Responses to "Spam costs and questions" (long)

[Kent Crispin]

On Sun, Jun 08, 1997 at 08:42:49AM -0500, Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM wrote:
> "William H. Geiger III" <whgiii at amaranth.com> writes:
> 
> > In <199706071754.MAA01524 at manifold.algebra.com>, on 06/07/97
> >    at 12:54 PM, ichudov at Algebra.COM (Igor Chudov @ home) said:
> >
> > >There is a lot of commercial compelled speech. For example,
> > >mutual funds must say that past performance is not a guarantee of future
> > >results.
> >
> > >Do you find this kind of compelled speech unconstitutional?
> >
> > Well I don't know how Duncan feels about it but I think it's highly
> > unconstutional.
> 
> I can still publish a book and claim that borshch (Russian beet soup)
> cures cancer.  However if I also offer to sell beets my mail order,
> the FDA can bite me. It's "constitutional" because it protects the
> olygopoly of the large drug companies with political connections.

Drug regulation muddies the waters quite a bit -- the issue is
commercial speech in general.  And that issue is a more basic one --
some entity (the government, in this case) is designated as the
"enforcer of contracts".  Contracts are special documents that by
their very nature involve "enforcement".  What you say in a contract
binds you.  What you say outside of a contract does not.  What you say
in a contract is, therefore, and by definition, not "free". 

-- 
Kent Crispin				"No reason to get excited",
kent at songbird.com			the thief he kindly spoke...
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