Occupy Wall Street Protesters Aren't Against All Capitalism

There is an excellent piece on the Huffington Post that everybody who is mindlessly pooh-poohing the Occupy Wall Street movement and repeating the hateful, mindless drivel that the right's bullshit-emitting volcanoes, Rush Bimbo and Faux News, are making up of whole new cloth, day in, day out. (Yes, I do have in mind more than a couple of friends/acquaintances who fall in the category of mindless pooh-poohers. Not to say that none of them has a mind. Unfortunately some do, which makes them pretty evil in my book).

Anyway, you should read the whole post, Not Here To Destroy Capitalism, But To Remind Us Who Saved It. And here's an excerpt, to get your appetite for intelligence up:

Kristof's right to suggest that the Occupiers aren't "half-naked Communists aiming to bring down the American economic system." This isn't the "Project Mayhem" of Chuck Palahniuk novels -- we're talking about a movement that's spurring people to move their money from "too big to fail" banks into credit unions. That's not exactly "smash the system." That's more like a group of people seeking out a means to maximize their power within the system, or using consumer choice to preserve, enhance and improve the best parts of the system. As Matt Taibbi notes in a fitting companion piece to Kristof's, "These people aren't protesting money. They're not protesting banking. They're protesting corruption on Wall Street." [Emphasis added]

Boycott and Defeat Koch Industries

Boycott Koch Industries. The Koch Brothers are a truly destructive influence on American politics. You can read more about them here (scroll down the page to see a list of products you should boycott) and here.

Yes, my money is but a drop in the ocean of billions that go to Koch Industries everywhere, but why should I support their regressive political activities with my money? Resistance has to begin somewhere. So vote with your dollars.

The One Year Anniversary of a Shameful Ruling

Today marks the one-year anniversary of the Citizens United v. FEC ruling, in which the conservative judicial activists of the Supreme Court decided to sweep away decades of settled law and restrictions on corporate contributions to political campaigns instead of just issuing a ruling limited to facts of the case.

I regret that at the time, caught as I was in the frenzy that followed the Citizens United decision, I was a bit too quick to announce that the Supreme Court had spelled the death of democracy with its ruling. A few days later, Ed Brayton wrote the following on his blog, Dispatches from the Culture Wars:

I know a lot of liberals are very upset by yesterday's Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v FEC, but frankly I think it's much ado about little. The standard reaction seems to be: "Oh my god, corporations can now spend tons of money to influence the outcome of elections." But I've got news for you: They already do that. They always have. And the campaign finance laws did not prevent it.

And also this:

The fact is that the campaign finance law that the court struck down was never really intended to reduce corporate influence over elections in the first place. It was designed to give the illusion of reducing corporate influence over elections.

In a world where the haves have many hundred times as much as the have-nots do, and where the profits of corporations are expressed in billions of dollars, Brayton is absolutely on point when he says that "campaign finance laws were designed to give the illusion of reducing corporate influence over elections." Who are we kidding?

Nevertheless, the ruling did two notable things: Instantly, it destroyed the notion that judicial activism is a prerogative of the left, which is a well-known talking point of the right. Also, as I wrote at the time on this blog,

[Citizens United] further reinforces the opinion that money is a natural means of securing free speech, and that corporations are entitled to the same free speech protections in the political arena as individuals do without being exposed to the same liabilities that are attached to physical persons. Corporations cannot be put to death, they cannot be imprisoned, they do not have post bail, and so forth. This creates a class of supercitizens that the Founding Fathers would not conceivably have endorsed. In fact, all evidence points to the contrary: Founding Fathers feared the rise of corporation against the interest of the nascent Union. How supposed originalists like Scalia and Thomas failed to see this is a testament not to their dedication to preserving the original intent of the Constitution but to the degree of their subservience to the particular interests they represent.

Still, I have to agree not only with Brayton's assessment, but with what Chris Hedges wrote on Truthdig, when he called democracy in America "a useful fiction". In that article, Hedges said

The coup is over. We lost. The ruling is one more judicial effort to streamline mechanisms for corporate control. It exposes the myth of a functioning democracy and the triumph of corporate power. But it does not significantly alter the political landscape. The corporate state is firmly cemented in place.

I recommend that you read Hedges's article in its entirety, as it contains a clear insight of how American democracy has been deprived of any substance.

Whereas campaign finance laws certainly contributed to the death of democracy, what really did democracy in is the advent of media conglomeration, as well as the repeal of the fairness doctrine under President Reagan. Though in different guises, many have expressed the concept that, to function properly, democracy requires an informed electorate. A correctly informed electorate, I would say. How well-informed can our voters be when there are "news" organizations like Fox News, the Washington Times, the Wall Street Journal, to name a few, and when the airwaves are filled with the incoherent, hateful, and lie-filled rants of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Michael Savage, Sarah Palin's, and many others (including the occasional liberal)?
In retrospect, I have to admit that news of the death of democracy because of Citizens United were greatly exaggerated: How many times can you kill a corpse?

Majority of American Support Tougher Firearm Restrictions

Via the Huffington Post: Majority Of Americans, Including Gun Owners, Support Tougher Restrictions. In case you didn't read that accurately, the headline says "including gun owners."

Fat chance the NRA will go along with it, which means that the politicians who rely on NRA scorecards to get votes will likely also reject tougher restrictions, which means... You know what it means.

The Greatest Banana Republic The World Has Ever Seen

The New York Times' Nicholas Kristof penned an op-ed titled Our Banana Republic. It seems to me the that Tea Party and the Republican Party, true to the American tradition of leadership, are hell-bent on making the United States "number one!" Among Banana Republics, that is.

P.S. If you are wondering why I used corruption as a label, it goes without saying that you do not become a true Banana Republic without a corrupt political system. It's just that here we call it "lobbying" Congress.

Supreme Shame

Please read this excellent editorial from the New York Times on the poisonous rationale and the disastrous effects that yesterday's Citizens United v. FEC is certain to have on our already corrupt political process.

The Day Democracy Died (UPDATED)

In a stunning display of judicial activism, the kind that conservatives are prone to decrying, today's outrageous Supreme Court ruling sounded the death knell for democracy in the United States.

Corporations and unions (but corporations especially), with all their financial might, will be able to buy political favor in ways to date unprecedented. Their ability to influence the electoral process has been blown to unimaginable proportions by the Courts' corporate servants with today's ruling.

This is not a Republican vs. Democratic issue (though Republicans, in their role of defenders of corporate interests, are likely to benefit, at least initially): It's an American issue.

Events like these warrant a popular revolt, preferably a peaceful one, but a revolt indeed.

UPDATE 1
It is impossible to overstate the destructive import of the Roberts' Court decision. Some are already calling it the worst decision handed by the Supreme Court since Dred Scott, and that is a very high bar to pass. I will keep adding updates to the original post, below.

Here are two important opinions from Jason Linkins and Dahlia Litwick.

UPDATE 2
Senators Snowe (R-ME) and McCain (R-AZ) have expressed their disappointment with today's Supreme Court decision on unlimited corporate funding for political advertising

UPDATE 3
Greg Palast has a very troubling take on the Citizens United ruling.

UPDATE 4
In a somewhat rambling post on the Daily Kos, Potatohead nails the problem with today's SCOTUS Citizens United ruling:

Giving corporations this complete freedom of speech, "money as speech", without also constraining them as we the people are constrained by our needs and the natural world, does nothing more than grant any of us, who have sufficient wealth, [the right] to act above the law, doing harm without accountability, and stand above others, violating equality of law, and violating the social contract, checks and balances necessary for an equitable social justice.

That's what this ruling did. It says that really ugly people can invoke a corporation, do harm through it, profit from that, then place all accountability on the corporation, where our means for legal remedies are largely ineffective.

This is a mistake.

Industry Talking Points and Republican Whores

Emptywheel (Marcy Wheeler) has a post that shows that corrupt politicians (as in politicians whose mouths and votes are bought with industry money) are mouthpieces reading from the same script. Big deal? I'd say.

An Open Letter To Sen. Baucus

Dear Senator:

This is the first time I have ever written to you. I have written emails to you before, but I have never "pulled the trigger". Why? Because I wanted to give you the benefit of the doubt. I wanted to wait until your plan was out, so it could be analyzed by people who know better than I do. Well, now the plan is out, and you are proud of it. Congratulations! You have written a bill "that can pass the Senate." Hooray. Except, that should not have been the goal. The goal should have been to pass a bill that would improve the life of the American people, not one that would line the coffers of the insurance industry.

Wendell Potter, a former VP at Cigna, said in yesterday's testimony to a congressional committee that your plan might as well be called "the Insurance Industry Profit Protection and Enhancement bill", because that's what it actually is.

Sen. Baucus: you and you colleagues have shamed the people of Montana by putting your insurance industry contributors ahead of the welfare of your constituents and of the rest of the American people. Well done!

Unfortunately it will be a few years before I can donate to your opponent when/if you have the gall to run for re-election, but rest assured that I will, and I will participate in any campaign against your re-election.

Sincerely,

Fabrizio Siracusa,
Denver, CO


UPDATE

I also wrote the White House and asked them to pay attention to the fact that, in the Senate Finance Committee bill presented by Sen. Baucus, the cap for Flex Spending Account (which is a pre-tax benefit) drops from $3,000 to $2,000. Where I come from, that translates into higher taxes, which goes against President Obama's campaign pledge not to raise taxes on 95% of Americans. It is only one of the many ways in which the "Max Tax" sticks it to the middle class.

More on this as facts develop.