[NEWS] Supreme Court Allows Corporations To Support Campaigns

If a judge has decision over the case alone, there can be a problem of an activist judge letting serious offenders off (as has happened quite a few times, most notably Judge Cashman of Vermont) because they don't "agree" with the law. Juries are far less likely to hand down such controversies.

You think the reason why we have overcrowded jails is because activist judges are running around letting serious offenders off willy-nilly? Just what version of reality do you live in? Because in the one where I come from, states with large prison systems are slowly having the life crushed out of them by prison guard unions and bondsman lobbies who have a vested interest in keeping as many people in jail as possible.

I don't know much about this Cashman character but I'll bet Internet money that Vermont is probably one of the top ten safest states to live in the entire country. And that they somehow accomplished this feat without jailing a fifth of their population.

...I mean, really, you're worried about judges letting too many people go? Seriously? We just had a high court decision stating that corporations have free run to influence political campaigns to a virtually limitless extent, and you're worried that judges will let out random serial offenders who will commit more crimes? The idea of elections being bought isn't exactly an absurd hypothetical. It has happened before.

...And no, I have no idea why Kennedy thought that that case would represent a significant bias in the system but this one wouldn't. Apparently there's no bias unless we see a smoking gun, a dead body, and a guy scribbling out a confession in dried blood. This court is so hopelessly screwed up. Time was you didn't even think about overturning precedent unless you had at least six judges on board.

edit: Oh to heck with it- just search for "Caperton". You'll find it.

edited 27th Jan '10 8:30:45 PM by SomeGuy

Prisons are over crowded cause some retard thought "three strikes" should apply to drug use laws.

Oh, update on the topic itself: Alito was seen shaking his head and looking a bit pissed when Obama criticized the ruling during the State of the union.

Who is Alito? "Little male wing"?

Samuel Alito is a Supreme Court Justice and wrote the majority opinion in the United Citizens case. Obama wants it overturned by an Act of Congress. Let's see if the Democrats can at least manage that.

He was probably more pissed because Obama was turning the public opinion on him.

It's not like he had to try very hard. This pisses everybody off. Even from a cynical standpoint this ruling is bad news for Republicans because it completely screws up their current grassroots message. Massachusetts voters didn't elect Scott Brown because they thought we needed more corporate involvement in elections, and they sure as hell will think twice about doing it again if this is what we can expect from Republican court appointees.

Wasn't Alito the same guy who promised up and down during his confirmation hearings that he wouldn't "govern from the bench" and badmouthed "judicial activism"? And didn't he make a few obscene gestures to his critics?

Yeah, screw 'im.

—R.J.

I don't understand how supporting a canidate would be beneficial to a company. I mean, think of it this way: Let's say that Coca-Cola decides to support the Republican nominee for president. That would cause nearly every Democrat who drank Coke to switch to Pepsi, thus denying the company money.

The idea, I think, is that the Republicrat candidate would get laws passed that benefit the company (for example, deregulation). The Demublicans make up a minority anyway - most people are independent - and I find it hard to believe that a boycott would get off the ground.

^ "The Demublicans make up a minority anyway - most people are independent" wut

Unless I am horribly mistaken, most Americans do not belong to a political party. They just vote for them.

^ 40% of Americans consider themselves conservative. 39% consider themselves independents. Liberals make what's left.

edited 28th Jan '10 5:07:12 PM by MajorTom

Party affiliation, not ideological sides.

Ah, sorry, I misunderstood.

Major Tom: this?

Thus far in 2009, Gallup has found an average of 36% of Americans considering themselves Democratic, 28% Republican, and 37% independent. When independents are pressed to say which party they lean toward, 51% of Americans identify as Democrats, 39% as Republicans, and only 9% as pure independents.

I assume that "liberal" is perceived as such a dirty word that fewer democrats choose to identify with it than republicans do to "conservative". But hell if I know.

Nah, it's not that, but the Democrat party is not hardcore enuff. Like all "left wing" parties in a bipartidist system, its number one enemy is abstinence (that the right word?).

I think I'd need a cite to believe those numbers.

That's Gallup.

It is a cite.

So, question: if other corporations shouldn't be allowed to advertise politically, should newspapers be barred from endorsing candidates?

Was talking about Major Tom's. Gallup's look more in line with what I'd expect, given that high voter turnout is generally seen as a good thing for Democrats among other things.

edited 28th Jan '10 6:21:59 PM by Nornagest

"Major Tom: this?"

Hai

That's exactly what I am talking about.

Hmmm. Has anyone here read Unequal Protection by Thom Hartmann? Or studied up on the Corporate Personhood debate?

Cause it seems like that's what this case comes down to. Most of Justice Stevens more quoteworthy remarks seem to me to reference this.

Anyone?

Care to share some Courtesy Link or maybe a brief explanation? Otherwise I and others will be left out of the loop like in the fighter jets thread.

Brief explanation... well, let's see. It's *really* hard to sum this up, but the beginning of the argument kind of goes like this: Corporations didn't have any human rights' protections when this country started. For about 100 years states could and did regulate corporations as they saw fit and corporations couldn't appeal to the courts to overturn the laws of their state on grounds that they were violating corporate rights. Sometime around 1886 the courts started granting corporations the protections of the bill of rights and such on the grounds that they were legally defined as persons and the 14th amendment granted equal protection under the law to all 'persons'.

This might sound legally valid, but there are many more details that show this to have been very legally questionable. But read more on wikipedia to get a better idea, or on the summaries/top-rated amazon reviews for the book:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_personhood_debate http://www.amazon.com/Unequal-Protection-Corporate-Dominance-Rights/dp/1579549551

edited 28th Jan '10 7:28:49 PM by mochakasem