It took me a while to figure out that W was actually a genius who was boldly, blatantly, and with no regard for individual Americans, selling out individual Americans to the corporate interests that got him elected and promised to keep him rich long after his presidency.
I never wanted to believe that anyone would do that... not even W, but over the course of two terms, he convinced me. What other goals could he possibly have had? He never mentioned any others. He's certainly got little to show for any other efforts. He didn't address the runaway irresponsibility piling up on Wall Street. He blew the savings accounts on wars for... for... what was it again? Oh nevermind. And then he promised us his legacy.
And now the Supreme Court has delivered that legacy. They have iced the corporate cake by interpreting the 1st amendment to apply to corporations as though they truly were individuals (but without the individual responsibility, of course) AND by equating CASH with SPEECH.
So, while the old quaint saying, "one man, one vote" still holds true in this great nation, if that man is a CEO, he can buy up all the air time in every small market during every election for the next 10 years to ensure that no one who opposes his candidate can run a TV ad in that market. But at least we all still get our one vote!
...and he can do it by spending his shareholder's money without their consent, permission or input.
...he can even do it by spending his employees' salaries without their consent, permission or input.
...and we can all just lie there and take it, losing our jobs, then our homes, while the CEO and politician BOTH pass the cost of it all right back down to us. Yep, that's the best part. We get to pay for it, we just don't get choose the message.
OK, so union presidents and the CE or CFOs of PACS can do the same thing. Is THAT supposed to make an individual American voter feel better?
With this interpretation, it will become even harder to tell where the CEO ends and the politician he or she owns begins. It's already difficult to tell a lobbyist from a legislator, but those middlemen can be eliminated now. The CEO can just hand the $$ right on over. Of course, that's only fair since for the last 15 years, the politicians have handed everything right on over to the CEOs.
The lack of an individual conscience that has allowed corporate greed to run DC since the Reagan administration (Yes, including the Clinton years) is directly responsible for our current economic crisis. Those same crybabies who complained about Clinton's activist judges used to talk a lot about Adam Smith too. They talked about leaving the market alone.
They're quiet about Smith and the activist judges now because the activist judges gave them what they wanted.
And so did Adam Smith. When you read him a little more thoroughly/a little less selectively, you discover that not only would Smith have advocated public healthcare in the world's richest nation (have I mentioned that completely irrelevant to this argument idea here before?), but also that the corporate greed of the unchecked "invisible hand" would first destroy all competing markets, and then, finally, destroy itself. (Unless, of course, we prop them up with cash WE will never see again... and by WE I mean anyone who doesn't have a half million or more to invest tomorrow.)
As long as you're on top of the game when it happens, it's a great short term, get-rich-quick plan....just like that of just about every CEO in the last 20 years. Now the rest of us have to clean up the messes they've left behind and pay all the tabs they ran up while they were making sure they got theirs.
And thanks to the Supreme Court decision, they'll be buying up the next round of politicians, running up that tab again, to make sure that broken wheel just keeps on spinnin! Unless, just maybe, we get tired of the reality TV they pay for, and find some way to make a decision on our own.
I ain't holdin my breath.
Luth
Out
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