Dozens of news stories are telling the horrific impact of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision on 2012’s election, and we’ve barely begun. Super PACs, billionaires, and front groups for who-knows-what are the oxygen that candidates rely on for their lives. They’ll also have a chokehold on them if they are elected. Election attorney Rick Hasen has a helpful overview of where we are now after Citizens United, and the Campaign Finance Institute adds important background and valuable details. A more responsible Congress would tackle this mess not just through campaign finance regulation but through the tax code. Mega-wealthy “persons” are using tax-exempt vehicles to smash democracy, with no “social welfare” purpose as required by the tax code. It’s past time to tax these entities as predatory commercial enterprises.
Democracy NC Blog
Welcome to Democracy North Carolina’s main newsfeed. You can review all of our latest blog posts below, starting with the newest post on top, or you can visit our individual sections for more in-depth coverage:
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LOD: Two Nasties, One Target
January 31st, 2012
Here’s a strategy to simultaneously fight nasty political money and the nasty political ads they buy: Go after the broadcasters and make them pull any ad not completely substantiated with hard evidence. As a media expert explains, independent ads don’t enjoy the same protection from a broadcaster’s good-taste test as ads produced by candidates during the election season. Independent groups escape many campaign finance regulations because they’re technically not connected to the candidate. So why not use this distinction to insist that their ads get treated like non-campaign ads and are pulled when they cross the line with exaggerated claims and accusations. Here’s another strategy being tried in the high octane Senate race in Massachusetts. Sen. Scott Brown (R) and challenger Elizabeth Warren (D) have signed an unusual agreement that they will give a charity half the cost of any third-party’s ad attacking his or her opponent – and they’re telling outside groups from Karl Rove’s American Crossroads to the League of Conservation Voters to back off and let the candidates handle their own messaging, with the piles of money their raising themselves. Definitely a model worth watching.
LOD: Pope’s Blessing
January 26th, 2012
An editorial writer for the Raleigh News & Observer handed Art Pope a bevy of compliments for his “humanitarian” philanthropy, extolling the list of “charities and universities the Pope Foundation blessed with $1.2 million in grants last year.” Alliance Medical Ministries – $10,000; Barium Springs Home for Children – $10,000; Blessed Sacrament School – $10,000; etc. The writer, Burgetta Wheeler, managed this sweet story by cherry picking from the list of foundation recipients and committing the “one dimensional” journalism she ascribes to Pope’s detractors. Here’s a link to the complete list (pp. 20-23). A balanced story would have noted that the Pope Foundation gave a whopping $1.35 million to the strident rightwing group Americans for Prosperity in the same fiscal year, more than the combined total of Wheeler’s featured grantees. Or how does Pope’s giving to the goody-good list compare to one gift for college sports – $1,000,000 to UNC’s Rams Club, cleverly named The Educational Foundation Inc. Other unmentionables for the year: John Locke Foundation – $2.6 million; Civitas Institute – $1.2 million; NC Institute for Constitutional Law – $710,000; Pope Center for Higher Education – $542,800; NC Family Policy Council – $100,000; Job Creators Alliance – $100,000; NC Free Enterprise Foundation – $95,000; Heritage Foundation – $50,000. To shore up the foundation’s cash flow, Art and sister Amanda each donated $3.5 million, presumably from their share of earnings from Variety Wholesalers (Roses, Maxway, Super Dollar). An LOD account of previous foundation donations is here.
LOD: Mike Easley’s Money
January 23rd, 2012
For those of you fascinated by the strange behavior of former Gov. Mike Easley, Don Carrington of the Carolina Journal has a new piece that examines Easley’s finances after his felony conviction, with an appropriate question: How can he move hundreds of thousands of dollars around and still not pay a dime toward the $90,000-plus fine that the Mike Easley Committee owes the State Board of Elections – that’s the fine Easley says he accepts personal responsibility for, but why doesn’t he pay it? The fine was levied in the same case where Democracy North Carolina filed a complaint against the NC Democratic Party for acting as an illegal conduit of money meant for the Mike Easley Committee, with supplement documentation to highlight the abuse. The Party forked over thousands of dollars as a result, and the Mike Easley Committee was also found guilty of benefitting from undisclosed airplane flights. Even though Democracy North Carolina filed this complaint against the Democratic Party (and the earlier one that triggered the state and federal investigation into Jim Black), some Republicans still say we’re a front for the Democratic Party whenever we criticize their practices. Go figure.
LOD: Small Biz Opposes CU Decision
January 18th, 2012
A trio of small business federations today released a survey showing that two thirds of small business owners across the nation believe the Citizens United decision gives big corporations an unfair advantage over them. The Supreme Court decision from January 2010 allows businesses to spend unlimited amounts from their treasury to tell people how to vote. “America’s entrepreneurs feel corporations have an outsized role and say in politics to the detriment of the small business community,” said John Arensmeyer, founder and CEO of Small Business Majority. The Supreme Court’s narrow 5-to-4 majority said campaign spending doesn’t win corporations political friends, or intimidate their enemies, because it must be “independent” of the candidate and can not be given directly to the candidate’s campaign. “Small business owners aren’t stupid,” countered Melanie Collins, owner of Melanie’s Home Childcare in Falmouth, Maine. “We know who wins when corporate heavy hitters can spend all the money they want, as secretively as they want, to influence our country’s elections – and it’s not us.” The survey also shows that by a margin of 7-to-1, small business owners think money plays a negative role in politics.
LOD: Corporations Are Not People
January 17th, 2012
The landmark Citizens United v. FEC decision, which gave corporations the political speech rights of people, will celebrate its second anniversary on January 21; its impact only grows worse each day. Jeff Clements has written a great book titled Corporations Are Not People that traces the shocking history of how business interests gained the rights of “we the people.” (Hint: The tobacco industry and its attorneys were deeply involved.) Here’s a link to a lively hour-long video interview with Jeff at a Demos breakfast last week. The book has its own valuable website with a very short video of Jeff with Dylan Ratigan of MSNBC, plus good pieces about “What the corporate takeover of the Constitution means to you,” who’s fighting back, and more.
LOD: Pope v. PopeExposed On the Air
January 14th, 2012
Art Pope is going on the radio this Sunday for a two-hour faceoff with Chris Kromm, director of the Institute for Southern Studies and creator of ArtPopeExposed.com. Pope wants to answer his critics and respond to questions from the listening audience. The call-in show is on Raleigh’s Rush Radio 106.1 FM from 3 to 5 PM, but the hosts (publishers of Spectacular Magazine) are civil-rights advocates who don’t fit the usual talk-radio profile. Tune in and ask a question or listen on the web by following the link at this site.
LOD: Green Votes in Raleigh, 2011
January 12th, 2012
How did your state legislator perform in 2011? What effect did Art Pope’s money machine have on state policy? Here’s an answer to both questions: A scorecard of key votes to protect NC’s environmental resources reveals that the current crop of lawmakers in Raleigh achieved the worst grades in decades. The new majority killed bills they perceived as elevating any value above greed. Just say you’re doing it for Jobs or Private Property Rights and slash away. The legislators backed by Art Pope’s money showed even more hostility to environmental issues than their colleagues. As a group, they got less than half the score of the average legislator, pulling down the entire General Assembly (and the state) with their kneejerk hatred of business regulation and investment in public resources.
LOD: Election Officials Nix New Maps
January 11th, 2012
A press release today from Democracy North Carolina begins: Statements from election officials across the state provide new reasons for concern about the controversial district lines that zigzag through and split up hundreds of precincts to create the new district boundaries for state legislators and North Carolina’s 13 members of Congress. The election professionals are not taking sides on whether or not the new district maps discriminate against African Americans or give one political party an unfair advantage over the other. However, in affidavits filed with the Wake County Superior Court, the officials say the maps will confuse voters and poll workers, make elections harder and more expensive to administer, and even jeopardize the secrecy of the ballot for thousands of voters. The press release has links to the affidavits.
LOD: One Reason for Delay
January 10th, 2012
Nonprofit groups, including Democracy North Carolina, are asking a three-judge panel to push back the 2012 election schedule while the judges consider the merits of their challenge to the Republican redistricting plans for General Assembly and Congressional districts in North Carolina. Rather than use the plans in a May primary that could be postponed, it’s better to decide if the plans are as obnoxious and unconstitutional as the nonprofits and a group of Democratic plaintiffs claim. The motion for a preliminary injunction was filed Friday and could be heard as early as this week when the judges convene on another aspect of the case. Our side – the plaintiffs challenging the plans – filed 380 pages of affidavits in support of the motion. Among the many reasons to overturn the plans, several county elections officials say the new plans slice up too many precincts with zigzagging district lines, putting voters in the same neighborhood in multiple varieties of different political districts. That will create confusion among voters and poll workers and elevate the risks of tainted elections that have to be rerun. Our affidavit provides loads of data to make the point, summarized briefly in a letter-to-the-editor about split precincts. One point in our affidavit not in the letter explains the threat to secret ballots from carving a little slice out of a precinct and placing it in a different political district (see paragraphs 35-36).
LOD: Big Apple Shines
January 6th, 2012
New York is stepping up to challenge corporate control of elections. New York City already has a pioneering public financing program for its municipal elections. On Wednesday, it joined a growing list of cities by adopting a resolution calling on Congress to start the process for amending the U.S. Constitution to say corporations don’t have the rights of natural persons. Meanwhile, in Albany, Gov. Andrew Cuomo included a robust call for public campaign financing in his State of the State speech. His backing, fulfilling a 2010 campaign pledge, and the pro-reform NY House make the Empire State the likely epicenter for expanding Voter-Owned Elections programs in 2012. A host of nonprofit groups have been working in the state for years; their efforts are paying off.
LOD: Veto Override Votes
January 5th, 2012
Gov. Perdue called the General Assembly back to town yesterday to give the legislature its constitutional opportunity to override her veto of the bill killing the Racial Justice Act. The state House couldn’t muster the votes to do that (at least 60% of those voting must approve), but rather than go home as promised in an agreement with Democrats, the Republican leadership then spent hours plotting a series of maneuvers to take up other bills vetoed by Perdue. At nearly 1 AM this morning, the House overrode her veto of a bill to strip the teachers’ association of its right to use the payroll check-off system to collect dues for the NCAE; state employees in SEANC were not targeted for similar action. Two Democrats joined the Republicans in the 69-45 vote, but one or both would not go along with override votes planned for the photo ID bill and a bill to authorize fracking in North Carolina – so the House finally adjourned until February 16. The surprises, broken promises, and outrage are captured in this reporting by Laura Leslie/WRAL and the video of a Democratic press conference around 1:30 AM.
LOD: MT Judges Slam US Supremes
January 3rd, 2012
As the second anniversary of Citizens United approaches (Jan. 21), the corruption flowing from that decision is becoming more apparent. The Supreme Court declared that independent groups can not corrupt the political process, but the dominant role of Super PACs in the Republican primary is just the latest evidence that their decision was based on bias, not fact. Now another court has stepped up to tell the Supremes exactly that. The Montana Supreme Court rejected the Citizens United ruling, saying the evidence shows that independent spenders can and do wield enough influence to corrupt politics. “Organizations like WTP [a corporate political group] that act as a conduit for anonymously spending by others represent a threat to the political marketplace,” wrote Mike McGrath, Chief Justice of the Montana Supreme Court, for the majority. “Clearly the impact of unlimited corporate donations creates a dominating impact on the political process and inevitably minimizes the impact of individual citizens.” Even the dissenting judges in the 5-2 decision upholding Montana law denounced the US Supreme Court. “While, as a member of this Court, I am bound to follow Citizens United, I do not have to agree with the [U.S.] Supreme Court’s decision,” wrote Justice James C. Nelson, in his dissent. “And, to be absolutely clear, I do not agree with it. For starters, the notion that corporations are disadvantaged in the political realm is unbelievable. Indeed, it has astounded most Americans. The truth is that corporations wield enormous power in Congress and in state legislatures. It is hard to tell where government ends and corporate America begins: the transition is seamless and overlapping.” If the Montana case gets a fair hearing on appeal at the Supreme Court, it will completely expose that majority’s hypocrisy and corruption of judicial duty.
LOD: Wisdom for a New Year
January 2nd, 2012
Maybe you have a holiday today. Here’s a good way to spend a few minutes or a couple hours: A C-SPAN video interview exposing the global wisdom and deep morality of Chris Hedge as he peels back the layers of a sick and sinister empire. He puts his faith in the power of movements, not electoral politics, but many of his examples highlight the necessity of both, especially to pressure substantial change.
LOD: Dominatrix of the Year
December 31st, 2011
Two commentaries close out the year, each describing a way big money shapes our lives. Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor, reviews the year with a focus on why Congressional decisions are so out of touch with real needs. Jesse Jackson looks at what’s getting covered over by big money in the presidential campaign.
