WTF?
The Supreme Court has overturned a century-old ban that stops corporations spending whatever the f**k they want on a political candidate.
Now, thanks to 5 of these fools in the SC, corporations can basically choose and place their own interest ahead of the greater good.
In a 5-4 decision, the court's conservative bloc said corporations have the same 1st Amendment rights as individuals and, for that reason, the government may not stop corporations from spending freely to influence the outcome of federal elections.This is feels a G.I. Joe episode where Cobra brainwashed SCOTUS to make Destro president. What were they thinking? This can be the beginning of the end of the pubic making a difference.
The decision is probably the most sweeping and consequential handed down under Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. And the outcome may well have an immediate impact on this year's mid-term elections to Congress. Until now, corporations and unions have been barred from spending their own treasury funds on broadcast ads or billboards that urge the election or defeat of a federal candidate.
This restriction dates back to 1907, when President Theodore Roosevelt called on Congress to forbid corporations, railroads and national banks from using their money in federal election campaigns.
After World War II, Congress extended this ban to labor unions. In today's decision, the high court struck down that restriction and said the 1st Amendment gives corporations, just like individuals, a right to spend their own money on political ads.
Well, Obama and others are not feeling it and plan to do something about it.
Wow, what's really going on?President Obama, along with members of the Senate and the House of Representatives, have vowed to fight back against Thursday morning's Supreme Court decision rolling back restrictions on corporate campaign spending. Among the possible responses under consideration: an amendment to the Constitution.
"It's time to take matters into our own hands to enact a constitutional amendment that once and for all declares that we the people govern our elections and campaigns, not we the corporations," said Rep. Donna Edwards (D-Md.)
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3 comments:
V, your assessment of the decision is the most sensible yet. Discounted crack whores, they seem to be.
Well, if take the view that corporations are semi-persons the ruling is obvious and expected; however, if you think that notion is ridiculous then the ruling would naturally come as a bit of a shock.
I don't know where I stand on this. Though I certainly have some concerns about assigning legal personhood to a body of individuals rather than specifically natural persons.
The law was kind of silly though, and was just an invitation for something like this to happen. Passing a law that says certain persons can only contribute to campaign up to a certain point was kind is just inviting a law suit. Imagine a law that says that the top 1% of Americans can only contribute up until the final weeks of the campaign.
I think the law itself underlines a more fundamental point unrelated to corporate personhood, which is that our elected officials are effectively bought by big money. Anything other public financing would be too short.
Then again money is legally considered speech when it comes to elections.
We're screwed either way.
Well, under a purely constitutional view this was inevitable. What we need to do is go back in time a bit and correct the notion that a corporation should have the same access and rights as a flesh and blood human.
All this started up with the 14th Amendment believe it or not. The folks who wrote that saw no reason to include any exclusionary language because at the time corporation hadn't really grown to the size where they represented a threat to our representative republic.
It was accelerated in the 1886 case of Southern Pacific Railway v. Santa Clara County. There a clerk in the pocket of business interests inserted language into official court transcripts that indicated the justices supported the notion that corporations were entitled to the same constitutional protections as a flesh and blood.
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