OK, libertarians I assume you are down with Citizen's United like conservatives

Had to Google Citizens United. After reading about them, I can say that no, I am not "down" with them. I have never heard of them before, and never heard them discussed on any libertarian website or gathering in Houston.

They seem more of the activist social conservatives than libertarians. The two are definitely not the same.

"As for me, I will punch anyone who calls me a conservative in the nose. I am a radical." - Frank Chodorov

 

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Uh, what glynch was talking about was This.

 

I'm pretty sure there are plenty of Dems and Republicans who know nothing about Citizens United.

 

I thought you meant the group Citizens United. Not the recent court case. My bad.

Simple answer would be that the decision is wrong because corporations are more creations of the state than they are people.

I had heard about this case but then lost interest because I am not a democrat. I probably shouldn't be in this discussion to begin with. So I bow out and will let one of those "small" gov't "libertarians" take over...

 

Ya there are no misinformed voters in the other parties.. I mean there were 0 people who voted in the last election with race being the deciding point.

Exactly.

Although I think most Libertarians would support this decisions, because the dissenting opinion could be seen as a restriction of the 1st amendment, I do not agree with it.

These decisions make things more complicated, well corporations may not contribute money, but they can contribute media.... Anyways by allowing corporations or unions to compete in the process you are taking away the individuals voice, hurting democracy.

 

The citizens united case to me is not a failure of gov't but a failure of people.

The greatest threat to democracy isn't corporations, it is apathy.


People tend to just dismiss problems and blame their elected officials, not realizing their apathy allows for a massive amount of corruption.


If OWS and the Tea Party stood for anything, it would be they should unite in their opposition to money in politics and pass a constitutional amendment so the Supreme Court couldn't legislate how much corporations influence politics.

I mean, you name it, the bailouts, the banking sector, liberal groups, Soros, American Crossroads, whatever. All these things do is to advance the power of the rich and powerful. All they do is give corporations the ability to prevent tax reform, lobby groups to fight against entitlement program reform, insurance companies to fight for health care cost controls, and so on.

But that's not going to happen. And therefore, everything both sides bemoan about politics under the guise of blaming it on the other party is about to get much much worse.

 

What do you mean "individual voice"? Corporations and unions are means for individuals to work together and to provide a common voice, which is fundamentally what politics is about.

And at the end of the day, that is what Citizens United was. A group of people who decided to get together for a common interest and release a video on Clinton, only to have it shut down because it used money. Is that not a great limitation of free speech?

 

And that might apply to Citizens United, but what if you are a shareholder in a corporation whose board of directors decides to support a candidate that you don't support?

 

What about it? I mean, a corporation ( and note that we're using the common definition, not the legal definition is what really matters and is what people fail to understand) can hardly be expected to accommodate all the interests of every single shareholder.

 

That is true, but personally I don't think it should apply to politics, even if politics could have an effect on a business. If the heads wants to donate to a campaign, they can donate their personal funds.

 

I do.

 

I have not done any kind of analysis of the opinion, but from what I have read, I think the opinion is correct on the Constitution. I would prefer that any group of which I am a member not get involved in elections, but groups should have the ability to make political speech. It is nice that Texas is not a battleground state so I am not as exposed to all of the ridiculous ads.

I do not think this is necessarily a libertarian/democratic/republican issue. It might be an issue of Constitutional interpretation.

 

I don't like it and think it's horrible for elections but I see why they ruled how they did.

 

Well, if you are rich you will have more voice than the average person, what is so new? That we are all equal is just some fantasy ideas people made up that sounds nice.