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March 1, 2012, 03:16 AM | #1 | |
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Join Date: December 29, 2010
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Goodbye First Amendment?
A new bill in Congress seems to make it a federal crime to conduct a protest in the presence of certain federal employees, even if you did not know they were present.
http://rt.com/usa/news/348-act-tresspass-buildings-437/ Quote:
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JustThisGuy Mediocrity dominates over excellence in all things... except excellence. Last edited by JustThisGuy; March 1, 2012 at 03:22 AM. |
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March 1, 2012, 09:03 AM | #2 |
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Where've you been in the last 40 years?
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March 1, 2012, 09:07 AM | #3 | |
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Quote:
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March 1, 2012, 09:30 AM | #4 |
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First, consider the source of this article is "RT" or Russian Times.
Not exactly an unbiased source of news. WRT the bill, I would think that it is unconstitutionally vague. A person who decides to protest, say, IRS actions could be arrested if, unbeknownst to the public, the VP is visiting that same building. Otherwise lawful conduct becomes proscribed without notice and does not allow a citizen the opportunity to avoid being charged...as a result, he must either first ask if any official is present (and may be told "no" due to security concerns) or forego his right to protest altogether.
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March 1, 2012, 09:39 AM | #5 |
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In some sense, this reminds me of some things that I heard right after the Tuscon shooting. There was talk on the TV of making it illegal to possess a firearm within 1000 ft (IIRC) of one of our members of Congress. One of the problems that I saw with that was that it would have created "roving gun-free zones" with no notice to the public as to when or where such a zone might exist. If this bill functions as the article claims, it looks like it might create "roving protest-free zones."
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March 1, 2012, 10:33 AM | #6 | ||
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The link to the text of the bill in the article cited in the OP was dead. So I looked it up myself at thomas.loc.gov.
This is what I found: Quote:
The original post said: Quote:
(I am not endorsing this bill, I just don't see that what was claimed in the OP is true. It looks like everything is tied to being in proximity to a "restricted building or grounds." Please point it out if I missed it, though....) |
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March 1, 2012, 12:59 PM | #7 | ||
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Join Date: October 20, 2007
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^^^^ jkp1187, I don't see it either.
JustThisGuy- you say this: Quote:
This bill says this: Quote:
It seems to me that the absence of clearly visible signage, cordons, or other indications that the person is present would be an affirmative defense to prosecution under this statute.
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March 1, 2012, 01:23 PM | #8 | |
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Quote:
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March 1, 2012, 02:07 PM | #9 |
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It looks like we're really crying "wolf" ("volk?") here.
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