money, so they say…

Jordan Jordan threatened my kneecaps with a tire iron so I have agreed to guest-blog on this fine syndicated publication, The Oddity Odyssey. I also do something like blogging over at Miss Information. All of it’s true, none of it’s relevant.

Since I was made an offer I couldn’t refuse gladly agreed to blog on the interplay between corporations and politics in the US, I’d like to begin with a rant on the recent Supreme Court decision in the case of Federal Election Commission v. Wisconsin Right to Life and McCain v. Wisconsin Right to Life, 06-969 (full-text .pdf of decision is here).

There is one phrase in the majority opinion that I’d like to briefly discuss, in which Justice Roberts, writing for the court, rules that only those advertisements that are paid for by corporations during the pre-election period and are “susceptible of no reasonable interpretation other than as an appeal to vote for or against a specific candidate” may be kept off the air. I’m still reviewing the entire decision, but this makes me wonder – shouldn’t any platform issue, political issue, etc. be construed as an appeal for a particular candidate? I mean, arent we supposed to understand what these candidates represent, what they stand for and shouldnt it be blatantly obvious to any “reasonable” person which candidate(s) these corporations’ monies are promoting in an advertisement?

Are we so blind that we really do not see the corporations behind the curtain?

Apparently so, and it would seem that the Supreme Court would like to keep it that way by continuing to find exceptions and protections for financial contributions to campaigns by corporations and private interests. With this "free speech" decision, the Court has continued it's trend and handed our government to private interests and corporations, on a silver platter, then called it a constitutional right!

As usual, John Stewart puts it well...