SUPREME COURT LIFTS CAMPAIGN FINANCE LIMITS
By a 5-4 vote, the U.S. Supreme Court has struck down limits on the number of campaign contributions individuals can make in a given election cycle. Under current law, individuals were barred from donating more than $48,600 to individual candidates during a two-year election cycle.
A separate limit of $123,000 had been applied to contributions made to party committees.
Those limits have now been removed – although the court did leave in place contribution limits to individual candidates ($2,600) and individual committees ($32,400).
“Contributing money to a candidate is an exercise of an individual’s right to participate in the electoral process through both political expression and political association,” a majority of justices concluded. “A restriction on how many candidates and committees an individual may support is hardly a ‘modest Restraint’ on those rights. The Government may no more restrict how many candidates or causes a donor may support than it may tell a newspaper how many candidates it may endorse.”
We agree …
Obviously money – especially the sort of “bundled” special interest cash that will benefit directly (and substantially) from this ruling – is a corrosive force in politics. It perpetuates all sorts of corruption at the expense of taxpayers, and is one of the primary reasons why our middle class is evaporating.
But at the end of the day money is speech … and the court is correct in concluding that limitations against it represent an unconstitutional infringement of the free exercise of speech.
Sadly, the real enemy here is an electorate that’s dumb enough to keep swallowing the lies politicians spoon feed them on a daily basis – and an establishment media that refuses to hold the politicians accountable for their lies.
Until we have a Fourth Estate willing to call these special interest whores out for what they are … we shouldn’t be surprised if people keep electing them.
56 comments
And our precious democracy takes another hit on the road to plutocracy and crony capitalism. Of course, if people weren’t so stupid, this wouldn’t work. Maybe stupid deserves what stupid gets for stupidity.
+100
Maybe stupid deserves what stupid gets for stupidity.
At the unfortunate expense of those who actually can see through the dumb but are powerless to stop the stupids.
It’s OK for Obama to use our tax money to fund ACORN, Planned Parenthood and GM Unions to get him elected…but the liberals try to tell Americans they cannot use THEIR money to support people who will give them a voice in an ever-usurping, maniacal, socialist government machine……
ANYONE who ever votes democrat again, you need your @$$#d kicked…to vote democrat shows you to be an anti-American, idiot and inhumane @$$hole…
Hey, Idiot! What the fuck does @$$#d mean? You mean assed? Well, come get some, stupid.
But you’re too F*#king stupid to challenge the content…most of you brain-dead liberals are quick to push personal insults…but you get the S#!* kicked out of you on substance.
You have to be really stupid to be a leftist, don’t you?…
Challenge the content?
“ANYONE who ever votes democrat again, you need your @$$#d kicked…to vote democrat shows you to be an anti-American, idiot and inhumane @$$hole…”
How do you challenge the inane rants of a madman? One would have to be schizo and off my meds for a month…
OBAMACARE!!!!
I rest my case, you ignorant son of a B!*ch….
You are the ignorant son of a bitch. Bless your heart. BTW I know several so called libertarians and republicans who hate Obama, “That so and so in our White House.” Over the past months they have signed up for insurance and are covered for the first time in years. Guess what? They love it you dumbass POS.
Remember Obama said: If you like your coverage, you can keep it…and it will cost less…tell me you’re not that F*#king stupid are you???..that you believed him…
Obamacare is a failure, idiot. Democrats are fleeing from it in droves…and the employee mandate has not even set in yet…the people being screwed now, are just the people who are buying their own…it’s a fraction of the population…aside from the freeloaders….
Why do you think your lord-god keeps postponing the horror of forcing employees off the former system…?????
With 34 million projected to be covered by 2016, You, sir, are beyond stupid. Very few people are being screwed by this regulation. Just keep lying to your dumbass self. It doesn’t appear to be working very well for you. You don’t have a f#cking clue.
You’ve had FOUR years, and you claim to have signed up (maybe) 6 million users, and very few, if any, payers..
And you’re going to get 26 million more in a little more than a year and a half…LMAO….
Your puppet masters needs to get on here and stop your Dumb @$$…you are making liberals look like the most IGNORANT MoFos on earth….Hahahahaha…
I say: PLEASE keep posting…and if anyone is undecided, you are BEST weapon to educate the slow to learn…
I say: PLEASE keep posting…and if anyone is undecided, you are BEST weapon to educate the slow to learn…
He’s talking to himself again.
Tango, even I know not every Republican is Larry Craig or Garry Sandusky…
You are the secret weapon of the liberals. Just keep posting your hate filled rhetoric and driving people to vote for the Dems. Thank you for your support.
You tell him, Zippy!
Well, at least the brain-dead liberals out there have a brain of some sort. GT on the other hand…
Tell them hoss, I’m too mad to.
“Those limits have now been removed – although the court did leave in place contribution limits to individual candidates ($2,600) and individual committees ($32,400).”
Maybe that’s the answer. Lower the limits on any kind of political contribution to a level that the average working person can afford, say $50.00.
For perhaps the only time in my life, I agree with John McCain. He said that a major scandal is bound to happen because there is too much money washing around the system. Restrictions on campaign funding first appeared after the Tea Pot Dome Scandal, when America realized its government lands were being mined, logged, and drilled by companies who had bought off politicians with campaign donations. It’s only a matter of time before something similar happens. Once again there will be a call for campaign finance reform. I wish America could learn from its history so we don’t have to keep going through bad times to get to the good.
It’s particularly hard when you have a major political party that has devised a revisionist national history and want to destroy the public school system to insure it is spread to all.
All well and good, and completely beside the point. Lots of objectionable conduct is protected by the Constitution. If you don’t like it, amend it.
Won’t be a scandal if the Supreme Court legalizes buying elections … which it’s pretty much done.
Let’s just go all the way and legalize outright bribery.
Contributing money to a candidate is an exercise of an individual’s right to participate in the electoral process through both political expression and political association
——–
one dollar one vote.
When you have 10% controlling 90% of the money able to buy 90% of the speech, you have to wonder if the 90% of the rights of the people are being served, and whether the average IQ of the supreme court justices is in the triple digits.
I just hope the Trial Lawyers Assoc. follows your advice. They have 90% of the money and did not earn ANY of it…except through trumped-up law suits…that perpetuate misery on all of us…
So I hope the lawyers are forbidden from paying toward candidates…don’t you???
Yeah – and look which justices voted for it and which justices voted against it – certainly no surprises there – we all know who supports those special interest whores!
If you think for one minute that the Democrap Party isn’t also in the pockets of the “special interests” you’re dumber than I ever imagined. And I thought you were pretty dumb to begin with.
LOL . . . can you even address my comment? Apparently not. I don’t give a GGD what you think of me, dumbass!
The Justices in the majority are the ones who understand their role in our system of government. A SCt Justice is not a super-legislator. You may be comfortable with the notion of a Court that second-guesses Congress on matters of policy. I’m not. There is a constitutional mechanism for dealing with your objections – amend the constitution.
“All this money in politics is really screwing up our nation via mass corruption.”
“Money is speech and politicians should be able to be influenced with it.”
facepalm.jpg
How does he do it?
Thank God the court got something right..
The gov’t telling you how to spend your money is ABSURD…ALL regulations on spending to help elect leaders needs to STOP, as Justice Thomas opined in this case…
Obama lets the New Black Panthers carry clubs and intimidate voters based on racism…or they persecute Conservatives w/ the IRS…yet they think they can control how EARNERS spend their money…
Better wake up people…and thank the court for moving in the right direction…away from Obama and Communism….
Seriously, I want 2016 election to get here just so you have new horse to beat.
I’ll be glad when you can stop looking like a D@#n fool defending your lord-god…but I doubt his exit will stop you. Ignorance like yours is hard to cure…
Only thing I’ll defend anyone over is lies. You tend to rubberstamp too many of them. I do not want to vote for Hillary, but don’t see anyone yet that can beat her. So prepare yourself for at least the four years after 2016.
Tell me one lie I’ve told, you ignorant, mind-numbed Piece of $#*!…
Just because it was not fed to you by the masters that control your mind…does not make it a lie…
Ok, your post above…..you imply Obama started Planned Parenthood…he did not. You imply he started GM bailout….he did not. He supported both, but he didn’t start it. Now ACORN was an embarrassment for sure. And he has had many in his tenure as President. The ACA has had a rough and rocky rollout. Too many mistakes to mention. I agree with the law’s intent, but the implementation has been flawed to say the least. My premiums did not go up one dime. The good company I work for I guess. My out-of-pocket max did increase. But, my coverage overall is much better. But I do know many people who have had “Obamacare shock” inflicted on them.
I forgot to add that Obama did not start ACORN….it had been around since 1970. So, if you’re bitching about any tax money going their way, it went on long before Obama. And ACORN has been gone since 2010.
And the expose that outed ACORN was proven to be a lie with the person responsible paying restitution.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickungar/2013/03/08/james-okeefe-pays-100000-to-acorn-employee-he-smeared-conservative-media-yawns/
Robert,
I hate to put an end to this love fest but I need to let you know that GrandTango is a nom de plume that Will uses to generate angry comments. You are playing right into his shit-stained hands.
If true, that’s ok. Each of us have some sort of alter-ego.
Fits endorsing an action that benefits only ONE group,the wealthy.Shocking!He doesnt like “Crony Capitalism “you know.Just the juice that keeps it going.Oh, but he believes in the Constitution,except when its interpreted in a way he doesnt like,then?Damn libruls !Sure am glad he Aint a damn Republican!
The freedom to spend money YOU earn benefits AMERICANS, Dumb@$$…
You can’t stand people thinking, voting or expressing in a way that is different from the failure you embrace…
Now if we can just STOP fools like Obama from robbing us blind to give money to his freeloaders, so they vote democrat….There is hope…
Keep up the good work!
You can bet your ass that Willie didn’t have to consult with his Man-Teat, Howard Rich, to decide that (with minor caveats) this is a good thing.
Fucking pimp…
If the SCOTUS got this one right, like they did…let’s rush gov’t sanctioned homosexual unions (for federal handouts) up there…
Maybe the absolute failure of Obama is making an impression on the court…
For a more analytical view, see: http://www.scotusblog.com/2014/04/opinion-analysis-freeing-more-political-money/
Save any trees lately?
Money is not speech and corporations are not people. The acceptance of these two concepts is devastating to any form of representative democracy. Because it now becomes a one dollar one vote system, and multinational corporations have a lot more dollars than “real” people do.
This decision is putting a sign on the Capitol Door and the door of every state house. Open for Business. Highest bidder wins. What the Bush appointees to the Supreme Court have done to this country is devastating; and the vast majority of Americans will suffer because of this decision. In fact this nation may never be the same. We may very well become just another Oligarchy or Plutocracy. I guess America will now see how much damage desperate conservatives can do to the concept of “liberty and justice for all.”
The Koch Brothers, Howard Rich and the like, played the game well. The invested their money and acquired the best Supreme Court money can buy. Now they have a decision that says their speech is more important than my speech, more important than your speech, and more important than the speech 99% of the people in this county. Because in the end, if money is speech, most of us have no voice at all.
This is a sad day in the history of this country.
Great decision- now I don’t have to guess who will win when I buy influence. Now I can buy influence with all of the vermin.in any race in the country. I can even buy both candidates now- wahoo! Why only buy one letter (party) when you can buy both?
The establishment justice system is just as selective as the establishment media in not finding fault in politicians. Can you say labor unions and corporations and individuals are now treated as equals? The Court in Citizens United found that unions and corporations could spend money from their general treasury to advocate for or against a candidate and that banning that activity was unconstitutional under the First Amendment’s Free Speech Clause. That being said, why should individual contributions be restricted under the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2003? An “independent expenditure” is money spent by groups or individuals that are not controlled by a candidate (such as his or her campaign committee). ’bout time.
Now I can contribute more than $48,600 to candidates and more than $123,000 to party committees in a single election cycle.
The chains have been removed. Free at last! Free at last! Thank Gawd almighty. Free at last!
So “money is speech?” And I thought speech was speech. Based on the Supreme Court’s rationale that means the Constitution entitles the Koch Brothers, et al, to millions more in “free speech” than I. I don’t think that was what the framers had in mind.
So when I put more than 10,000.00 in cash in a bank, the IRS gets a report. Having a stack of 100 dollar bills sitting in my front seat is reasonable suspicion – maybe even probable cause for the cops. I can “talk a women” into bed in most states – we’ll I can’t – but its illegal for me to used ‘paid speech’ to get her into bed in most states. Yep, money is speech all right except when it isnt? Can I quit paying employer matching FICA for my employees and just give them 15 bucks worth of speech per hour instead. This is so stupid and logically inconsistent by the court.
This is the kind of free speech to which politicians, especially Repubs (look at the list) are committed.
https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/recips.php?id=D000000186&type=P&state=&sort=A&cycle=2012