Daily Archives: July 14, 2012

Corporatocracy — No Comments
14
Jul 12

Judge halts private probation practice in Alabama city, equates it to ‘debtors prison’

This only the latest example in where America is returning to a time when working people and the poor had no rights. This time it failed but the trend is clear. The corporations setting up a dictatorship in where labor will be mere servants to the capitalist class. And it is being achieved through a political system in where we tricked into thinking they speak for the people:

A judge has temporarily shut down what he called a “debtors prison” run by the municipal court of an Alabama city.

In an order filed Wednesday, Shelby County Circuit Court Judge Hub Harrington said the Harpersville Municipal Court was running a “judicially sanctioned extortion racket.”

Harrington wrote that the court’s actions repeatedly violated the constitutional rights of defendants that appeared before it. The judge found that if defendants weren’t able to immediately pay court-imposed fines and fees, they were trapped into paying several times the amount when their cases were turned over to a private probation company.

Corporatocracy — No Comments
14
Jul 12

Public Pensions are Used by Corporations to Buy Elections, Lobby Government

Source: NY Times

That’s because the vast majority of people who work in the public sector — state, local and federal employees — are required to make contributions to a pension plan. Nearly all states make participation in a pension plan mandatory and a “condition of employment” for public employees. To get and keep your job with the government, you have to give some of your paycheck to the pension plan.

Public pensions, moreover, are so-called defined benefit plans, which means that employees don’t have a say in how their mandatory contributions are invested. The employees cannot request, for example, that their money be used only to buy government bonds or that it be invested only in certain mutual funds or only in select corporations.

Instead, the employees’ money is invested according to whatever decisions the pension plan’s trustee makes. And, not surprisingly, pension plans invest heavily in corporate securities: in 2008, public pensions held about $1.15 trillion in corporate stock.

Here’s the problem. In its Citizens United decision, the Supreme Court held that companies have a First Amendment right to make electoral expenditures with general corporate treasuries. And they’ve done so, with relish, pouring millions into the political system.

Uncategorized — No Comments
14
Jul 12

States Close in On Citizens United: California, Montana, and Beyond

Source:

Last week, the State of California became the sixth state in the country to call for a constitutional amendment overturning the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2010 ruling in Citizens United v. FEC, and restoring democracy to the people. 

With the passage of a resolution through its state legislature, California is the latest to join this growing grassroots movement across the nation.  Hawaii, New Mexico, Vermont, and Rhode Island have passed similar resolutions through their state legislatures, and a majority of state legislators in Maryland have signed a letter to Congress supporting an amendment. And, just this past Wednesday, the Montana Secretary of State certified for the November ballot a voter initiative calling for a constitutional amendment, the first such statewide ballot measure in the country. 
Without even hearing the case or reviewing the factual record before them, the nation’s highest court reversed the Montana Supreme Court and struck down the state’s century-old law.

All of this comes on the heels of another controversial Supreme Court decision, in a Montana case, that makes it clearer than ever that we the people must use our amendment power under the Constitution to defend our democracy.

Corporatocracy / Uncategorized — No Comments
14
Jul 12

Lawyer Who Argued For Citizens United Admits Elections Are Bought

Source:

Billionaire Matty Moroun has come out swinging with astounding sums of money in response to Michigan Governor Rick Snyder signing a deal to build a new bridge spanning from Detroit to Canada, and even the staunchest supporters of corporate speech are admitting Mr. Moroun may be buying an election.