Susan B Anthony List v Driehaus

A very funny amicus brief has been filed with the US Supreme Court (there's a sentence you don't see everyday) and regardless of your political persuasion it makes for a very enjoyable read.  It was filed by PJ O'Rourke, noted humorist and author (Parliament of Whores is THC's favorite), and the Cato Institute, a libertarian group.
(PJ)
The case, Susan B Anthony List v Driehaus is a free-speech case which oddly enough has reached the Supreme Court.  The Ohio statute involved presents the question "can a state government criminalize political statements that are less than 100% truthful?"

You can find more background on the case by reading this



The O'Rourke/Cato brief is non-partisan, poking fun at everyone across the political spectrum (including the Supreme Court itself) and invoking Stephen Colbert's concept of "truthiness" to make its point about the dangers of regulating political speech or, as the brief puts it:

This case concerns amici because the law at issue undermines the First Amendment's protection of the serious business of making politics funny.

An excerpt is below but THC urges you to read the whole thing (including the footnotes) as it is by far the most entertaining legal brief he has ever read.

While George Washington may have been incapable of telling a lie, his successors

have not had the same integrity. The campaign promise (and its subsequent violation),

as well as disparaging statements about one’s opponent (whether true,

mostly true, mostly not true, or entirely fantastic),are cornerstones of American democracy.

Indeed, mocking and satire are as old as America, and if this Court doesn’t believe

amici, it can ask Thomas Jefferson, “the son of a half-breed squaw, sired by

a Virginia mulatto father.”

Or perhaps it should ponder, as Grover Cleveland was forced to, “Ma, ma, where’s my pa?”

In modern times, “truthiness”—a “truth” asserted“from the gut” or because it

“feels right,” without regard to evidence or logic —is also a key part of

political discourse. It is difficult to imagine life without it, and our political discourse

is weakened by Orwellian laws that try to prohibit it. 

After all, where would we be without the knowledge that Democrats are

pinko-communist flag-burners who want to tax churches and use the money to fund

abortions so they can use the fetal stem cells to create pot-smoking lesbian ATF agents

who will steal all the guns and invite the UN to take over America? 

Voters have to decide whether we’d be better off electing Republicans, those hateful,

assault-weapon-wielding maniacs who believe that George Washington and Jesus Christ

incorporated the nation after a Gettysburg reenactment and that the only thing 

wrong with the death penalty is that it isn’t administered quickly enough to secular-

humanist professors of Chicano studies.