Native American campaign donations that this false concern really begins to ring with the sick sound of a cow bell.

You see, the Right has spent a lot of time in the last few years defending unlimited campaign donations on free speech grounds. In Buckley v. Valeo, SCOTUS confirmed the legal basis for this notion. Campaign donations are protected under the First Amendment because they are a kind of free speech. And well-funded fundies will repeat that equation until they’re red in the face.