Query: In the Epilogue, the authors suggest that "the need for a deliberate lie may well be key to any notion of a First Amendment premised on deliberative democracy." What is the character of the deliberate lie? Why might it be necessary to a free speech system premised on deliberative democracy?

Query: How does the deliberate lie operate for the preservation of Madisonian discourse in the contemporary First Amendment culture?

Query: The authors claim that the etymology of the deliberate lie in political philosophy extends back to Plato’s Republic. By virtue of the lie, "the citizens can in all good faith and conscience take pride in the justice of their regime, and malcontents have no justification for rebellion." Can the deliberate lie effectively "fortify Madisonian discourse" by "fabricat[ing] its vitality?"

Query: In "The Discourse of Death," the authors claim: "We can avoid First Amendment paradoxes and lies by trading in idealized Madisonian principles for modern cultural practices." This "cultural approach to the First Amendment . . . stands ready to embrace openly the conventions of the popular culture: contingent truths, entertainment ideology, imagistic talk, compulsive consumption, and libidinous self-gratification." Is the cultural approach to the First Amendment a realistic alternative to the deliberate lie of the deliberative democrats?

Query: In their concluding paragraphs, the authors present a choice between the Madisonian and the modern First Amendments. What is this choice as the authors view it?

Query: Do you believe, along with the authors, that the only realistic choices are between the Madisonian and the modern First Amendments? What other choices are there? Would such choices ward off the "death of discourse?" What would such choices mean for Americans? Given the realities of our current free speech culture, are such choices any more realistic than those presented by the authors?

Query: Three of the commentators in the Afterword--Professors David Nyberg, Shadia Drury, and Robert Hariman--give significant attention to the issue of what it means to "lie." They distinguish between "lying" and "myth-making" or "narrative truth-telling." And they challenge the charge of the Epilogue that modern liberal defenders of traditional First Amendment values may be "deliberate liars." Why the focus on conscious "lying?" Why the distinction between "lying" and "myth-making?" What responses do Collins & Skover have to these observations?

Query: Professor Robert Hariman argues that The Death of Discourse suffers from "tunnel vision" by failing to acknowledge the vitality of public discourse in modern America. What "vitality" does Hariman find in contemporary public discourse? Do you agree with Hariman’s indictment of The Death of Discourse on this account?

Query: Three of the commentators--Professors David Nyberg, Robert Hariman, and Loyal Rue--contend that American educational institutions might be reformed to counteract the excesses of the popular carnival culture. What are their arguments? Are they persuasive? What responses do Collins & Skover have to these arguments?

Query: Two of the commentators--Professors Richard Stivers and Loyal Rue--appear to critique The Death of Discourse generally and the Epilogue in particular for not going far enough. Ostensibly, these critics see little problem with "deliberate lying" or with First Amendment paradoxes. They focus on forces beyond the mass entertainment culture, consumerism, and self-gratification to explain the degraded state of American civilization. Why do Professors Stivers and Rue abandon the front discussed by the other commentators? What are their greater concerns? What reactions do Collins & Skover have to their observations?