Everyone seems to have forgotten what Citizens United v. FEC is. It only made it so that people could...
Everyone seems to have forgotten what Citizens United v. FEC is. It only made it so that people could pool their money together and use it for election speech. It said that government cannot restrict speech because of who is saying it.
Indeed, no government act I can think of in recent memory has been more democratizing than the Citizens United decision. It means that if there's some rich guy out there dumping his own money into a campaign for someone who is opposed to bubble gum -- totally legal before Citizens United -- you and I can form a group called "Geeks for Gumballs" and spend our pooled money on electing someone who is in favor of bubble gum. That's all this is. It gives people more voice, not less.
Yes, it applies to ExxonMobil, but it also applies to independent filmmakers, unions, and public-interest groups like the Sierra Club and the NRA. Before Citizens United, only individuals -- not nonprofit corporations -- could spend unlimited money on campaigns (well, and news media, which for some reason got an exemption, even though independent filmmakers didn't). Overturning Citizens United would give more power to billionaires in the political process, by criminalizing the speech of the rest of us who need to pool our resources together to get heard.
Citizens United did not say that corporations are people, nor did it rely on that principle. Citizens United did not increase spending limits. Citizens United did not allow anonymous donations or change reporting requirements. Citizens United did not create or enable Super PACs. Citizens United did not do any of the things that the Democrats say it did.
All Citizens United said is that you don't lose your right to spend money on political speech just because you are joining your voice with other voices. That's it.
And to be against that is ... baffling, frankly.
Indeed, no government act I can think of in recent memory has been more democratizing than the Citizens United decision. It means that if there's some rich guy out there dumping his own money into a campaign for someone who is opposed to bubble gum -- totally legal before Citizens United -- you and I can form a group called "Geeks for Gumballs" and spend our pooled money on electing someone who is in favor of bubble gum. That's all this is. It gives people more voice, not less.
Yes, it applies to ExxonMobil, but it also applies to independent filmmakers, unions, and public-interest groups like the Sierra Club and the NRA. Before Citizens United, only individuals -- not nonprofit corporations -- could spend unlimited money on campaigns (well, and news media, which for some reason got an exemption, even though independent filmmakers didn't). Overturning Citizens United would give more power to billionaires in the political process, by criminalizing the speech of the rest of us who need to pool our resources together to get heard.
Citizens United did not say that corporations are people, nor did it rely on that principle. Citizens United did not increase spending limits. Citizens United did not allow anonymous donations or change reporting requirements. Citizens United did not create or enable Super PACs. Citizens United did not do any of the things that the Democrats say it did.
All Citizens United said is that you don't lose your right to spend money on political speech just because you are joining your voice with other voices. That's it.
And to be against that is ... baffling, frankly.
"It is the common fate of the indolent to see their rights become a prey to the active. The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt."
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