The post rightly points out that Citizen United is one of the cornerstones of contemporary American politics and the continued success of Trumpism.
Regrettably, when a law is enacted to make existing laws meaningless, there appears to be no legal path to undo it.
There is no “law” that was passed to enable Citizens United, it was a court case that was interpreted in a stupid way that enabled all of the current political happenings to be possible by allowing “corporations” the ability to flood the zone with cash.
Just need to pass laws that ban that.
You pass more laws to undo the undoing of prior laws.
Unfortunately it takes way more time to do things right than to undo or undermine things.
The genius of CUvsFEC is they basically made it sure there’s no way back. If a legislator dare to revert this, they will be out-raised and voted out.
I disagree. There was a path to getting it unfucked for a period of time through states and potential constitutional amendment, but the Republicans (naturally) tanked it.
If all of this happening right now does anything, it should definitely be illustrated based on current events this can’t happen again. We’ll need to put the sitting Republicans quick to stop it though.
Regrettably, when a law is enacted to make existing laws meaningless, there appears to be no legal path to undo it.
I’ve seen this before. Who is out there claiming Citizens United is a law?? And there is always a legal path. If space aliens show up and eat Musk there’s a legal path to convict them. Not that we should.
“The problem with CU’s rationale is that, when applied in today’s media setting, it discriminates against the viewpoints of everyone else. When the world’s richest man spent $44 billion to purchase a social media platform to amplify his own political views, he chilled the free political speech of everyone else. Ditto when he spent an additional $288 million to get Trump elected, largely through disinformation. When Trump promised fossil fuel giants who donated $1 billion to his campaign that he would gut environmental laws as their payback, he chilled the free speech of everyone who depends on clean air and water but can’t pony up a cool billion.”
I am sorry my American friends but it is going to get a lot worse before it returns to the status quo and I doubt that it will even remotely get better ever again. As a nation you have lived off the spoils of victory and sided with despots because you have been happy with the crumbs that rich capitalists throw at you. Only when your conscience got the better of you, have you engaged in altruism and even then it was for the furthering of corporate interests.
You will no longer command the respect of your allies and trust of those that you once claimed to protect. Your friends will now treat you with suspicion and maybe contempt. The oligarchs and religious zealots will eat your organs while you’re distracted by culture wars, racism, fear and entertainment.
Many of you will say “Well, America first!”, without realising that it has been that way for almost a century except it has really been “America’s wealthiest first”. I really feel a great sadness, like losing a parent to dementia in that there are two deaths: one when they are no longer themselves anymore and the other when the vessel fails.
Vale.
Pay and privacy wall
Tell that to the nationalist ideologues at the ACLU.
A painful read, but a good article.
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