Santorum on SOPA : There are limits to freedom on the internet

Oh REALLY?

Rick Santorum Answers Question On SOPA: ‘There Are Limits To Freedom On The Internet’

In the midst of all this talk of jobs and wars and families, one of the issues the Republican presidential candidates have not addressed that much is the internet. Specifically, their positions on regulating the internet. Over the weekend, Rick Santorum was asked by a New Hampshire resident during a campaign stop if he supported or opposed the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), which would give the government more authority to regulate the internet and crack down harder on piracy.

Considering how much the Republican party of late has been concerned with government overreach, Santorum has been a surprisingly strong defender of big government conservatism in this race. And his opinion on online piracy remains consistent with these principles. Santorum explained that from his perspective, not every right or freedom is unlimited, and there need to be regulations in place to limit the extent of a certain right.

“There is, and can be, a limitation on that. You know, freedom of speech. The things you can’t say. You can’t cry ‘fire’ in a crowded theater. And there are limitations to all freedoms. They’re not absolute rights. They are rights that have responsibilities that come with them, and if you abuse those rights… then you have a consequence of you using that right.”

Basically using a strawman argument to support big government and censorship on the internet.

reply to post by Vitchilo


After his timely surge in Iowa took him to second place , people are now actually listening to what he is saying.

Not good for him and his campaign, the man is a few nuggets short of a six pack.

Keep talking Santorum, keep talking.

The internet so far has been as uncontrollable as the spoken word, however since its always recorded somwhere somehow, its never been as free as it seems.

Now the powers that be, can see its influence and thus try to control it.

They have already squashed most inteligence conversation with celebratys and junk news........ intenet dominaiton is a matter of time, not wills.

Maybe he doesnt like it when they google his name and the truth comes out,

They’re not absolute rights.

WRONG!

As time passes I firmly believe that these corrupt freedom hating A-holes who use the constitution to wipe their ass after their morning dump will expose themselves to the American Public for who they truely are.

The problem has always been that there was apparently unspoken code amoungst those seeking public office,especially the presidency, to never bring up certain uncomfortable topics which would expose their opponent for the crooked freedom hating snake they are because???????

Because they knoiw that they are just as guilty and would promptly have their record of corruption and undermining the constitution thrown back in THEIR face for the whole world to see.

What gets accomplised then??
Nothing!!!
Now you have two people who are standing there with their D***s in their hands looking like the corrupt snakes that they are.

But for the first time in my lifetime, we now have a man who CAN, HAS, and WILL point fingers and violate the code. He can do this because????

Because he is as close to blamless and is as consistant, and has the best track record for defending our freedoms as you can POSSIBLY ASK FOR!!!!
He has clean hands and doesn't mind poiting out everyone elses dirty hands and no one can really say a damned thing about it either.

Ron Paul only has to sit back and watch these A-holes anniahlate eachother right now.
Then, he can ride in on his white stallion, pick up our constitution off the bathroom floor of the Oval Office
and the rest will be history.

at least this is my hope.
and if we don't have hope then what in the F do we really have?

reply to post by Vitchilo


He's probably still sore that Miley Cyrus made him butthurt enough to question himself. The guy is as much of an idiot as he looks.

Let him keep mouthvomiting, perhaps it will get him off the ballot and out of the people's minds for good.

here you go its already on you tube , but the quality of the sound is poor

And he admits that he isn't familiar enough with the bill to have an opinion about it. So why comment on something you haven't fully read and understand completely?

His analogy of yelling fire in a crowded theater isn't applicable or relevant.

“There is, and can be, a limitation on that. You know, freedom of speech. The things you can’t say. You can’t cry ‘fire’ in a crowded theater. And there are limitations to all freedoms. They’re not absolute rights. They are rights that have responsibilities that come with them, and if you abuse those rights… then you have a consequence of you using that right.”

Santorum speaks mindlessly only parroting empty rhetoric too often blathered by too many ignoramuses. Yes you can "cry fire in a crowded theater", and if you were in a crowded theater and saw a fire blazing it is arguable that you have a lawful responsibility to point this out to the rest of the crowd in the theater. However, if you stand up and cry "fire" in a crowded theater knowing full well there is no fire, then you are not exercising a right to speech because you are willfully lying and the consequence comes with damage.

Further, this over used and woefully misunderstood metaphor of crying fire in a crowded theater is actually a paraphrase of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes who, in his opinion for Schenk v. United States said this:

The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic. It does not even protect a man from an injunction against uttering words that may have all the effect of force.

Following with this:

The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent. It is a question of proximity and degree.

Justice Holmes was upholding the governments right to legislate against "the substantive evils", not their right to regulate speech. When Justice Holmes uses the analogy of someone falsely shouting fire in a crowded theater not to speak to speech, but to speak to the crime committed by this false utterance, communication, or call it speech if you must, but let's not pretend that when the First Amendment acknowledges people to speak freely, it is not presuming such speech is unlawful. Free speech pertains to the lawful action of speech, and what is said that is criminal is no longer speech under this distinction.

The proximity and degree the Supreme Court speaks of, is the distinction between speech in its lawful right of action, and crimes such as slander, defamation, and inciting a riot. The argument that Schenk v. United States had some how granted Congress the right to regulate speech is fallacious and ill informed.

Santorum's insistence on framing rights as something that can be abused misses the point of unalienable rights. The reality is not that you have a right to speak freely, but...no buts, if it is a right that's it, it is a right. A right, by definition does not cause harm unless defense of a right makes it necessary. An unalienable right, by definition, means it is outside of the purview of Congress, the Executive branch, and even the vaunted Judicial branch. What causes harm without clear and present justification is not a right, it is a crime.

We do not have responsibility for just the outcome of an exercise of our rights, we have a responsibility for all our actions, great or small, right or wrong. Santorum would only pretend to be woefully ignorant, it appears, because his crafted insistence of regulating rights has been asserted by the Supreme Court in other cases, and it is unsurprisingly the "conventional wisdom" of politicos that government has the right to limit freedom and regulate rights. If this is true, then the people get the government they deserve.

Freedom, by definition, has no limits and I cannot say it often enough; unalienable rights are outside the purview and scope of jurisdiction of government. Some will argue that by establishing government we have made a "social contract" to surrender some freedoms and accept restrictions on our rights in order to have a government, but I say, if this is the case, why make that "contract"?

There is a rational reason why we should institute government and that should be to further the end of protecting our unalienable rights and fending off the ugly borders that seek to limit freedom. If this is true, then the People get the government they deserve.

reply to post by Vitchilo


way to go Santorum tell people your okay with limiting internet freedom...that will get you elected...NOT!

geez

‘There Are Limits To Freedom On The Internet’

This is the standard reply to anything that takes liberty away; there are limits. In this way, we excuse the loss, accepting that we never had the freedom to begin with or that for whatever reason, we should have never expected it.

Ahem... and we just go on our way believing that the lesser is the greater and the loss is a gain.

The old thing about limitations on freedom of speech that refer to shouting 'FIRE!' in a crowded theater is one of the best examples of how we are misled. In fact, that kind of behavior has nothing to do with free speech but it is regularly applied like a bludgeon to beat down those who understand the abuse and try to fight back.

Don't buy it.

I know there are rules on ATS for 1 word posts so I will preface my one word with this lengthy prelude.

Ahem.

(crowded forum)

FIRE!!!!

(bite me Santorum)

Santorums soapbox,will eventually get the best of him.He is not Presidential Material. Hes smug,and ill informed.
Hes unconstitutional.MHO

Every politician voicing support for SOPA should be ignored and receive ZERO votes. You'd have to be a complete idiot to vote for someone like that!!!

Funny how those "small government" guys all loooooooooooooove "big government" if it makes their corporate donors money. Let's not forget, Santorum spear-headed the GOP efforts to ensure ONLY Republican lobbyists are hired once the GOP got the majority in congress!! He's a prime example of a bought SOCK PUPPET.

This alone should be reason not to vote for this clown. You'd have to be incredibly dumb to vote for someone who's soooooo obviously serving corporations rather than people...even if that means he has to cut the freedom and liberties of citizens.

Funny enough, Romney's just as bad. And although RP's against SOPA, he's also against pretty much all regulations, ensuring that if he gets elected, corporations will get free reign to screw everyone over. Deregulation caused this financial crisis, and if RP gets elected, he will support the very thing that caused the crisis.

In short, there's ZERO good candidates on the GOP side apart from Huntsman (who seems to be the only rational one)...but he stands ZERO chance at getting elected.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but Obama's the lesser evil compared to this time's line-up of GOP clowns.

- Romney: Likes to fire people...nice...
- Newt: Preaches family values while cheating on pretty much all of his wives (plural!!), and gets paid to twitter about what chocolate bars he eats...what a bought sock puppet.
- Perry: LOL!! Hire him to shoot stuff, but he's clueless about the other stuff...
- RP: Wants to end the environmental protection agency ensuring pollution (and as a consequence diseases) will increase, and also wants to end the department of education which would lead to the population being dumbed down even more.
- Huntsman: No chance he'll win the primaries. He is intelligent enough to admit evolution's real, which means he's clearly too intelligent for the average fundamentalist voter.

In short, they're all clowns or unelectable. This time's slogan should be "vote for Obama...sure, you won't get real change, but at least he's not as laughable as the GOP candidates".

When crocks are elected to government they get to screw you with laws, but still people doesn't learn the lessons, the generation zombie in America are no connected with reality anymore, politics and corrupted politicians are nothing but conspiracies to them.

Listen people, NO Politician in America is working for the people NONE

iTunes and Netflix are excellent examples of the (internet) free market working EXTREMELY well without government intervention.

To be honest, I can't wait to shut down the Internet. In Switzerland, online piracy isn't a crime (well, posting links isn't), so as long as I'm there, I can spam as many pirated links on Facebook, Google, Fox (lol), and all the other sites people use on a daily basis (including those people who are in favor of SOPA) as I want. Already got an auto comment spammer in place in case this bill goes through. Let's see if they can keep up with me posting 2 links a minute 24hrs/day. I will obviously focus on companies who are in favor SOPA. They better switch of their comments section