Warm up the bribes.

Remove all ads!

This can be a bad thing IMO.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34822247/ns/politics-supreme_court/

I would like to see an option for (near) total public funding for candidates for election rather than the loophole laden election laws we have today for the ways candidates get campaign money.

But making the laws we do have fewer and/or weaker doesn't strike me as improving the situation at all.

And for anyone that says they don't want to fund the campaign of a candidates you don't like, I'd ask if you have ever heard of the "Graft Tax".

That is the amount of money citizens have to pay, through the government, for various favors, special contracts, special tax credits/cuts/loopholes, and so on to groups and individuals that bribed elected officials via campaign fundraising.

 

I saw this story earlier and thought the same thing - that it's likely bad. Upon thinking on it a bit more though, there were private groups running smear campaigns already. Remember the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth in 2004, and the Mormon crusade against Prop 8 in 2008? In both cases the private groups did more to smear the candidate/issue that the actual opponents ever would have. So while I do find it concerning, I'm not as concerned as I initially was.

 

I agree, although I would have mentioned moveon.org, ACORN, SEIU, etc. instead

 

On the one hand, I agree with others that this likely won't improve the situation any. On the other hand, given the grounds of the challenge, I don't really see the Court having any other choice (thus I don't really understand the 4 dissenters). As long as corporate entities are given similar rights to citizens, they also have similar freedoms, including Freedom of Speech. If private individuals can do it, corporations should be able to, as well. God help us all.

 

I would love for someone to explain that. It makes no sense. Hopefully you can add some clarity.

 

I wonder why the judges that voted for this change aren't getting the "activist" label? This is about the most activist decision we have seen in decades, and is basically legislating from the bench. I know activist judges are usually associated with liberals, but this was a conservative issue that was voted on by the conservative members of the court.

 

Just wait till insterets in China, Iran and North Korea set up Proxy corps in the US and start taking out political ads. That will change things pretty quick. Conservatives are crowing right now, but wait till their political enemies start up the ad machine with high-sounding American names in the ads. Most large corporations are multi-national affairs. These boobs have given Constitutional rights to anything on the planet that calls itself a "corporation." What fools they are....

 

It evolved from the original corporations, which were basically just joint ventures. Instead of having one person own each item, they allowed for a kind of 'corporate ownership', in which all members shared ownership. From there, I think it just expanded. If people can own as a joint entity, shouldn't they be able to act as one, to gather money as one, to speak as one, etc?

Again, I don't see this as activist judging at all. It's a basic application of rights, only confused by the issue that it's a corporation claiming them. How formally enshrined in law corporate rights are, I don't know, but given them, it's a logical conclusion.

I haven't heard any conservatives crowing yet. Then again, all the news I see is about Brown and Health Care. Care to link?

 

IIRC, legally speaking, a corporation is treated as an "individual". Though if that's true, then it'd seem to me that a corp should have the same contribution limits as any private individual.

 

Corporations are not natural born citizens, and they don't speak as one. Already shareholders, some of whom are Democrats, Republicans, liberals, conservatives, moderates, are demanding that THEY vote on which political parties corporations should support. And customers: Those Corporations do business with all kinds of people. I have already started notifying the companies I do business with that as a customer, I demand that they support my policial views in their ads, since I help pay their bills. And I'm sure conservatives will be doing the same thing now. What foolishness.

Sure:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/politics_nation/2010/01/who_won_lost_supreme_court.html

 

Actually, I think that it was "activist" to deny corporations the same rights as individuals in the first place.

 

A possibility I had not even considered until you brought it up.

One would think so, but that doesn't appear to be the case.

 

Can you explain this? A corporation is not an American citizen, and while a citizen doesn't have to be born here, he/she has to make the requirments set by the US law.

Here are the requiements to be a citizen of the US:

http://immigration.findlaw.com/immi...&HBX_PK=us+citizenship+requirements&HBX_OU=50

 

How typically liberal.

I did NOT say that corps were "citizens". I said that I think that corps are treated as "individuals", legally speaking.

 

How utterly black and white.

...and I'm pretty sure you just ignored Chandos' point by playing semantics. Just as corporations do not fit the the requirements to be a citizen of the US, they also do not meet the requirements to be a legal Alien. Chandos' larger argument is that corporations should not be accorded the same rights enjoyed by us living, breathing human beings. Agree or disagree, but at least respond to his actual argument.

 

Chandos, thanks for the link. Those people are idiots, but it's Congress so what do you expect.

Drew, Chandos was actually playing semantics first, so I consider Crucis's stab fair game. No one ever said they were citizens, or legal aliens, or illegal aliens, or any of those things. They're corporations. And, apparently, US law treats corporations as individuals. Does that mean they have the same rights as a US citizen? God I hope not. All we need is corporations voting themselves to really straighten up the electoral system. What it seems to mean is that they are capable of having rights, just like any other individual of any type.

The term 'corporate individual' may seem like an oxymoron (or a term from The Exorcist), but this is law we're talking about.

As for the rights a corporation should have, I'd say all the same property rights as a citizen, but none of the political/legal rights (meaning no Right to Remain Silent). Which way spending your money on political ads falls? Well, I don't know.

 

Fair enough, NOG, but I'm still inclined to agree with Chandos that corporations enjoy far more privileges than they probably should. By the looks of things, we'd probably share a lot of common ground issue, too.

 

... Wait, what? Huh? How many of you are there in there?

If you meant, "You'd probably share a lot of common ground with us on this issue", I suspect we'd agree on a lot and disagree on a lot.

 

It depends on whether I'm having one of my "episodes". As many as 14, but usually just 3. Anyway, thanks, I fixed my post.