Arkansas Blog

An unsigned political letter? Horrors! Or, as you say, scurrilous! Dirty pool!

It's a good thing your website wasn't around during the debates over constitutional ratification. Those debates coincided with a justly famous series of unsigned political letters that discussed the new Constitution -- called the Federalist Papers. You may have heard of them.

I understand the temptation for journalists to get in bed with state legislators and criticize things that threaten those legislators' interests. And I understand the temptation for journalists to criticize practices that are deeply rooted in American history and culture that allow people who don't own newspapers to play a part in discussing current affairs. IMO neither of those temptations reflects well on journalists.

It looks to me like free speech is taking place in Benton County.

ARK. BLOG: I'm sensitive to the point you raise. But the prevailing law says that we can constitutionally require disclosure of money spent for and against political candidates. The threshhold -- $500 generally -- permits plenty of unregulated free speech for pamphleteers, presuming that they are copying and distributing fliers themselves. But when the speech is delivered by paid hands, when it is distributed in paid mailings and, in some cases, if not Benton County, when it includes TV and radio time, it becomes speech of the sort that should be regulated. Money is important. Voters deserve to know which interests lie behind this sort of paid advertising against a candidate. When anonymity is achieved through the lack of the words "vote against" it's a dishonest scam.

Similar tactics in an anonymous mailout in the Miller County sheriff's race. I suspect that the near proximity of Texas has poisoned the race.

sniff, sniff. Holt? Integrity Marketing LLB?