Here’s a question: What is the all-time dopiest and most objectionable decision that the Gang of Five in the wrong-headed Republican Supreme Court has forced on us? Answer: It has to be the so-called “Citizens United” decision. That’s the one that made it an article of right-wing faith to believe that corporations are people.
That’s not true, of course. Even the Gang of Five must know that. But there are people who seem to think it’s Gospel. Mitt Romney, for one, because when he got into an argument with a voter at the Iowa state fair, he said, “But corporations are people, my friend,” and walked away, apparently thinking he’d won the argument.
Well, they aren’t really people. Every sane person over the age of six knows they aren’t, and yet that ludicrous decision holds the force of law. Among other things, it permits the super-rich to take money right out of the treasuries of the corporations they control and give it, in any quantity at all, to the campaigns of any politicians they choose. We see that going on right now in the primary battles to see who can buy the most TV time.
The Supreme Court is so intoxicated with its own majesty that it thinks it is indeed supreme. However, in this also they are wrong. A Supreme Court ruling can be overruled. One way to reverse such a ruling is to treat it as though it were part of the Constitution and pass an amendment
This means to carry the fight every state house and state legislature in the nation until a sufficient number of states agrees to it. At that point their decision no longer has any effect.
Obviously this entails a lot of work by a lot of people, but the other way to look at that fact is to bear in fact that you are carrying the fight to all those nationwide politicians, giving Occupy a good way of getting all of the people who oversee the nation’s lawmaking to be forced to take a stand.
And they have to do this while polls tell them that a substantial majority of the county’s voters want the amendment passed.
Is there a better issue to allow everyday people to weigh in on their wishes, in a way that the bureaucracy can’t ignore?
Shakatany says:
Well of course everyone knows that Lincoln said government of big business, by big business, for business /sarcasm
February 24, 2012, 8:54 pmSkip says:
Of course corporations have first amendment rights. Because the people who make them up have first amendment rights, which they don’t give up just because they’ve chosen to use their constitutional freedom of association. This isn’t even a close case for anyone who believes in freedom. Now I know this won’t sway you, because the inherent evilness of corporations in general, and the Citizens United case in specific are articles of faith among the left, but let’s just look at the consequences if your view held.
“No newspaper shall endorse any political candidate within 60 days of an election”. Constitutional under your theory, and there goes most of the output of the New York Times – they’d have almost nothing left but sports and advertisements. And please note, the laws which Citizens United overrode specifically excluded newspapers, because they thought they had to. A law like this shouldn’t be constitutional in any country I’d care to live in.
February 24, 2012, 9:21 pmRobert Nowall says:
I’ve never heard from conservatives that it’s an article of faith that a corporation is a person. Rather the contrary.
February 25, 2012, 9:26 amJohn A. Healy says:
I am all good with it. If, and only if, corporations are subject to all the laws that effect me. Alternative Minimum Tax, the draft (can you say cost plus?), any legal requirement vis-a-vis the court system would be the same for me as for Mr. Corp., except jury duty (voters only, please.) Otherwise the thing must be repealed.
February 25, 2012, 11:23 amJay Borcherding says:
I wonder what the exact wording of this proposed amendment should be? While I agree that the Citizens United ruling was very wrong-headed, I’m leery about monkeying with the free speech protections of the first amendment.
If we restrict political free speech protections to individuals only, that might have the unintended consequence of increasing the power of high net worth individuals. If corporations, unions, and organizations like the Chamber of Commerce or the AARP can have their political speech muzzled, who is left to counteract the power of wealthy right-wing individuals other than wealthy left-wing individuals? And isn’t there a slippery slope danger? Restricting political speech is not a risk-free enterprise, which is why the precise wording of such an amendment is so important.
February 25, 2012, 12:43 pmRichard Molpus says:
“We the People” _is_ a assertion of corporate behavior; the ability of groups of people (in this case the combined citizenry of the Several Sates) to join together and act as a ‘single’ entity.
Claiming that only individuals can speak on political matters destroys the intent, purpose, and meaning of “We the People”; a group of people can speak with one voice, in unison carrying their words farther that the reach of their summed voices.
Mr. Pohl has made his living joining with others to speak – as a writer selling words to publishers, and as an editor selecting the words of other fro distribution. He’s been a source of, and selector of, political speech, in his editorial selections, and when he authored a book on practical politics.
IF corporations cannot speak for themselves (which means the owners or managers of the corporation using it’s resources to their own ends), then how can an individual use those same resources to spread his words? To forbid one individual, yet allow another, to spread their words using the methods of the marketplace is a mark of destroyed freedom, independence, liberty, and the mark of a tyrant’s fist.
February 26, 2012, 4:05 amgene says:
FWIW, when Romney made that stupid and incorrect statement at the Iowa State Fair, there was a lot of hooting and heckling in response. Iowans are not yokels, despite Iowa Republican support for Rick Santorum.
February 26, 2012, 3:11 pmwillow says:
I read your blog on a regular basis & just love it. Your thoughts on politics & such are a lot like mine, the difference is that you are much better at putting it into words than I am. I always look forward to the new postings on this blog. Thanks for giving me another thing in life to look forward to on a regular basis.
February 26, 2012, 6:07 pmWalt G says:
If the Court had decided the other way, it would mean the government could censor movies because they had political content.
February 26, 2012, 7:40 pmTodd Mason says:
Unfortunately, though corporations are contracts, they have been treated as de facto “persons” in US law since an 1800s US Supreme Court opinion was worded to allow that interpretation. The CU decision simply reinforced that. Not allowing corporations to be treated as persons no more destroys the 1st Amendment than not allowing marriages to be a third person along side the partners (leaving aside for a moment marriages of more than two people).
February 28, 2012, 8:31 amRed Emma says:
What really incenses me about the Citizens United decision is that the corporations are actually demanding representation without taxation (as in “get rid of the corporate tax”).
February 29, 2012, 2:59 pmJohn Kavanagh says:
With all due respect, Mr. Pohl, you should stick to discussing science fiction. When you write about politics you sound like a not very bright college freshman.
March 2, 2012, 3:48 amRobert Nowall says:
Re: John Kavanagh:
With all due respect, I find Mr. Pohl’s political opinions come from someone well-versed in history and current events, and, all in all, well worth a look. That I disagree with them is beside the point—besides, how can one know one’s opinions are right when one doesn’t examine the other side?
March 7, 2012, 8:00 amRick Mullen says:
The Justices of the Supreme Court never declared in their written decision of the 1886 case “Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad” that corporations were persons and entitled to the same rights. That is a simple fiction that is easily debunked. Thus, CU does not reinforce the decision of that earlier case.
March 7, 2012, 9:06 pmRob D says:
In one sense, what Romney said is irrefutable. Corporations are people, in the way that bodies are tissues, tissues are cells, or in the way that soylent green was people. Corporations are composed of people plus material assets. The problem, as I see it, is that the corporate form enables, and in some cases coerces, people to behave in ways that would otherwise be immoral and often illegal. It demands loyalty to goals that would, on a personal level, be reprehensible, and displaces people from feeling or understanding the full ramifications of their actions. In the case of public corporations, it also divorces capital from day-to-day decision-making, leading to bizarre inefficiencies.
March 9, 2012, 1:39 pm