Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
When you contemplate all of the problems that beset us in this election year it is hard not to feel daunted by the task of finding solutions. Many millions of American’s are without jobs, with the prospect of future employment seeming illusory. The top 1% of the American population controls vast amounts of the country’s wealth. http://www.businessinsider.com/15-charts-about-wealth-and-inequality-in-america-2010-4?op=1 Wages of average Americans have stagnated for the past 40 years to such an extent that our middle class is shrinking rapidly. The housing boom of years past has become a bust of monumental proportions and foreclosures are destroying formerly viable neighborhoods. Our once barely adequate “safety net” has been shredded and there are attempts to destroy both Social Security and Medicare as we know it. Despite a weak attempt at Medical reform millions of Americans find health care unaffordable, with many dying and others forced into bankruptcy to stay alive. Due to lack of money America’s once magnificent infrastructure is rotting and solutions are not on the horizon.
The collapse and bailout of our banking industry has cost us trillions and appears to have been brought about by fraudulent practices on the part of the industry, yet no one has been indicted. In fact the remuneration of top executives in this duplicitous industry has actually increased. Efforts to impose stiff controls ensuring that these artificial crises don’t happen again and that these huge financial entities do business ethically, have failed to pass the Congress. We see that the fallout from the American banking crisis has undercut the world’s economy and that economic crises in other industrialized nations appear regularly. Please notice I’m only referring to the economic problems we face and only producing a partial list of those economic problems.
We have seemingly come to the conclusion of an unnecessary war in Iraq, where trillions were spent and perhaps a million were killed, yet the withdrawal of troops is to bases that surround Iraq. We are leaving about 40,000 Americans in country, many as mercenaries (contractors is a euphemism) as we support the largest diplomatic infrastructure in any foreign nation. The war in Afghanistan still rages in a land that has never been significantly shaped by any outside empire, this despite the killing of Osama Bin Laden and the virtual destruction of Al Qaeda. Hundreds of billions are being spent and the lives of our troops are put in danger, in an exercise with little hope of success. Billions are going towards building Afghanistan’s infrastructure as ours is falling apart. Yet these instances fail to raise the broad spectrum of the military/foreign policy problems continuing to plague us. These issues include a military budget that far greater than that of all other nations. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures
However, these three paragraphs still do not encompass the broad range of problems we Americans face. There is more to be touched on before we come to the conclusion that I’ve reached, that there is one problem that not only transcends all of these, but its need for immediate solution supersedes any of the others in importance.
On this blog the issue of civil liberties is constantly with us because our host/founder is a distinguished Constitutional Law Professor and Lawyer. Jonathan Turley’s career has been spent fighting for civil liberties and for our freedoms. One result of the tragedy of 9/11 has been the steady erosion of our civil liberties in the name of anti-terrorism. The formation of a “Super Agency”, the frighteningly named (on so many levels) Department of Homeland Security has centralized LEO’s of all levels, both civilian and military intelligence organizations, into an establishment with unprecedented vigilance of American’s daily lives. We have allowed torture, used brainwashing and unlimited preventive detention. This doesn’t fully subsume the efforts made in the losing War on Drugs that has cost hundreds of billions and in fact has proved to be an utter failure. The major drug dealers receive the main benefits via higher profits created by this enforcement. A side effect, but perhaps far more costly has been the phenomenon of our country having the highest incarceration rate in the world. Our incarceration rate is way beyond Russia and China, not to mention other nations whose names are synonymous with oppression. We have literally created a prison industry, with privatization and hiring out of prisoners to work for private industries in virtual chain gangs. This is a return byAmericato indentured servitude and perhaps slavery. As any of our regular readers on this blog know the above merely superficially touches upon the problems we have in ensuring civil liberties and staving off prejudice.
So far I’ve touched on the critical issues we face regarding the economy, the Military/Foreign Policy establishment and on the erosion of our constitutional freedoms. The last area I’d like to briefly explore is that of the encroachment of religion into our political life and the radical new interpretations of Church/State separation it has brought. It is true that in America there has always been a tension between those who wear their religiosity on their metaphoric sleeves and the right of average Americans to live their lives as they see fit. This encompasses the right to believe, or disbelieve as we choose. I grew up in a time when great literary works were banned from our shores, where movies were censored, where an actual husband and wife on a TV show (I Love Lucy) had to be depicted as sleeping in separate beds and when she was obviously pregnant, the word pregnant couldn’t be used. In my native New York State, our Governor’s wife had to established residence in Reno,Nevada in order to divorce him, since divorce was not allowed in New York. This was how far religion already had encroached upon civil life and the lives of ordinary people in times past.
Today we are faced with the specter of religion once again dominating our society. These new religious zealots disdain separation of church and state; re-write history to suit their narrow views; would force a woman to bear children she doesn’t want and enforce their peculiar notions of sin upon all of us. They would resurrect the marginalization of homosexuals via depriving them of their constitutional rights and even go so far as some as suggesting we ban contraception. They raise a legitimate fear of returning us to the “Dark Ages” of only sixty years ago. Sadly, these problems with religious zealots that I’ve enumerated aren’t even a complete catalog of things we should fear by their renewed rise to political power through overwhelming wealth.
What I propose to you here is that all of these difficult situations, to those who view them as problems, have arisen out of one overarching issue. This is the source for all of those dilemmas detailed above and therefore must be dealt with before all of the others. It is America’s transcendent issue. This is the problem of the influence of wealth upon our political system. All of the evils (to my mind) listed above arise from the power to control government that money gives. Think about that in context of every issue I’ve detailed above and you will see that at its root is the influence of entrenched wealth upon our political system. The economy is a no-brainer. The Military/Security/Industrial Complex, of which Dwight Eisenhower warned, has controlled our military budget and our foreign policy. This interlocking self interest group has required diminishing our civil liberties to justify the money spent on wars and intrusion into foreign affairs, by promoting a climate of fear. They also use unconstitutional intrusion to intimidate and/or punish those who expose their misdeeds. Religious institutions free of taxation and oversight have developed huge war chests to control politicians and ensure that they adhere to certain litmus tests of “putative piety”.
From lobbying efforts and emoluments offered politicians, to the vital need for campaign financing that politicians rely on to get elected/re-elected, money drives our system. All of the difficulties we face arise because of the influence of wealth upon our political system. Therefore, in my opinion this should be the transcendent issue that must be addressed if we have any hope of making America conform to the vision of our Founding Fathers. While some may argue that I’m belaboring the obvious, I would put to them that nothing else can be changed until we change our laws on campaign financing, lobbying and corporate personhood. In that mix we should ban religious entities, not from their right to freely practice their beliefs, but from the ability to influence politicians through money that is un-taxed. In America everyone should have the right to have their say, but it is intolerable that the opinions of some “elite” citizens prevail because their money is considered “free speech” as was formulated in the SCOTUS case Buckley v. Valeo http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buckley_v._Valeo and then recently expanded in the infamous “Citizens United Case”. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission .
An example of “Citizens United” impact was seen this week in Iowa where there were massive infusions of so-called “Super-Pac” money for campaign ads, which changed the dynamic of the Iowa Caucus. The Jack Abramoff lobbying case brought out the sickening details of how politicians were bought and corrupted. Abramoff ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Abramoff ) was recently released from a minor jail term, but most of those he was involved with, like the ubiquitous Grover Norquist and Karl Rove were never indicted. That Abramoff is trying to atone for his behavior by speaking out against money in politics, is but a cruel irony of how powerless the system is to deal with its corruption by money.
My conclusion is that with so many problems to deal with in our country our efforts to bring significant reform must “follow the money”. If we can’t limit the destructive effect of wealth upon our political system, our efforts at dealing with the many other issues destroying our Constitutional government will fail. I believe we must start here. What do you think? Below are links to organizations that have been formed to fight the influence of wealth and to overturn Citizens United. If you agree with me you might check some of them out to see if they are worthy of your support.
http://democracyisforpeople.org/
http://www.democracynow.org/2010/10/28/free_speech_for_people_coalition_urges
http://www.movementforthepeople.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/CfAW_ActionToolkit.pdf
http://sanders.senate.gov/petition/?uid=f1c2660f-54b9-4193-86a4-ec2c39342c6c
Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
Gene, I have said this before and will say again; I will believe a corporation is a person when Texas executes one. Not until.
BTW, Mike, excellent article.
The only simple thing going on here is that someone is clearly so inured into the schema of corruption that they would defend a legal fiction – a shield against liability – as even remotely having personality commensurate with an actual human. You apparently don’t understand what the Constitution says or the spirit it was written with, slick.
“When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”
The very foundation of this country is based upon the usurpation of tyranny in any form, including economic tyranny. Citizens is not logical in that context and instead is a political decision that favors plutocracy. This is contrary to the Constitution which sets up a democratic form of government, not an oligarchy. As a matter of legal reasoning, the case has some validity, but as Ian Ketterling so famously noted, “Logic is a way to go wrong with absolute certainty.” Logical does not mean correct or ethical or desirable simply because it is logical. Value judgments come into play. Citizens United is a decision absolutely devoid of democratic values and patently and clearly destructive to the ends of equality. So let me remind you that money does far more than create an opportunity to communicate. It creates misfeasance of office and causes dereliction of the sworn Constitutional duty of lawmakers to both protect the Constitution and represent the best interests of ALL of their constitutions and not just the ones who pay for their advertising campaigns come election time. It gets lawmakers to stand aside from their job as legislators and allow the very people engaging in the very activities to be regulated to write their own regulations which by function as ineffective at curbing bad corporate behavior as not having any regulations at all. Your embrace of this clearly political decision is a clear embrace of plutocracy and oligarchy. If the “simple old school” thought that participation in democracy should not be contingent upon how large your campaign contribution is and that an egalitarian government serves all citizens and not just the wealthy offends you? Tough luck for you, troll. I suggest you are in the wrong forum to sell oligarchy in any form.
I’ve about listened to all of your bullshit I’m going to listen to 1zb1 without calling you what you clearly are: a fascist in the Italian mold and a plutocrat.
Come on, now. Try to tell me how a corporation is people. That’s the standard play from your type of troll at this point.
Gene H. Not withstanding my comments above I have to wonder how much do they pay you to be this stupid based on some of your remarks. You should have left it at just quoting the DOI so folks might not realize how ignorant you are.
Blouise1, January 8, 2012 at 5:37 pm
“A corporation cannot participate in the franchise, i.e. vote in an election, because it has no inherent right to do so. A corporation, with no inherent right to speak or any right whatsoever to vote in an election, can have no other purpose in making expenditures of money for particular candidates or parties than to influence the outcome of an election in which it had no say in the first place.” (Bob Esq)
I don’t see how it could explained any more clearly and simply than that.
By your logic (quoting Bob the author to prove what Bo the author says is true) “the bible was written by the hand of god because the bible says so”, or to put it another way, “what you say is true because you said it.”
You must have missed the part in nursery school where they told you not to use the word to define the word.
Too bad the Constitution doesn’t say what you seem to think, and if you read it that would be obviouse.
And btw: it says a lot of things that really offend me – as in the part about slavery and treatment of indians – but by acknowledging the truth about what our nation was founded on (ie, slavery, genoocide, exploitation, discrimination against woman) instead of the delusional myth of the Republican/Tparty is how you try and fix it. It doesn’t mean you (or I) agree with the principle as stated.
Just what are you folks smoking here?
I’m beginning to think not many of you have actually read Citizens United, or have given any real thought to how you actually fix the problem of money/politics/government.
Let me remind you (because apparently its too complicated for you to grasp on your own), what money in government buys is the opportunity to communicate: advertisements, media content, mailings, phone calls, influence, contracts in order to influence decisions (ie., voters, politicians).
More efficient means of effective communications directed toward an electorate not engaged in willful ignorance can overcome to a large extent money. Think of modern communications capabilities as a form of asymetrical political warefare.
Most of you with your simple old school thinking are focused on eliminating money out of politics and government. Given the history of human existence that seems highly unlikely regardless of laws or enforcement any time in the foreseeable future. But don’t let that little bit of reality stop you from doing it your way.
It is Over and Denver Wins!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It is over time and Denver still sucks.
For clarity’s sake:
guy/gal = 1zb1 in the above post … not kathleen
Bob,
What in the world is the matter with this guy/gal?
Oh well …
Justified is coming … for an hour all will be right in our world. 🙂
=============================================
“It is immensely depressing, astonishing even, that this even needs to be spelled out. But apparently it does.” (kathleen) … you have no idea … stick around for a while, you’ll see. I have to hand it to the lawyers who post here for they do continue to try and educate.
Bob Esq: “Working for or purchasing stock in a corporation is not the equivalent of being a party to the social contract.”
It is immensely depressing, astonishing even, that this even needs to be spelled out. But apparently it does.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2012/jan/06/ron-paul-useful-idiots-on-the-left
“A corporation cannot participate in the franchise, i.e. vote in an election, because it has no inherent right to do so. A corporation, with no inherent right to speak or any right whatsoever to vote in an election, can have no other purpose in making expenditures of money for particular candidates or parties than to influence the outcome of an election in which it had no say in the first place.” (Bob Esq)
I don’t see how it could explained any more clearly and simply than that.
ekeyra,
Working for or purchasing stock in a corporation is not the equivalent of being a party to the social contract.
Your options are to compel the parties in government to change their policy or be removed if the law demands or to vote them out in the next election.
Bob,
“When a corporation expresses itself in a political scenario it cannot be truthfully stated that they speak for every shareholder, and no vote can be accepted from ATT or IBM in any election. The consent of the governed is contained not in the artificial personage of a Corporation, but in each individual that holds stock”
Why doesnt that same logic apply to governments? If IBM cannot engage in actions that represent the will of every individual shareholder or employee, how can any government claim that it acts on “the will of the people” or “consent of the governed” ?
Not only that but, if IBM makes a decision I dont like, I can peacefully and voluntarily end my employment or financial support of IBM. I am offered no such luxury by the federal government. If they decide drone strikes, indefinate detention, and global military invertvention are in my best interest, and I decide they are not, what avenues do I have to withdraw my support or funding short of fleeing the country and renouncing my citizenship?
1zb1: “However, corporations in one form or another did exist at the time of the constitution and the constitution does provide for the regulation of commerce as well as the right to assemble both of which bear on corporations (ie the right of people to join together for a business purpose is not unlike a union). As such the constitution is not without some interest in the subject.”
1zb1,
You completely missed the point of my argument. The mere fact that the constitution acknowledges the existence of corporations does not mean that corporations have any inherent rights whatsoever. Hamilton’s arguments in Fed 84 apply to humans with rights existing before society and before the drafting of a constitution or a bill of rights– NOT corporations.
“The problem i tried to underscore is what happens when we begin to regulate corporate speech different from other speech.”
First of all, we already do treat corporate speech differently from other speech; see commercial speech doctrine.
Second, when a human makes an expenditure of money, he or she is necessarily expressing a product of human cognition; i.e a deliberate choice. The concept of the subject of ‘expenditure of money by a human’ ALWAYS contains the concept of a predicate “I want or need this.” Whenever a human to expresses its wants and needs, within the social compact, it necessarily triggers its inherent right of free speech because the concept of expression itself requires the pre-existence of such a right. For telling a human it cannot express its wants or needs, e.g. through the particular expenditure of money, is to suppress such expression and directly affects the human’s right of free speech.
When a corporation makes an expenditure of money it is not expressing a product of human cognition or a deliberate choice. Epistemically speaking, corporations are wholly incapable any cognition whatsoever and are therefore incapable of expressing a choice via the expenditure of money. Furthermore, even if we assumed that corporations were capable of cognition and expressing choices they make via the money they expend, it still would not trigger a right to free speech since the concept of the predicate ‘free speech’ is not contained within the concept of the subject ‘corporations.’ That is to say corporations do not exist within the state of nature and have no inherent rights to trigger whatsoever. If we revisit Hamilton’s Fed 84 with regards to the existence of corporations right to free speech, the primary question is not whether we granted the power to the government to regulate such speech but whether the power was conferred by the people to the government so as to create such a right in the first place. Textually speaking, the answer to that question would be categorically no.
A corporation cannot participate in the franchise, i.e. vote in an election, because it has no inherent right to do so. A corporation, with no inherent right to speak or any right whatsoever to vote in an election, can have no other purpose in making expenditures of money for particular candidates or parties than to influence the outcome of an election in which it had no say in the first place.
As a friend of mine, who happens to be a constitutional scholar, told me in an email this morning: ““When a corporation expresses itself in a political scenario it cannot be truthfully stated that they speak for every shareholder, and no vote can be accepted from ATT or IBM in any election. The consent of the governed is contained not in the artificial personage of a Corporation, but in each individual that holds stock.”
Furthermore, the acrimony you direct at Mike S. regarding the influence of money in politics is nonsensical. Granted that Mike could have been more analytical and less ‘touchy feely’ and long winded in expressing the observation; nonetheless the observation is a truthful one.
“With greater knowledge, and better information money will have less influence. Money in politics would become a waste of money.”
Not for nothing, but that is a bigger load of naive horse shit than anything I’ve read from the doe eyed liberals commenting on this blog.
“I personally consider 911 and subsequent attempts to attack the US to constitute forms of invasion, which would also include cyber attacks in my view.”
I’m sorry, but since you’re not God or have god like powers to change the definition of invasion, much less the definition of truth, your ‘personal consideration’ is not only false but meaningless.
“What is clear (to me) is the founders understood the world was a lot more complicated (and dangerous) then a lot of people seem to understand today.”
Actually, the rules of order remain the same. The complications arise from your tortured use of logic.
Bob, limited time right now but you seem to have left out you ever actually having read the 1st Amendment:
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
“establishment of religion” easily includes an entity beyond an individual. The same goes for “press”. Both terms involve entities well beyond the individual. “Freedom of Speech” is in the same sentence. Nothing in the structure limits this rights just to individuals. Indeed to suggest any of them are limited only to individual rights as opposed to a, for example newspaper or church would render them basically meaningless. Similarly a union or a corporation or any organization is a form of peaceful assembly.
By your interpretation the entire first amendment would be rendered impractical at best and meaningless at worst.
“Because speech is an essential mechanism of democracy—it is the means to hold officials accountable to the people—political speech must prevail against laws that would suppress it by design or inadvertence. Laws burdening such speech are subject to strict scrutiny, which requires the Government to prove that the restriction “furthers a compelling interest and is narrowly tailored to achieve that interest.”
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/08-205.ZS.html
Personally I found the majority opinion weak but the dissent was little better. There are valid points on both sides. The idea that entities have what amounts to more rights then citizens is offensive in the extreme (not just in this matter but so many other matters as well)
http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/08-205.ZX.html
Needless to say Roberts and his gang made much of stare decisis when it came to the nomination process and very little of it once they were on the court as in this case.
However, in the grand scheme of money in politics this is really of little consequence when you think about it. So instead of 1 billion dollars in an election cycle we have 2 billion with ones sides special interest group versus the other sides. It really doesn’t fundamentally change the problem of the overwhelming influence of money and special interest groups in politics drowning out the voice of citizens, which I think is what we are actually most concerned about.
What it does underscore, is elections have consequences. A different court would likely have ruled differently in Gore v. Bush or CU. To say, as some here scream that the parties are all the same or Obama sucks, etc. etc. or are not fervently committed to his reelection seem to ignore that central fact. GB and CU proves they are profoundly and completely wrong.
Now you seem to think that my emphasis on information and knowledge is a “load of naive horse shit”. If that is naive then I dare say the notion that the rout to a better politic is by addressing the money in politics is about as idiotic a notion as ever walked the earth. Money has been a part of politics since there was politics (a few tens of thousands of years ago more or less). On the other hand the ability to communicate information and knowledge now has new means that were never previously available and who knows, might actually make a difference (can you say, blog, facebook, internet, mobile phones as examples or is that too hard to grasp).
So you keep going after the money think and call me in a couple of centuries while I’ll work on the idea of information and knowledge as the road to a better system. Lets see which gets there first.
“Touchy Feely”
Bob,
I was trained as a Gestalt Psychotherapist, of course I’m a “touchy feely” kind of guy. As for long winded well you know me too well by now. As for 1zb1 I can understand not liking my blog, but defending money in government not so much. He or she as the case may be, enjoys being contrary for its own sake. I’m bored and unfortunately Denver won, time for 60 Minutes.
there you go again mike…. to say that I “defended money in government” is either a lie or a sign of an idiot. take your pick which applies to you.
Mike, are you this desperate that you out and out lie? You are starting to develope some bad habits.
you said: “As for 1zb1 I can understand not liking my blog, but defending money in government not so much.
That is not what I have done and you know it… meaning you are even stupider then I thought or a liar.
“I do not believe your solutions are adequate.”
Tony,
You’re right, they are not adequate. I’m neither creative, nor smart enough to have all the answers on this. I’m just positing the problem, however, and trying to put focus on where I think we should begin, faced with such an overwhelming amount of problems across so many areas of life.
“great article, but I don’t think you mentioned the actual transcendent problem of the United States, which is also the transcendent problem of the entire world:
Global Warming.”
Roger,
I didn’t but if you think about it money is being used to prevent
Nations from taking steps to deal with global warming, so once again that is where we have to start. Please understand though that in no way was I calling for forgetting about all these other issues.
Tony C.,
I don’t disagree at all about “Top Secret” it was always a way to cover up, that stemmed from a few good instances where it was needed. Manhattan Project perhaps. As for money in government on other threads I have discussed the fact that this has been a problem since our countries inception, so I don’t believe it is new. For one instance see W.R. Hearst using the influence of his newspapers to start the Spanish/American War. Money has always been a factor. Today it has become more so.
I think the label, Top Secret, has been abused for a long time by the United State government and military. It’s use does seem to be increasing during the Bush/Obama era. The military industrial complex has something to do with it, but politicians wanting to hide stuff is the main culprit.
“Much of the reason, I think, that Bush and Obama are pushing to make everything the government does “Top Secret” with leaks punishable by torture and indefinite detention without trial is rather simple: To hide the corruption.” (Tony C)
I certainly agree with that and the only qualifier I would apply is that, in my opinion, this “Top Secret To Hide the Corruption Program” began in earnest as soon as Bush I moved into the office of the Vice President of the United States in 1981. Please note that I do not place the responsibility for this Program on Reagan who was almost killed within 2 months of taking office.
Mike,
great article, but I don’t think you mentioned the actual transcendent problem of the United States, which is also the transcendent problem of the entire world:
Global Warming.
It looks more certain everyday that we have already waited too long, and that even if all greenhouse gas emission were to end today, civilization as we now know and enjoy it will be gone in 100-200 years. The Earth will flip into a very stable hot phase, and this will last for millennia. The breadbasket regions of the planet will become too hot and dry to retain soil, let alone raise crops. Many millions if not billions of people are going to die because of starvation, lack of water, weather catastrophe, or disease; at least half of all known species will disappear. It’s going to be very very ugly.
Kinda puts political cronyism and corporate corruption into perspective, IMHO.