This week’s letter come from Sue Bastian who takes direct aim at the recent Supreme Court decision that removed campaign spending restrictions on corporations in federal elections, a move that is expected to increase Corporate America’s influence on our government. Thanks for the letter Sue. You can pick up your winner’s spoils, a bag of Strictly Organic Coffee at our office, 704 NW Georgia – no corporate influence peddling required.
The Supremes pounded the final nail in the coffin of democracy with their recent decision to unleash the few remaining restraints on the corporados and banksters to own and control government.
In 1886, the Supremes granted personhood to corporations endowing these artificial entities (legal fictions) with all the rights of real persons except the right to vote.
In 1976, the Supremes ruled that money is synonymous with free speech essentially deciding that corporations could buy elections using money as an expression of free speech. Now corporations could vote.
The McCain-Feingold Act in 2002 restricted some of the more onerous practices of corporations in federal elections.In 2010, the Supreme GiveAway reversed McCain-Feingold removing the restraints on corporate contributions to buy everything and everyone with impunity.
The “Get Guvment Off The Backs of the People” crowd is undoubtedly elated with the decision. Now the corporations, not the “guvment” can call all the shots. Issues including war, health care, drugs, privatized prisons and schools, abortion, immigration, resources, energy and environmental issues will be decided by corporations rather than real people.
The federal government is essentially redundant. Time to cut out the “Big Guvment” middle man and close the Big Brokerage Firm on the Potomac. Just send your tax money directly to Chase Manhattan, Halliburton, Exxon-Mobil, Monsanto or your favorite multi-national corporation.
The Corporate Coup is Complete.
God Bless the Corporados!
This article appears in Feb 4-10, 2010.
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Well said Sue!
There comes a point when a People must start to take responsibility for being intellectually and morally lazy … I think it is clear that, with this recent Supreme Court decision – another disgrace in a long list of disgraces that demonstrate that this Court believes the Constitution was written for businesses, by businesses rather than for actual people – it is clear that the American public is about to get exactly what it deserves.
Your Government will now not only represent you, it will resemble you.
Only the politicians who are going to benefit from corporate largesse are going to put a ‘positive’ face on what the Supreme court did through their decision. The legal fiction that a corporation is a ‘person’ with the legal rights of free speech has been twisted to usurp the election process and the voice of private citizens. That dollars constitute speech and that unbridled spending on ‘message ads’ is a constitutional right is generating tears of joy and thunderous rolls of laughter in the halls of Congress, the boardrooms of companies worldwide, and the offices of every lobbyist in Washington.
We, the people, have given it all away…
Abdicated, Mr Cramer. Willfully gave over our Founding responsibility to govern ourselves to a dynastic generation of military/medical/media industrial complex ‘college’ educated professional career politicians and multi-millionaire mainstream media ‘personalities’.
Abdicated, Mr Cramer. Abdicated.
To follow up conversation outside of these hallowed halls: yes, there is indeed common ground with the ‘teabaggers’, but common ground need be met half-way. Consider that Measure 66 didn’t need Multnomah county to pass, and Measure 67 didn’t need much help. As the Oregonian reported, “Measure 66, in fact, was leading by 5,000 votes before the counting ever reached the Multnomah County line. (Multnomah then tossed in its margin, just more than 100,000.) Measure 67 barely trailed, by 11,500, outside the state’s most populous county. It hardly ever works like that. Liberal measures, and Democratic politicians, historically have tended to get beaten up in the rest of the state and then limp into Multnomah hoping for a powerful boost to edge ahead.”
Oregon is no longer as ‘conservative’ as it once was.
Lets see if all the aspects of a Sue Bastian letter are here:
Big Pharma-check
Halliburton-check
Exxon-Mobil-check
banksters-check
A few galring ommissions Sue. You forgot military industrial complex, big box store, and calling American service members war criminals. Not your best effort.
Lets see if all the aspects of Jon Jiggles’ letter are here:
1. No specific point to make – check
2. The obligaterry splelling mistakes – check
3. The hilarious put-down – check
4. The “hit-and-run” cowardice – check
5. No counter-argument, logic, debate – check
But actually Jonny Boy, it WAS your best effort as this is really all you have to offer.
Thanks for the contribution