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This is a red herring - there's no law against untruthful political advertising. Such a law, broadly enforced, would likely be unconstitutional and how do you
by adthrowaway123 7y ago
This is a red herring - there's no law against untruthful political advertising. Such a law, broadly enforced, would likely be unconstitutional and how do you suppose that you enforce it? Also, if that was the law, it wouldn't be up to corporations to determine what is true and the responsibility would fall between the politicians and the regulatory body that decides what the truth is. That sounds to me like a totalitarian nightmare but I suppose YMMV.
- apendleton 7y agoI don't know why it would be any different constitutionally from false advertising in any other context. It's not a crime per se, but false advertisers can be held civilly liable for misleading consumers, and individual consumers can sue false advertisers, as can the FTC on the public's behalf (presumably it would be the FEC instead, but work similarly). The court system (so, presumably a jury) decides whether or not it's false.
- adthrowaway123 7y agoCivil liability is an entirely different matter altogether but what's problematic about false advertising isn't that the claim was false, but more that you're breaking a promise. This isn't about free speech, but more about an implicit contract being violated. Political speech, on the other hand, is explicitly what the freedom of speech as a right is about. Either way, I don't believe anyone would claim that in case of false advertisements, the responsibility falls on the publisher of ads, not the advertiser. It's not generally possible to evaluate the claims made in advertisements - if I were to say, something I'm selling will work for 10 years and will offer replacements if it breaks in the next 10 years, how would the ad publisher know if I would honor the claim several years later?