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Comment by techterrier | Hacker News Reader

I'm not sure she could do anything else. However bad the limits on free speech are, applying the law selectively is probably worse.

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The very spirit of this law is that it is applied at the government's discretion, though.

Such a law should not exist. If a law is so bad that the only way people are willing to tolerate it is with selective enforcement, then it shouldn't be tolerated at all.

Who said the government approval is there to make people tolerate the law? It only applies where foreign head of states are concerned. The government approval was added as is their job to manage international relations - including cases like this.

There is also another general insult law which applies to everyone and where no government approval is needed. This case would run anyway.

Exactly. That's why they are going to abolish it.

She could push for repealing a stupid law. Insulting world leaders (especially our own) is a celebrated past time for the western world. This is, after all, the homeland of Martin Luther (warning, visual fart joke): http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/17e3edby8mik5jpg/original.jp...

EDIT: does german law allow for pardons?

There is no pardoning that would be relevant. However, they could change the law before the court's verdict. In that case the court needs apply the more lenient version. As far as a I know there is significant push to change the law at the moment.

she has actually said that they will work on repealing the law asap and this will likeli go into effect in 2018.

>does german law allow for pardons

No idea. But in this case it's the government itself that gave the ok for prosecution in the first place (it's a very special law...). It doesn't make sense to first say "go ahead, law enforcement" and then pardon Böhmermann.

I think that's happening too?

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