Editorial - The Court’s Blow to Democracy - NYTimes.com
I wonder what status quo the NYT thinks ought to be protected? Try this. In 2008, one has to get to the 39th group on the list before one hits a group that is "strongly Republican" (Club for Growth). Number 23 (National Car Dealers) "leans Republican". Out of the top 100, 3 lean R, 2 are solid R, and 1 is "strongly" R.
How about D? 3 are "Solid", including #1, ActBlue, a PAC that hides god knows what shenanigans and contributed $24 Million, over 3x #2, which is Goldman Sachs, "strongly D". 30 are "Strongly D", and 10 "lean D". The current advantage in this list alone is many 10s of millions, and we know in the last cycle, BO alone had an advantage approaching $500 Million.
Is it any wonder the NYT wants this state of affairs protected? We well know how campaign finance laws are enforced. Republicans are scrutinized and prosecuted if they or their contributors step out of line. Democrats are rarely looked at, and even if they are -- as in Slick and the Goracle in the '90s when they got caught with their hands in the cookie jar on all sorts of campaign irregularities, including taking foreign funds, the answer is "well, we had to do it because it looked like the Republicans might win". That is always a good enough emergency to justify ANYTHING to the MSM.
As the NYT understands, in a big country where media costs money, freedom of speech means freedom to raise money to speak. While the NYT will defend anyone's right to agree with them (as will all good liberals), they aren't so sure that those that DISagree with them ought to be able to raise money, so we have a HUGE crisis here from their POV.
Freedom of speech for Republicans. The end of Democracy!
I wonder what status quo the NYT thinks ought to be protected? Try this. In 2008, one has to get to the 39th group on the list before one hits a group that is "strongly Republican" (Club for Growth). Number 23 (National Car Dealers) "leans Republican". Out of the top 100, 3 lean R, 2 are solid R, and 1 is "strongly" R.
How about D? 3 are "Solid", including #1, ActBlue, a PAC that hides god knows what shenanigans and contributed $24 Million, over 3x #2, which is Goldman Sachs, "strongly D". 30 are "Strongly D", and 10 "lean D". The current advantage in this list alone is many 10s of millions, and we know in the last cycle, BO alone had an advantage approaching $500 Million.
Is it any wonder the NYT wants this state of affairs protected? We well know how campaign finance laws are enforced. Republicans are scrutinized and prosecuted if they or their contributors step out of line. Democrats are rarely looked at, and even if they are -- as in Slick and the Goracle in the '90s when they got caught with their hands in the cookie jar on all sorts of campaign irregularities, including taking foreign funds, the answer is "well, we had to do it because it looked like the Republicans might win". That is always a good enough emergency to justify ANYTHING to the MSM.
As the NYT understands, in a big country where media costs money, freedom of speech means freedom to raise money to speak. While the NYT will defend anyone's right to agree with them (as will all good liberals), they aren't so sure that those that DISagree with them ought to be able to raise money, so we have a HUGE crisis here from their POV.
In dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens warned that the ruling not only threatens democracy but “will, I fear, do damage to this institution.” History is, indeed, likely to look harshly not only on the decision but the court that delivered it. The Citizens United ruling is likely to be viewed as a shameful bookend to Bush v. Gore. With one 5-to-4 decision, the court’s conservative majority stopped valid votes from being counted to ensure the election of a conservative president. Now a similar conservative majority has distorted the political system to ensure that Republican candidates will be at an enormous advantage in future elections.In the interest of "even handedness", the NYT didn't find a google search to point to who has the advantage today to be worth a couple minutes of their time. They apparently found Democrats skirting the law on every front and coming up with 100s of millions in advantage in the last election cycle to be completely unthreatening to democracy. While we listened to them prattle constantly post '94 of the "dangers" of the Republicans having control of ANY branch of government, the 2008 election and talk about the "end of the Republican party" was a sign that America had finally "woke up". One party rule is apparently "democratic" as long as it is the party that you agree with!
Freedom of speech for Republicans. The end of Democracy!
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