"A black sheriff?!": The Official Topic of Obama and New Era American Politics

[Himu]

edit: wrong thread

[Human Snorenado]

No, what were corporations back in the day is what I'm trying to get at.  Could anyone have reasonably mistaken them for a person back then?  Could anyone have reasonably thought they deserved or warranted the same rights and protections that actual people did?

[Dickie Dee]

If Malek or anyone else who's qualified wants to smack me down a bit here, I'd more than welcome it.

I don't have a clue what's going on in the States; I have more than enough English and Canadian cases to read.

Useless Canadian Perspective: The Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that corporations do have freedom of expression. The Canadian Charter, however, was written well after the idea of corporate personhood had been accepted into British and Canadian law. The Court has also interpreted all Charter rights very broadly and liberally. It has ruled that soliciting is a protected form of expression. It has, in dicta, even said that illegal parking can be a form expression. So protecting corporate expression isn't much of a stretch.

The Supreme Court has never really had to seriously grapple with the issue because they can rely of Section One of the Canadian Charter, which allows the government to limit Charter rights, as long as those limits are reasonable. This has, imo, allowed the Court to grant corporations freedom of expression without worrying about the consequences: The government can limit corporate speech, which it has constantly, and the Supreme Court then say the limitation is reasonable. Furthermore, the Court has said that commercial speech is less worthy of protection than other speech (this had no basis in law; it was a purely normative judgment on the part of the Majority).

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I do realize that none of the above was the least bit helpful.

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Sound like a bunch of wishy-washy fags

[Flannel Boy]

It's the Canadian way.

[Dickie Dee]

i actually have an ex who's PoliSci PhD thesis was about how the modern Canadian charter left some gaping holes that made the supreme court have to step in and "legislate from the bench" even though they really didn't want to

[Flannel Boy]

i actually have an ex who's PoliSci PhD thesis was about how the modern Canadian charter left some gaping holes that made the supreme court have to step in and "legislate from the bench" even though they really didn't want to

That's bullshit. All The Supreme Court needs to do is ascertain the intent of the founding fathers--and, maybe pick up a dictionary--that's it.

Seriously, I'm shocked that merited a PhD thesis. The Charter, like all constitutions, is written in sparse general language; The Court had no choice but to fill in the gaps. Plus, a lot of existing laws conflicted with The Charted once The Charter came into effect.

[Dickie Dee]

i actually have an ex who's PoliSci PhD thesis was about how the modern Canadian charter left some gaping holes that made the supreme court have to step in and "legislate from the bench" even though they really didn't want to

That's bullshit. All The Supreme Court needs to do is ascertain the intent of the founding fathers--and, maybe pick up a dictionary--that's it.

Seriously, I'm shocked that merited a PhD thesis. The Charter, like all constitutions, is written in sparse general language; The Court had no choice but to fill in the gaps. Plus, a lot of existing laws conflicted with The Charted once The Charter came into effect.

I dunno if I was acurately describing what she was getting at but that was the general gist of what I took away. I think the last sentence is mostly where she was coming from, establishing a new legal foundation onto an already mature and stable society had a bit of unintended consiquences

[brawndolicious]

Picking cotton with black people?

Picking cotton

(Image removed from quote.)

So the corporations were originally WHITE WOMEN.  No voting, no land ownership, and no political donations.

[AdmiralViscen]

conclusion? There is no reason for a thinking individual to respond to you any longer, as you are likely to bail out at any moment and leave the burden on them to keep track of it all. Fuck off.

This is EB, dude. Who the fuck makes an effort to try to meet the basic standards of debate?

you go above and beyond.
 

[Van Cruncheon]

the government isn't composed of people, of course; rather, it's a terrible violation of nature

[Mandark]

The law limited speech, which was the no-no.

The majority ruling states that the association of the speaker is not grounds for censorship, that said censorship laws violate the First.  Corporations are not given special status or special regard in this ruling.

When you say corporate personhood means "a court can extend certain legal rights and protections to corporations in the same way those rights and protections apply to persons, even if the text of the law does not," well there's an obvious counter to that.  Chiefly, the text of the law, does not limit freedom of speech, nor does it state who is given free speech.  The text of the law forbids our legislative branch from passing laws that are restrictive of free speech.

The ruling doesn't care whether or not corporations are people, or rather, "people."  The First Amendment doesn't draw a distinction that would make such a question material.

Okay, look.

1)  The concept of corporate personhood is NOT about whether a corporation is a person.

2)  The concept of corporate personhood is about the extent to which legal rights can or can't be extended to corporations.

3)  The CU case revolved around a question of how far 1st Am. protections protect corporate speech.

4)  The CU case was about corporate personhood.

4a)  This is true INDEPENDENT OF WHETHER YOU AGREE OR DISAGREE WITH THE RULING.


Take a moment and go back to read my posts.  You'll notice (I hope) that I haven't said a damn thing about whether or not the case was decided properly, or about my own opinion of corporate personhood.  The point I've been trying to get across isn't that it's good or bad or whatever, just that corporate personhood is central to the CU ruling, and as such you shouldn't mock people who say so.

For now, I'm not saying it's good or bad or whatever.  I went out of my way to link to some libertarians defending the idea so that this would get through, but apparently it didn't so I'm trying to be as clear as possible.



Malek:  Not helpful, but still interesting.  I can feel like I learned something today, and at some point in the future I'll casually mention this stuff as if I just happen to analyze different legal systems in my spare time.  People will fail to be duly impressed.

GS:  I actually think the dynamic here is just like the one with you and the Titanic/melodrama business.  I also think that Titanic fits not just the classic definition of a melodrama ("popular romances that depicted a virtuous individual (usually a woman) or couple (usually lovers) victimized by repressive and inequitable social circumstances, particularly those involving marriage") but also the common one (manipulative schmaltz).

[The Fake Shemp]

the government isn't composed of people, of course; rather, it's a terrible violation of nature

Is this stole from anywhere? If not, you're getting credit for its inclusion down the line.

[Stoney Mason]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/26/paterson-wont-run-in-2010_n_478077.html

lulz

[Phoenix Dark]

so can spitzer get his job back plz

[Flannel Boy]

P.P.S. Yikes at Canada, per usual, though that was informative.  Can you give us an example of how they've employed that "reasonable" clause with regards to, say, freedom of speech?

Section One is governed by the Oakes test, which is applied by a court after a claimant has proven that one of his or her rights has been violated.

The government needs to first show it is addressing a pressing and substantial objective (almost anything counts!), then it needs to show, on a balance of probabilities, that the means employed are proportional (rationally connected to the object with a minimal impairment to rights).

To answer your question, the Supreme Court has found that the following were reasonable limits on expression: obscenity and hate speech laws;  limits on election spending; and bans on tobacco advertisement and advertisements geared to young children in Quebec.

[Mandark]

yes, they are extended protection, but that is because they are a subset of well, all speakers whom Congress has no right to limit in this regard - namely, everyone.

But that's basically the definition of corporate personhood!  The idea that corporations are not excluded from enjoying certain constitutional rights!  Have I not been clear?

You seem to believe that the text of the ruling would include some phrase like "as Citizens United is a person" or "as a factor of its personhood" or "the Court has wished upon the star, and now the complainant is a real boy!" and that because it doesn't, it must not be applying that concept.  That's not how it works.

1)  The concept of corporate personhood is NOT about whether a corporation is a person.

I mean, was this unclear?  I don't know how to rephrase it any better.

[Mandark]

hahaha, I *knew* you were gonna go with "well, by the broad definition you're using..." bit.

I'm using the definition that's used in the legal profession, as best I can understand it.

You're using a definition you seem to have made up yourself, and then insulted people for not applying that definition correctly.  That is what bugs me.

[Mupepe]

founder's intent only applies to guns.

and rightfully so.

<3 guns <3

[Flannel Boy]

I must say, though, that if the concept of corporate personhood is wholly unrelated to whether a corporation is a person, it's not really well named, is it?  And you well know the way our government wields personhood is already a matter of concern for me.

corporate personhood =/= human personhood. Corporate personhood is just a useful legal construct allowing corporations to be treated as artificial persons for specific purposes (to hire employees, agree to contracts, purchase property, pay taxes, and, originally, shield shareholders from liability). In other words, the personhood is--or at least was--limited to specific contexts.

[Mandark]

I'm using the definition that's used in the legal profession, as best I can understand it.

And you think I wasn't?

Nope.

I think you tried to suss out the meaning based on the definitions of the individual words in its name.  That is what you did, isn't it?

[Mandark]

Oh, where did you get your definition then?

[Mandark]

...

[Oblivion]

Oh, man this is just priceless. I've mentioned my birther roommate before. The thing that's been bothering me about him for months is that he's got a vehement hatred of liberals. Now, that by itself would have been just fine if it wasn't for the fact that he's a drug using, pro-gay marriage atheist, among other things. So I made a list of roughly ~25 questions, some general, some specific, to see where he officially stood on the political spectrum, and maybe he had a host of other issues that he sided with the repubs on to a much greater extent. From the ~25 questions or so, there were only 3 that he sided with republican philosophy:

-abortion
-gun rights
-feelings toward the military

I was surprised at abortion, but I didn't press him too much on the issue. For the second one, apparently he hates the fact that Obama opposes assault rifles (he doesn't), and that if he could, Obama would totally repeal the second amendment. When I pressed him on why he thought that, he said he heard that he was the most liberal senator in the senate.

But the real fun began with issue no. 3. The specific question I asked was: Would you be in favor of increased funding for the troops by closing tax loopholes on the very wealthy? He said no. Mind you, this is from a guy who was in the fucking army for 4 years!

However, as amusing and confounding as that was, the highlight of the night was when we started discussing how the military is treated by both political parties. He says that he hates liberals/democrats because they're not patriotic at all and they're the ones that 'spat on soldiers' coming home from Vietnam. He then went on to talk about how at a funeral he attended for another soldier a few years ago, there appeared to be protesters that showed up with signs that said "Thank god for I.E.D.s" and other inflammatory language. Who were these protesters? Apparently some group that called themselves the 'Liberal Church". Now, I thought that was kind of weird, what with "liberal church" sounding like an oxymoron, but I still decided to go and check out who these douchebags were. After much searching on the google, I was continuously led back to the same group. I tried to make sure I wasn't confusing them with someone else and saw if there were other hate groups with an evil liberal agenda, but alas, didn't turn out to be the case. Same signs, same location he mentioned, same everything. So who was this "liberal church"? Turns out it was the Westboro Baptist Church. The same one that's headed by - wait for it - Fred fucking Phelps.

Since my roommate had absolutely no problem with painting all liberals with the same brush due to this one incident, logically he will denounce all things right wing at this point as well, right?

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[Van Cruncheon]

with the majority of my idiot gender in this country, the fundamental problem is that the word "liberal" is deeply associated with the word "pussy" in their minds. republicans and conservatives own angry, vengeful, hypermasculine rhetoric, and as a result, many duders will reject self-identification as liberal out of fear of being considered a total wuss. yay, identity politics!

personally, i think more ought to be done to associate conservatives with knuckle-dragging, kid-diddlin', illiterate hill folk, but stupid pussy liberals keep acting like we should play nice -- the pussies.

[Dickie Dee]

I honestly don't know why conservatives aren't mocked more as giant pussies for demanding the entire country stop and assume the fetal position everytime a brown person from the middle east says "boo".

[Mandark]

Hey, the knuckle-dragging, kid-diddlin', illiterate hill folk vote Democratic, at least in West Virginia.

I'm all for defecating on the GOP brand, but I'd hate to further stigmatize any lower class communities doing it.  Cause you know, pussy liberalism and stuff.

Besides, it's probably more effective/accurate to paint them as callous, moneyed assholes.

[Van Cruncheon]

yeah, but male voters WANT to be callous, moneyed assholes. fuck, i want to be one, too, but my librul pussiness holds me back! our heroes are like gordon gekko, not gandhi.

[Mandark]

Yeah, I realized that after I hit post.

At least most of the country still hates the pampered heirs of industry, even if we spend a good chunk of money on magazines telling us who they're schtupping and how they got ready for bikini season using just three rules.  Sigh.

[Stoney Mason]

I think in this society for various reasons "conservative" and "liberal" have different connotations even when you divorce the politics from it. "Liberal" has a connotation of overly permissive. And "conservative" has a more positive connection/connotation in this country based on tradition and stability.

Then when you add in the political equation, Liberals were never able to overcome the stigma of the word from the 70's and 80's.

Whenever you poll people based on how they self identify Conservative always is the most common political choice. However when you  generally poll based on the actual positions of these ideologies, liberals policies tend to do just as well and better than conservative policies. People in general are a victim to connotation and perception rather than reality. Nothing new there.

[AdmiralViscen]

In what way does the first sentence fail to identify modern conservatives?

[Van Cruncheon]

well, how about gawping shitheel homeschooled jesus freaks, then? 'cuz when someone self-identifies as a Republican, i think of three things:

1) a barely educated, reactionary hillbilly
2) a moralizing evangelist
3) a confused randroid teenager

as for being elitist, i believe everyone should strive for elitism! if you call me an elitist, it's already an acknowledgment that i am looking down on you and that you should cede all future authority in discussions to me lest you find your inferior position justified. "elitist" is the equivalent of "teabagger" for filthy socialists like me; it's something we WANT to be called!

and what's money? are you happier or more secure because you have more? i got a fair bit through the result of my bootstrappin' american git-up-an'-go, and i'm no happier at $200K/yr then i was at $20K/yr, because the acquisition of capital has never been the central joy of my life. i'd rather a healthy chunk of my money go to placate the little people and let me get on with the business of being elite, rather than suggesting they eat cake, senator bunning style, and then having them light me up because the cake was a lie, lol portal, etc etc

but i do enjoy guns just in case social services can't buy 'em off. mmm, coercion. it just amazes me how libertarians don't understand human nature; it's no wonder most of them are just noisy failures.

[Human Snorenado]

I think what Prole is trying to say is

[Mandark]

Libertarians, insofar as they buy into public choice theory and hardcore neoclassical economics, don't believe in human nature, so much as they do a completely bowdlerized version of it designed to fit mathematical models.

[Van Cruncheon]

bububububu selfishness is a virtue! sociopathy is admirable! empathy is the degeneracy of the species!

[Mandark]

You don't really believe that JD.  You just pretend to believe it because you think it will get you richer in the long run.

[Van Cruncheon]

yet somehow, we are among the most social of creatures

[Mandark]

Apparently "self interest is human nature" really means "self interest alone is the sum total of all human emotions and thought".

[Van Cruncheon]

i was gonna post that, but i figured we'd get into one of those weird libertard self-justification games where they decide to do something disingenuous and pseudoalgorithmic, like enumerating and ranking human principles

[ToxicAdam]

When ideologues collide, we all lose.

Poli-bore: A thread of public masturbation to imaginary ideals.

[Van Cruncheon]

perhaps in his hippy-dippy socialist utopia

[ToxicAdam]

I could go through the last 60 posts of Somedude, drakesfortune and Diablos and glean more information than I have learned in the past three pages.

[Human Snorenado]

TA has apparently found some magical internet forum where concensus building is the name of the game.

I bet on that forum John McCain is still a well respected, independent minded legislator instead of a grouchy, vindictive senile old bitch.

[ToxicAdam]

And yet you still read.

\

I wish I had that much time to waste. I skim and pray for someone posting relevant information to today's world.

[Van Cruncheon]

And yet you still read.

\

I wish I had that much time to waste. I skim and pray for someone posting relevant information to today's world.

perhaps you can graduate to the huffpo in a couple years

[Mandark]

When ideologues collide, we all lose.

Poli-bore: A thread of public masturbation to imaginary ideals.

If those ideals can include a vaguely defined self-congratulatory centrism, you're leading the pack.  Just saying, yo.

[Dickie Dee]

I dunno - when you find yourself descending into an argument about natural rights with JayDubya you might be wanking on the side of angels, but wanking nonetheless

[Stoney Mason]

All political conversations basically devolve into the same repeating shit and patterns. Which is why I treat it like a sports thread. In that sense political threads are fun and fine.

[ToxicAdam]

Rangel gets slap on the wrist for ethics violations.

You would have thought the signs and materials from Citigroup, Pfizer, American Airlines, AT&T, Verizon, Macy's and IBM plastered around the 2008 conference in St. Maarten would have provided a clue that corporate money was involved. But apparently Rangel was clueless. His response to the ethics committee's admonishment? (Rangel) criticized the committee and blamed his staff. "Common sense dictates that members of Congress should not be held responsible for what could be the wrongdoing or mistakes or errors of staff," he said. What a stand-up guy.

http://www.courant.com/news/politics/sns-ap-us-ethics-rangel,0,4039517.story


20 term representative.   10 terms too long.

[Mandark]

Term limits!  Earmarks!  Frank Luntz!  etc.

[ToxicAdam]

perhaps you can graduate to the huffpo in a couple years

Maybe I could join you then ...

http://www.evilbore.com/forum/index.php?topic=7213.0

[Van Cruncheon]

perhaps you could

perhaps

 

[Human Snorenado]

Term limits!  Earmarks!  Frank Luntz!  etc.

Deficits!  Spending!  Center-right nation!

[Mandark]

Getting this back on track:




Note that those are percentages of conservatives who want to cut those programs, not of the population at large.

This pretty well dovetails with Prole's repeated observation that most of the people demanding less spending have absolutely no clue about the composition of the federal budget.  Foreign aid is the money that falls out of Social Security's wallet and the State Department finds beneath the sofa cushions a month later.

The hobbyhorses of soi-disant deficit hawks (funding for the arts, foreign aid, earmarked spending, welfare) is a miniscule part of the overall budget, and an even tinier part of future obligations.  It's like they believe that the cost of a program is directly proportional to their own sputtering outrage at that program's existence.

[Phoenix Dark]

I was gonna post that. It was kinda shocking at first, but after a few minutes it makes sense.

[Stoney Mason]

Getting this back on track:

(Image removed from quote.)


Note that those are percentages of conservatives who want to cut those programs, not of the population at large.

This pretty well dovetails with Prole's repeated observation that most of the people demanding less spending have absolutely no clue about the composition of the federal budget.  Foreign aid is the money that falls out of Social Security's wallet and the State Department finds beneath the sofa cushions a month later.

The hobbyhorses of soi-disant deficit hawks (funding for the arts, foreign aid, earmarked spending, welfare) is a miniscule part of the overall budget, and an even tinier part of future obligations.  It's like they believe that the cost of a program is directly proportional to their own sputtering outrage at that program's existence.

It's always easy to demagogue on those welfare queens and sending aid when "hard working Americans™" are out of jobs!

Most conservative politicians get deathly silent when it comes to things like social security or defense spending because they don't want to lose elderly votes and being a war hawk always plays well to certain parts of America. To be fair Democrats have also chickened out when it comes to things like the defense budget because its a votes loser. Sad.

[Mandark]

The other takeaway is how much more popular "aid to the poor" is than "welfare programs".

We've got a damn uninformed electorate, and practically the only reason I'm not a follower of Walter Lippmann is cause I don't trust the governing class either.

[Mandark]

Posting this here to try to keep it from derailing the outside link thread too badly.

Privately owned companies shouldn't be punished legally for discriminating against employees and customers.

Ok, have you ever lived in an area that has its fair share of racist attitudes?  Like the South?  Have you ever stopped to think that if there are enough racist/apathetic people in an area to support a business than an essential necessary service for daily functioning could be denied to someone because of skin color?  This person should have to relocate because of someone's ignorance?

I was gonna post something, but it was sprawling pretty badly.  Luckily MCGrammar said it instead, and way more concisely.

The practical libertarian argument against anti-discrimination laws is that things would work out, as people would boycott openly racist businesses and the competition would benefit from serving, hiring, and promoting the wronged minorities.  Invisible hand!  But that doesn't work if the dominant chunk of the community is mostly racist and has all the wealth.

In that scenario, the boycott gets turned around where businesses can lose a lot of money by doing the right thing.  Besides, being systematically cut off from access to capital prevents the minority community from effectively creating their own wealth.  People won't be able to boostrap themselves up as a group under those conditions.

The irony is that if it seems plausible that anti-discrimination laws aren't needed in 2010, it's thanks to the civil rights movement that got those laws on the books in the first place.

[recursivelyenumerable]

The poor are white, welfare programs are for blacks

I dunno why "soi-disant" gets to be in the English language.  What does it add to the perfectly good "self-styled", other than possibly providing Satoshi Kanazawa with more material?

[Mandark]

I find that tossing in some French adds a certain I don't know what.

[Mandark]

A certain joy of life, if you will.