If a corporation, as a "person", can make unlimited political contributions...

[Make7]

... why can't I, also as a person, make unlimited political contributions?
 

[closeupready]

1. You should be able to, if they can.

n/t

[damntexdem]

14. And if corporations are persons, why wasn't Ken Lay charged with murder?

[Deep13]

2. You're not fabulously wealthy...

...the one bit of reality which shows how elitist and authoritarian this decision really is.

[Echo In Light]

4. +1

[Make7]

8. Even if I were fabulously wealthy, I would be required to follow the FEC limits.

 
http://www.fec.gov/pages/brochures/contriblimits.shtml
 

[Deep13]

10. The limits for candidates remain in effect which includes $0 from companies.

It's direct advertisement that is now allowed. Walmart can now buy a two hour TV ad asking you to stop Stalinism by voting against Barack Obama. While it's legal for you to do the same thing, I doubt that you have the resources to do it. And if you did, TV stations would be under no obligation to show it.

[leftstreet]

3. It'd be cheaper to buy advertising for/against your candidate..

rather than just handing him/her money.

Which is why all the politicians are screaming about this ruling

[NoNothing]

5. They can't

The decision today was NOT that corporations can give unlimited - or any - campaign donations. That is still against the law. What they CAN do is INDEPENDENTLY spend as much money as they want promoting one candidate or another, just like you can individually. So it's the same on both sides now, where before corporations had special extra restrictions on what they could say/spend near election time.

[Make7]

13. Oh, I see. As long as it's not a direct contribution, we can spend as much as we like.

Thanks for the clarification.

So now campaigns will probably be run mostly outside of the traditional campaign structure in any seat that is important. What then is the point of any campaign finance laws?
 

[NoNothing]

16. Yes, that's correct

That is the law. The point of limiting <i>direct</i> contributions to candidates campaigns was to make outright bribery more difficult.

[Make7]

17. So now corporations can basically bribe/blackmail candidates indirectly.

Do what we ask and we will shovel piles of money into advertising for your next campaign. But if you vote against us, we will shovel twice as much money into ads for your opponent.

And it's all perfectly legal now.

So there is really little point in even having campaign finance regulations at all. The result is the same whether the bribery/blackmail is direct or indirect.
 

[NoNothing]

18. Pretty much

But really, isn't that how it's always been? In a free-ish society, money will find a way to influence politics no matter how many barriers you try to erect.

[uponit7771]

22. No, it's not the way it's always been

[Make7]

23. Yes, the people with money are the people that influence politics.

It has always been that way, but up until the last decade or so they at least tried to not make it so obvious. This is just the latest in a procession of changes that make it more and more unmistakable that the corporations are running the government. If that fact becomes apparent to a large enough proportion of the population, those people might even start to do something about it! And that wouldn't be so good for the corporations' bottom line. Perhaps it's a mistake on their part, or maybe they just don't think people will ever do anything about it.

And welcome to DU. :hi:
 

[NoNothing]

6. oops, dupe

[qazplm]

11. what it also didnt say was corporations are people

what it said was, which you have to admit was clever, was that freedom of speech in the 1st Amendment isn't tied to people anywhere in the Amendment. Now that's common sensically a pretty silly argument, but from a pure nonsensical logic it is true.

[guitar man]

7. maybe we should

All start our own little corporations? Two can play at that game? :shrug:

[Ian David]

9. You just need to create a corporation to do it.

Here you go: http://corp.delaware.gov/

Go ahead and donate two million dollars to Al Franken if you want to.

[TheKentuckian]

25. That's the ticket! Now to accumulate a few hundred billion dollars each

This equalizes nothing, thats one of the craziest things I've ever seen or heard, ignoring the utter need for no "equalizing" ever. The wealth is in very few hands and a lot of it right out of the treasury.

This is serious.

[gateley]

12. It's not contributions -- it's advertising that they got the green light for.

Instead of only organizing PACs, they can now product advertising and buy the time for it to air. Unlimited. I THINK they have to have "paid for by Monsanto Corp" on it, which might be an improvement over the cutesy names they used for their PACs.

But hopefully this won't come to pass -- Obama's trying to stop it.

[Bitwit1234]

15. Easy to get around that

just go to LEGAL ZOOM and incorporate yourself. Then you can do anything you want. And the Supreme Court can't stop you.

[librechik]

19. we should all incorporate, I guess

so we can get free speech rights given to the "superpersons" that the underclass doesn't have.

[negativenihil]

20. Whats stopping...

...the ultra rich private citizen from setting up a Corporation to be used as a front for political donations?

[negativenihil]

21. Seems everyone above me has the same basic idea ;) n/t

[NoNothing]

24. Nothing stopping it

There just wouldn't be any point to it, since corporations still cannot make donations to politicians. They can now indepenedtly spend an unlimited amount, but so can individuals.