Re: Persons?

[Declan McCullagh <declan@pathfinder.com>]

There comes a time in debates when you're confronted with someone making
such incoherent (no mention wrong) arguments that you try to bow out
gracefully. This is such a time.

At 14:58 -0400 4/23/98, Luigi P. Bai wrote:
>You conflate First Amendment protection with censorship of entities such as
>the NY Times. A publisher is protected from external censorship by the
>rights of its individual content producers to speak their minds. What it
>CHOOSES to publish, on the other hand, represents an internal censorship,
>not protected by anyone or any law. A corporation, as such, only exerts its
>First Amendment rights when it makes statements on its own behalf -
>typically something corporations rarely do anyway (even the Editor's rants
>and ravings are of an individual).

So a corporation that owns a newspaper can print news stories without
censorship, but cannot print editorials that are crafted jointly by the
newspaper's board? Geez, this is even loonier than I thought. Good thing a
court would just laugh at you.

>You reduce John's argument to absurdity when you suggest that he advocates
>censorship and corporate raids, when that's not the only logical extension
>of his proposal. Far better to engage in the debate than attempt to shut it
>down with ridicule.

Some ridiculous ideas are best met with ridicule. It's a time-honored
tradition, after all, and is often a useful form of criticism.

Anyway, you & Mitch can keep on going without me. I've got an article on
Windows 98 to write.

-Declan