http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/01/21/cam...x.html?hpt=Sbin

The Supreme Court has given big business, unions and nonprofits more power to spend freely in federal elections, a major turnaround that threatens a century of government efforts to regulate the power of corporations to bankroll American politics. A 5-4 conservative majority crafted a narrow overhaul of federal campaign spending Thursday that could have an immediate effect on this year's congressional midterm elections. The justices eased long-standing restrictions on "independent spending" by corporations and unions in political campaigns.

"When government seeks to use its full power, including the criminal law, to command where a person may get his or her information or what distrusted source he or she may not hear, it uses censorship to control thought," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the majority. "The First Amendment confirms the freedom to think for ourselves."

The opinion radically alters the election calculus, offering greater spending flexibility for a broader range of for-profit and nonprofit groups seeking a voice in the crowded national political debate.

Hours after the ruling, President Obama responded, saying the court has given "the special interests and their lobbyists even more power in Washington -- while undermining the influence of average Americans who make small contributions to support their preferred candidates."

In a statement, he said he is telling his administration "to get to work immediately with Congress on this issue. We are going to talk with bipartisan congressional leaders to develop a forceful response to this decision. The public interest requires nothing less."

"The Supreme Court has given a green light to a new stampede of special interest money in our politics," Obama said. "It is a major victory for big oil, Wall Street banks, health insurance companies and the other powerful interests that marshal their power every day in Washington to drown out the voices of everyday Americans."

Reaction on the other side said the ruling was long overdue.

"The Supreme Court's decision today is a victory for the First Amendment and the right of all Americans to participate in the political process," said Theodore Olson, who successfully argued the case for the conservative Citizens United.

In a dissent to the opinion, Justice John Paul Stevens wrote, "In a democratic society, the long-standing consensus on the need to limit corporate campaign spending should outweigh the wooden applications of judge-made rules."

He added, "The court's ruling threatens to undermine the integrity of elected institutions around the nation."

The case was the first one heard on the bench for newest Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and she voted in dissent with her three more liberal colleagues.

The issue hinged on whether corporations' ability to pour money into election campaigns could be strictly regulated, or whether corporations have free-speech rights to spend their cash to influence elections, just as individual donors do.

In this ruling, the justices also nullified earlier rulings upholding the core of a 6-year-old federal law aimed at curbing corporate campaign spending. Under current law, there are severe restrictions on campaign ads used by corporations for federal elections. They generally must be issue-focused -- talking about abortion or taxes, for instance -- and not expressly supporting or opposing a candidate. Those limits have now been generally removed.

The specific case grew out of a documentary on Hillary Clinton. Produced last year by Citizens United, "Hillary: The Movie" was a scorching attack on the then-presidential candidate. The filmmakers wanted to promote it during the heat of the 2008 primary season, but a federal court blocked any ads, as well as airings on cable television's video on demand.

On that specific question, the justices ruled against Citizens United, saying federal restrictions on broadcast ads are appropriate.

"Citizens United's narrower arguments are not sustainable under a fair reading of the statute," Kennedy wrote.

The Washington-based nonprofit corporation and advocacy organization balked at campaign finance rules that would have required disclosure of its financial backers, and restrictions on when the film could air. It was financed with a mix of corporate and individual donations.

Navigating the complex, ever-evolving landscape of election money rules has spurred a cottage industry of financial, political and legal armies, ready to do battle over the money and the message. The crux of this dispute, like others before it, is just how far the government may go to regulate campaign spending and campaign ads.

In his opinion, Kennedy acknowledged that, but said Americans should be trusted to decide competing election issues.

"The appearance of influence or access," he wrote, "will not cause the electorate to lose faith in our democracy."

"Our nation's speech dynamic is changing, and informative voices should not have to circumvent onerous restrictions to exercise their First Amendment rights," Kennedy said. "The censorship we now confront is vast in its reach."

But Stevens, who read part of his harsh dissent from the bench, said, "The court's opinion is thus a rejection of the common sense of the American people, who have recognized a need to prevent corporations from undermining self-government since the founding."

Justice Samuel Alito and Chief Justice John Roberts were key to the ruling, agreeing with their more conservative colleagues. Alito replaced moderate Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who upheld past corporate restrictions in 2003, when the high court last confronted the issue.

Section 203 of the comprehensive Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act of 2002, widely known as the McCain-Feingold law, bans the broadcast of "electioneering communication" by corporations, trade groups, unions and some issue advocacy groups, if the material would air close to election dates and identify candidates by name or image.

The law also requires an on-screen notice of the groups financing such ads, as well as public disclosure of all who donated to the sponsoring organizations.

The landmark McCain-Feingold law took effect the day after the November 2002 elections.

Among its many provisions are a ban on "soft money," the unlimited and unregulated contributions to national political parties; a ban, in the 60 days before an election, on advocacy ads, those criticizing or supporting a candidate's stand on an issue; contribution limits; and donor disclosure requirements.

Much of McCain-Feingold remains unaffected by the high court's latest ruling, including the current ban on large, unregulated donations to political parties and the candidates themselves by corporations. The case also does not affect political action committees, separate groups created by corporations, unions and others that can contribute directly to federal candidates.

PAC money has a $5,000-per-candidate limit, and must be funded through voluntary contributions from employees, members or individuals, not by direct corporate or union treasuries.

The ruling could have far-reaching effects beyond the federal arena. Twenty-two states have similar bans on corporate spending in state and local elections. Restrictions on money in gubernatorial, legislative and even judicial races could soon be a thing of the past.

"Campaign 2010 was already bulked up with the potential of campaign ad spending," said Evan Tracey, president of Campaign Media Analysis Group and CNN's consultant on political television advertising. "Now it's on steroids."

The reason for the subtitle ("bad week for big government liberals") is, from watching reactions to this decision, there is almost a 100% inverse correlation between approval of this ruling and approval of big government programs.

Why don't big government types like competition? Are they afraid if anyone besides the MSM and incumbent politicians get a voice, their ideas will disappear completely?

You shoulda seen that imbecile Olbermann on pmsnbc tonite ranting about this. I thought he was about to hang himself.

This is a good litmus test to see if something makes sense. If Olberman hates it, the idea is probably pretty good.

Woo hoo!
Another victory for intellectual consistency as a determinist suicide-pact!
GG sense.
Faggots.

I almost said this very thing.

Yeah, that horrible intellectual consistency that allows people other than the corporations that run the MSM to say things about candidates in the days before an election. Next thing you know, they'll be saying ACORN can't cheat at elections anymore. How dare they allow people other than professional politicians to comment on professional politicians?

I'm not really seeing how this is bad for liberals. Liberals don't like it because they tend to distrust corporations and lobbyists, and this seems to be an opening for way more corporate influence. I don't think it's necessarily going to favor one party more than the other. The only thing that it's going to hurt us the political process as a whole.

I mean, this is a good example of why I'm not on board to libertarianism. Certain rules, even if they limit "freedom," are good for the country. Limiting corporate donations is one of those rules. All this will do is drown out the voice of the people and dramatically strengthen the voice of of really rich corporations. Or was the concern that Senators in the past weren't bought off enough.

Or, to put my argument more eloquently:

This is why I don't understand why it splits that way, but it appears to. After all, this ruling gave unions their free speech rights back, too.




But history indicates otherwise. Since M-F passed, corporations have *more* power, and it's less visible. Not only was M-F theoretically bad, but from a practical point of view it most hurt the people that it was supposed to help. Instead, it helps incumbents, and hurts local community groups that wish to have their voice heard.

When R's were in power, it was enforced on D's. When D's were in power, it was enforced on R's. When either was in power it was enforced on anti-incumbent groups.

The Constitution works because the people who wrote it realized that incentives and power matters. Incumbents are not going to write a law that hurts themselves, and M-F was no exception.

Instead what happens is that corporate donations go underground, those in authority look the other way, and we lose valuable information -- the source of the information. How does that help anyone?

In the end, I am not afraid to have my ideas challenged in a public debate, because it's obvious I'm right. I guess all of you who are wrong are afraid of the competition, but I say, bring it on.

Well, let me start by first asking a question.

Do you believe that this ruling will make the country a better place, or do you support it because you support free speech and freedoms in general? Are you happy for the law, or the philosophy behind the law?

I am happy about this law for both theoretical AND pragmatic reasons. Look at the cases that have been prosecuted and the ones that have been conveniently ignored. This law had nothing to do with campaign finance reform and everything to do with silencing the voices of those who would oppose those who are in power.

Also, it's not like corporations are any more united than the people on any issue. For every company that wants their business subsidized, there are 10 that want to stop them.

One of the biggest issues is: CNN and FOX are corporations. Should they prohibited from discussing issues in the 30 days before an election? Under M-F, they are allowed to state whatever opinions they want, whenever they want. But Joe's Muffler Shop, Inc, who has three local stores, is not allowed to talk in the 30 days before an election. How does this enhance debate?

this is pretty disingenuous. No one is worried about Joe's Muffler Shop. They are worried about the Exxons of the world having even MORE power. If they made this ruling and simultaneously outlawed lobbying, then ok. All this did was make giant corporations even more powerful than before. The idea that McCain-Feingold was aimed at small businesses is silly and I am sure you know that.

This will not enhance the debate it will help the special interests control and shape the debate more than they already do.....while drowning out the voice of Joe's Muffler Shop.

Check the case law. Enforcement has been almost universally against the likes of Joe's Muffler shop while the Exxon's get a pass. That's because Exxon can afford lawyers and bribes, Joe's Muffler shop cannot. It's more than disingenuous to pretend that it just happens to work out that way, that the incumbents that M-F protects never *imagined* that such a thing could happen.

But let's take another scenario. Some KKK member just happens to have become a billionaire, maybe selling armor piercing bullets to rednecks. He decides that his life's work will not be complete until he gets in federal office. So he uses hundreds of millions of dollars to run ads. Nobody denies that he has the right to do that, because otherwise, free speech means nothing. So now, a bunch of corporations say "this is crazy, we can't have a KKK member holding political office, let's match his spending and let people know, plus we'll gain an image as good corporate citizens." Under M-F, that is illegal. Mr KKK goes unchecked. How has that helped free speech?

See, the thing is, for the constitution to mean anything, it has to apply equally to the voices you like and those you dislike.

I liked how the SC said this:

"Laws prohibiting speech, even via corporations, are subject to the highest scrutiny, which is strict scrutiny. It's not enough to broadly claim that a certain form of speech is corrupt. Government may not impose restrictions on certain disfavored speakers based on the wealth or lack thereof of the speakers."

Obama spent over $600 million on his campaign. $200 million of it came from the unions..under M-F....

Are corporations anti-people or something? Why are we so afraid of them?

I realize this probably makes me look really naive.

They're not anti people, they're pro themselves. They're anti anything that gets in their way. Are all corporations evil? No, of course not.

But the ones that would want to alter the political process through their campaign contributions probably fall into the "bad" category. And those are the ones that this ruling empower. Its' not like Apple was previously dying to do some political lobbying. The HMO industry, on the other hand...

So if a Senator has a brother that runs an oil company and the Senator is about to vote on a bill awarding money to brother's company, is it somehow bad for other corporations to run ads pointing out this conflict of interest?

Or here's another example, a very real one that cost Minnesota taxpayers millions of dollars. The local newspaper, the Star-Tribune, owned a bunch of land downtown that they were having trouble selling. So they used the corporate mouthpiece, the Star-Tribune, to promote a new sports stadium. They shot down any argument against it, and regularly ran favorable articles about what an economic benefit it would be to build a stadium there. They seemed to forget to mention, in their hundreds of articles, that they would make millions off the real estate deal.

So you have a case of corporate power going unchecked, because M-F didn't allow the corporations that lost in the deal to organize a vocal opposition. How is this moral or fair or even a positive result? We ALREADY have self-interested corporations with a large voice. They just call themselves "news" and use their power to promote *their* special interests. So you have a choice: let a chosen few influence elections, or open the debate up to everyone.

Which, I guess, explains why leftists hate this decision -- it gives them competition. They are already pissed about having to put up with FOX News contradicting them, now they might have to face actual open debate.

A civil debate on this issue for those interested.

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/02052010/watch2.html

Wal-mart wants to come to town. Local business opposes. Local TV stations sell advertising on the nightly news to the highest bidder. Wal-mart bids higher.

?

I'm not sure what your point is, but I don't think this is how commercial time slots are sold.

and???

also, walmart, because of its resources and scale, offers better prices and more selection (more employment too). this is bad?

more low-wage, partial employment tailored specifically to deny benefits to their workers. if we are listing things, let's list them correctly.

false dichotomy. free speech and freedoms in general make the country a better place.



again, false dichotomy. if the philosophy behind the law is bad then the law is bad and vice versa.

they might have been better off with a smaller pool of full time jobs. it's not necessarily more employment. Would you rather have 50 bad jobs or 35 ok jobs (numbers pulled at random)?

Who is "they?" And who am I?

You are the scorekeeper. You're good.

They is the town that may or may not benefit from Walmart coming to their town. I worked on some Walmart zoning litigation once so I know that the city council meetings regarding new Walmarts are always extremely controversial. I have read enough depositions about it to know that it is really hard to tell if Walmart is good or bad for a community. My old boss felt that Walmart was great for really small towns and really big towns but terrible for medium sized towns. Of course, how do you define those things?

Let's go talk sports and movies.

i agree, let's.

more employment, and not just low wage cashiers. you have managers of different levels, security guards/managers, accountants, other office type jobs, all the people associated with the restaurants that are often included in the store, cargo and warehouse workers/managers. even multiple mom and pop stores will offer no where near this type of employment and no where near the benefits and salary, overall and generally speaking, that wal mart will offer them at.

and tailored to deny benefits? i dont know what this refers to exactly but wal mart doesn't force anyone to work for them and you have no right to any benefit from them. you'll get them if they offer them.

so yes, LETS.

They tailor the hours worked of their employees so as to make sure none of them qualify for full benefits (below the managerial level). No one is forced to work for them unless their previous employer goes out of business because Walmart came to town and you have few choices. Your assertion that Walmart is automatically going to offer "more" to the community is backed up by nothing but your assertion. Many, many towns fight tooth and nail to keep Walmart from adding a store in their area. I am sure for no reason other than because they hate America.

if they want to tailor hours to part time employees, they can. so what?

i never said that walmart will "automatically" do anything. walmart is not something that functions automatically, but i told you why they will offer more. they will lower the cost of living in the area, offer more employment, offer more selection, and probably attract more residents and other types of businesses to the area, but even if you leave off that last part my point stands. dont say i only asserted, thats a baseless assertion in itself.

towns fight tooth and nail to keep away walmart? then it would follow that those walmarts quickly went out of business due to lack of support by the surrounding town, and the stores that were already there continued to receive all of the business of the townsfolk. so whats the problem?

So you admit that labor laws are a failure and harm the people they were designed to help?

Thank you.

are you insinuating that washington is less then perfect?? LOL

Every time I read a thread like this, my first thought is "Boy, are you guys ever ****ed". And by that I continue to mean your political system.

where are you from? canada or something?

FYP

It's not like Canada is a shining example of democracy working well, but you guys built too many boats and not enough paddles...