FreeSpeech.org Pushes Petition Against the Decision!

FreeSpeech.org (at http://freespeech.org) is circulating a petition on the Internet to have the Supreme Court decision (to allow corporations to do unlimited politicking and electioneering) reversed by means of a Constitutional amendment. You might want to go to their website and sign their petition, which reads as follows:

WHEREAS, the First Amendment to the United States Constitution was designed to protect the FREE SPEECH rights of people, not corporations;

WHEREAS we, the People of the United States of America, reject the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United;

WHEREAS, the United States Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. FEC will now unleash a torrent of corporate money in our political process unmatched by any campaign expenditure totals in United States history;

WHEREAS, the United States Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. FEC presents a serious and direct threat to our democracy;

Now hereby be it resolved that we the undersigned voters of the United States call upon the United States Congress to pass and send to the states for ratification a constitutional amendment to restore the First Amendment and fair elections to the people.

Be sure to click on Links under Pages to see my Links Page!

Be sure to click on Links under Pages to see my Links Page! The links are mostly to sites dealing with the new Supreme Court decision. You can also click on Move to Amend under Blogrolls.

New Law: CEO’s Must “Approve This Message”

In the wake of the recent Supreme Court decision permitting electioneering by corporations, some members of Congress are introducing legislation that would require CEO’s to state in their commercials that they “approve this message.” For the full story, and many comments including mine, see:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/04/bill-would-force-ceos-to_n_450245.html#postComment

My comment on the Huffington Post story (with a few improvements) is pasted in below:

This proposed legislation is a piece of damage control. It is intended to help mitigate the damage from the recent game-changing Supreme Court decision.

There is a way to reverse the worst feature of this decision, and that is to sign and ratify a treaty with one or more foreign countries, a treaty that would define down corporate personhood. In this era of trans-national corporations, perhaps there needs to be a trans-national consensus on the rights, responsibilities, and raison d’ètre of corporate “persons”.

Of course, the Supreme Court could find this treaty to be un-Constitutional, on account of being a transparent attempt to make an end-run around a Supreme Court decision. In that case, perhaps Congress should expand size of the Court to make room for suitable litmus-tested judges. (This is called ”packing the Court”). When Franklin Delano Roosevelt tried it, the public was outraged and it didn’t happen. But this time the public might cheer the effort.

But wait–maybe this feature of the decision will cause more good than harm. Freedom of expression–speech, press, and the Internet–is under attack now as never before. (I am referring to efforts to make it riskier to publish facts which are “false”, as well as to shut down websites that are tinged with hatred or terrorism.) Perhaps once corporations have these rights, the corporations will all use their massive power to defend them and they could never be taken away.

Taking another look at the game-changing decision

UPDATE!: When I wrote the comments in the previous post, I was very much against the Supreme Court’s decision (to expand the ability of corporations to influence elections with their finances). Since then, I have been forced to reconsider. True, any decision that runs to hundreds of pages is probably up to no good. But there is no way such a long decision could be all bad! Probably, there are things in this decision that We The People can use, and the first order of business should be to study this decision.

In favor of the decision, it must be said that it strikes a blow for free speech! And any rights that it gives to corporations must apply to all corporations, including political parties, 501c3 churches, subversive leagues, PAC’s, and you-name-it! Likewise, it applies to non-501c3 churches and unincorporated bodies, such as clubs and common-law churches.

In addition, any right given by this decision to corporations automatically applies to actual human persons.

Whether this decision turns out, on balance, to be good or bad, the first order of business is to study it, to determine its most likely results as well as its validity under the Constitution as interpreted according to original intent.  Grand Juries should investigate, likewise Independent Commissions. Their should be discussions and debates.

And if corporations are persons, maybe they should get health care and be subject to death panels! (Oops!–They already are subject to death panels. These are called bankruptcy courts.)

A Dreadful Supreme Court Decision–What to Do?

Someone at the Infowars site suggested that the 5 erring Supreme Court justices should be arrested for treason. (The post is here: http://www.infowars.com/call-for-immediate-arrest-of-5-supreme-court-justices-for-treason/ .)

I share some of his emotion, but Constitutionally speaking, the Supreme Court justices are immune to arrest until they are first impeached in the House of Representatives and tried and found guilty in the Senate, which would strip them of their seats.

(Although I suppose that they could be designated as “enemy combatants” and shipped off to Guantanamo.)

On the correct theory that this decision is so bad that it transcends bad decision-making, and crosses the line into the realm of bad behavior, the five erring justices should be impeached. As a first step in this direction, there should be a “sense of Congress” resolution declaring that this decision is wrong, and stating why.

One of the reasons that could be given is that the original “decision” granting personhood to corporations in 1886 is a fabrication–that is, a fraudulent headnote written into the casebook by the court reporter. (The case is “Santa Clara County v. the Southern Pacific Railroad”.) For the full story, see here:

http://www.commondreams.org/views02/1226-04.htm

Welcome! Here’s a little about myself.

I am 62 years old. I have been married since 1972. I am the father of two, and the grandfather of two. I have been a school teacher, a computer programmer (business applications), and a consultant. Now I am working to help start a nonprofit that will help the homeless.

The main focus of this blog will be politics. My politics is Left Libertarian (not to be confused with the Libertarian Left). I believe that government should own few enterprises and should mainly create a mostly level playing field on which capitalism can thrive (hence “Libertarian”). On the other hand, I believe that the playing field should be somewhat tilted in favor of the middle class, the working class, and the underclass (hence “Left”).