Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Justice Scalia’s most recent entry in the kulturkampf

From today's decision:
We doubt, to begin with, that small-town broadcasters run a heightened risk of liability for indecent utterances. In programming that they originate, their down-home local guests probably employ vulgarity less than big-city folks; and small-town stations generally cannot afford or cannot attract foul-mouthed glitteratae from Hollywood.
I can't really help but think about "real Virginians" versus, you know, me and people like me, who only live and vote here. But more broadly, who exactly does he think invented the earthier terms, if not the salty salt of the earth?

4 comments:

Mark said...

Don't you long for the good old days when the court required evidence in the record to draw such factual conclusions? :)

Francesca Coppa said...

Color me naive, but do supreme court justices really refer to the "F-word" and the "S-word?" It looks so--junior high!

RT said...

They seriously do!

Jessie Bennett said...

I can't believe that this is what passes for legal opinion in the current SCOTUS--that small-town folk don't use naughty words like those big-city types. How do you argue with crap like that?