One person, one vote or one dollar, one vote?

[krispos42]

The former is democracy, the latter is corporatocracy. And where are we on this scale?

I don't know, exactly. But I do know this: we are far enough toward one dollar/one vote that the people and corporations that have the dollars are able to make themselves seem pro-democracy.

And if you even question that maybe we've gone too far toward one dollar/one vote, you're a stinking COMMUNIST!

Or a Marxist, or a Socialist, or a Fascist, or a Maoist, or a reverse-racist, or something equally silly and divisive.

It's not jealously, although the Right Wing prefers to pretend it is. I can't speak for other DUers but my jealously of the rich is only to the extent that they don't have to worry about where they are going to be living in a year and that they can tell their boss to shove it anytime they want to.

I'm in no way jealous of the "rich" lifestyle... the TV show "Cribs" or "My Super Sweet 16" causes gastric distress, frankly, and I really don't give a shit about how many massaging motors are built into the seats of the newest S-class Mercedes. And I have no hidden desire to play Segway polo or collect Impressionist oil paintings.

But I am gravely concerned about how the predatory, elitist, mercenary, psychotic mentality that is required to get into the top fraction of 1% of income-earners is now deciding public policy via those dollars. Especially when the public policy seems to consist of giving them more dollars!

And a huge percentage of these dollars come from corporations... artificial people created by the various Secretaries of State. Artificial people, of course, can't have the even the pretense of morality or ethics. Corporations are a legal framework designed to generate as much money as possible. Period. Corporations only act in a legal, ethical, and moral manner when we the people MAKE them act that way.

And yet, even though no corporation can vote in an election, we let these artificial people vote with their dollars.

How stupid are we, exactly? How much money has been spent by artificial people to convince us that letting those artificial people participate in our politics is a good and healthy thing?

And when will we realize that it's killing us? That it's killing our democratic-republic? And that it's killing our nation?

When will we remember that those corporate artificial people don't have, can't have, patriotism?

[insanity]

1. K&R!

Money does not equal speech.

[krispos42]

2. I wish that was true.

However, the Supremes have ruled differently. :-(

[sui generis]

3. What, are you saying corporations don't have a right to survive?

(artifical outrage, outrage outrage)

The problem with incorporation stems from the very root of the word - to become a body. A corporation has legally defined responsibilities and a defined entity status to be used to legally conduct business transactions on behalf of "group" of people, including owning property and assets, lending and borrowing money and establishing participational values in the form of shares (most types of corporations).

The REAL problem aside from semantics is that elected officials are at the beck and call of major corporations and entire industries with sweetheart deals and promises that go far beyond simple cash transactions.

The saddest part is when we hear people saying they won't vote for healthcare because they're worried about getting re-elected; meaning they're worried they won't get that stadium built or that new tollway or worse, federal budget allocation for local projects from their own committee members.

Do the right thing. It is less important to worry about re-election than to do the right thing. If you do the right thing even if it's unpopular with the insurance industry, you force them to evolve and you show leadership in the game of representative politics. You most pointedly do NOT represent the corporations.

[zaj]

4. That's what is interesting about Libertarian and pure free-marketers...

They won't say it, because it's distastful, but at the core (or at the extreme I guess) there is a battle between "let the markets decide" (which is $1, one vote) and "let the people decide" (with 1 person, one vote).

It's an ultimately uncomfortable discussion for the right to have.

I consider myself center left (as opposed to left or far left, I guess). I place a LOT of value on the input of the market, went to Biz School, do some work in the defense industry, etc.

But I think it's a tension that we need to recognize and deal with. And the answer is NOT to go to either extreme (market dominated or voter dominated). But to push back and forth between the two forces and keep somewhere within a rational middle ground.

It's not easy.

[krispos42]

8. The CitiGroup memo mentioned this

Apparantly, the real worry of the "management aristrocracy" is that the unwashed masses (people like, say, the bottom 99%) might decided to actually use that one man-one vote thingy to gut the top 1%.

If only...

[depakid]

5. Wait until the Supreme Court announces Citizen's United v. FEC

later this year (or early next year).

Those dollars are about to radically increase in "value" and influence.

[krispos42]

6. You're just a fountain of good news, aren't you?

:D

[depakid]

7. In one respect, over the long run it actually could be good news...

As the half measures in place are largely ineffective and the entire line of cases since Buckley v. Valeo need to be reversed or counteracted by some other doctrine of responsible media reform.

[boppers]

9. One media viewer share, one vote.

Dollars can be related, but Oprah has a lot less money than Bill Gates or Warren Buffet, but can affect many more votes.

The problem isn't corporations, per se, it's the fourth branch of government... the media.

While the media is *often* a corporate structure, changing the Gates, Buffet, and Oprah company structures doesn't affect their media shares.