The Supreme Court has not only re affirmed a 2003 decision that money some how equates to free speech, they took the limits off how much money can be free speech.
At the root of the debate is how much money a Corporations can spend on election campaigns of political officials.
Now first keeping mind that it is very hard to track just how much money a company pushes into a election issue, yes, I said issue as they care not for the candidate, just for who will prevent anything that will keep them from doing what they want and or help them put up regulation to keep small business (who run much leaner) from being able to get a grip on their market because they have built a better mouse trap.
This also has the effect of Some company’s basically silencing small company’s let alone the taxpayer… How Much Free Speech Can You Afford? They can afford to buy all the air-time of all the media. Even easier, many of them own their own media, many more have control of them via the services they offer (ie the banks) can you ?
I should say that not all company’s are guilty of this but I only need to say the the bank lobby, the health insurance lobby for you to understand the kind of grip they have already had on congress alone.
This hard to track money will most likely be filtered to other groups like Chambers of Commerce or folks you never have herd of that say they act in your (citizen/taxpayer) interest for promotion into campaigns.
One large problem with reforming any of this “with law” is that the current system will not allow for it with the current level of Influence The FREE SPEECH OF Company’s presently enjoy and the fact that Company’s have been given the same rights as Citizens.
As far as I am concerned, Corporations have as much free speech as the employees that own and work for them. How many votes is that.
I am reminded of a old phrase I once touted in High School,
“It Said We The People, Not We The Corporations”
So How Much Free Speech Can You Afford?
I also remember the history of Supreme Court Rulings that took away some states rules that voting rights only for those that owned land was not allowed under the constitution. Are we headed back to those times? Company’s may have the same rights under current law but they are still not people. So how is this different than a vote per acre of land?
Corporate charters specifically state that the charter is issued only on the premise that it is in the public’s interest to provide protection not afforded an individual. So who is to be serving who here? It is clear on the issue of that charter that they are given special rights not afforded a citizen.
In the current climate, I would like to take issue with the fact the Congress Listens with their wallet until we can find a way to change this failed ruling. Those in congress need to know we are watching close but the reality is with so much dis-information out there now, I just can’t see how the average person can sift through it without a good investigative journalism in the nation, also a result of large merger activity and lobbying.