Save Our Democracy

Submitted by Bob Fertik on January 27, 2010 - 10:33am
13942 of 100000 people have signed this petition.
Background

BERJAYA
In January, five radical Republicans on the Supreme Court overturned 100 years of American law.

They gave huge corporations a Constitutional right to spend unlimited amounts of money to elect candidates at all levels, from Mayor to President.

As President Obama declared in his State of the Union address, this ruling "will open the floodgates for special interests – including foreign corporations – to spend without limit in our elections. I don't think American elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities. They should be decided by the American people."

In 2009, the Chamber of Commerce spent $145 million to defeat healthcare and global warming laws - twice as much as the Democratic Party. In November, they could spend 10 or 100 times as much simply to defeat all Democrats.

This radical ruling could destroy American Democracy if we do not act in time for this November's elections. Please join our nationwide movement to keep Corporations out of politics.

Sign the petition

Lobby Firm Tells Clients How To Sway Elections While Avoiding 'Public Scrutiny'

Submitted by davidswanson on February 17, 2010 - 4:58pm

TPMMuckraker looks at the strategizing going on in the corporate world on how to funnel buckets of cash through middlemen like the US Chamber of Commerce:

In the wake of last month's Citizens United ruling, a powerhouse Washington lobbying firm is informing its corporate clients on how they can use middlemen like the Chamber of Commerce to pour unlimited amounts of money into political campaigns, while maintaining "sufficient cover" to avoid "public scrutiny" and negative media coverage.

Cheney's Crimes and Confessions

Submitted by davidswanson on February 17, 2010 - 4:44pm

By David Swanson

Dick Cheney's statutory crimes are notable for their severity, their number, and his public confessions to them.  Torture is the least of it.

We can start with the crimes found in the three articles of impeachment contained in H Res 333 in the 110th Congress:

1. "Cheney has purposely manipulated the intelligence process to deceive the citizens and Congress of the United States by fabricating a threat of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction to justify the use of the United States Armed Forces against the nation of Iraq in a manner damaging to our national security interests, to wit:" (H Res 333 goes on to list evidence).

Here Comes Single-Payer Healthcare in Another State

Submitted by davidswanson on February 17, 2010 - 1:55pm

A bill to create single-payer healthcare in California has passed that state's senate for the third time now.  Californians just need to persuade a governor to sign it.  Single-payer healthcare bills are advancing in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Minnesota, Massachusetts, and a growing list of states, including New Mexico, where State Senator Jerry Ortiz y Pino, a long-time supporter of single-payer healthcare, is running for Lieutenant Governor.

Now North Carolina house candidate Marcus Brandon has pledged to introduce a bill to create single-payer healthcare in that state.  Brandon, whom I know and like and who worked for Congressman Dennis Kucinich's 2008 presidential campaign, is a candidate in North Carolina House District 60.  That's near Greensboro, where I can just picture Marcus sitting at a lunch counter and refusing to be provoked.

Best of the Blogs

Submitted by davidswanson on February 17, 2010 - 10:50am

The White House yet again refuses to say it will not torture. As it has done before. And people still wonder why it won't allow the enforcement of laws against the previous "administration."

Who has been the biggest force opposing law enforcement against the biggest criminals? Rahm Emanuel of course.

Marcy Wheeler has a dozen updates on her site to this original post on the post-Fourth-Amendment FBI.

But hope springs eternal and Daphne Eviatar still believes the DOJ might release the phony sexed-down OPR report some day.

Maybe? Maybe? Maybe Progressives Really Earn The Scorn Everyone Seems To Hold Them In! says DownWithTyranny!

But not always: Marcy Winograd Keynotes The Southern California Junior State Convention

Steven Hill does the FireDogLake book salon.

Virginia voted down Creigh Deeds but got guns in bars anyway.

 The United States has a hard time now in calling places like Iran dictatorships without those places calling the United States a dictatorship.  Of course, the Teabaggers now agree with Iran, just as liberal Americans would have a year and a half ago.

 

 

 

Poll Finds Virtually Everyone Opposes "Citizens United" Ruling

Submitted by davidswanson on February 17, 2010 - 10:33am

By Dan Eggen, Washington Post

 

Americans of both parties overwhelmingly oppose a Supreme Court ruling that allows corporations and unions to spend as much as they want on political campaigns, and most favor new limits on such spending, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

Eight in 10 poll respondents say they oppose the high court's Jan. 21 decision to allow unfettered corporate political spending, with 65 percent "strongly" opposed. Nearly as many backed congressional action to curb the ruling, with 72 percent in favor of reinstating limits.

The poll reveals relatively little difference of opinion on the issue among Democrats (85 percent opposed to the ruling), Republicans (76 percent) and independents (81 percent).

Senator Kerry Describes the Amendment He Wants

Submitted by davidswanson on February 16, 2010 - 7:06pm

From an Op-Ed by Senator John Kerry in Politico:

"The ruling presents at least two challenges: first, to mediate the impact through immediate countermeasures and, second, to think boldly about the best way to free our democracy from the dominance of big money. Some reform ideas already circulating are promising — ideas like mandating shareholder approval of political spending, prohibiting spending by subsidiaries of foreign corporations and government contractors, and giving candidates prime-time access to the public airwaves at the lowest rates.

"But we need to think bigger. We need a constitutional amendment to make it clear, once and for all, that corporations do not have the same free-speech rights as individuals do."

Senator Tom Udall to Call a Point of Order to Throw Out the Filibuster Rule

Submitted by davidswanson on February 16, 2010 - 5:07pm

Senator Tom Udall of New Mexico has put an honest description of the antidemocratic filibuster rule on his website.

According to Jon Walker at FireDogLake Udall plans to call a point of order at the start of the next Congress to eliminate the filibuster rule.

This is the real solution that we need (although not all experts agree it has to wait for the start of a session), not asking the Vice President pretty please to declare the rule unconstitutional as Thomas Geoghegan suggests or supporting a filibusterable bill or pushing for a vote of -- even worse -- 67 senators (see the FireDogLake link above).

The filibuster rule just isn't very popular among those who know what it is.  Recently Pew found that 26% of Americans knew how many votes were needed to get around a filibuster. Zogby reports that 32% want to get rid of that anti-democratic blockage.

And these two polls were probably looking at samples of the same population, given Zogby's findings confirming vast ignorance: Only 34% knew Republicans use the filibuster more. Only 28% knew the House represented public opinion better than the Senate.

Two weeks after those polls came out, a CBS/New York Times poll found that 50% want the filibuster rule thrown out.  At that rate of increase, we should be at 100% by April.  But it all depends how the pollster asks the question.  This one asked if people would prefer simple majority rule to minority rule by 41 senators.  The Zogby poll asked people whether the filibuster rule was undemocratic rather than pointing that fact out to them.

Chris Bowers at Open Left has a whip list of Senators willing to throw out the filibuster rule.  Get whipping!

 

2/17 Brownbaggers Not Teabaggers

Submitted by Bob Fertik on February 14, 2010 - 10:23am

Brownbaggers Not TeabaggersBush's Great Recession has already caused deep cuts in crucial state and local programs from coast to coast. Now it is forcing cuts in Congress too.

But instead of cutting massively wasteful military spending, President Obama and Democratic "leaders" are pushing a record $708 billion Pentagon budget, including $160 billion for the never-ending wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

If you think Democratic "leaders" should spend our tax dollars on healthcare not warfare, there's an exciting new grassroots movement you can join: the Brownbaggers!

Last month, there were 22 Brownbag Vigils outside Congressional district offices. This Wednesday, that number will grow to 50 - and even more if you help organize one near you.

It's time to start a grassroots revolution to demand the change we voted for in 2006 and 2008.

Bob Fertik

p.s. We are also working to reverse the Supreme Court's decision in January to let corporations spend unlimited sums to buy politicians. If you haven't yet signed, please pledge to Save Our Democracy:
http://democrats.com/save-our-democracy