Big business is set to buy elections

And for your information Mr. McManus, every study shows that corporations throw their financial support behind Democrats and Republicans just about exactly equally.

I certainly hope it is not your position that people do not have a First Amendment right to join together in a group that speaks for their financial interests.

This white house has been expressing animosity towards the First Amendment practically since they took office. Which has been a subject of several previous discussions on this web site.

The white house is so unbelievably arrogant, that they no longer feel that they even have to keep their hostility to the First Amendment under wraps. The following verbal exchange between a reporter and Rahm Emanuel occurred last week, before this Supreme Court ruling was handed down in the Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission case. The exchange was caught on film:

Reporter: “ Mr. Emanuel, what is your viewpoint on the First Amendment?”

Rahm Emanuel: “It’s highly overrated.”

And Barak Obama told two more bold face lies last night when he stated that the Supreme Court overturned “100 years of precedent” with this decision. And falsely stated that “foreign” corporations would be able to affect our elections due to this ruling. Neither is true. “Activist ruling”, what a malarkey statement. No wonder Obama was never offered tenure, even though he supposedly “taught” Constitutional Law for 11 years. His colleagues probably couldn’t wait to get rid of such a legal ignoramus and liar.

And it was Justice Anthony Kennedy, the moderate swing vote on the Supreme Court, who wrote the Opinion for this entirely correct decision.

The financial, not the political, well-being. Ever since Ronald Reagan the right has succeeded in framing every argument in financial terms.

Have you, Red Indy, ever taken advantage of your proxy voting rights as a stock-owning member of a corporation? Can you give me, without further research, the amounts and the receptors of the political contributions that the companies in which you own stock have made in the last year? Given the earnestness with which you post here, the answers may be yes, but that would put you in the tiniest of minorities. I do not deny that political contributions “speak for the financial well-being” of corporations. I argue that that is all they speak to, occasionally at the expense of the public good.

“I certainly hope it is not your position that people do not have a First Amendment right to join together in a group that speaks for their financial interests.”

Do you have a problem with the individual cap that has been put on campaign contributions? Why must individuals be allowed to skirt that law by joining a corporation? Can’t we pro-rate the contributions that a corporation has made and deduct them from the individual limit that has been set on individual members of that corporation? If corporations are speaking together, why are you given a larger campaign contribution limit than I simply because you own stock?

Sorry for the mess of ideas, but I’m sure you get my picture

Rahm Emanuel: “It’s highly overrated.” ‘

Yes, caught on film at the White House correspondent’s dinner, spoken to an entertainment reporter, no? What an ironic place to say so. Do you have no sense of humor, or do you merely deny as much to your political opponents when it serves your message board purposes?

No, Rahm Emanuel was not speaking to an entertainment reporter when he made his remark, he was speaking to a straight news reporter who caught him in a hallway on an normal business day. And Rahm Emanuel is not known for either his wit or his geniality. He is known for his ambition and single-minded purposefulness in powering his agenda through.

Skeptical White Man is exactly right.
The Supreme Court decision in question did NOTHING to dislodge the 100 year old law banning corporations from contributing directly to political campaigns. or candidates. It also did NOTHING to dislodge the separate law banning foreigners and foreign corporations from contributing to political campaigns.

One of the reasons that Constitutional Law is complex is that there is always an “underlying” case or several cases upon which the Court’s decision is based. I previously attempted to explain this case on another thread here, but was apparently not too successful. So I am going to quote here an article from this morning’s Wall Street Journal, written by a Constitutional law professor at Georgetown Law Center. Which is, I think more succinct than I have previously been:

[. . . there is the substance of (the President’s) remark itself. It was factually wrong. The Court’s ruling in Citizens United concerned the right of labor unions and domestic corporations, including non-profits, to express their views about candidates in media such as books, films and TV within 60 days of an election. In short, it concerned freedom of speech; in particular, (the underlying case of) an independent film critical of Hillary Clinton funded by a non-profit corporation. While the Court reversed a 1990 decision allowing such a ban, it left standing current restrictions on foreign nationals and “entities”. Also untouched was a 100-year old ban on domestic corporate contributions to political campaigns, to which the president was presumably referring erroneously.” That is a whole lot (for the president) to get wrong in 72 sanctimonious words. Clearly, this statement had not been vetted by the president’s legal counsel. Solicitor General Elena Kagan, for example would never have signed off on such a claim. Never.] (end of quotation)

Notice that there are only two possible interpretations of the president’s determination to go after this Supreme Court decision, and they both reflect very poorly on Barak Obama. Either as the Georgetown Law Professor assumed, Barak Obama did not understand the case at all, and should have consulted his legal counsel before opening his arrogant mouth.

Or the interpretation that I lean to. Which is that Barak Obama deliberately lied about the case to the American public because his arrogance knows no bounds, and he knew that only a very tiny percentage of the population would ever know that he was lying. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Are you now going to suggest that the president was simply joking around in his State of the Union address, and doesn’t really harbor any animosity toward the First Amendment?

Someone needs to remind this president that the Supreme Court is a co-equal branch of government. He is not king. It is Barak Obama’s job as head of the executive branch to enforce Supreme Court decisions. Not to make stupid, unfounded remarks that deride their Constitutional Law decisions and undermine the authority of the judicial branch.

Also, do you have trouble recognizing hyperbole, such as when McManus wrote, “Senator ‘so and so’ hates veterans and hates the poor; did I mention he is a rapist?”

Hi Reg Indy!

So, and please correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t believe anywhere in this editorial the author mentioning Democrats or Republicans. What’s with the commentary assuming he is ignorant of which parties receive corporate funding? That’s just rude.

Here’s a hypothetical for you to ponder, and let me know if you think it’s OK:—-

I’m middle class and work for GenCO (madeup) but am nowhere near executive status. It makes gloves, gloves so wildly popular that the company makes billions in profit each year. Presidential Candidate Tim is running on the pro-choice abortion platform and also the pro-glove platform, promising to open up foreign markets to my company’s gloves if elected, but also to promote government funded abortions. His victory would be very good for GenCO financial, and thus for myself financially.

I don’t want Tim to win. For religious, and other personal reasons, I’m against abortion. I abhor it! But wait… GenCO is throwing millions of dollars towards Tim’s campaign without my approval. Who’s allowing them do that? The CEO? The Board of Directors? The Shareholders? I certainly wasn’t asked! And seeing how no other company is funding Tim’s rival, he is now sure to win with GenCO’s support!

Should I quit my job? This is so unfair. I can only contribute a few thousand toward Tim’s competition, but the company I work for it giving millions!

So, Reg Indy, how do you feel about that?

Presumably as a GenCo employee, you would have been aware of their promotion of Tim no matter at what point in time they began their pro-Tim advertising.

So your hypothetical is saying that if Genco had taken out its pro-Tim advertising 3 months prior to the election, you would not have had a moral dilemma about where you worked. But now that they can take out pro-Tim advertising 3 weeks prior to the election, this all of a sudden creates a moral dilemma for you about where you work. Now there’s a dichotomy. Genco’s behavior is fine with you 3 months prior to an election; but 3 weeks prior and you are somehow at your wits end.

You will have exactly the same moral dilemma about quitting your job now, as you would have had prior to the Supreme Court decision. You will just have that moral dilemma at a different point in time.

The Supreme Court has always made what are called “time, place, and manner” restrictions on free speech. Which is why we are not Constitutionally protected to yell “fire” in a crowded theater.
Nor peddle pornography on an elementary school playground.

What the Court said in Citizens United is that the “time, place and manner” restriction on labor unions, corporations, and non-profits for the last 60 days prior to an election, was so overly restrictive as to seriously nullify their political speech. What the First Amendment is designed to protect is primarily political speech. While there is obviously some need for time, place and manner restrictions, those restrictions cannot be “aimed” at nullifying political speech. That cannot be the primary goal of such restrictions. And the entire point of the 1990 ban on free speech for 60 days prior to an election was just that; to make sure that such political speech was as ineffectual as possible. Thus the Court overturned it.

Keep in mind that the Supreme Court’s lifting of the 60 day ban applies equally to non-profit organizations, to labor unions, and to corporations. The underlying case was that of a non-profit organization, which had been banned by the Federal Election Commission from showing a political film unflattering to Hillary Clinton.

Thus for the title of Mr. McManus article to be remotely accurate (although still quite factually wrong) it would have to have read “Non-profit Organizations, Labor Unions and Corporations Are Set to Buy Elections.” I attribute his misunderstanding of the Supreme Court case directly to Barak Obama’s lying remarks in his State of the Union address.

There is no reason to fear free speech. There is no reason to fear it by groups of individuals acting together, any more than speech by an individual should be feared. Big Business (as Mr. McManus calls publicly-owned corporations) were huge supporters of Bill Clinton. It was Clinton who signed both GATT and NAFTA, which they loved. Big Business also went strongly for Obama in the last election. Of course that may very well change the next time around.

What the public should be concerned about is anyone who wants to limit free speech. Particularly anyone who wants to pick and choose among which groups should be “allowed” to exercise free speech. And which interests are “allowed” to be protected by free speech.

Especially when the person who clearly wants to do the choosing about what speech is “best for the public”, happens to be the most powerful man on the planet.

We the voters will decide what is best for us.

All this ruling does is ruin political discourse. We can protest and boycott all we want, but at the end of the day, the corporations are the ones who have the money to make the Hollywood-style ad campaigns that will influence millions.

Democracy has been sacrificied in the name of the First Amendment. Is that really what you want Indy?

However Goldman had been making billions long before this 60-day ban was enacted in 1990, which the Supreme Court just overturned. They are a very old Wall Street firm. And I do mean old, they were founded in 1869. The general public was just not aware of Goldman until recently, because their name was not in the news. Goldman is a big lefty firm by the way, and always has been. They went strongly for Obama in the last election. So they might not be your best example.

But are you under the impression that prior to 1990, we did not have democratic elections in this country just because firms like Goldman Sachs were allowed to buy advertising 60 days prior to elections? Do you really think that FDR and Harry Truman and John F. Kennedy and Jimmy Carter and Reagan were put in place by big business interests, rather than by democracy?

For all of this nation’s history prior to 1990, we did not have this “60-day ban” that the Supreme Court just overturned. And elections operated just fine. I get the distinct impression that I am the only person here who knows that the ACLU filed a friend-of-the-court brief in this Citizens United case, urging the Supreme Court to rule exactly as they did. Do you think that the ACLU has fallen under the spell of “Big Business”, and that’s why they filed the brief? Obviously not. They wanted this decision because it supports important First Amendment rights. Because a little panel of 6 men (who were not elected but appointed) that operates out of public view called the Federal Elections Commission, should not have the power to make decisions on what political films can be distributed, and when, nor decide what books can be published, and when.

The Constitution says very clearly that Congress shall make no such law restricting freedom of speech. Political speech in particular is to be protected. Protected from Congress specifically by name, you’ll notice. And from the dictates of a little 6-man panel called the Federal Election Commission. The Founding Fathers knew perfectly well that Congress would try and overstep their bounds on this, and specifically prohibited them from doing so. Thank heaven.

Perhaps the name Floyd Abrams will ring a bell with some of you. Floyd Abrams is the attorney who successfully represented the New York Times in the landmark Pentagon Papers case of 1971. Mr. Abrams is quoted in an article in today’s Wall Street Journal as follows: Citizens United advances rather than hinders democracy. He supports this Supreme Court decision fully.

So on this issue I am in the company of the ACLU and the man who argued the Pentagon Papers case. While you are in the company of Barak Obama, who couldn’t even get the basic case law right. Or didn’t want to get it right in his speech.

What is continually amazing to me is how some Obama followers just believe every single word out of that man’s mouth as if it were gospel. Even now that you know that he lied about the Supreme Court case publicly, and had the case law all wrong.

Could it possibly be that Barak Obama is not really concerned about democracy for all of us voters; but rather is focused entirely on how this Supreme Court case might affect his own political fortunes? I think so.

Here is why Obama is really concerned about this Supreme Court ruling. It’s entirely personal. Barak Obama outspent John McCain by a ratio of 3 to 1 in the last presidential election. Which obviously gave him a huge advantage. He now fears that next time around he might not get that same 3 to 1 spending advantage. Perhaps things will be a little more evened up financially next time around. As far as election finance is concerned, the last thing on earth Barak Obama wants to experiment with is (gasp) a level playing field.

Talk about fear mongering. Barak Obama has got several of you scared to death of Freedom of Speech, of all things.

And it’s absolutely ridiculous.

What’s interesting to me is that people who don’t like this recent Supreme Court ruling are operating under the presumption that all business interests will be on the same side. Right now there is a huge clash between Wall Street firms such as Goldman, and bricks-and-mortar businesses. Would it surprise you to know that Exxon is a bricks-and-mortar business? If there is a political clash between those two, the effect would be essentially to neutralize each other.

Your flat out in denial….

Tom,

Corporations should have the same free speech because all a corporation is, is a collection of individuals with a vested interest in the company. If I were to incorporate (probably going to happen sooner than later, sub-s) instead of operate as a sole proprietor, I would still be the sole owner of that corporation. Why then should my corporation not receive the same rights as the individual who owns and operates it? The major issue is that there are too many pinheads out there who think the only “corporations” around are multi-billion dollar conglomerates. When in reality, the vast majority of “corporations” are very small less than 20 employee companies. Free speech is free speech, even if you dislike the outcome and/or the message. You cannot pick and chose which rights and privileges one should receive based upon your subjective interpretation at any given time… I would suggest reading The Crito again….

Now you are redistributing the right to free speech, dependent upon how people allocate their own income and resources. Since when did the poor have the ability to give $5,000 to their favorite candidate? Should all citizens be denied the ability to contribute to their candidate of choice because only the wealthy can make the contribution… what a joke!

First is that this Supreme Court decision applies just as much to non-profits and labor unions as it does to for-profit corporations. The point of the decision was to equally free up all groups who had been targeted by this ridiculously restrictive law. The ACLU, the Sierra Club and everybody else had been hamstrung by the 60-day rule that the court just overturned. I have repeatedly pointed out that the underlying case in this Supreme Court decision was regarding a non-profit organization, that had tried to put out a film about Hillary Clinton but were prevented from doing so by the law that the Court just overturned. Some people are just plain deaf to facts that don’t jive with their political stance. This Court decision is not just about corporations. It is equally if not more important to labor unions and non-profit corporations.

Secondly, unlike the blatant whopper that Obama told the public the other night, prior to 1990 when the 60-day ban was enacted, our elections operated just fine, thank you very much. Obama lied when he said the Court had overturned “100 years of precedent.” The law they overturned had only been around since 1990, and this was its first Constitutional test before the Supreme Court. Our elections operated just fine prior to 1990 for all those years back to the revolutionary war, and they will operate just fine going forward.

Thirdly Mike, you have no idea what you are talking about with your blanket statement that “corporations are not good citizens.” You just have no clue what you are saying. Corporations give hundreds of millions away to very good causes.

Case in point: ARCO oil company. ARCO, an American firm, was headquartered in downtown Los Angeles for 40 years. In year 2000 they were taken over by British Petroleum, which is a Brit firm. British Petroleum closed down ARCO’s headquarters in L.A. as they were only interested in the North Slope leases and the other“nuts and bolts” assets.

Guess what Los Angeles suddenly realized after ARCO was gone? ARCO had been giving away tens of millions of dollars every year to the local community, just like clockwork. Almost entirely centered upon the impoverished, disadvantaged areas. To all kinds of non-profits whose goal it was to assist the needy, and rebuild L.A. after the riots. When ARCO was gone, a lot of these charities went under, and many other good programs were gutted. The company had provided the “backbone” charitable money that individual donors could not replace.
That money for charity is now gone forever. Presently Los Angeles has a 14% unemployment rate. So the city of Los Angeles sure wishes it had those 8000 white collar jobs back, and all those millions that the corporation gave to its charities.
ARCO never had an oil spill of any kind, by the way.

So in what way could they possibly be construed as a “bad citizen”? Would that be for providing thousands of good white collar jobs for college graduates? Or were they “ bad “ for giving so much money to worthwhile charities?

Obviously Mike has no idea about how large corporations really work, what kind of jobs they provide (generally well-paid jobs with good benefits), or what a large percentage of charities they support.

He must be very young, and susceptible to simplistic propaganda.

“ I can’t believe anyone in this country would argue for a more moneyed and exclusive lobbying system, which increases the likelihood of porkbarrel projects that don’t benefit citizens, bureaucracy, ethical problems and interference between government and corporations.”

I believe it would be more inclusive, you know allowing corporations to be included in the political process by contributing to candidates and their campaigns…

If the argument is that individuals are creating political speech through stock ownership, than the cap on individual campaign contribution is totally pointless.

“If the argument is that individuals are creating political speech through stock ownership, than the cap on individual campaign contribution is totally pointless.”

An activist judge would be one who tries to “reinterpret” the Constitution in a brand new way for political reasons.

Not, as here, judges who have simply restored the First Amendment to its rightful position of superiority over recent Congressional attempts to chip away at it.

If you want to insult the present Supreme Court, the accurate term would be to call them “strict constructionists” of the Constitution.

Of course unbeknown to most liberals is the fact that it’s the Supreme Court’s main job to protect our constitutional rights from such encroachments by Congress or the executive branch.

I guess Obama’s plenty pissed that this first case makes clear to him that the Supreme Court intends to do their job.