Data-Mining Ban Struck Down By US Supreme Court

smitty777 writes "The Supreme Court struck down in Sorrell vs IMS Health a Vermont law banning data mining which has been in place since 2007. The court ruled that the data on medications prescribed by doctors is protected by the First Amendment and can be used for marketing by the pharmaceutical companies. This follows similar declarations in Maine and New Hampshire."

Comments

Big Corporation

[Anonymous Coward]

Big corporations always win in the end. They have the money to pay the lawyers and the lobbyists. It's their world; we just live in it. This has basically become a country by the corporations for the corporations. One nation, under CEO, with corruption and insider trading for all.

Re:Big Corporation

[Anonymous Coward]

Alternatively: Information wants to be free.

Re:Big Corporation

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

This isn't a new phenomenon. In the Middle Ages, Barons and Earls constantly vied with kings for supremacy over the nation. In the early modern era, merchants literally seized control of certain states, and corporations like the East India Company rules territories as vast as India.

The price of freedom might be eternal vigilance, but the price of control is simply a lot of money.

Re:Big Corporation

[MickyTheIdiot]

The Boston Tea Party was a protest against the East India Company as much as it was against British Rule and taxes.

That's something they don't like to teach at school any more...

Re:Big Corporation

[bughunter]

Big corporations always win in the end. It's their world; we just live in it.

Yes, and this nation was founded on the ideal that the people (not businesses co-opting the rights of individuals) should rule, and that the three tyrannies of big warlords, big religion, and big business can be prevented.

I infer from your comment that you're simply content to see a return to the homo sapiens status quo: it took barely a 100 years for that experiment to fail. Well, many of us aren't content. In fact, more than a few of us are downright pissed.

We almost turned it around after the Great Depression, but the great war against Fascism transferred too much power back to the warlords and businesses. (Religion never really went away, though it seems more a less a tool for the other two these days.)

Re:Big Corporation

[geminidomino]

The price of freedom might be eternal vigilance, but the price of control is simply a lot of money.

Sig-snarf'd! Nice.

Re:Big Corporation

[Hardolaf]

The East India Company was a government-sponsored monopoly on many goods and services related to trade on the high seas. So it wasn't actually a protest against the East India Company, just a protest against everything related to the British government in regards to intercontinental trade and taxation.

Re:Big Corporation

[AngryNick]

IANAL, but I actively follow the SCOTUS -- what I consider to be the most interesting, and respectable branch of government. Say what you will about the conservatives vs. liberal biases of the justices, but they are all really smart and tend to make sound arguments (except for the one about corporations = people).

As I read the case, my understanding is that the data is already out there and available to the public (miners, corporations, journalists, me) via the pharmacies who are collecting the info during the course of operations. Vermont was simply trying to limit how that sold and now free (as in speech) data could be used once it was purchased.

The Court's opinion states on page 24-25:

"If Vermont's statute provided that prescriber-identifying information could not be sold or disclosed except in narrow circumstances then the State might have a stronger position. Here, however, the State gives possessors of the information broad discretion and wide latitude in disclosing the information, while at the same time restricting the informationâ(TM)s use by some speakers and for some purposes, even while the State itself can use the information to counter the speech it seeks to suppress."

Vermont screwed up by saying the data couldn't be used for "the wrong" reasons. What they really needed to do was ban the sale of the prescriber data in the first place. It's a messy rule and doesn't address the heart of the privacy issue it used as its basis.

That said, Justice Breyer makes some good arguments in his dissenting opinion (pages 30-53). One point from the summary:

"The Vermont statute before us adversely affects expression in one, and only one, way. It deprives pharmaceutical and data-mining companies of data, collected pursuant to the governmentâ(TM)s regulatory mandate, that could help pharmaceutical companies create better sales messages. In my view, this effect on expression is inextricably related to a lawful governmental effort to regulate a commercial enterprise."

By the way, Justice Sotomayor (an Obama Supreme Court appointment) sided with the majority, so this isn't necessarily a clear-cut case of liberals vs. conservatives.

Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[Nimey]

We can expect more and more of this because he replaced two fairly liberal judges with very conservative ones.

Not that liberal judges are a panacea - they all voted in favor of eminent domain in Kelo v. New London - but they tend to not believe in corporate power so much.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[DoofusOfDeath]

I'm mostly a conservative, and I don't recognize these rulings as conservative. These are corporatist, which I mostly view as a form of treason.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[lashwhip76]

The two "fairly liberal" justices Bush replaced were the ultraconservative Chief Justice Rehnquist and the fairly conservative O'Connor. Since this was a 6-3 ruling with Obama appointee Sotomayor in the majority, I'm not too sure either of them would have voted differently if they were still there, and I'm pretty sure it wouldn't have made a difference if they did.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[poetmatt]

or accurate.

the issue is not conservative or liberal, it is indeed a concern that this pro-corporate viewpoint has gotten out of hand.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[Anonymous Coward]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelo_v._City_of_New_London

"On June 23, 2006, the first anniversary of the original decision, President George W. Bush issued an executive order instructing the federal government to restrict the use of eminent domain '...for the purpose of benefiting the general public and not merely for the purpose of advancing the economic interest of private parties to be given ownership or use of the property taken.'"

Sounds like Bush didn't entirely agree with it.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[rdbiker]

Huh? Nowadays: corporatist = conservative ...been that way for a while

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[MickyTheIdiot]

This is wrong... both parties are bought out by corporations... it's just they are slightly different groups of corporations. Also the Republicans are more open (and often proud) about it.

Almost everything in the corporate media is focuses on the liberal vs. conservative sideshow... they have an interest in the country turning into a corporate state.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[MickyTheIdiot]

The liberals love to promote laws written by the RIAA and Hollywood. How is that not corporatist?

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[Bob the Super Hamste]

I see most of them a just being 2 sides of the same coin. The "conservatives" tend to favor the corporations more and the government when it comes things that relate to the military industrial complex, where as the "liberals" tend to favor the government more and the corporations if they are the right type. In both cases neither one favors the individual. I hated the Kelo v. New London case as well as the Citizens United case. I feel Kelo v. New London was just decided wrongly, where as I feel that Citizens United was decided too broadly. Then again am I not a legal scholar nor do I pretend to play on on ./.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[Hatta]

I'm mostly a conservative, and I don't recognize these rulings as conservative. These are corporatist

What's the difference?

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[DoofusOfDeath]

What I mean by political conservatism is a preference for limited scope of the federal government, an general aversion to a welfare state, and a preference for limited taxation. Also, it's underpinnings are a general distrust in the competence of central planning, and an assumption that power corrupts.

None of that entails pretending that corporations are persons, which I think is the root of this current nonsense.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[SpryGuy]

Well no. The entire GOP is wholely owned by corporate interests at this point. The buying of Democrats is a case-by-case basis (Banks own Dodd for example). It's a significant difference. The two parties are not (yet) equivalent.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[kj_kabaje]

How is giving away private medical information about prescriptions a 1st Ammendment issue or a curtailment of liberty?  Perhaps if this was made available freely to the public as well so I could in effect "audit" my doctor to see if he's been bribed into a particular brand, I could see this benefited the general public, rather than being just a tool for Pharma.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[geminidomino]

Um, in what way is "corporatist" not a philosophy of "limited scope of the federal government?" Doesn't limiting the scope of the federal government mean limiting its ability to regulate industry?

Not to mention limiting its ability to bless interstate corporations, which are a legal entity. Otherwise, corporations would have to do so separately in every state where they operate.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[SpryGuy]

No "liberal" I'm aware of does. At least none I know personally. I'm constantly amazed at all these things that conservatives say "liberals" support. Not all moms trying to "protect the children!" via RIAA and such are liberal. I wouldn't even say a majority were.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[bill_mcgonigle]

Um, in what way is "corporatist" not a philosophy of "limited scope of the federal government?"

Corporations are creations of government by definition. They don't exist without government protection.

Here's a limited government position: governments should not be in the business of creating and protecting corporations. See, that was easy, wasn't it?

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[rtb61]

Actually conservatives by definition seek no change, so at the time of the founding of the US, which all the current rank of conservatives pretend is about them, the conservatives at the time of founding of the US government were of course, Royalists.

Conservatives do not normally call for a limited scope of Federal Government, in fact conservatives, likes lots of regulations to 'limit' the actions of others, whether those others are exploiting or polluting the shared environment or in others ways seeking to change the shared socio-economic environment. Your are confusing conservative with libertarian and or exploitative.

The welfare state is about limiting the affects of downturns in the economy (it provides an economic cushion and prevents an economic death spiral) and of course reducing crime brought about by desperation and a lack interest in the shared economy resulting from exclusion from it. Of course the libertarians and the exploitative abhors the welfare state because it prevents the ruthless exploitation of those around them in economic downturns, this with total disregard for the impact upon the shared socio-economic environment, the prime driver being the fulfilling of personal greeds and lusts.

No matter how loud the current rank of pretend 'conservatives" scream they are religious conservatives, they are not, they are quite simply lying pseudo religious libertarian exploiters.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[bill_mcgonigle]

This description would better fit the terms 'Paleo-Conservative, Libertarian, or Classical Liberal' these days. 'Conservative' has come to mean corporatist, supportive of the military-industrial complex, and for big government to control people on moral issues and vices. Unfortunately, the Republican Party, on a national level, has become Conservative.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[hey!]

I don't think in this case corporate personhood is behind this "nonsense". Rather, it is one of those situations where the naive interpretation of one right (the right to free speech) conflicts with another right (the right to privacy).

Nobody really believes in a "right to free speech" that allows you to say anything you want, any time you want. For example, a lawyer can't divulge confidences his clients make to him because somebody offers to pay him for it. As an IT professional for many years, I've often been in possession of confidential information that it would be unethical for me to use for private gain. Were a law to make it *illegal* for me to sell that information, that law would not infringe on any reasonable interpretation of my right of free speech, because my misuse of that information would impinge on the rights of others.

The problem is that our framers, while able men, weren't superhuman. They didn't specifically understand the existence of a right of privacy because the institutions that threatened that right didn't exist yet. It was only a century later that a common law right of privacy began to be formulated, and not until the mid 20th century that the *implication* of a right of privacy in the Bill of Rights was discerned. Even so, the right of privacy, which nearly every American in his capacity as private citizen believes he has, is stuck in the 9th Amendment ghetto of "penumbra" legal reasoning. The recognition of such rights are often particularly controversial. They include the rights to abortion and contraception, which are not specifically enumerated in the Constitution and which were illegal in the early 20th C.

Because things we desire tend to conflict in the real world, you can frame any restriction on the rights of an individual as a restriction on government power. You can restrict the right of an individual to privacy by restraining the government's power to regulate speech that infringes on privacy. Such a policy sounds libertarian. It might even *be* libertarian under certain interpretations of the word. But it damages individual liberty.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[dummondwhu]

I see where you're coming from, but I think your thoughts need to be taken just a little further. It's not that conservatives (me being one, for full disclosure) inherently favor corporations. It's that we generally feel that free enterprise is a good thing and that when corporations are allowed to thrive, they create wealth which creates jobs which, in turn, makes life better for the individual (and obviously for the higher-ups in the corporations, probably to a much higher degree). That's an over-simplification, and it's not utopian, but I personally believe free enterprise is the best foundation. I don't believe in propping up corporations for their own sake, just in giving businesses the freedom to operate, unburdened from needless regulation and taxation (note that I didn't say *no* regulation or taxation), for our sake as well as theirs.

On the other hand, it's not that liberals inherently favor the government. It's that they tend to believe that the government is the primary tool that makes things better for the individual, by restraining the Monopoly guy from getting rich off his/her exploitation, by promoting justice, and by evening the playing field between the little guy and the powerful business entities (i.e. via promotion of things like labor unions and heavy regulation). The problem that I see with that philosophy is that it makes the government bigger, more suffocating, and definitely more menacing than the big businesses for which they have general disdain.

Like you, I hated the Kelo decision, but I actually agreed with the Citizens United decision. The reasoning is that things like corporations and other organizations are simply groups of people who come together for a common purpose. That purpose might be to make profit, or it might be to further some social or political agenda. Corporations and organizations don't exist for their own benefit. They exist for the benefit of the individuals of that have a stake in them. And as such, I believe it is not constitutional to squelch the voices of these individuals, just because they've come together in a group in an organized fashion, and because they tend to have more money, and thus a louder voice.

I know it kind of feels wrong, but it's not much different from 10,000 people picketing outside of some building. They come together for some unified purpose to amplify their individual voices into one large one (sort of). We rightfully recognize that peaceful assembly as a right of that group because it's a right of each individual. So, the same hold true for people that are even more organized and who focus their voice in a different direction. That holds true be it for the NRA or Citizens United, or for labor unions, or for Exxon, or for any other groups like that.

I'm not saying there aren't improvements that can/should be made in how these entities communicate their desires to our elected officials and how our elected officials act upon that pressure. But we have to be very careful about letting them have their voice because that one collective voice is really the voice of many individuals, which is protected by the First Amendment.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[pnutjam]

There WAS a difference, conservatives need to stand up and make sure there is a difference tomorrow.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[Culture20]

So no true liberal is a corporate fascist, but every true conservative is? Which is Biden?

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[JBMcB]

Because it isn't private info - it's just data on what kinds prescriptions are filled, they aren't tied to individual people.

The first amendment issue comes in because the data is already publicly available. The state was saying that companies weren't allowed to use it to gather marketing information.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[pugugly]

The Lifecycle of Conservative Politics.

Step 1) Conservative voters fight tooth and nail to get people that espouse certain libertarian/objectivist/fundie christian philosophies elected to office/appointed to lifelong judicial positions.

Step 2) These people do . . .exactly what the philosophies they espoused implied they would do. The results are entirely predictable, devastating to the economy, destructive to the environment, creating about one millionaire for every few thousand people it drives into poverty.

Step 3a) Conservatives explain these people were never really conservative . . .
Step 3b) and anyway these sudden recent catastrophic results are actually because of liberal policies put into place decades ago that have never caused problems before.

Step 4) --> goto Step 1

Pug

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[pugugly]

Two other observations -
A) the Democrat that's not bought by corporate sector 'X' will actually go toe to toe with the Democrat whose state depends on that sector, and
B) even the Democrat that is under corporate influence becomes independent when things have *obviously* gotten out of hand - as an example witness the Dodd Frank act.

From the viewpoint of the corporate lobbyist Republicans have the 'virtue' that they stay bought and stick together no matter what.

Pug

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[kj_kabaje]

Except that if a doctor has even a slightly limited number of patients... you could easily work out, based on a doctor and the type of medication, what ailments his patients had and thus reveal what is supposed to be private data.  Trust me--this information along with other databases of information that are also available are an invasion of private data such that HIPAA is violated.  I'm truly disappointed this was struck down, but not surprised given our corporatist culture.

The positive side to this, given my belief that medicine should be researched and used scientifically rather than marketted to doctors with said doctors recieving kickbacks for using them, is that perhaps we will have better evidence of the eficacy of drugs rather than the bought-and-paid-for-by-Pharma studies we currently get.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[gumbi west]

You may want to look at your party John Roberts has NEVER voted against a corporation's interest.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[marnues]

Those are nice, rational definitions. Too bad those that espouse rational thought don't subscribe to much of it.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[DoofusOfDeath]

I'm actually trying to draw a distinction between the Republican party, and conservatism.

The Republicans have gone so insane that, sadly, I find myself far closer to Libertarians than Republicans.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[marnues]

Has come to mean? That's what conservative has always meant. Even in America's history. Except the corporatist part. When it was new (ie the North and the South fought a war over this stuff) it was liberal, now that it is the status quo it is conservative. But always supporting the military and big government control of social issues has been the conservative ideal in almost every society everywhere. It's a shame that libertarians are trying to convince people that economic issues can be separated from social issues. Liberals haven't done much to help though as the soccer mom that goes to yoga is labeled a liberal even though she's probably the epitome of conservative values in this country.

Note that small vs big government is a red herring. Libertarians have muddied that water immensely, but yes conservatives really do want big government more than liberals. Socialism, for instance, is only a liberal cause in a select few countries (ie USA), and is only labeled "bigger government" here because our conservatives forget that outlawing abortion and gay marriage requires big government.

Re:Long-term damage from the Bush Admin

[SpryGuy]

No TRUE conservative is a corporate fascist. But all REPUBLICANS (at least elected ones, not necessarily voters) are. Republicans are not conservative. They're radical right-wing corporatists with a military fetishist. They're every bit the big-government people they rant against, they just think big governement should come in the form of a military policing bedrooms and wombs and invading scores of other countries.

No TRUE Conservative could stomach voting for a modern day Republican.

Of course

[Anonymous Coward]

Where individuals and corporations collide, in the US the corporations win.

Supreme Court Decision Disasters keep mounting...

[SpryGuy]

This after Citizens United and several other recent decisions...

Man, Scalia, Thomas, and Alito are three of the worst things to happen to the Supreme Court in recent memory. Ugh.

Re:court made the right decision

[Jawnn]

the state should not suppress free speech without a good reason. moreover, it is almost always bad policy to regulate the use of information rather than regulate a specific bad action that we want to stop. if the state wanted to prevent pharmaceutical companies from advertising to doctors, it should have tried its luck pass a law to prevent that. http://www.innovationpolicy.org/do-not-track-for-doctors-vs-do-not-track-for

Really? How the fuck is taking my personal and private health care information and selling it, in any way, "protected speech"?

Re:I love New York

[snspdaarf]

I always said New Yorkers thought their shit didn't stink.

Ever heard of HIPA?

[AarghVark]

Makes me wonder if these judges have heard of things such as maybe HIPA? Whatever happened to that whole privacy of medical records idea?

Re:Ever heard of HIPA?

[Anonymous Coward]

HIPAA is specific in allowing information to be gathered for research as long as identifying information of the patient is removed. Since this involves the names of the prescribing doctors and not the patients, HIPAA doesn't really apply.

Re:Ever heard of HIPA?

[will_die]

That does not matter because the data is already be sold, the court just said you cannot the speech of a sub-set; limit it for all or none.

Re:Ever heard of HIPA?

[fnj]

Care to rephrase that please?

Re:Ever heard of HIPA?

[Khyber]

From the name of a prescribing doctor I have the potential range of patients.

From the potential range of patients, that can be narrowed down by medication.

From medication, it's usually not too difficult to find a person, because many people will talk about that kind of stuff openly, or someone that knows the situation will, and with today's internet, we've seen that people blab all too often, myself included.

All it takes is a little logic and research, and you have violated someone's medical privacy.

Re:Ever heard of HIPA?

[Local ID10T]

From the name of a prescribing doctor I have the potential range of patients.

From the potential range of patients, that can be narrowed down by medication.

From medication, it's usually not too difficult to find a person, because many people will talk about that kind of stuff openly, or someone that knows the situation will, and with today's internet, we've seen that people blab all too often, myself included.

All it takes is a little logic and research, and you have violated someone's medical privacy.

That is the worst misunderstanding of HIPPA I have ever seen. Your strawman failed with the very first statement.

Re:Ever heard of HIPA?

[suutar]

The overturned law did not prevent the sale of the data, it only prevented the use of the sold data for certain purposes. The presumption is that a flat ban on the sale of prescription data would not be overturned. The Court did say that a flat ban would probably lend more weight to Vermont's case, but that's hardly definitive.

Re:Ever heard of HIPA?

[Khyber]

There is no strawman here. This is a simple exercise, one which I have tested and was EASILY able to find references to medications and my own brother (a particular steroid, in fact.)

I think your name does you justice. Perhaps you should actually try my idea before dismissing it as something it isn't.

Strange definition of conservative

[Kupfernigk]

In the US today, "Liberal" and "Conservative" seem to have reversed meaning. You would expect a Conservative to say "this (data mining) didn't exist when the Constitution was written, and therefore should come under States Rights. And, anyway, we should be very wary of allowing any part of the community to bring about social changes that may affect the majority in ways we can't yet predict". And you would expect a Liberal - i.e. a free-market, laissez-faire capitalist - to say "if they want to do it let them, and then if it goes wrong someone can sue."

But in fact "Conservative" now seems to be used to mean "someone who sells the intent of the Constitution to the highest bidder", and "Liberal" means someone who wants the Government not to interfere so much in people's private lives and their privacy - which I imagine the Founding Fathers would be in favor of.

In the late 80s it was the Democrats - Lloyd Bentsen in particular - that were in bed with Big Oil. Now it's the Republicans. Why the switch?

Re:Strange definition of conservative

[iluvcapra]

Lloyd Bentsen was a Texan. It's sort of complicated, but in the late 80s/early 90s the Republican leadership in the House prevailed on conservative Democrats in Texas and the rest of the south -- people who were very conservative but were Democrats for historical reasons -- to switch to the Republican party and/or to withhold their votes for the Democratic Speaker when organizing the House. This effort gave the House to the Republicans in 1994, and the decades-long Democratic control of the House has been intermittent ever since. The realignment has made House vote much more ideological.

Republicanism and Coservativism isn't inherently pro-oil, but the Republican party is where all the southern, oil producing state representation is, and the party ideology is whatever the powerful voting blocks in the party say it is.

Re:Strange definition of conservative

[geminidomino]

and "Liberal" means someone who wants the Government not to interfere so much in people's private lives and their privacy - which I imagine the Founding Fathers would be in favor of.

Not really, since I doubt there's anyone in the government who falls under that description, but that word sure gets thrown around a lot anyway...

Re:Strange definition of conservative

[SpryGuy]

Conservatives today believe in limited government and states rights, at the base of the movement, not all "Republicans" are conservative, of course.

I'd say none of the elected Republicans or the GOP fit that description. They may pay lip-service to "limited government", but they don't believe it and certainly don't act on it. Never in the last 30 years has any Republican actually implemented more limited government, or anything even approaching fiscal responsibility. Quite the opposite. They say one thing (to get vote) and do another entirely. I would agree that most also stoke the fires of Confederacy, but we already fought a war over that, the Confederacy lost, and our modern Constitution is definitely and clearly a Federalist document.

And Pelosi didn't say that, for the record. And Food Stamps and Unemployment benefits do have significant stimulative effects on the economy, while tax cuts for the wealthy decidedly do not. Tax cuts don't create jobs. Demand does.

The Republican Party has really nothing to do with conservatism any more (they don't believe in "conserving" pretty much anything). They're radical right-wing extremists, and a welcoming home to racists, sexists, homophobes, and xenophobes, manipulating people via fear-mongering in order to increase their own wealth and power, putting party over country at every turn, and their own greed (refering to the people in the Party structure, not the common voters) above all.

Meanwhile, Democrats have allowed themselves to be so bullied and to become so spineless that they won't even stand up for basic facts, even when they're on their side.

The whole situation is pathetic, which is why Congress has the lowest approval ratings ever right now.

But looking at historical data, anyone who wants less intrusive government and more fiscal responsibility is a fool to vote Republican. Not that Democrats are ideal (far from it), but their actual track record is significantly better on both those issues.

Full disclosure: I live in Texas (Perry is an idiot), grew up in Ohio (what Kasich is doing there is criminal) and have lots of relatives in Wisconsin (Walker is even worse than Kasich).

Re:Strange definition of conservative

[dkleinsc]

That's because "Liberal" and "Conservative" are basically meaningless.

Consider, for instance, the recent issue of the US war in Afghanistan. The 'liberals' Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid support it, along with the 'conservative' John McCain, John Boehner, and Mitt Romney. Opposed to the war are 'liberal' Dennis Kucinich and 'conservative' Ron Paul. Or another example: the Sierra Club really liked self-described conservative Senator Bob Smith (R-NH) back when he was in office, because he would frequently vote in their favor if they showed him a picture of a cute animal who would be harmed if he didn't. So you can't describe a political leader as 'liberal' or 'conservative' and give much insight into how they're going to behave once in office.

The far more useful measurement of a politician's actual behavior in office is to find out their campaign funding. Generally speaking, if a group that supports a policy you want doesn't appear on the politician's top 100 contributors list, the politician in question won't represent that policy.

Re:Strange definition of conservative

[CowTipperGore]

But in fact "Conservative" now seems to be used to mean "someone who sells the intent of the Constitution to the highest bidder", and "Liberal" means someone who wants the Government not to interfere so much in people's private lives and their privacy - which I imagine the Founding Fathers would be in favor of.

Actually, it is much simpler and sadder than this - in the US these definitions are really used for social issues only. Both major political parties are wings of the multinational corporate government. The conservative and liberal tags no longer denote any difference of opinion on most real issues and both sides are going to prefer larger and stronger federal governments. These monikers simply give an idea on where a person might stand on something like abortion or gay marriage. To find differences of opinion on issues like state's rights, smaller governments, personal liberty, corporate rights and responsibilities, and such requires going outside the political mainstream quite a bit.

Re:Strange definition of conservative

[zzsmirkzz]

Here is my understanding of the difference between "Liberals/Democrats" and "Conservatives/Republicans" in the US. Since they are always treated as synonymous here, I will do so.

Democrat: Wants Big Government interfering with individual citizens economically via taxes (attacks financial freedom). Their apparent end-goal is for every dollar earned to be taxed and then have the Government ration out all services. Essentially, Communism/Communists.

Republicans: Want Big Government interfering with individual citizens socially via Legislating Morality, the Police State (actually this is apparently bi-partisan) - (attacks social freedom). This apparent end-goal is 1984 style government tracking everyone, at all times.

Summary - both major political parties are for the destruction of USA as it was originally intended. Neither trusts individuals with free choice - either in their actions nor on how they spend their money. Allowed to combine and continue to control the Government these two parties will rip this country apart. Which is why they like playing see-saw of "majority control" and giving the illusion the votes have a say in where this country is headed.

Vote for an Independent/3rd-party candidate - it is the only sane choice!

Re:Strange definition of conservative

[Darinbob]

Because these have always been relative terms. Even left wing and right wing are subjective, as these terms were initially describing post revolutionary French legislature which just doesn't apply very well to other times and countries.

In the recent past in the US you could see that conservative legislators tended to be mostly influenced by and favorable to corporations, whereas Liberal legislators instead favored or were influenced by unions. These has changed in the present mostly because of extremely weakened unions so that both sides of the aisle tend to be pro-corporate (you vote which way your campaign funds tell you to). Actually both sides still pay a lot of lip service to the average worker but when it comes down to actually voting it turns out that "protecting your jobs" actually means "increasing your bosses' profits".

Re:Strange definition of conservative

[Nimey]

He's basically a moderate Republican from back when there was such a thing.

Logical conclusion of this

[AarghVark]

Now that the gloves are off and they can mine data to their hearts content, what is to prevent them from using the data for more than just advertising? I think some people will start seeing letters like this in the future from their insurance companies: "Dear Sir/Madam, due to the number of your relatives receiving (cancer/alzheimers/diabetes/etc) treatment, we are electing to no longer cover you due."

Re:Logical conclusion of this

[Twon]

They'd have to figure out who the insured is, first, as well as their relatives are -- I'm not sure it'd be impossible with a sufficient quantity of data, but the patient's name gets stripped out of the data in question. I think this is a bad idea for other reasons, but at least there's that. FTFA:

When filling prescriptions, Vermont pharmacies collect information, including the prescribing physician's name and address; the name, dosage, and quantity of the medication; the date and place where the prescription was filled; and the patient's age and gender.

Re:Logical conclusion of this

[berbo]

Depends. If they can correlate your health records with your credit history, they would search for wealthier people, who would get this letter:

Dear Sir/Madam, we understand that you are at risk for (something terrible requiring expensive treatment). We'd like to offer you our Premium insurance program.

Re:Logical conclusion of this

[bws111]

That would be discrimination based on genetics, which is against the law.

Re:Logical conclusion of this

[Richard Dick Head]

Not to mention companies looking for dirt in the hiring process. The FCRA is violated as a matter of course in many HR dept's, because it is hard to prove if you cover everything up. It wouldn't take long before this data winds up in the hands of a shady background check company, and there's nothing anybody could do about it.

Interviewing == Dating. All the same rules apply. And human nature shuns baggage of any kind, even if it is "fully treated". HR people tend to be ruthless "daters", its their job.

I mean, consider if you found out the person you are dating has numerous mental disorders, how do you react? You get less interested.

You don't want to say
"I won't date you anymore because you have paranoid schizophrenia, and here is a copy of the background check I ran on you",

you say,
"sorry I don't think this will work out".

Same thing happens in the hiring process, nobody tolerates well the drama that happens when you give people the real reason for not being interested in them.

Re:Logical conclusion of this

[bws111]

It is already against the law to discriminate based on genetics. You claim that the FCRA is 'violated as a matter of course' - do you have any actual evidence of that?

And before you say 'well just because there is a law against it doesn't mean companies won't do it', why would a law against data mining mean companies won't do it? If you're so paranoid as to believe that people are going to discriminate against you based on genetics, in spite of laws against that, then don't give your genes to anyone, ever, because any one of them could break the relevant laws and use that information against you.

Re:Logical conclusion of this

[bws111]

You can stick that stupid 'for now' phrase on anything you want, because EVERYTHING is 'for now'. You're not allowed to murder people - for now. You are allowed to exist - for now.

Re:Logical conclusion of this

[bws111]

So has there been a bill introduced to repeal that law? Has there been discussion of repealing that law? No, and no. The law passed the house 414-1 (only nay vote was Ron Paul), and the senate 95-0 (two of the 5 people who did not vote were Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama), and was signed by President Bush. That is as close to universal agreement as you are ever going to see in government. This is not going to be repealed 'because some corporation wants it'.

It is completely asinine to say that there are corporations who don't like the law. No shit. For every single law made by every government anywhere there is someone who doesn't like it, or else we wouldn't need the law.

Your 'for now' crap is just stupid.

How does this impact the Roe V Wade ruling

[Bob the Super Hamste]

Now what I wonder is how this impacts the Roe V Wade decision as I am not a legal scholar nor do I pretend to be one on /. but to me it seems that this ruling clashes because of the right to privacy which was found in that decision. The Vermont law wasn't outside that right, but supposedly violated the free speech rights of the corporations. It is rather sad commentary that it seems corporations now have more rights than individuals. I am not trying to troll but if one really wanted to stir the pot with this ruling just mention that it would allow data mining of individuals who have taken the morning after pill or other similar ones (I don't know if they exist).

I find the law to be fascinating being that I am engineer. this is mostly due to how it seem the law claims to be fair, and only concerned with the facts, but never seems to be. Additionally I get the impression that there really isn't much logic in how justice is handed out as there are very different ruling from different courts on the same issue.Maybe I should submit my resume the next time a spot opens up on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Re:How does this impact the Roe V Wade ruling

[theangrypeon]

I am not trying to troll but if one really wanted to stir the pot with this ruling just mention that it would allow data mining of individuals who have taken the morning after pill or other similar ones (I don't know if they exist)

This is a bit of straw-manning of what the actual case was about. From another article on the subject.

Pharmacies are required by state and federal law to get that information when they fill prescriptions. They sell the information, without patient names, to data mining companies that, in turn, provide drug makers with a detailed look at what drugs doctors choose for their patients..

The data-miners aren't going to know who is taking what, only what pills doctors are prescribing. This makes the "privacy" argument on the other side lose a bit of luster. I could admit that people could use this data to help find out who is actually taking what, but there are probably other ways of legally preventing marketers from connecting the dots. Furthermore, the law did not restrict the doctor prescription data from being released at all, only that certain types of people couldn't use it for certain types of purposes. The majority found this law to be very selectively targeting specific uses of information to pass constitutional muster, and I think I agree with that.

Re:How does this impact the Roe V Wade ruling

[Kamiza Ikioi]

I think the key is the de-personalized data that is being used. We can surmise that they were not talking about Patient X using Medication Y showing up in an ad. While that's not analogous, there probably is a yet-to-be defined area between the areas of doctor-patient privacy, personal rights, and information first amendment rights. I doubt it will ever be totally settled except on a case-by-case basis.

Re:How does this impact the Roe V Wade ruling

[Caraig]

Well, if I had any faith that this data wouldn't be used for marketing shenanigans, I'd be leaning towards saying that this is good data to have. There are a number of interesting trends that I can think of off the top of my head that could be investigated with this data.

Unfortunately, 'selling data' kind of implies that it's going straight to marketing.

Re:court made the right decision

[nedlohs]

It isn't your personal and private health care information, the patient stuff is lost in the aggregation, all they want is the prescribing doctor data.

They don't care about your health information, they want to know things like:

* Dr Phil is prescribing competing Product X 5 times as often as he prescribes our Product Y.
* Dr Bill is very well respected by other physicians and prescribes our Product Z a lot.

Sure, you mightn't like what they do marketing wise with that, but it has exactly nothing to do with your personal and private health care information.

Selling stuff is speech?

[erroneus]

Oh that explains a LOT. So every time a legislator or a judge sells a law or a ruling, it's free speech they are exercising... on all our behalves. And of course, by this standard, laws against prostitution are all unconstitutional as their selling themselves is protected by the first amendment as what they do is speech and not conduct.

Re:court made the right decision

[Rayonic]

Really? How the fuck is taking my personal and private health care information and selling it, in any way, "protected speech"?

When your personal information is stripped out of it per existing federal law. RTFA, this is about doctors not patients.

HIPPA?

[kammat]

While it appears identifiable patient information isn't included, is there any way that this falls under HIPPA protections?

Ultimately

[Greyfox]

The courts are there to enforce the letter of the law. Their response to this sort of thing is generally the same, "If you don't like the law, change it." In the past, they've interpreted "Freedom of speech" as having potential limitations, but with this court I'm pretty sure you could get away with yelling "Fire" in a crowded theater.

Limiting speech in general would be a contentious issue, and it would be a tricky thing to get right. I think we should expand on the whole "A person has the right to be secure in his papers and possessions" concept to "A person has the right to enjoy the solitude of his privacy." Much is made of the right to free speech, but I feel I also have the right not to be forced to listen to the speech of others, and laws limiting peoples' abilities to intrude into your space and bother you have been what are under attack lately.

Once the concept of privacy is defined and expanded, you start to have a framework in which you could reasonably start to limit speech in some cases. Apply these concepts to noise ordinances, the Federal "Do not call" list and the idea of "Your right to swing your fist ends when it meets someone's face" plays out. However, this could also conceivably be used to limit the ability of people to gather and protest, since that could also disrupt the lives of people who live in the protest area. So perhaps this idea still needs some work.

Re:Ultimately

[Nimey]

No. Enforcement of the law is left to the Executive Branch. It is the job of the Judicial Branch to /interpret/ the laws and ensure that they are in keeping with the Constitution.

best judges money can buy

[sunzoomspark]

Ironic that they call it free speech when it was bought and paid for by the drug companies. SCOTUS also ruled this week that makers of generic drugs cannot be sued, even in cases where there was a known problem they did nothing about[1]. They also upheld a limit on medical malpractice damages set by a West Virginia law[2]. See a pattern here?
1. http://www.wwltv.com/news/northshore/Local-shocked-US-Supreme-Court-ruled-against-her-124458214.html
2. http://www.wvmetronews.com/news.cfm?func=displayfullstory&storyid=46230
== the golden rule - those that have the gold make the rules

Re:best judges money can buy

[canajin56]

They have to rule according to the law. The law says that a maker of a generic drug MUST use the exact warning label on the brand-name drug. If they add an extra warning, they are in serious trouble with the FDA. If they have a duty to add extra warning to the label, then they have a duty to break the law.

Re:best judges money can buy

[will_die]

Get a better source for your news.
For the decision on generic drugs the court said they cannot be held to a higher responsibility then the drug they are coping. The original drugs did not have to have the warning so the copies of the drugs did not need the warning and could not be sued because the warning was not there. A very logical decision.

Re:best judges money can buy

[sunzoomspark]

They knowingly allowed people to suffer permanent neurological damage and did nothing to try to warn anyone. The woman who filed the suit has had her life ruined, she cannot work, the drugs she needs to treat the problem caused cost thousands of dollar per month. The fucking company should pay. They could have stopped this and did nothing. They are morally responsible. "Actavis ignored scientific and medical literature establishing a higher risk of developing tardive dyskinesia, failed to request a labeling revision from the FDA, failed to change the label itself even though no prior FDA approval was required, and failed to report safety information directly to the medical community." THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT Case No. 08-31204

Isn't sharing data good?

[jellomizer]

You got a lot of Slashdotters praising hacker groups for exposing all sorts of information. However when there is a legal sharing of information it is just horrible.

Data mining isn't bad it is about collecting data. Business Intelligence is processing the data and its trends to solve issues. Ok yes for the case Pharma is using it to sell to doctors. They are going to do that anyways, now they can do it more directly and cheaper, and that cost savings does get passed down.

And for you IT people wanting cool Comp Sci jobs, Data Mining and Business Intelligence is actually quite fun Computer Science work, it is good pay, and not well outsourced.

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[geoffrobinson]

Yes, Slashdotters are largely using double-standards in regards to Wikileaks.

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[ukemike]

Yes, Slashdotters are largely using double-standards in regards to Wikileaks.

Hardly. In one case you have governments that are supposed to serve their people and don't; that reflexively classify everything mostly to hide the foul deeds of people in government from the people. In this case some sunshine is a good thing. It is beneficial to people and to societies to know what their governments are up to.

In the second case you have massive corporations that have access to the most intimate details of all our personal lives. They wish to use this data for profit. This almost always happens to the detriment of people and societies. That data is not the property of society at large (like the data of a government is). It is private. It should be under the control of individuals.

The only way you can twist these two situations into a "double standard" is by making the erroneous case that these two cases are similar. They are not.

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[bws111]

Oh, 'massive corporations' - scary. Gee, I wonder what makes them so 'massive'. It surely is not the thousands or millions of people that make them up, is it?

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[bws111]

Show me a government that can operate with no privacy, and I'll show you a government that doesn't last more than about 10 minutes, because it can have no defenses against any internal or external threats.

A corporation is nothing more than a piece of paper. That piece of paper does not have privacy. The people that make up a corporation, and their dealings with each other, deserve exactly the same privacy as people who are not part of the corporation.

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[BJ_Covert_Action]

Repeat after me:

"The open and free sharing of information regarding publicly elected officials, public government offices, and actions taken in the name of a country's citizenry by it's public: good.
The open and free sharing of information regarding private individuals, private individuals' habits, lifestyles, or time schedules, and private individuals' actions: bad."

Do you see the difference? The issue is not a binary, "Share all data, hide all data." The issue boils down to who we, as a country, want to be allowed privacy and who we, as a country, think shouldn't be allowed privacy. Individuals are granted the right to privacy via The Constitution. That's a pretty important legal document. There is no reason to assume that corporations, governments, activist groups, or other large social entities have those same rights. They are not individuals. They don't. It really is that simple.

Does that make sense to you yet? Or do you need me to try to be more explicit?

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[ukemike]

Oh, 'massive corporations' - scary. Gee, I wonder what makes them so 'massive'. It surely is not the thousands or millions of people that make them up, is it?

The people who are employed by a corporation do not "make up" that corporation anymore than the corporate headquarters building "makes up" that corporation. The employees are entirely incidental and replaceable, so is the building. The corporation is a person in and of itself under our current law. The size or power of a corporation has much more to do with it's ability to exert power in the public realm, to bend our society to its interests at the expense of mine. The corporation has all the rights that you do and many more. It has virtually none of the responsibilities that you do. It cannot be arrested and thrown in jail, even if it kills someone. But it does have one very important responsibility that you don't. It must increase shareholder value. Not the interests of the society in which they exist, not the people you think "make up" the corporation, only the shareholders. So in addition to being massive regardless of the incidental employees, yes they are scary, because they are almost completely unaccountable to me and to you.

So in simple answer to your question, no. The number of people employed by a corporation not what determine the corporation's size or power. There may be a correlation but it is not the cause.

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[bws111]

Your post makes no sense. You talk as if a corporation is some magical sentient being, with the will and power to act independent of the people involved in it. The people involved in a corporation have exactly the same rights and responsibilities as you do. What additional rights do you think they gain, or responsibilities they lose? Of course a corporation can't be arrested and thrown in jail - it has no ability to act. How can a corporation possibly kill someone? The actions of the PEOPLE in a corporation may result in someone's being killed, and if their actions rise to the level of a crime they can and will be arrested. The thing that people value most is liberty, so if they commit a crime we remove their liberty. The thing that corporations value most is money, so if the corporation as a whole commits a crime we remove it's money.

I never said the people I was referring to were employees. The people that make up a corporation are it's shareholders, because they are the ones who control what the corporation does, either explicitly by voting for the board who directs the management what to do, or implicitly by investing money in it.

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[ukemike]

How can a corporation possibly kill someone? The actions of the PEOPLE in a corporation may result in someone's being killed, and if their actions rise to the level of a crime they can and will be arrested. The thing that people value most is liberty, so if they commit a crime we remove their liberty. The thing that corporations value most is money, so if the corporation as a whole commits a crime we remove it's money.

For decades W.R. Grace Inc. mined vermiculite from a mine in Libby, Montana. There is ample documentary evidence that they knew that the vermiculite was contaminated with tremolite asbestos. For decades they concealed this fact from their workforce and the inhabitants of the town. Many people died of asbestosis, lung cancer, and mesothelioma. That is how a corporation kills people.

No criminal charges were filed since there was not enough evidence to convict any one particular living person. Grace did get sued, but hid behind bankruptcy and ended up loosing very little actual money. Our history is overflowing with examples that and uglier. In fact W.R. Grace's history is full of similar stories. They've literally killed thousands of people in their attempts to profit. A person who committed those crimes would be considered a mass murderer. Grace is merely a risky investment.

Yes corporation frequently do things that none of the individuals would dream of doing. It is a well established psychological phenomena that a committee of people is frequently willing to to abominable things that none of the people on the committee would consider.

To bring it back to the original topic, I honestly don't care if it's Bayer Corp. or some mom and pop operation, my medical data is mine and mine exclusively and only I should get to determine if it is shared with a person or a corporation regardless of the benign/malignant nature of the person or business.

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[riondluz]

Well spoke. But the binary is that either (both those conditions are met) or not; marked now in inverse proportion; true being a 'less good' and 'more bad' place.
I conclude its more about having the ability to control what i (a citizen) want divulged and that in accepting public office one sacrifices any claims to privacy by default.
Considering the levels of hypocracy comming from the entrenchments; the entire point of politics seems to be bargaining with skeletons in closets.

Otherwise, our Supreme Court today would be held in Contempt of Country; most of Congress would be
ridden shamed out of D.C

History books will not be kind

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[riondluz]

I'd like to think that sharing data is neutral, the human condition. It's just asking to be shared if it has any value. Unfortunately i suspect we have lost (if ever had) all self-restraint when it comes to more and more of it.
Gleaning info like bit-coin mining, a great obsession that seldom leads to making things better, even with more informed choices.
We all seem to listen to what we want (are programmed to hear).
Our loss of privacy is just a by-product of that addictive need. Growing State and Corporate Intelligence espionage (for lack of beter word),
the data is just another commodity.
For little peeps like me, it means that, despite signing onto the NCL, i get calls from "david" (maybe jitender?) in "TN" (maybe mumbai?) informing me that i 'requested online information about diabetes' and wanted a contribution for research and do i have diabetes? or someone i know, or .... oh such a sad empty pitch in broken english.

Re:Isn't sharing data good?

[riondluz]

Considering that the evolution of conglomeration has many corps larger/richer than most countries,
their kingdoms are no less contested territory. Then, take the Carlyle Group; small and very powerful. They, like their ilk, squeeze, pressure, co-opt and trade corps like pawns in a park-bench/avenue chess game.
It must be so, otherwise so many people would not be 'failing up'.
Immediate employees are no less disposable than the floor worker, boards are adversaries to be mastered. Our zions of industry are a clique unto themselves, for themselves exclusively.
The oilygarchs are big game hunters, corporations are their prey, their trophies. We, in their minds, are inconsquential, predictible, controllable and disposable liabilities. Their job is to devalue the work we do. Our 'Managers' are not standing up for us, but taking whatever gravy they can before it all falls apart in a complex heap.

Who has power will become an interesting question
Corporations, like their shell counterparts, have no meaning whatever. They are a body of faith in the system. What's now possibly an offshore Postal Box might have left a big, empty, toxified wasteland in their wake as they disolved, went bankrupt (by design), and morphed into some global hydra-headed consumption machine looking for investors.
I've heard that of the Fortune 1000, of those HQ'd in the US, around half have some foreign investment. Of that 1/2, half again are (+-5) 50% foreign owned. Our government have sold us as a bill of goods for foreign sovereign debt.
Follow that money, the x-fer of public wealth.
The privatized consumption machine that made 6% look pitiful in all aspects.
While GM (triad?) was shrinking itself into GMAC
in MI, it's Chinese head exec was on camera talking up stunning growth and profits.
Corps are streamlining themselves into paper holding companies because they know only the bankers, the institutional investors, have the power. Corps gone mobile. Elites gone virtual.
Us, left to clean up a mess after realizing there is no spoon.
Sorry, needed to vent; found myself here.
You have the power, use it where you can.

Only people have power; corps were 1st given that status only bec it was too easy for the 'owners' to slip away and not be held personally accountable. These days that is impossible. The executives, their boards, institutional investors, their hedge-fund cronies in Greenwich, they dont care how their investment is spent, only in the promised returns, too smart or too connected or too big to fail, numb to the sorrows that come from its yields and dividends.
How much power does it take to wield disaster capitalism from rice paddy to waterfront city.
To economically impose debts upon a corrupted country only to come back as vulture funds to bleed em dry a 2nd time.
How much power does it take to orchestrate a massive bailout, get free, 0% money to sit on and leverage, and not only survive a bad economy - but be better off for it.

 

Hm...

[JustAnotherIdiot]

I'd like to express my first amendment right and say FUCK YOU SUPREME COURT.

Can you hear Mark Zuckerberg singing about it?

[Kamiza Ikioi]

All I do is win-win-win no matter what! I got money on my mind, I can never get enough!

Once again the summary is way, way off

[will_die]

Again a very poor summary and let me predict that most of the comments on this board will be from idiots who think they understand the decision from the summary.
The decision said that states cannot limit the speech* of companies that purchase info from pharmacies to one specific group, in this case manufacturers of drugs. If they want to limit the speech it has to be to everyone not just one class.

*There have been previous longstanding decisions that say that some data is free speech and cannot be limited by the states or federal government.

Re:Once again the summary is way, way off

[cowboy76Spain]

Having RTFA just once, what I find most disturbing is that pharmacies can sell the information of what doctor is prescribing what drug.

This eases the opportunities for pharma bussiness of going to doctors and telling them "If we receive x prescription of our product from you, we will pay you a % as our agent. And we do not care if the drug is what the patients really needed or not, we only care about units sold."

The rest of the data is mostly harmless (it needs to be linked to medical history to retrieve the name of the patient, and if you have the medical history you probably already have all what you need).

Re:Freedom of Speech

[Caraig]

It was only decided correctly if you consider a corporation to be a person.

Weather corporations are persons or should be persons is, to be fair, worth a debate of its own. Even speaking as a progressive, it'd be a good debate to have.

Re:Supreme Court Decision Disasters keep mounting.

[Kamiza Ikioi]

This can be positive, though. If we think in terms of government, it helps push for more open government and governmental data as a freedom of speech issue, even in cases where certain things are "copyrighted" by governments, such as NYC subway maps.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[MickyTheIdiot]

1) There ought to be a difference between speech by individuals and corporations as corporations are a "legal fiction" and not real persons. When you elevate corporations to "people" you essentially give them MORE rights than real people because they can be such a potent concentration of power. The writers of the constitution actually knew this... it was never their intent for companies to have more power than individuals. They were very wary of corporations because of their dealings with the East India Company.

2) Freedom of Speech is more about freedom to speak opinion, not freedom to know someone's personal facts. It appears people bent over backwards to try to make medical facts fit into that hole.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[geoffrobinson]

The first amendment doesn't reference anything about personhood. It references "speech". So the question is whether speech is limited or not (it definitely was), not who is speaking (a collection of individuals or individuals).

Don't you mean "bought & paid for" judges inst

[Anonymous Coward]

See subject. Everything's done for big money, not regular people. Makes me ill and I am far from the only one.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[Hatta]

Free speech liberals don't like is free speech. Free speech conservatives don't like is "obscenity". Funny how that works out.

I'd happily support an absolutist position on free speech, if the courts were consistant about it. But they are completely hypocritical. "God hates fags" == protected speech. "Bong hits for Jesus" == unprotected.

It's like they're not even trying to hide their bias anymore.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[geoffrobinson]

If you think there should be a difference pass a Constitutional amendment. Again, the 1st amendment just mentions "speech" without any qualification as to whom is speaking.

Corporations, while a legal entity, are still collections of people. I fail to see how a collection of people should lack the free speech rights of a singular person.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[geoffrobinson]

It's not like anyone on the Court likes Westboro Baptist, so that example doesn't really show a bias.

Fine

[jvkjvk]

The Supreme Court and Big Business want information to be free?

So be it.

Regards.

Re:court made the right decision

[flaming error]

> this is about doctors not patients.

Are you sure?

the Supreme Court ... ruled that "the creation and dissemination of information are speech for First Amendment purposes."

If that's all they've got to say about it, then what limits this to doctors and pharmacies? If this is allowed in the medical industry, what industry would it not effect?

Regardless, GP is right. This is not public information, it's private.

And SCOTUS is delusional. The pharmacies didn't create the content, they aggregated and sold it against the wishes of doctors who did create it and expected the information to stay private, and the State of Vermont which explicitly forbade this practice.

This has absolutely nothing to do with expressing ideas. It's just about selling raw data they were given in confidence.

I can't give you sources, but anecdotally I can tell you that there are kickbacks between pharmacies, doctors, and pharmaceuticals. Selling the pharmaceuticals data on whether a doctor is prescribing their drugs will have a further corrupting effect, not unlike what could come from selling data on who a voter voted for in an election.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[Hatta]

Evidently they like Westboro more than they like pot smokers.

Re:First Amendment?

[bws111]

The prescription itself is not free speech, but talking about it is. There is nothing private about a prescription except for the patient's name. You are perfectly free, if you so desire, to declare to the world that Dr Smith gave you a prescription for some drug - you don't need Dr Smith's permission to do so. And this is nothing new - in the mid 70s I worked at a pharmacy, and my job was filling out a card with drug-dosage-doctor for each prescription filled and sending it to some company (IMS, I think).

Your expense reports are the private property of your company, and they can give them out or not as they see fit. Your medical records and financial statements are private information, and that privacy is protected by law.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[geoffrobinson]

You are looking for all decisions to be based on some underlying bias for or against a certain group. That's prevalent way of looking things. That's why people interpret decisions about being for or against corporations as opposed to following their stated legal reasoning.

I would look at the legal reasoning and take it at face value. Westboro Baptist cases are usually straight up protests which have less qualifications in terms of free speech rights than a student being in a public school and wearing a shirt.

Re:Judges also know blackmail's against the law

[erroneus]

It can't be "blackmail" if the information is publicly available.

Once Again, Transparency is Needed

[bill_mcgonigle]

"I'm sorry ma'am, we don't call in prescriptions to that pharmacy, they sell the prescription data to pharmaceutical companies and we disagree with that policy. May I suggest Pharmacy Y, it's the next closest to your home?"

how is this free speech?

[statsone]

it just boggles the mind.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[Hatta]

You're not even looking at the facts and taking them at face value. Frederick was an adult, was not on school grounds, and was not under school custody at the time he made the "bong hits for jesus" statement.

If you look at the legal reasoning and take it at face value, it doesn't get any better. Roberts said that the speech "reasonably viewed as promoting illegal drug use". Well hell yes it did! Promotoing civil disobedience is political, and therefore, protected speech.

The only possible reason for the ruling is that Roberts et al., hate drug use more than they love the Constitution.

Re:court made the right decision

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

It isn't your personal and private health care information, the patient stuff is lost in the aggregation, all they want is the prescribing doctor data.

Except it is NOT lost. That was one of the major issues in the case, it was the entire reason the state banned it in the first place. That information is recoverable by cross-referencing with other databases such as credit card transactions (time/date/amount/store).

They don't care about your health information,

That's what they say but the now that the SCOTUS has ruled it legal you can be confident that there will be services which will do that cross-referencing and will sell that information for things like back-ground checks.

What we need is for someone to apply that cross-referencing to the pharmacies near where the SCOTUS justices live and then publish a list of the medications they currently take.

Re:court made the right decision

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

If that's all they've got to say about it, then what limits this to doctors and pharmacies?

Apparently regular people are limited - see free speech zones.

The comparison is valid - the SCOTUS has a four-part test that requires a free-speech zone serve a very narrow and clear purpose, generally of "protection" or "safety."

Yet a patient's very specific need for protection from having the list of their medications abused by others for profit is apparently not good enough. Such hypocrisy.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[geoffrobinson]

Thanks for the clarification about this particular case. I'm not granting them infallible powers. Nor am I saying they or anyone else is immune to bias. But commenters and analysts don't even bother to take their legal reasoning seriously.

Re:court made the right decision

[black soap]

They want to know which doctors to are good targets for more "drug rep" visits pushing the newest highest-profit-margin drugs. The goal of this collecting is to get the info of how many prescriptions each doctor is prescribing, and for what.

When you see the lengths the drug companies go to to push doctors toward a specific drug, it is horrifying. They can't bribe them, but they can "hire" that doctor to tell other doctors about it (purely informational, of course). The people who show up aren't really interested in hearing the presentation, the whole point is knowing that the doctor they hired to speak about the drug is significantly more likely to prescribe that exact drug immediately afterwards.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[black soap]

If it can't go to jail, reproduce, serve on a jury, vote, etc., it isn't a person. A corporation is a comittee, a group of people. Giving that corporation rights is a joke.

Re:Freedom of Speech

[geoffrobinson]

So you are saying if Sierra Nevada wants to run an advertisement or publish a book, the government can ban that.

And if the government wants to censor the New York Times or shut it down, they can. Only individuals have freedom of the press, not corporations.

That is where your logic leads.

Re:Must have been false and disproven (see link)

[erroneus]

Please please PLEASE file a charge. You are the biggest moron I have ever seen on here. Recently I've exchanged correspondence detailing some history of you and your interactions. You're all talk. So please, surprise someone.

This "running" thing is just nonsense. It's a web based forum. People choose whether or not to reply and if and when there is time to reply and if they have anything useful or more to say. It is impossible to continue a conversation indefinitely here. By your definition, literally everyone has "run away" because at some point they have nothing left to say to you.

Once again, please PLEASE contact a lawyer and try to file a suit. You are making accusations that just won't fly.

Put up or shut up. I have done no libel -- I have referred to comments made by others and comments and actions made by you. Ultimately, it has all come from you and continues to come from you. I have done no blackmail. Sad that you misunderstand reality, but it's true. Everything you write here is out of your hands and is available to the public for review. It can be reviewed by lawyers, law enforcement, your mother, your employer or anyone. The more of this you do, the more you bury yourself in it. So I say it again, you should stop because you just make it worse.

No one cares if you are right or if you shot someone's argument down. What they seem to care about is the harassing manner in which you behave. And frankly, it is your behavior that would be of most interest to any employer and not whether you were right or wrong, won or lost.

You're an idiot. Now please prove it by keeping this up or prove you're not by shutting up. And if you really have to speak, use a lawyer.

Re:court made the right decision

[nedlohs]

I know how it works. It's the field I work in (on the IT end of manpulating that presciption data amongst other things...)

Re:Freedom of Speech

[black soap]

No, I'm saying we shouldn't consider it Sierra Nevada wanting to publish the book. We should consider it what it is: the owners of Sierra Nevada are using their combined resources to publish a book.

The company does not have rights on its own, the people who form the company have rights. Forming the company does not give them any extra rights. It just makes it easier to refer to that company, do business under a certain name, etc., rather than naming all the people who form the company.

Right now, a person can be limited in political contributions by a dollar amount, but corporations do not; this effectively means that a corporation has been given rights a person does not have - and I am arguing that the current situation is inherently wrong.

Re:court made the right decision

[black soap]

I wasn't disagreeing, just elaborating.