A friend called my attention to this article and I wanted to help spread the word on this issue. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately in light of the recent Supreme Court ruling on campaign finance and Corporations.
The Supreme Court ruled many, many years ago that Corporations have the same rights as Individuals. If that isn’t Capitalism run amok, I don’t know what is. Corporations are the product of labor and ideas, not individual entities themselves. They are a collective legal entity designed to produce a profit, and sometimes goods or services.
I would love to hear the so-called Christian Right’s take on this…If Corporations are Individuals and if life begins at conception, who screws whom to create a Corporation?
The Republican Party obviously thinks Corporations are more important than people and the Government, in general, is much more attentive to Corporate needs than those of the vanishing Middle Class. This makes them kind of a privileged, super class of person– with “Special Rights” as they say, not Civil Rights. When Corporations- and Airlines- fail, the Government rushes to their aid. When Katrina strikes New Orleans, they fiddle as a major city drowns.
This article covers a story about a Corporation that is running for Congress. Not a person in the Corporation but the Corporation itself. They are doing this to make a point: Corporations are not people. They are also making the point that too many Congressional Representatives are just representing Corporations, not the people. I hope this gets more attention.
The idea that Corporations are people needs to be clarified by the Courts at some point– just not now. The current Right Wing Roberts Supreme Court would probably decide the Corporations had more special rights and were more important than actual people. We need to wait for a Supreme Court that is not a wholly owned subsidiary of the Corporate Right Wing before we try to clarify this Constitutional point.
Here is the link to the article. Thanks to Kirk for sending it to me….
Campaign stunt launches a corporate ‘candidate’ for Congress – washingtonpost.com.
Lost in the 21st Century 
I think it would be best for both sides to drop the corporation-as-a-person meataphor, as it just clouds the issue. A corporation is a collection of persons, and the big question is: Should such collectives be allowed to contribute to political campaigns?
If the answer is “no,” then should the same rule not apply to labor unions?
Corrollary question: If a corporation must pay taxes as a corporate entity, why should it not be able to speak, through its campaign contributions, as such an entity?
I’m happy if the rules apply evenly.
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I would love to take all the special interest money out of campaigns and limit all contributions– including those from the candidate– to a relatively small amount. It’s money that is corrupting the process and why we have so many millionaires in Congress. Personally, I think we should have public financing with no other contributions allowed strict limits and all candidates be required to accept it. I don’t know how else to level the playing field and stop elections from being bought.
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