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by MaduroBU
Mon Nov 16, 2020 9:58 am
Forum: The Crime Blotter
Topic: GA: "Jogger" chased and murdered
Replies: 311
Views: 105865

Re: GA: "Jogger" chased and murdered

From a personal perspective, I have publicly stated that Biden will never be my president. He may become THE president, but everything that he stands for is so diametrically opposed to anything that I stand for, that on his very best day, he can never represent ANY of my interests, and will never defend them against those who would trample them. He is nothing more than a symbol of a dying republic. I have publicly stated that he deserves nothing less than the exact same levels of respect and cooperation that his supporters gave Trump for the past 4 years. I have publicly stated that I will resist him in every way that I can lawfully do so as an individual, and I have repeatedly (and deliberately ironically) used the #resist hashtag in online posts stating my opposition to a possible Biden administration. If, once he has been inaugurated, some feckless boneheads unknown to me attempt to kill him, do my words constitutionally justify rounding me up as well and denying me bail? What if it turns out that I “follow” one of them on Twitter? I don’t advocate for murder and would never be party to such a conspiracy, but the main reason I pray for Biden's good health is Kamala Harris.....who may in fact be a greater threat to Biden than anyone who voted Republican.....and I have stated those sentiments publicly.
IANAL, but my caveman understanding is that in both scenarios, posting that sort of general criticism of the president is laughably distant from evidence that someone has or might commit a crime. In every case, I am suggesting that publicly available speech might be used to reinforce other evidence, but I cannot envision a scenario in which such speech were used as evidence of a crime unless the problem had shifted from "suppression of speech" to "outright political oppression". I agree that broadening evidentiary standards to include any sort of criticism of the ruling party is deeply problematic, but I think that it fits into a different bucket (essentially a denial of due process rather than some form of prior restraint). There is is a large body of case law on the general topic of "chilling effect", but I think that is a due process problem creeping into the area of suppressing free speech. The suppression of relevant evidence in some cases doesn't directly address the issue of the same sort of wildly insufficient evidence being misused in other cases.

One other important thing to learn: Text messages are discoverable.
by MaduroBU
Fri Nov 13, 2020 6:50 pm
Forum: The Crime Blotter
Topic: GA: "Jogger" chased and murdered
Replies: 311
Views: 105865

Re: GA: "Jogger" chased and murdered

I would also add that having "consequences" of a legal nature for what you say is NOT free speech.
I strongly disagree; the goal of speech meriting protection by the law is to produce consequences. No law is needed to protect conversation about the color of the sky or what the weather looks like. Controversial speech does require such protections, but that takes the form of prohibiting prior restraint. The government cannot legally prevent you from saying or disseminating your thoughts. Private individuals are more than welcome to refuse to help you amplify your thoughts, a distinction which has new import now that public discourse is online (and thus, due to atrocious planning at all levels of government, private). None of that changes how consequences of speech, legal, illegal, desirable, undesirable, intended and unintended play out.

The standard for prosecution for holding or sharing thoughts, even thoughts which are intensely and widely unpopular, is EXTREMELY high. It's legal to be a racist, a nazi, a communist, or whatever so long as one does not actively incite people to illegal action. Other people may respond very negatively to your public beliefs, but the government cannot prevent you from sharing them or prosecute you for doing so. The fact that one holds such beliefs could legally be used in the investigation or prosecution of criminal activity. If a black family has a cross burned in their yard, locals who are known to publicly espouse racist views are going to merit increased suspicion and, if other evidence suggests involvement, inadvertently aid in their own prosecution. If three white guys run down a black guy and then kill him based upon essentially no evidence of wrongdoing, their prior admissions of gross racial bias are absolutely germane to the prosecution. That's not suppression of free speech.

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