I posted this in the other thread on the topic, "The Facebook workers called for specific changes including holding political ads to the same standards as othe

I posted this in the other thread on the topic, "The Facebook workers called for specific changes including holding political ads to the same standards as other advertising, stronger design measures to better distinguish political ads from other content, and restricting targeting for political ads. The employees also recommended imposing a silence period ahead of elections and imposing spend caps for politicians." In the U.S., political speech is often afforded the highest amount of protection from govt. censorship (c.f. the FB is private platform/publisher). One of the reasons articulated by some First Amendment commentators is that political speech is important to self-government in a democratic society. To quote Brandeis, "Political discussion is a political duty." Further, "Implied here is the notion of civic virtue - the duty to participate in politics, the importance of deliberation, and the notion that the end of the state is not neutrality by active assistance in provided conditions of freedom . . . ." [1] Public political speech should not be censored based on perceived truth or falsehood. In fact, political speech that promulgates false or misleading messages should be exposed to criticism. Again quoting Brandeis, "Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants . . . ." However, political speech is regulated to an extent by the F.E.C., e.g. requiring disclosure notices, etc. However, the political speech issues presented on FB can be more complex than that of traditional 20th century print and broadcast media. For example, micro-targeting political speech to certain demographics may cross the line from public political speech to private speech, and perhaps should be affored less protections. See Alexander Meiklejohn [2]. Also, content based prohibitions of speech tend to be more troubling than content neutral restrictions, such as time, place or manner restrictions on political ads or spending caps as mentioned in the employee statement above. [1] Lahav, Holmes and Brandeis: Libertarian and Republican Justifications for Free Speech, 4 J.L. & Pol. 451 (1987). [2] Meiklejohn, Free Speech and Its Relation to Self-Governemnt (1948).