Saturday, January 23, 2010

Special Comment: Pandora's Box.

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I spoke of this the other day. Now Olbermann gives his take on this.

UPDATE:

It now transpires that even current and former executives fear what this will unleash:

Today, in response to the Supreme Court’s catastrophic decision, “dozens of current and former corporate executives” from corporations including Delta, Ben & Jerry’s, and Crate & Barrel sent a letter to Congress asking it to immediately pass the Fair Elections Now Act, which would publicly finance all congressional campaigns out of a special fund created by a fee levied on TV broadcasters:

Roughly 40 executives from companies including Playboy Enterprises, ice cream maker Ben & Jerry’s, the Seagram’s liquor company, toymaker Hasbro, Delta Airlines and Men’s Wearhouse sent a letter to congressional leaders Friday urging them to approve public financing for House and Senate campaigns. They say they are tired of getting fundraising calls from lawmakers — and fear it will only get worse after Thursday’s Supreme Court ruling. [...]

“Members of Congress already spend too much time raising money from large contributors,” the business executives’ letter says. “And often, many of us individually are on the receiving end of solicitation phone calls from members of Congress. With additional money flowing into the system due to the court’s decision, the fundraising pressure on members of Congress will only increase.”

UPDATE II:



As always, Alan Grayson is on the money:
GRAYSON: I`m shocked. I`m shocked by the decision. This is the most irresponsible decision by the Supreme Court since the Dred Scott decision.

OLBERMANN: Agreed.

GRAYSON: . over 100 years ago. The one that you referred to, the Dred Scott decision has some analogy to it. In the Dred Scott decision, the court decided that slaves and their free born children do not have any constitutional rights.

Today, the court, in effect, decided only corporations have constitutional rights. This will lead to a drowning flood of money from corporations in exchange for favors. And it basically institutionalizes and legalizes bribery on the largest scale imaginable. Corporations will now be able to reward the politicians that play ball with them and will be able -- they will be able to beat to death the politicians that don`t.
Guess Obama raised too much money from the Internets for the Republicans not to respond.

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