Supreme Court Removes Corporate Restrictions on Campaign Spending
WTF?!?!?! Things are so far out of whack in this country. The Supreme Court, stacked with ultra-conservative justices from the Bush era, has just ruled to remove restrictions that limited corporate financing of political candidates based on a corporation’s right to free speech.
WHAT RIGHT TO FREE SPEECH??!! CORPORATIONS ARE NOT PEOPLE!!!! It’s truly insane that the court just ruled to entrench the treatment of corporations as individuals in a court of law. Do they get to vote next? This is such bad news to anyone, of any party or political persuasion, who wants to see a return to democracy by the people and for the people. Corporations have deep, deep pockets and live eternally. If you thought lobbyists, were bad, they’re NOTHING compared to what the Supreme Court just unleashed.
Justice Roberts just won my award for the most despised man I know. He promised to rule as a judicial moderate. This is a screaming piece of judicial activism. This ruling blew away decades of past precedents limiting campaign financing by corporations, even repealing portions of McCain-Feingold and affecting state laws limiting corporate financing as well.
Here’s a reaction to the ruling from Senator Patrick Leahy, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee:
“Without any basis in the plain text or history of the Constitution, five Justices overturned precedent to grant corporations the same power as any individual citizen to influence elections. For these five Justices to reach their broad ruling, they overturned precedent, as well as the statute. As the dissenting Justices noted, ‘the final principle of judicial process that the majority violates is the most transparent: stare decisis…. But if this principle is to do any meaningful work in supporting the rule of law, it must at least demand a significant justification, beyond the preferences of five justices, for overturning settled doctrine.’
There is clear reason for ordinary citizens to be concerned that this divisive ruling will, in reality, allow powerful corporations to drown out the voices of everyday Americans in future campaigns. This ruling is no doubt yet another victory for Wall Street, at the expense of Main Street America. Our founding document begins, ‘We the People,’ and throughout its articles and amendments, the Constitution enshrines the power of our government in the people, not in corporations and powerful special interests.”
This is not good. And because it’s a Supreme Court decision, we have no recourse. Glenn Beck, now’s the time to cry.
The Upside of the Economic Downturn
Anyone who’s still got shares in a 401K or, holy mackerel, a stock portfolio, is feeling like a battered bronco rider. Up! Down! Up! Down! Yikes! I am in California, in Silicon Valley, and we are just now starting to feel the belt-tightening. Talk of lay-offs is spreading. Life is feeling a little ominous right now. There’s a dark cloud on the horizon.
But, hey, to really take a trite analogy too far, we need the rain. An economic downturn will be painful, but it will also realign some of the values that lead to the craziness in the first place. Around here, there really was another gold rush, the dot com boom, and it stretched pretty far into the present. The myth lived on. Workers in Silicon Valley still believed in the IPO and the get-rich-quick buyouts that piled money onto small company founders. The myth was a reality until very recently, though the numbers of people cashing out was shrinking every year. I don’t like to see the entrepreneurship and the optimism go south because it’s the reason everyone in the world wants to live here (well, that and the weather!). But I welcome a return to more sensible living. Less Humvee, more Prius, you know? Friends and community and gardens will be all the rage. Dads and moms might make it home for dinner.
Here is a list of the things I WILL NOT MISS:
- The cell-phone hubris, loud talking arses bellowing out their self-importance in public areas.
- Twenty-four year old guys driving Lamborghinis.
- The children in my daughters’ classes saying, “We are SO RICH.” (Really, they say it.)
- Trophy wives who are pissed at the weekend nanny. “I had to cut my work-out short!”
Who wouldn’t love to be fabulously wealthy for a couple of years’ worth of hard work? Who wouldn’t love to retire at thirty-two? I don’t want to sound like the bitter un-rich. Money’s great. Lots of money is even more great. But living a humble life has a simplicity and a respectability I can appreciate. It feels more in line with what nature intended even if it means fewer toys and plane flights.
If we command our wealth, we shall be rich and free; if our wealth commands us, we are poor indeed. ~Edmund Burke
Gavin Newsom and Gay Marriage
I can’t discuss marriage without hearing the voice of the bishop from Princess Bride saying, “…MAWAGE.” In this case, the case of the Supreme Court of California in essence validating gay marriage, I think any bishop would’ve flopped over dead! But there are two important thoughts about this verdict that I can’t separate. One is “Yay! There is some sanity in the world!” and the second is “OMG Gavin Newsom is so hot.” Even though the latter is an involuntary thought. Even though the latter actually has nothing to do with the former.
Or does it?!?!
Gavin Newsom has the suave, well-coiffed looks of a gay man, but he’s actually something of a womanizing playah. (Or used to be if you believe the tabloid press.) He’s clean-cut to a T, dresses impeccably if you can get over the no-tie thing, tall, handsome, male-model looks. To all appearances the man’s gay. Does this explain his gay friendly policies? Not at all. But he is hot. See my problem?
On a more serious note, I am very glad that many of my friends and some of my family can feel like their relationships are just as true and valid as taxes, divorce court, and health benefits imply. It’s about time. Now if we could just elect our first half-black president I’d really celebrate!
Oh, How We Need Bush to Leave Office
Greenhouse, greenhouse, greenhouse. Gases, gases gases. The loveliness just keeps rolling in. I voted for Ah-nold. I am mostly a democrat, something of a libertarian, but I voted for Schwartzenegger and I’m proud because the man has held up his end of the deal, at least where it comes to environmental policy. The Bush administration, et al, is just tearing the last of the flesh from the decimated environmental laws with this new federal proposal. This morning’s paper illustrated the underhanded pro-oil, pro-car manufacturers stance of the Bush jackasses:
Tucked deep into a 417-page “Notice of Proposed Rulemaking” was language by the Transportation Department stating that more stringent limits on tailpipe emissions embraced by California and 17 other states are “an obstacle to the accomplishment” of the new federal standards and are “expressly and impliedly preempted” by federal law.
California is already suing the federal government (EPA) for the right to implement tougher emission standards. Hello conservative Republicans?? Get on this guy! Remember the Tenth Amendment?
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
California has led the way on environmental legislation for decades. The Bush Administration continues to the desperate end in their pursuit of extraordinary federal and executive control. Guess what Bushies?? The country belongs to the people. And California belongs to its forward thinking residents.
Free Range Kids, or Not…
Have you been following the free range debate? See www.freerangekids.com to catch up if you’ve missed out on the brouhaha.
The issue is whether or not to let your kids roam free and unsupervised, and if so, when and where and how much?
I’m sure there are many parents out there who feel confused and unsure about making declarative statements about this type of thing. Yes, helicopter-style parenting is bad. Doing your children’s homework for them is bad. There seems to be a general consensus that being overly cautious is bad, bad, bad. Unless your kid gets hurt, in which case, it’s obvious the parent did something wrong, probably neglectful.
I am truly perturbed by the fully overblown paranoia of schools, afterschool classes, and organizations like girl scouts over litigation prevention. I would never sue any institution, short of true malfeasance or gross neglect (NOT minor oversight, only GROSS neglect). But my contemporaries don’t agree with me. When I complain about the requirements for waivers, permission slips, health forms, etc., I am thought of as a difficult woman who needs to get over the obvious: bad things happen and we need to be prepared. The school (or fill in blank) can’t afford to get sued, and you don’t want to lose your house if you’re chaperoning, do you?
When I let me kids ride up and down the street on scooters without helmets, I am practically sending them to their deaths. Not to mention, it is now criminal to let your kids out of doors on wheeled vehicles without helmets. I am not so against the helmets. If your kids are going fast, far, or near fast-moving traffic, they’re mandatory in my house, too. But where did my right to use my judgment go?
Free-rangers argue that children need to be trusted and respected when they decide they are able to make decisions. Only their own parents know when they’re ready, not society at large. But there is such a societal force at work, driven by liability avoidance, that we really can’t argue about kids in isolation from this larger cultural movement which seeks to save us from ourselves. Seat belts, motorcycle helmets, vaccinations, 55mph speed limits, insurance required by law, workman’s comp… It just stretches out larger and larger. It’s so far beyond an argument about kids and how far away from the house they’re allowed to go. It’s about all of us losing our individual rights, and all of the people who demand to be protected.
Protected from what? Well, here in America, we want to be protected from everything. Everything that would cause us physical harm, including terrorists, drug users, cigarettes. Sharp edges, transfats, doctors who make mistakes. But don’t you dare come near anyone’s God-given right to make a buck. Or in the case of liability paranoia, anyone’s ability to keep a buck even if they do something wrong since they’ve got an army of lawyers on their side.
I’m not sure when it happened, but I’ve become a Libertarian. I want my rights back. Sadly, like taxes and military budgets, it seems to be a one-way land grab. I’ll keep working on letting my kids expand their territory, their right to explore the world on their own terms. Who’s working on mine?
Somebody Stop the Plastic
First, apologies since this is not a new thought. (At least I hope it’s not!)
My daughter participated in a school-sponsored event this week: jump rope for heart health, or something like that. She collected donations for jumping rope continuously for ten minutes. Exercise to raise money. Great
But then the American Heart Association had to send her home with goodie-bag-like prizes: completely worthless plastic crap good for nothing but the trashcan. One smelly yellow plastic water bottle that surely leaches PBTs or TRBs or some unpronounceable chemical acronym. And one cheap plastic jump rope that’s so lightweight it doesn’t hit the ground when it’s time to jump over.
Really. Seriously. We don’t need these things. My daughter is proud to contribute to the effort and is no longer a self-centered preschooler (thank god!) who just wants something for herself.
At what point do people actually start to react in a reasonable way to rejecting plastic crap? I think I’ll go write a letter to the American Heart Association.
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