by Gene TeSelle
We had suspected it for a long time, but now, thanks to a swing vote by Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, the United States is officially a plutocracy. On the dubious and probably perverse principles that corporations are legal persons and that political contributions are “speech” protected by the First Amendment, restrictions on corporate contributions to issue organizations (though not to specific political campaigns) have basically been thrown out.
The decision, says Mark Green in the Huffington Post, allows “a Katrina of corporate money” to “overwhelm the levees of democracy.”
In recent years we have seen how effective the power of money can be in the political process. It is most dramatic in the way it influences Congress, and especially the Senate, where key members receive more out-of-state than in-state contributions, especially from industries affected by the committees on which they serve. We just saw the Senate, in full public view, haggling over every detail of the health care bill, responding to one special interest after another. The response to this sausage-making process was disaffection in public opinion polls and perhaps a shift in the Senate vote in Massachusetts.
The power or money has also been evident in the takeover of newspapers and television networks by mega-corporations, which have downsized their news reporting staffs and increased the number of pundits who are in a position to poison public opinion through shock statements, half-truths, and in some cases downright fabrications. Congress and the FCC have accepted this situation with general passivity, despite their ability to set a regulatory framework that would ensure a freer flow of news and opinion.
The power of money also extends to the executive branch. The Clinton administration gave us NAFTA and the World Trade Organization — agreements that amounted to a vast transfer of sovereignty from national, state, and local governments to shadowy panels of referees who belonged to the world of international trade. And the Obama administration has looked to Wall Street insiders for guidance on how to deal with financial institutions in the midst of a serious downturn in the economy. It has often been said that we have a one-party system based on the sanctity of property and markets, with the Republicans basically calling the shots and the Democrats coming in when there is an emergency.
Now political propaganda will join advertising, executive bonuses, and travel as deductible expenses for corporations, Farther down on the food chain will be employees and community stakeholders — and perhaps even stockholders.
