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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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 Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2010 5:18 pm Post subject: Even Some Corporations Realize SCOTUS Ruling Unjust |
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Article here.
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Last week, �all five of the [Supreme] Court�s conservatives joined together�to invalidate a sixty-three year-old ban on corporate money in federal elections,� a move that Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) said �opens the floodgates for the purchases and sale of the law� by big corporations. While progressives were outraged by the court�s judicial activism, many Republican politicians applauded the decision, with RNC Chairman Michael Steele even calling the ruling nothing more than �an affirmation of the constitutional rights provided to Americans under the first amendment.�
The progressive PR firm Murray Hill Inc. has announced that it plans to satirically run for Congress in the Republican primary in Maryland�s 8th congressional district to protest the Supreme Court�s disastrous decision. A press release on its website says that the company wants to �eliminate the middle man� and run for Congress directly, rather than influencing it with corporate dollars:
�Until now,� Murray Hill Inc. said in a statement, �corporate interests had to rely on campaign contributions and influence peddling to achieve their goals in Washington. But thanks to an enlightened Supreme Court, now we can eliminate the middle-man and run for office ourselves.�
�The strength of America,� Murray Hill Inc. says, �is in the boardrooms, country clubs and Lear jets of America�s great corporations. We�re saying to Wal-Mart, AIG and Pfizer, if not you, who? If not now, when?� [...]
Campaign Manager William Klein promises an aggressive, historic campaign that �puts people second� or even third. �The business of America is business, as we all know,� Klein says. �But now, it�s the business of democracy too.� Klein plans to use automated robo-calls, �Astroturf� lobbying and computer-generated avatars to get out the vote.
Murray Hill Inc. plans on spending �top dollar� to protect its investment. �It�s our democracy,� Murray Hill Inc. says, �We bought it, we paid for it, and we�re going to keep it.�
Murray Hill Inc. released its first campaign video Monday. A narrator in the video explains, �The way we see it, corporate America has been the driving force behind Congress for years. But now it�s time we got behind the wheel ourselves.� Watch it:
Update Radio host Thom Hartmann interviewed Murray Hill Inc's spokesman Eric Hansel yesterday on his radio show. Hansel explained to Hartmann that his company chose to run in the Republican primary because the GOP is more sympathetic to corporations. Watch it: |
Indeed, if corporations are "people with rights" why shouldn't they be able to run for office? In fact, why shouldn't every political candidate simply corporatize and have his corporation run in his stead? He could then sell shares in the newly elected corporation at substantial value. Participation in Congress -- or even the office of the Presidency -- would be bought or sold on markets. A free market solution to government.
Once this very idea would have been ridiculous. But the utterly inane idea of corporations being people in their own right, with rights that need to be defended, makes it completely plausible. |
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Street Magic
Joined: 23 Sep 2009
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| Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2010 5:51 pm Post subject: |
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| Does anyone here not want NASCAR for President? I think our upcoming college grad generation's hipster sensibilities fit in perfectly with this kind of freak out the rest of the world scenario. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2010 5:54 pm Post subject: |
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| Street Magic wrote: |
| Does anyone here not want NASCAR for President? I think our upcoming college grad generation's hipster sensibilities fit in perfectly with this kind of freak out the rest of the world scenario. |
I'd like an Apple iPresident personally. It might not be signficiantly more functional than past Presidents, but it would usher in a new era of foreign relations by winning over other nations with sheer coolness. |
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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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| Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2010 6:13 pm Post subject: |
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If corporations are persons and there is no limit on how much these persons can spend to buy politicians to write laws favoring corporate persons, if a corporate person buys another corporate person, is that slavery?
From the perspective of logical progression, where does this end? |
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2010/01/no-im-not-nascar-driver.html
The best piece I've read in defense of the decision is from from The Independent Institute.
http://www.independent.org/blog/?p=4832
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We Are It, or Not: Government versus Corporation
By Robert Higgs on Jan 24, 2010 in Civil Liberties, Constitution, Elections, Law, Liberty, Politics, The State
In the wake of the Supreme Court�s ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, we are witnessing an outpouring of wailing and gnashing of teeth. Progressives emphatically deny that a corporation consists of nothing more than a voluntary aggregation of natural persons and that therefore it has all the rights of speech that its individual members have. Leftists have long maintained, and continue to maintain, that a corporation is something apart from, and more menacing than, the aggregate of its shareholders. They hold that corporations as such have no rights at all, but only privileges, which the state may revise or revoke as it deems desirable.
The progressive position is not obvious nonsense. Highly intelligent people have argued, and continue to argue, for it. Whether these arguments are valid as a whole or in part does not concern me here. I am struck, however, by a manifest inconsistency between the progressive position on the corporation and the progressive position on the government.
When aggrieved persons complain about the state�s actions and speak as if it were nothing more than an alien aggressor against an individual�s rights�and an impudently highhanded one at that�progressives have long replied that �we are the government.� In this instance, they steadfastly maintain that the whole is identical with the sum of its parts. Thus, no person has a firm ground on which to complain about the government because, after all, he is (a part of) the government.
This reply is so manifestly silly and transparently false that libertarians seldom pause to consider it except to mock it and to denounce the seeming foolishness or arrogance of anyone audacious enough to advance it. And rightly so, I think. I did not buy shares in the U.S. government; I simply happened to be born in a place known as Oklahoma, and by virtue of this happenstance, the gang of armed bandits who style themselves the U.S. government has claimed the right to rob and bully me at its pleasure from the day of my birth till today. Nor do they have any plans to lighten this oppression, however unwelcome I may consider it to be. I cannot escape from it by �selling my shares� or by declining to deal with it.
That I bear any responsibility whatsoever for the manifold crimes of this gang strikes me as too preposterous to deserve debate. The fact that I have spent the preponderance of my life in the land of my birth and rearing, rather than emigrating to another place where I would also be robbed and bullied (because similarly overbearing governments operate virtually everywhere), in no way validates the government�s treatment of me. In short, I am not the government, not even an iota of it. It is as alien to me as the Martians who land their flying saucers in the Arizona desert and undertake to probe the local hysterics.
That progressives and other collectivists can maintain with a straight face that �we are the government� while simultaneously maintaining that �a corporation is separate and apart from its owners� stands of one of the most glaring inconsistencies in their ideologies. If they hate private property and individual liberty, so be it. But such hatred does not exempt them from an obligation to comply with the rules of logic and to respect the evidence of plain facts. |
A tad aggressive, but I agree with the premise. The state has full freedom to lobby on the behalf of the state. A private firm is merely a competitor to the state, and a voluntary one (as opposed to the state).
I do not believe in the limited liability firm (LLC) as presently constructed. A libertarian has two beliefs (relevant to this topic):
1) non violence (the initiation of)
2) personal responsibility
The LLC violates #2. The LLC when combined with the state (corporatism) has the potential to violate #1.
I would be comfortable with the decision in the absence of the LLC. I strongly support the market economy. The LLC distorts the market. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2010 7:21 pm Post subject: |
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While my response to this is not directly relevent to the point he's making, I'd like to speak about it.
| mises wrote: |
| I did not buy shares in the U.S. government; I simply happened to be born in a place known as Oklahoma, and by virtue of this happenstance, the gang of armed bandits who style themselves the U.S. government has claimed the right to rob and bully me at its pleasure from the day of my birth till today. Nor do they have any plans to lighten this oppression, however unwelcome I may consider it to be. I cannot escape from it by �selling my shares� or by declining to deal with it. |
Yes he can, it's called renouncing citizenship and leaving the country. Citizenship is essentially a combination of a service you pay for with tax dollars, and owning shares in the country in question (which allows you to vote on the board of directors who will dictate the policy of the country in question). It grants you the right to reside in the country, along with the other benefits of citizenship, which vary depending on the country. If you feel the price is too high, or the benefits are insufficient, you can end the arrangement in question by leaving the country and renouncing your citizenship.
"But what if there's no other country I want to move to?" one might ask. Well if I want to buy a car, but feel every car dealer is providing a bad deal, I'm simply out of luck. I can try to build my own car, or I can do without one. The same goes for any other product. Citizenship is no different; you can either deal with a government, paying tax dollars in return for the benefits of citizenship, or you can do without. If you don't want to deal with any government, there are lawless places one could go. Living without the benefits of government can get ugly, though, so for obvious reasons many aren't too keen on the prospect. |
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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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| Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2010 7:25 pm Post subject: |
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| Yes he can, it's called renouncing citizenship and leaving the country. |
He will still be, for tax purposes, a "US person". |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2010 7:45 pm Post subject: |
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Regarding the actual case he seems to be putting forward, I don't think it has an immense amount of merit. As non-citizens who deserve no legal rights, how we deal with "businesses lobbying the government" and "the government lobbying the government" is entirely at our discretion, and should be ruled upon based on what is best for the citizens of our country. We are in no way obliged to treat these two things in a similar fashion; no artificial consistency is required, all that matters is results.
I personally think it's fairly clear that increased business influence in politics results in harm to citizen interests. If this individual thinks the ability of "the government to lobby the government" also results in harm to citizens interests, he should develope that case more fully and argue in favor of a solution.
I will say this: citizens have every right to complain about the government. "We" are not the government, we simply elect it. If a government is performing inadequately, we owe it nothing, and should summarily replace it with one which better serves our interests. Just as with our handling of corporations, all that matters is results.
Regarding the weakest point in his argument:
| Quote: |
| Progressives emphatically deny that a corporation consists of nothing more than a voluntary aggregation of natural persons and that therefore it has all the rights of speech that its individual members have. Leftists have long maintained, and continue to maintain, that a corporation is something apart from, and more menacing than, the aggregate of its shareholders. |
If a corporation is nothing more than an aggregation of natural persons, it cannot itself be a legal person, and thus it has no rights at all. If a corporation is a legal person, it must be more than simply an aggregation of natural persons. In either case, the actual natural persons involved all retain 100% of their rights to freedom of expression; how the corporation is treated by the law has no bearing on their rights.
If a corporation is a legal entity that could even hypothetically possess rights of its own, it must be more than the aggregate of its shareholders. Further, limited liability also proves that corporations are more than the aggregation of their shareholders; 100% of a corporation's liability cannot be transfered to its shareholders, and thus, there's something there that's not simply an aggregation of them, or else this would be impossible.
So which is it? Are corporations legal persons, which can have liability applied to them above and beyond the liability applied to their shareholders in aggregate, and as such are clearly not simply aggregations of shareholders? Or are corporations simply aggregates of shareholders, in which case they can have no rights because they are not entities, and as such are incapable of possessing rights? Either way, the author's case cannot progress.
Like every other attempted justification of the ruling in question, this is weak, logically invalid, and rationally unpersuasive. |
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Fox
Joined: 04 Mar 2009
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| Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2010 7:52 pm Post subject: |
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| mises wrote: |
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| Yes he can, it's called renouncing citizenship and leaving the country. |
He will still be, for tax purposes, a "US person". |
I believe fully renouncing citizenship makes this untrue. Information on how to successfully renounce your citizenship and thus remove any future tax burden from yourself (in the United States) can be found here. According to this, while the IRS may claim a final chunk of taxes from citizens with unusually high income or networth before the expatriate (figured as if all your property was sold on the day before you expatriate at fair market value; in essence, the old "American you" is selling all their property to the new "non-American you" as far as the IRS is concerned), once you have gone through the process and renounced your citizenship, you no longer have a tax burden.
Needless to say, if I were to permanently immigrate to Korea and renounce my US citizenship (for example), I would not have a US tax liability for the rest of my life. If you don't like the service your country is providing, it's really best to leave it and sign up with a new provider. Few people do this, though, because it's awfully inconvenient, and most of us in the West have a damn good deal compared to the rest of the world. |
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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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| Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2010 8:08 pm Post subject: |
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If you earn 40k/yr, they'll probably not bother. But if you earn a substantial salary, the IRS will declare you a "US person" and tax you above about 80k.
Anyways, I don't agree with the Independent Institute piece I posted either. But I agree with the assumption that the state is every bit as foreign to me as is an equity I own. Where I part with it is in the LLC issue.
We're not going to agree Fox. The state will throw you in jail for holding a plant. The state will read your emails. The state will force my better half to get a body scan (showing her naked form to a stranger). The state, the state, the state. The state wages war. The state steals liberty. I don't like the SCOTUS decision. But do not delude yourself as to where risks to liberty originate. The problem isn't firms capturing the state, the problem is the state moving from sharply limited role. |
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ontheway
Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Location: Somewhere under the rainbow...
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| Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2010 8:28 am Post subject: |
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LIbertarians do NOT support the idea that corporations are legal persons.
As Mises has pointed out, the Limited Liability Corporation as it currently exists has many drawbacks. It is another creation of the state, so this should come as no surprise.
Shareholders should be accountable for their corporations according to the percentage of their ownership.
This, of course, means that what the Independent Institute has written is correct. We need to eliminate the problems caused by LLC, and not increase our problems by violations to the principle of Free Speech, which is paramount to the LLC problem.
By the way, if corporations are NOT legal persons, then they cannot be forced to pay the income tax. Of course the income tax should be repealed altogether, as it is the 2nd most evil of all taxes, but if corp.s are not persons then the tax can only be paid by the shareholders, each according to his share of the income. |
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Konglishman
Joined: 14 Sep 2007
Location: Nanjing
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| Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2010 8:43 am Post subject: |
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| ontheway wrote: |
LIbertarians do NOT support the idea that corporations are legal persons.
As Mises has pointed out, the Limited Liability Corporation as it currently exists has many drawbacks. It is another creation of the state, so this should come as no surprise.
Shareholders should be accountable for their corporations according to the percentage of their ownership.
This, of course, means that what the Independent Institute has written is correct. We need to eliminate the problems caused by LLC, and not increase our problems by violations to the principle of Free Speech, which is paramount to the LLC problem.
By the way, if corporations are NOT legal persons, then they cannot be forced to pay the income tax. Of course the income tax should be repealed altogether, as it is the 2nd most evil of all taxes, but if corp.s are not persons then the tax can only be paid by the shareholders, each according to his share of the income. |
What is wrong with that? |
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ontheway
Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Location: Somewhere under the rainbow...
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| Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2010 8:52 am Post subject: |
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| Konglishman wrote: |
| ontheway wrote: |
LIbertarians do NOT support the idea that corporations are legal persons.
As Mises has pointed out, the Limited Liability Corporation as it currently exists has many drawbacks. It is another creation of the state, so this should come as no surprise.
Shareholders should be accountable for their corporations according to the percentage of their ownership.
This, of course, means that what the Independent Institute has written is correct. We need to eliminate the problems caused by LLC, and not increase our problems by violations to the principle of Free Speech, which is paramount to the LLC problem.
By the way, if corporations are NOT legal persons, then they cannot be forced to pay the income tax. Of course the income tax should be repealed altogether, as it is the 2nd most evil of all taxes, but if corp.s are not persons then the tax can only be paid by the shareholders, each according to his share of the income. |
What is wrong with that? |
Nothng.
Businesses should not pay any taxes. Income taxes cause huge economic distortions and reduce economic growth every day, day by day contributing to the socialist drag on the economy that has reduced per capita personal income by 90% of what it would otherwise be.
Making all businesses income tax free would be a valuable small step toward liberty and prosperity for everyone in the world. |
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pkang0202
Joined: 09 Mar 2007
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| Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2010 8:55 am Post subject: |
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The court struck down SCOTUS in the current form.
You liberals talk like its the end of the world. Why not push through a different version of SCOTUS? Change the wording a little bit as to not get struck down by the Supreme Court.
That would require some actual WORK, and divert resources from shoving a Health Care Plan down the American people's throat.
Whatever happened to open negotiations and dealing on CSPAN that Obama promised? Fox, can you explain why talks about the Health Care plan are being held behind closed doors, and not on CSPAN like Obama pledged? |
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Konglishman
Joined: 14 Sep 2007
Location: Nanjing
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| Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2010 9:10 am Post subject: |
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| ontheway wrote: |
| Konglishman wrote: |
| ontheway wrote: |
LIbertarians do NOT support the idea that corporations are legal persons.
As Mises has pointed out, the Limited Liability Corporation as it currently exists has many drawbacks. It is another creation of the state, so this should come as no surprise.
Shareholders should be accountable for their corporations according to the percentage of their ownership.
This, of course, means that what the Independent Institute has written is correct. We need to eliminate the problems caused by LLC, and not increase our problems by violations to the principle of Free Speech, which is paramount to the LLC problem.
By the way, if corporations are NOT legal persons, then they cannot be forced to pay the income tax. Of course the income tax should be repealed altogether, as it is the 2nd most evil of all taxes, but if corp.s are not persons then the tax can only be paid by the shareholders, each according to his share of the income. |
What is wrong with that? |
Nothng.
Businesses should not pay any taxes. Income taxes cause huge economic distortions and reduce economic growth every day, day by day contributing to the socialist drag on the economy that has reduced per capita personal income by 90% of what it would otherwise be.
Making all businesses income tax free would be a valuable small step toward liberty and prosperity for everyone in the world. |
While I do think that taxes are too high in the U.S., I also think that taxes are a necessary evil in order for the government to function and fund things such as infrastructure and education.
Personally, I would like to see the tax code completely reformed. It should be reformed with two goals in mind. First, enough revenue should be collected to support the goverment functions. Second, the tax code should be restructured in such a way that would maximize economic growth to the extent possible while still keeping the first goal in mind.
Of course, before such tax reform can be undertaken, the government is going to have to eliminate its deficits and live within its means. |
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ontheway
Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Location: Somewhere under the rainbow...
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| Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2010 9:20 am Post subject: |
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| Konglishman wrote: |
| ontheway wrote: |
| Konglishman wrote: |
| ontheway wrote: |
LIbertarians do NOT support the idea that corporations are legal persons.
As Mises has pointed out, the Limited Liability Corporation as it currently exists has many drawbacks. It is another creation of the state, so this should come as no surprise.
Shareholders should be accountable for their corporations according to the percentage of their ownership.
This, of course, means that what the Independent Institute has written is correct. We need to eliminate the problems caused by LLC, and not increase our problems by violations to the principle of Free Speech, which is paramount to the LLC problem.
By the way, if corporations are NOT legal persons, then they cannot be forced to pay the income tax. Of course the income tax should be repealed altogether, as it is the 2nd most evil of all taxes, but if corp.s are not persons then the tax can only be paid by the shareholders, each according to his share of the income. |
What is wrong with that? |
Nothng.
Businesses should not pay any taxes. Income taxes cause huge economic distortions and reduce economic growth every day, day by day contributing to the socialist drag on the economy that has reduced per capita personal income by 90% of what it would otherwise be.
Making all businesses income tax free would be a valuable small step toward liberty and prosperity for everyone in the world. |
While I do think that taxes are too high in the U.S., I also think that taxes are a necessary evil in order for the government to function and fund things such as infrastructure and education.
Personally, I would like to see the tax code completely reformed. It should be reformed with two goals in mind. First, enough revenue should be collected to support the goverment functions. Second, the tax code should be restructured in such a way that would maximize economic growth to the extent possible while still keeping the first goal in mind.
Of course, before such tax reform can be undertaken, the government is going to have to eliminate its deficits and live within its means. |
This isn't really a tax thread, but ...
The tax on property - land, buildings, personal etc. - is the worst of all and causes the most harm to individuals and especially the poor, elderly and middle classes. It must be abolished at all levels of government.
Income taxes are the second worst, although because this is the main form of Federal taxation it causes the most harm and distortion. It too must be abolished at all levels of government.
All forms of taxation are evil, but given the political reality that governments will continue to use taxation and force to collect revenues, instead of using a voluntary means of funding, it then falls to a form of consumption tax as the least harmful to the people, especially the poor, elderly and middle class and the least damaging to the economy.
All taxes should be abolished and replaced with a 10% national sales tax, capped at 10% Constitutionally, with the Federal, State and local governments required to share and live within that amount of total reveune, with all deficits and borrowing by government at all levels prohibited. |
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