Creating Trustville 2020

Corporate Democracy? PR Agency running for Senate

Archetype: Bank City Media
Posted by Len Len Founder of Cradle of Design [...] Send an email Read Articles
on June 21st, 2010

­This question has been playing in my mind for some time now and I’m curious what you think of it.

How did democracy become corporate intrest?

A remarkable thing happened in the U.S. some time back already; the People’s Surpreme Court has given corporations the protection of first amendment. This means corporations have the same ‘civil-rights’ as civilians do.

The first amendment reads:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

What it also means (indirectly) is that corporations now have a right to fund political campaigns without restriction.

In a reaction - Professor Jamin Raskin, Washington College of Law and Maryland state senator stated that:

“American citizens have repeatedly amended the Constitution to defend democracy when the Supreme Court acts in collusion with democracy’s enemies, whether they are slavemasters, states imposing poll taxes on voters, or the opponents of woman suffrage. Today, the Court has enthroned corporations, permitting them not only all kinds of special economic rights but now, amazingly, moving to grant them the same political rights as the people. This is a moment of high danger for democracy so we must act quickly to spell out in the Constitution what the people have always understood: that corporations do not enjoy the political and free speech rights that belong to the people of the United States.”

To be honest this is the most interesting thing I have ever seen happen in politics. More important than the fall of the Berlin Wall? Yes. This has given virtually all governmental, social and legal power in the hands of those who have the most money. Say a corporation such as Exxon Mobile would decide to spend 10% of its profit over 2009 on the next political election. This would mean they’d spend $8.5 billion, to put this into perspective, Obama’s victory trail of last year cost $1.5 billion and was the most expensive campaign to be conceived by the democratic world as of yet. Or the words of Union leader Gary Hubbard: Democracy ain’t cheap.

There are people trying to reverse this decision the Citizens Amendment Movement has opened its door for people who wish to keep corporates out of the political sphere.

In a reaction the boys and girls of the Murray Hill Inc PR agency has decided to run for Senate. I kid you not.

What do you think about corporate influence in the political realm? What do you think about European media ignoring the story altogether? What would this do in Trustville?

Links:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/22/opinion/22fri1.html

http://action.citizen.org/t/10315/petition.jsp?petition_KEY=2190

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/22/us/politics/22scotus.html

Tags: democracy governance human rights