Yes, Obama laid blame at the feet of just about everyone but himself last night during his SOTU. “The Buck Stops Here” moment was very short-lived, was it not? It’s Bush’s fault about the banks, even though Senator Obama voted to bail them out; it’s the Republicans fault – the minority party – that nothing can get passed in D.C., even though the Democrats had a super-majority, it is everyone’s fault but his, for whatever condition the country is in, unless it is something positive, then it is ALL him. Yes, he can walk and chew gum at the same time – woohoo!!! Let’s give him a standing ovation!! Lost jobs? Staggering deficit? Home foreclosures?? Nah, that’s not his fault.

And how about Justice Alito’s “Joe Wilson” moment, when he said, “Not true” to Obama’s claim the recent Supreme Court Decision would allow foreign dollars to influence our elections. All I gotta say is, lucky for him he isn’t from South Cackalacki, or else he would be labeled a racist. Ahem. I am sure this will be looked at from every which way in the upcoming days.

But in case you missed it, here is the moment with Justice Alito, with commentary from Peter Johnson:

Wow, that was some response from Mr. Johnson, who is, by the way, a Democrat, and who voted for Obama.

What else? Oh, yes, the whole DADT thing that Obama punted out to the Congress. That’s exactly what he did. DADT could have long ago been repealed, but yet, there it still is. I have zero patience for LGB groups who are going to be thankful for this little throwaway crumb from the table. If Obama wanted to end it, he would have. Now, just because he mentioned it, organizations like Servicemembers Legal Defense Network are all atwitter. Spare me. When Obama, and the Congress, actually DO something about it, then I’ll give them appropriate props. But until then, it’s the same-o, same-o, all talk and no action.

And how about the Republican Response? It was offered by new Virginia governor, Bob McDonnell from Richmond, in the House of Delegates. Take a look:

I have to say, this is one of the better responses I have seen from either side of the aisle (remember the incredibly painful, stiff response from then-Governor of Kansas, Kathleen Sebelius?? Oh, wow – I had such high hopes for her until her incredibly wooden performance. Watching paint dry would have been more interesting.).

UPDATED: Jon Stewart had an interesting review of the media’s coverage of the SOTU. There was one person in particular who made a rather startling statement, and not for the first time. Check it out:

Why am I not surprised?? How about you?

“There is a dangerous, misguided movement out there that if we just let business rule the nation, all will be well — markets will take care of themselves, health care, jobs, just let business handle it. You know who says that the loudest? Business.

And now, it can say it even louder. It can shout down any candidate who opposes it. What happened to ‘of the people, by the people, for the people’?” (Excerpt from “Big Biz Needed No Help In The Election Game”, by Mitch Albom, columnist, Detroit Free Press.)

The country is rightfully reeling from the recent U.S. Supreme Court’s partisan 5/4 decision this past Thursday ruling that the “government may not ban political spending by corporations in candidate elections.” This decision, without question, continues the devastation of the power of the people in the elections process by ruling that corporations are “persons” who have a First Amendment Right to make campaign contributions without any kind of restriction.

What average citizen can compete with the lobbyists who already have overwhelming influence on our representatives, as well as compete with the deep pocket campaign contributions of our fellow “persons”, Big Business? Campaigns have already become “marketing” campaigns designed to sell a brand or personality more than be a campaign of ideas among the candidates. The American people already know that unlimited ability by a corporation to make campaign contributions to a certain candidate will surely undermine the “checks and balances” that our Founders intended for the elections process which were meant to be the sovereign province of “we, the people”, not “we, the corporations.”

The initial devastation of the essential balance of power between citizens and big business at the ballot box was the advent of voting machines in the elections process. These machines make it impossible for any citizen to oversee the counting of their votes due to the hidden counting by the voting software that runs the machines. Secret vote counting combined with the Court’s most recent decision has rendered a citizen’s role in the elections process virtually non-existent, which is tantamount to not having an election at all. How is this good for democracy?
Not surprisingly, citizens of all political persuasions are already protesting the Court’s decision because they can so clearly see the impending danger to the People’s role in elections and understand that the kind of money that corporations will use now to influence elections will most assuredly diminish, if not totally destroy, our freedom and way of life. In stark contrast, it has been so incredibly difficult for citizens to readily grasp that our right to control and visually witness the entire process of voting to know for certain that the persons truly chosen by the people have been elected has been stolen from us by government officials who cleverly convinced us to replace the ballot box of old with the way of the future — computerized voting.

For years, election integrity advocates have compiled a mountain of evidence against the use of these machines to no avail. The voting machine corporations have spent large sums of money on lobbyists and marketing these machines and have far too much support from politicians, election officials, computer security experts and powerful interest groups intent on keeping these machines an integral part of our elections process. They are marketed as “faster, easier and more secure!” Is democracy preserved when voting is allowed to be marketed as “fast and easy” rather than “public and accurate”? Despite investigations that definitively uncovered the truth about the dangers these machines pose to election integrity, which were featured in the Emmy nominated HBO documentary film, Hacking Democracy, our government is determined to maintain the current status quo.

It is important to note that American election integrity advocates haven’t been the only ones protesting the use of electronic voting machines counting their votes in secret. Citizens of other democratic republics, such as, Ireland, The Netherlands and India, are but a few of the growing number of countries that have either banned e-voting or are presently fighting to ban them and demanding a return to hand counts and the kind of voting every citizen can oversee and understand. The most recent has been Germany.

In March 2009, Germany banned e-voting because two German citizens, Dr. Ulrich Wiesner and his father, Joachim Wiesner, filed a lawsuit declaring e-voting “unconstitutional” under the German Constitution (which, by the way, the final language put into their Constitution had to be approved by the U.S. after World War II). To further bolster their argument against e-voting, the Wiesners requested the help of a group of computer security experts, who were members of the Chaos Compute Club, to demonstrate for the Court technically how the voting system’s counting the votes was totally unobservable by the average citizen. In response to their lawsuit and the demonstration, the German Federal Constitutional Court ruled in favor of the Wiesners. The Court even took it a step further. They also ruled that no amount of testing or government checks of any kind, such as post election audits or recounts, can substitute for public observation. Ultimately, they unanimously declared that e-voting was, indeed, unconstitutional because computerized, secret vote counting does not subscribe to the democratic standards of their country! All elections in Germany have now reverted back to the use of hand-counted paper ballots.

In direct contrast to the U.S. Supreme Court’s priorities, the German Court’s priorities were to guarantee a German citizen’s human right, which in this case is to be able to “see” their votes counted without the need for any specialized technical expertise in order to do so. They did so to protect “principles of transparency” and the “public nature of elections” as the priority in how elections in a democratic republic must be administered. It is a great example of the German judiciary using its power the way it was intended by protecting the best interests of its citizens in one of the most important processes – elections – available to them in a democratic republic. Despite the historic nature of this decision, our mainstream media chose not to cover this story. Why not? You would think that the “greatest democracy in the world” would consider this decision by the highest court in Germany a must read by the American people, as well as by our own high court justices and government officials.

Yet, here in America, over 95% of us are forced to have a computerized voting system count our ballots because our government officials unilaterally sanctioned the control of our elections to the voting machine corporations through the passage of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) in 2002 and have protected their software from public scrutiny by upholding trade secret laws. As a result, no one can guarantee even a single voter that his or her vote is being counted as cast.

What a disturbing and glaring difference between the German Federal Constitutional Court and our U.S. Supreme Court when it comes to asserting their power as intended — to protect a citizen’s rights above all others. The German Court banned secret vote counting in elections and the U.S. Supreme Court gave corporations unchecked influence in our elections, in alliance with our government’s sanctioning of even further corporate control over our elections through the continued use of these voting machines. One Court protects the best interests of the citizens and the sanctity of their basic human rights in a democracy, the other protects the best interests of corporations.

Therefore, the most effective and pro-active action we, the People, can take in the wake of this horrendous decision by our U.S. Supreme Court is to immediately demand a return to publicly hand-counted paper ballots at the precinct level on election night and to posting the results at the precinct – before any ballots are moved – so the results can be publicly documented by citizens which will protect the integrity of the final tally at local, state and federal levels. When all is said and done, this is the only avenue left for citizens to be able to reclaim their rightful role in the election process. It will ensure that our vote – our voice – will be accurately heard as we bestow our consent to those we deem worthy of serving as the protectors of our rights and freedom. Our collective wisdom will see through the ruse of the corporation-backed candidates and elect those who will have the strength and courage to strike down this giant of corporatocracy and revive our quickly fading republic.

If the majority of American citizens can understand that free speech, as exemplified by the giving of financial support to candidates running for public office, should only be for people, not corporations, then it’s truly not a difficult leap for these very same Americans to understand that voting should only be “for the People, of the People and by the People” too. In fact, they go hand-in-hand. The very instant that the counting is hidden from view inside a machine, then voting ceases to be a public endeavor and becomes the domain of those with the financial resources and special expertise to create, program and run the counting devices means that “they” – not the People – will determine the election outcomes. This is not a prescription for democracy, but, rather, one for tyranny.

Demand hand-counted paper ballots now and we can defeat unlimited corporate money and influence, and the corporate machines that now control our elections. And so my fellow Americans, let’s say it together in one voice – ELECTIONS ARE FOR PEOPLE – NOT CORPORATIONS!

Contact: Kathleen Wynne (Founder HCPBnow.org and Former Associate Director of Black Box Voting.org) and Karen Renick (Founder VoteRescue.org) at: wynnekathleen@yahoo.com and karen@voterescue.org to learn more about hand counted paper ballots.

Thank you so much for sharing your perspective with us, Kathleen. Certainly food for thought, especially on the eve of Obama’s first State of the Union address.

Thoughts?

Greg Palast had an excellent post on this startling decision (first printed at Alternet.org), “Manchurian Candidates: Supreme Court Allows China And Others Unlimited Spending In The U.S.” That pretty much says it all, doesn’t it? Palast went on to say:

In today’s Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Court ruled that corporations should be treated the same as “natural persons”, i.e. humans. Well, in that case, expect the Supreme Court to next rule that Wal-Mart can run for President.

The ruling, which junks federal laws that now bar corporations from stuffing campaign coffers, will not, as progressives fear, cause an avalanche of corporate cash into politics. Sadly, that’s already happened: we have been snowed under by tens of millions of dollars given through corporate PACs and “bundling” of individual contributions from corporate pay-rollers.

The Court’s decision is far, far more dangerous to U.S. democracy. Think: Manchurian candidates.

I’m losing sleep over the millions — or billions — of dollars that could flood into our elections from ARAMCO, the Saudi Oil corporation’s U.S. unit; or from the maker of “New Order” fashions, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army. Or from Bin Laden Construction corporation. Or Bin Laden Destruction Corporation.

Right now, corporations can give loads of loot through PACs. While this money stinks (Barack Obama took none of it), anyone can go through a PAC’s federal disclosure filing and see the name of every individual who put money into it. And every contributor must be a citizen of the USA.

But under today’s Supreme Court ruling that corporations can support candidates without limit, there is nothing that stops, say, a Delaware-incorporated handmaiden of the Burmese junta from picking a Congressman or two with a cache of loot masked by a corporate alias…(click here for the rest of the post).

Ah, yes, President Wal-Mart – now THERE’S some democracy for ya…

Palast continues:

Candidate Barack Obama was one sharp speaker, but he would not have been heard, and certainly would not have won, without the astonishing outpouring of donations from two million Americans. It was an unprecedented uprising-by-PayPal, overwhelming the old fat-cat sources of funding.

Well, kiss that small-donor revolution goodbye. Under the Court’s new rules, progressive list serves won’t stand a chance against the resources of new “citizens” such as CNOOC, the China National Offshore Oil Corporation. Maybe UBS (United Bank of Switzerland), which faces U.S. criminal prosecution and a billion-dollar fine for fraud, might be tempted to invest in a few Senate seats. As would XYZ Corporation, whose owners remain hidden by “street names.”

Let’s just hold the phone for a minute here, Mr. Palast. While Obama no doubt did get a lot of smaller contributions through PayPal, there were also a LOT of questions about from where some of those contributions came since, according to the Obama Campaign itself, their tracking left a bit to be desired. But thanks for playing. Still, there is a point to be made:

George Bush’s former Solicitor General Ted Olson argued the case to the court on behalf of Citizens United, a corporate front that funded an attack on Hillary Clinton during the 2008 primary. Olson’s wife died on September 11, 2001 on the hijacked airliner that hit the Pentagon. Maybe it was a bit crude of me, but I contacted Olson’s office to ask how much “Al Qaeda, Inc.” should be allowed to donate to support the election of his local congressman.

Olson has not responded.

Um, okay, I’ll say it – it wasn’t crude, it was CRUEL. I get his point, but really, that was uncalled for in my book. Still, the concept regarding foreign contributions is disturbing at best:

The danger of foreign loot loading into U.S. campaigns, not much noted in the media chat about the Citizens case, was the first concern raised by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who asked about opening the door to “mega-corporations” owned by foreign governments. Olson offered Ginsburg a fudge, that Congress might be able to prohibit foreign corporations from making donations, though Olson made clear he thought any such restriction a bad idea.

Tara Malloy, attorney with the Campaign Legal Center of Washington D.C. says corporations will now have more rights than people. Only United States citizens may donate or influence campaigns, but a foreign government can, veiled behind a corporate treasury, dump money into ballot battles.

Malloy also noted that under the law today, human-people, as opposed to corporate-people, may only give $2,300 to a presidential campaign. But hedge fund billionaires, for example, who typically operate through dozens of corporate vessels, may now give unlimited sums through each of these “unnatural” creatures.

And once the Taliban incorporates in Delaware, they could ante up for the best democracy money can buy.

A bit hyperbolic, but, well, yeah – they can, as can any other corporation-person, or country-person:

In July, the Chinese government, in preparation for President Obama’s visit, held diplomatic discussions in which they skirted issues of human rights and Tibet. Notably, the Chinese, who hold a $2 trillion mortgage on our Treasury, raised concerns about the cost of Obama’s health care reform bill. Would our nervous Chinese landlords have an interest in buying the White House for an opponent of government spending such as Gov. Palin? Ya betcha!

Given how things are going right this minute, a lot of people would probably be happier with a President Palin. Ask some Tea Partiers. But his point, and it is a good one, is this:

The potential for foreign infiltration of what remains of our democracy is an adjunct of the fact that the source and control money from corporate treasuries (unlike registered PACs), is necessarily hidden. Who the heck are the real stockholders? Or as Butch asked Sundance, “Who are these guys?”

We’ll never know.

Hidden money funding, whether foreign or domestic, is the new venom that the Court has injected into the system by its expansive decision in Citizens United.

We’ve been there. The 1994 election brought Newt Gingrich to power in a GOP takeover of the Congress funded by a very strange source.

Congressional investigators found that in crucial swing races, Democrats had fallen victim to a flood of last-minute attack ads funded by a group called, “Coalition for Our Children’s Future.” The $25 million that paid for those ads came, not from concerned parents, but from a corporation called “Triad Inc.”

Evidence suggests Triad Inc. was the front for the ultra-right-wing billionaire Koch Brothers and their private petroleum company, Koch Industries. Had the corporate connection been proven, the Kochs and their corporation could have faced indictment under federal election law. As of today, such money-poisoned politicking has become legit.

So it’s not just un-Americans we need to fear but the Polluter-Americans, Pharma-mericans, Bank-Americans and Hedge-Americans that could manipulate campaigns while hidden behind corporate veils. And if so, our future elections, while nominally a contest between Republicans and Democrats, may in fact come down to a three-way battle between China, Saudi Arabia and Goldman Sachs.

And again, to be fair, it isn’t just Republicans who are going to benefit from this new “Corporations are People, TOO!” ruling by the Supremes. Democrats will benefit, too:

Campaign Finance: The Supreme Court has ruled that corporations have a constitutional right to free speech. But Democratic leaders refuse to accept the decision, and their predictable reaction is to undermine it.

Rather than praising Thursday’s 5-4 decision to reverse the 1990 court ruling that banned corporations and unions from contributing directly to political campaigns as an advancement of liberty, President Obama condemned it.

“The Supreme Court,” he said, “has given a green light to a new stampede of special interest money in our politics. It is a major victory for Big Oil, Wall Street banks, health insurance companies and the other powerful interests that marshal their power every day in Washington to drown out the voices of everyday Americans . ..

“That’s why I am instructing my administration to get to work immediately with Congress on this issue. We are going to talk with bipartisan congressional leaders to develop a forceful response to this decision.”

Go get ‘em, Obama! Yeah, show some muscle on this!!! Oh, but wait – is this just more talk? It appears so:

The president is betting the public will accept his rhetoric without checking his facts, and the facts in this case show that lawyers and law firms, not “Big Oil” or “Wall Street,” are the biggest political contributors. According to opensecrets.org., 83% of their donations are going to Democrats in the current election cycle,

This is not unusual. In the 2008 cycle, Democrats took in 78% of lawyer and law-firm political dollars. In 2006, the ratio was 62% Democrats to 36% Republicans. Two years earlier, it was 80% to 20% in favor of the Democrats.

Maybe the president just doesn’t consider lawyers and law firms to be special interests. OK, so how about the securities and investment industry, a sector Democrats have demonized and unfavorably link to Republicans? Is this group a special interest?

The president can define special interests any way he wants. But he can’t redefine the fact that 73% of the political donations from the securities and investment industry — the “Wall Street” he apparently holds in such low regard — are going to Democrats in the 2010 cycle. In 2008, 64% went to Democrats, in 2004 it was 61% and in 2002 56%. In the 2006 cycle, the parties evenly split donations from the sector, each taking in 47%.

Oh, well, um – yes it would seem this is indeed more “words, just words,” from the man behind the curtain. What a big surprise – not at all. But there’s more:

As telling as that is, our fact-checking exercise revealed another valuable nugget. Of the 50 industries and sectors categorized as contributors by opensecrets.org, Democrats are the top recipients during this cycle in all but two (emphasis mine). Oil and gas, one of those named a “powerful interest,” is ranked as the 14th largest political contributor, and the auto industry, which ranks 46th.

In short, the stampede of special interest money began long before the court’s ruling, and Democrats are the biggest beneficiaries (emphasis mine).

Oops. Wait, look over THERE! Or, there! Or anywhere but here!! Um, do you smell something burning? Oh, yes – their pants are on fire:

The president knows this, and so does Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y. Yet Schumer calls the court’s ruling “poisonous” and, according to The Hill newspaper, promises to hold hearings “to explore ways to limit corporate spending on elections.”

Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, also knows that his party is swimming in special-interest money. But he vows hearings as well.

If Democrats are acting as if they fear what the ruling will mean, it’s because they probably do. They feel their funding advantage, which already includes so much indirect union money that the court’s overturning of the ban on direct union contributions won’t help them, is now at risk.

But their complaint about a stampede of special interest dollars is hard to take seriously, and not only because of how much special interest money they’re already getting. While supporters of campaign finance laws say money is the corrupting element, they ignore the second part of the equation and the more corrosive factor: lawmakers’ votes.

Their implication is that big money buys votes in Congress, and they might be right. But trying to cut the flow of political money won’t stop the practice; it will only drive it underground. The way to stop the corruption is to prosecute lawmakers who sell their vote.

Though tainted by undue persecution, political dollars are a necessary part of our system. They illuminate the issues for everyday Americans and give challengers a chance (to) drive out entrenched incumbents. No one, not even a group of individuals, should be barred from taking part in this exercise of freedom.

Still don’t think I can concur that a group of individuals is the same as a corporation. But other than that, this piece does highlight that it isn’t just Republicans who are going to benefit from this unprecedented decision by the Supreme Court, but ALL politicians will benefit.

But will WE?

This video provides some of the reasons the Memorial Cross should go from the ACLU’s perspective:

Hard to believe this is all the result of just one person, isn’t it? All the way to the Supreme Court? And yet, that is the case. Arguments were heard on Wednesday. I received this in an email from the ACLU on this topic:

Last week, the Supreme Court heard argument in Salazar v. Buono, an establishment clause challenge to the federal government’s display of a Latin cross in the Mojave National Preserve.

The Court’s questions focused largely on esoteric procedural doctrine, and while it’s always risky to predict the outcome of a case based on an oral argument, it seems unlikely the Court will rule on the broader constitutional issues in the case — namely, whether the plaintiff, a devout Catholic and former National Park Service employee, had standing to challenge the display of the cross; and whether, before it tried to transfer the cross to a private party, the government violated the First Amendment by displaying the sectarian symbol on federal land.

While the Supreme Court ultimately may pass on the loftier constitutional questions in this case, Wednesday’s argument had some dramatic moments. In the most heated exchange of the morning, Justice Antonin Scalia peppered Peter Eliasberg, the ACLU attorney arguing for the plaintiff, with questions about the significance of the cross. Justice Scalia bristled at Eliasberg’s suggestion that a World War I memorial featuring only a Christian cross sends a message of exclusion and religious favoritism, asking, “The cross doesn’t honor non-Christians who fought in the war?” After Eliasberg responded that the cross “is the predominant symbol of Christianity,” Justice Scalia pushed back, suggesting that there was no constitutional problem with the display because “the cross is the most common symbol of the resting place of the dead.” Eliasberg resisted, explaining that “the cross is the most common symbol of the resting place of Christians.” “I have been in Jewish cemeteries,” continued Eliasberg, the son of a Jewish World War II Navy veteran. “There is never a cross on a tombstone of a Jew.”

The notion that a war memorial featuring a stand-alone Latin cross serves to honor only Christian war dead — a notion Justice Scalia called “outrageous” — was echoed in a series of amicus briefs filed in the case by various veterans groups.

However the Buono case is resolved, it will be difficult, if not impossible, to convince many non-Christian veterans that an isolated, freestanding cross expressly recognizes their service to the country. And Congress’s designation of the Mojave cross as one of only 49 national memorials (and the only one commemorating World War I), joining such iconic symbols as the Washington Monument and Mount Rushmore, only compounds the problem. As one retired Army brigadier general recently put it, “The cross is unquestionably a sectarian religious symbol that, as a congressionally designated national memorial to veterans, would convey the message that the military values the sacrifices of Christian war dead over those of service members belonging to other faiths.”

Hmmm. Interesting take there on the non-Christian veterans. I would love to hear what those veterans think about this (and I say that as someone who isn’t a Christian, either. Not that I don’t appreciate who Jesus was, or his words of peace and love. I grew up as a devout Christian, actually, an very much appreciate the message of Jesus. But enough about me.).

The decision of the Supreme Court will surely have long reaching effects. So, what do you think – should the Memorial Cross stay, or should it go?

Rather, the point of the Editorial has to do with an upcoming Supreme Court decision:

The Supreme Court may be about to radically change politics by striking down the longstanding rule that says corporations cannot spend directly on federal elections. If the floodgates open, money from big business could overwhelm the electoral process, as well as the making of laws on issues like tax policy and bank regulation.

The court, which is scheduled to hear arguments on this issue on Wednesday, is rushing to decide a monumental question at breakneck speed and seems willing to throw established precedents and judicial modesty out the window.

Corporations and unions have been prohibited from spending their money on federal campaigns since 1947, and corporate contributions have been barred since 1907. States have barred corporate expenditures since the late 1800s. These laws are very much needed today. In the 2008 election cycle, Fortune 100 companies alone had combined revenues of $13.1 trillion and profits of $605 billion. That dwarfs the $1.5 billion that Federal Election Commission-registered political parties spent during the same election period, or the $1.2 billion spent by federal political action committees.

Uh, okay. Is it really possible that the Editors are unaware just how much money Obama spent to buy the White House in the last election? Are they unaware that he violated one of his campaign promises to forego Public Financing? Did they even BOTHER to look up just how much money Obama GOT from corporations?? Evidently not. Hence their outrage at this possibility. And it goes on:

The Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld the limitations on corporate campaign expenditures. In 1990, in Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce, and again in 2003, in McConnell v. Federal Election Commission, it made clear that Congress was acting within its authority and that the restrictions are consistent with the First Amendment.

In late June, the court directed the parties to address whether Austin and McConnell should be overruled. It gave the parties in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission a month to write legal briefs on a question of extraordinary complexity and importance, and it scheduled arguments during the court’s vacation.

All of this is disturbing on many levels. Normally, the court tries not to decide cases on constitutional grounds if they can be resolved more simply. Here the court is reaching out to decide a constitutional issue that could change the direction of American democracy.

The Editors are sure right about that – it IS “disturbing on many levels.” I just don’t get why they didn’t get so exercised about this say, oh, two years ago. I guess I’m just nitpicky that way.

And their concern continues:

The court usually shows great respect for its own precedents, a point Chief Justice John Roberts made at his confirmation hearings. Now the court appears ready, without any particular need, to overturn important precedents and decades of federal and state law.

The scheduling is enormously troubling. There is no rush to address the constitutionality of the corporate expenditures limit. But the court is racing to do that in a poorly chosen case with no factual record on the critical question, making careful deliberation impossible.

Most disturbing, though, is the substance of what the court seems poised to do. If corporations are allowed to spend from their own treasuries on elections — rather than through political action committees, which take contributions from company employees — it would usher in an unprecedented age of special-interest politics.

Corporations would have an enormous say in who wins federal elections. They would be able to use this influence to obtain subsidies, stimulus money and tax loopholes and to undo protections for investors, workers and consumers. It would take an extraordinarily brave member of Congress to stand up to agents of big business who then could say, quite credibly, that they would spend whatever it takes in the next election to defeat him or her.

The conservative majority on the court likes to present itself as deferential to the elected branches of government and as minimalists about the role of judges. Chief Justice Roberts promised the Senate that if confirmed he would remember that it’s his “job to call balls and strikes and not to pitch or bat.”

If the court races to overturn federal and state laws, and its well-established precedents, to free up corporations to drown elections in money, it will be swinging for the fences. The American public will be the losers.

Well,I don’t know about you, but this seems just a tad disingenuous to me. They are railing NOW about the money corporations can spend? Do you think they gave a crap that Goldman Sachs, yes, I said, GOLDMAN SACHS, gave Obama almost $1 MILLION dollars? How about Time Warner giving him almost $600,000? The list goes on and on, which is what makes the outrage of the Editors ring just a bit hollow to me. How about you?

I think of this exchange:

Charlie Young: [telling the President that he has to practice throwing a baseball with a bullet proof vest on before throwing the first pitch out at a baseball game] Sir, everyone agrees.
President Josiah Bartlet: Like who?
Charlie Young: Leo, Josh, CJ, your wife, the Notre Dame athletic department…

Maybe Obama should have practiced more, too, since he barely made it to the plate – oh wait, the announcer doesn’t mention that. Good thing there is THIS video that shows the entire pitch:

And he gives himself a little fist pump for barely making it to the plate, too!! Perhaps that’s why some people are booing him? Oh, no wait – it started before he threw out the pitch. Funny, the announcer doesn’t mention that, either. Did you notice the driver of the golf cart in the first video barely shook Obama’s hand? Interesting commentary there, too, I think.

Since I mentioned the “West Wing,” and since we are in the midst of hearings for a new Supreme Court Justice, how about this classic clip regarding nominees for the Supreme Court:

Ah, the politics involved in selecting the next Supreme Court Justice…

By the way, in response to my post recently on the grave robbers, a number of people mentioned that Michelle Obama’s father was buried in Burr Oaks Cemetery, too. As it turns out, that was not true. Apparently, Michelle Obama’s Communications Director put that out there without bothering to check the facts first (oh, now THERE’S a surprise – hahahahahaha), and has now had to retract that statement. Turns out, her father is not buried there after all. Gee, it is a little hard not to be too cynical about that revelation…

And while this is going on, there has been something else going on in Obama’s hometown, Chicago. Maybe it was because I was on vacation last week, but I had not heard anything about this until Disturbed mentioned it at No Quarter in my “For Some Peaceful Reflection” post. And that is the grave robbing going on in the Burr Oak Cemetery. This is an African American cemetery, and as I understand it, seven thousand families have now filed reports. It is a tragic story, one best told by my favorite Chicago writer, John Kass. He does so poignantly in this article, “The Dead Don’t Deserve This; Nor Do The Living“:

The disinterred bodies were in weedy mounds a short bus ride away, lumpy in the dirt, in a back section near the fence at Burr Oak Cemetery.

There were broken caskets and concrete grave liners in the mounds, too, and detectives said that when the grave robbers got tired or sloppy they just dumped the bodies on the ground.

So there were human teeth and leg bones, hips and finger bones scattered out there in the weeds.

Charles Taylor didn’t want to see them and neither did I.

“What kind of person does this? I’ll tell you,” said Taylor, a retired child-welfare worker, one of the anguished people in the cemetery on Thursday, each desperate to learn if the graves of their dead were among those that had been pillaged by the grave robbers.

“It’s the kind of person who breaks into a church and steals the cross of gold and sells it. And people ask, ‘Who could do something like that?’ But they know.

“A thief breaks into the church. A thief pulls bodies out of the graves for cash money and dumps them in a pile. That’s what we have here. Thieves of bodies.”

This is just beyond sad. The disrespect, of both the living and the dead, and all for money:

Those bodies once belonged to the dead. But the grave robbers stole more than that. They stole peace from the dead and from the living and they stole dignity and memory. They plunged every survivor in that cemetery on Thursday into despair.

There were hundreds and hundreds of people, all of them African-Americans, at the cemetery that predates the end of segregation. Each one was heartbroken. Some were guilty about not having visited their family plots sooner. Others were people, women mostly, who visited the graves at least once a month, with flowers and tiny pinwheels and watering cans.

Yet whether they provided constant vigil or offered just a thought from a distance, every one had been violated.

“I came here to visit my grandmother’s grave a couple months ago, and it didn’t look right, it looked like there was fresh dug dirt next to it,” said Precious Hicks, 21. “And the cemetery people wanted me to leave. You know what they told me? They said it was wild coyotes.”

Oh, my. So lies on top of theft, while looking these people in the face. That takes a helluva lot of nerve, to put it mildly. Kass continues:

Surely you haven’t missed the story. Up to 300 bodies, and perhaps even more, were torn out of their graves, allegedly by a gang of gravediggers and a cemetery official. The open graves were resold for cash, and the bodies that had been in those graves were dumped onto those terrible mounds.

The cemetery boss is suspected of taking the cash and driving out to the gambling boats, and the gravediggers received overtime for plucking bodies from graves, sources familiar with the investigation said. It worked like this for years.

Sometimes they just pushed the new ones on top of the old.

“They smashed the old ones down,” said Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart, whose office and investigators broke the case. The investigation is being run by the head of the financial crimes and public corruption unit, Jack Steed.

“This is sickening,” Dart told me. “All the people here, you look into their eyes, and you see pain.”

My heart just breaks for these families, who have endured so much at the hands of a few, at the hands of those who had been entrusted to care for their loved ones in death. Those who abused that trust from their own greed. These families, alive and dead, do not deserve this. One can only hope the grave robbers get their comeuppance:

Later, Dart and Cook County State’s Atty. Anita Alvarez held a news conference off to the side, and Dart explained the scheme, while Alvarez explained the charges.

The FBI brought in a forensics team, some of whom had worked sifting through the mass graves in the Balkans, and it will take months to sort it out, and match bone to bone.

With Alvarez and Dart there, I thought I might see another prominent politico with 19th Ward Democratic organization connections: Illinois Comptroller Dan Hynes.

A few years ago Hynes campaigned on cemetery rip-offs and made news splash after news splash about abuses in what he calls the “death care industry.” He vowed to fight them. His Web page is full of such vows.

Though Hynes’ office is responsible for the oversight of privately owned cemeteries like Burr Oak, he wasn’t at the news conference. His office said he has oversight but little legal authority to enforce cemetery upkeep.

Perhaps Hynes was busy making plans to get into the U.S. Senate race. Sen. Roland “Tombstone” Burris, who cozied up to disgraced former Gov. Rod Blagojevich for the Senate appointment, has apparently decided to drop out of politics.

It’s too bad Dan Hynes wasn’t there.

But Rev. Jesse Jackson was at the news conference. He terrified funeral directors by asking if any of them had ever resold used coffins through Burr Oak.

“There are prominent people buried here,” Jackson said, of civil rights martyr Emmett Till, and old Negro League baseball players, and entertainers and champion prizefighters.

“But everybody here is special. And those grave robbers deserve a special place in hell,” Jackson said. “How far did this scheme go? That’s what we want to know.”

As the politicians made speeches, Robert Gardner, 73, a retired steelworker, waited to speak with investigators about his father-in-law, Johnny Marks, buried in 1982.

“This is worse than bad,” said Gardner, pointing toward the death mounds out back. “All those people turned out of their graves, left out there. They get no peace. Neither do we.” (jskass@tribune.com)

“Worse than bad,” indeed. Here is a video on this issue, too:

There are more videos and related articles at the link above for Kass’ article.

Whatever one believes happens after death, whether the body is just a vessel, or that the soul is still there, this is just horrendous. The grave robbers have shown tremendous callous disregard for these people, for their remains, and for their families. It is heart-breaking, plain and simple. I hope the perps get everything that is coming to them. If they have an ounce of humanity in them (which they have not demonstrated), I hope they have to look each and every living family member in the eye, and apologize to them. Each one. That is the very least they can do. And then I hope they have the book thrown at them. They deserve no less.

So, there WERE African Americans and Hispanics who passed the exam, too, something previously unreported. As Mr. Ricci said, the press did NOT do its job, accepting as fact the city of New Haven’s talking points. Wow – what a HUGE surprise – the press not engaging in fact checking. Again! Shocking. Ahem.

I thought this was an interesting interview. Congratulations to all of the firefighters who worked so hard to pass their tests (Ricci was not the only one who sacrificed studying for the exam – it sounds like EVERYONE sacrifices for these extra classes and tests). Here’s hoping you all get the positions, and back pay, you worked so hard to achieve.

The only kids who weren’t self-conscious in the extreme about their evolving bodies and appearance were those few precocious jocks destined for high school football glory. To minimize exposure of the shiny wire braces on his teeth, one of my friends refused to speak unless absolutely necessary. Another tried to fake mononucleosis (the teenage diagnosis du jour) to buy time so that a bad haircut could grow out.

So it is difficult to imagine how 13 year old Savana Redding felt while being forced to expose her breasts and pelvic area to school officials. There was perhaps a reasonable suspicion that Redding could be in possession of a couple of Advil and possibly an Aleve because school personnel were tipped off by another student. Yet, was this breech of the rules sufficient to warrant what amounted to a strip search?

Even though Savana was also suspected of bringing other contraband to school, by an 8 to 1 majority the Supreme Court of the United States concluded that her rights had been violated and that the suspected breach failed to rise to the level of danger that would justify that degree of bodily invasion.

Oh, by the way, no pills were found in her backpack or on her person.

The case itself is somewhat complex, and good overviews appear
here and here. But the question remains as to what rights schools have when they receive tips from other students about threats that could endanger other students and school personnel.

Columbine and similar tragedies have put schools on alert. Students are actively encouraged to report any potential problems, and these reports are taken seriously. Yet there appears to be no bright line to demarcate exactly when extreme measures can and should be taken. Perhaps for that reason the Court did not impose any penalties on the personnel at Savana’s school. Yet, a quest to search for a couple of Advil’s by invading the body of a teenage girl, even though done by a female nurse and secretary, crosses way over some line.

What do you think?

Toss another knuckle-dragging sack of crap into the pile that guarantees the Republican Party will never recover. Imagine being married to something like this and not killing it in its sleep?

And don’t forget to buy some gold from this neanderthal, you hear?

Gordy talks periods at :35 seconds.

Say good night to me, Republican Party. Between Rush “feminazi” Limbaugh, Glenn “I’m 95% chick! I blubber all the time!” Beck and now this animal, I will stay home before I vote for the next Republican candidate. Guys like this are the best weapon the Democratic Party has. This ranks right up there with, nay it surpasses, Barack The Pig Obama’s reference to “Periodic moments” aimed at Hillary. It takes some real experience to outPig Barack Obama in the “Offend women” department. Is this what you REALLY aspire to, Republican Party? If so, say goodbye now. You deserve to be eaten alive by the other animal farm.

And I couldn’t resist stealing Gordie’s “hot” pic from Riverdaughter. I nearly went blind when I saw it. And speaking of “Patriotism,” there’s nothing like wearing the American flag over your old and shriveled age-induced low-hanging ball sac.

I’m sorry, but this is just beyond the pale!

Poor Michael Steele. It’s hopeless, isn’t it? I will keep this video to remind myself to stay home in 2012. This is the face and voice of the Republican Party.

And by the way, I find it hysterically funny that the men in this party don’t like how Sexism feels. You would think it would cure them, but nope. What do you expect from a guy who actually let’s someone take a photo of himself looking like this?

Hey Gordy! Scuse me, “G Man”. Eat shit and die!

Rachel’s commentary speaks for itself. Judge Sotomayor is a moderate, and has made several pro-business rulings. Here’s Rachel’s source:

From Rachel Maddow’s Web site:

The not very liberal-sounding dissent by Judge Sotomayor referenced on the air by Rachel: 209 F.3d 200 (2nd Cir. 2000)

Below find a screen grab of the top portion of this ruling.

MY NOTE to our readers: Please consider that ANY ONE of us who truly wishes to know what Sonia Sotomayor is made of as a judge must judiciously and openly read ALL of her rulings — including this ruling, in full — and not selectively pick and hammer on a few.

Her abilities are found in the sums of her experience and her judgment — as well as her not inconsiderable academic achievements in the first quarter of her life.

(Click on the image to view the larger version.)

UPDATE:

Lest there be any confusion about Rachel Maddow’s view of Judge Sotomayor, here is the first segment of her show last night:

I could have done without the cocktail metaphor, but I wanted to be sure you understand that Rachel Maddow is in favor of Judge Sotomayor’s appointment to the USSC, but that she is taking great care to point out that Judge Sotomayor is not some far-left radical. Hence the segment on her pro-business rulings.

Imagine a time when a female candidate for a position of power is actually judged on her merits. That moment is coming. It’s called The New Agenda.

On the back of the Sotomayor nomination, the Washington Post writes Women’s Groups Vow to Fight for Swift Confirmation. Which women’s group is the first to be mentioned? The New Agenda:

The New Agenda, a nonpartisan group formed during last year’s presidential campaigns, hailed the selection as “inspirational” and pronounced itself “thrilled” that four of the 10 women it suggested for the court were interviewed by Obama.

“It’s a great day for America and a great day for women,” said New Agenda co-founder Nancy Hopkins. “The choice of Sotomayor also shows that excellence and diversity go hand in hand. In this case, they were inseparable,” she added.

Yes, we are ready for a fight. We’re raring to go. Judge Sotomayor – We Have Your Back!

But imagine this in the future – the not too distant future – an organization with millions of members. Now that is a real voice. Then we wouldn’t be hearing “bad temperament”, “not that smart” (see video below) while of course we all knew, even the left, that Alito and Roberts were just “brilliant”. We could end this double standard in it’s tracks! Issues are fair game, sexist treatment is no longer fair game!

And to be a national organization with millions of members and real power to end the likes of the upcoming Sotomayor misogyny-fest – you know, the stuff that Hillary and Sarah had to endure – we need to build the infrastructure to become a national organization. And infrastructure requires dough – and we need your help. Remember – we are not a blog – we are a grassroots organization with a blog to keep our members informed.

Please donate to The New Agenda. We can and will make this country a better place for women and girls.

One donor from the West Coast wrote to us today to say that she was cutting into this month’s food budget to donate funds. She had been a lifelong feminist and was ready to throw in the towel until The New Agenda came along. Another donor wrote to say that TNA gives her hope for real progress for women: “If not TNA, who? And if not now, when?”

JOIN US! DONATE! WE NEED YOUR HELP!

Even our friends at Fox are joining the misogyny-fest. Who can we count on? Ourselves!

From the “About Us” page:

The New Agenda was founded on August 11, 2008, when 30 women met in Westchester, New York, to sketch out plans for a new non-partisan women’s rights organization. The attendees were community activists and leaders of women’s organizations from around the country, many of whom had met during Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. It was the painful lessons of that campaign that provided the raison d’être for the new group: to support women for public office, to draw a line in the sand against the sexism and misogyny so much in evidence in 2008, and to build a broad, non-partisan coalition to advance key goals for women.

The New Agenda calls on President Obama to select a woman to fill Justice Souter’s seat

The New Agenda, a non-partisan national movement advocating for all women, called on President Obama to fill the seat that will be vacated by Justice Souter with a qualified woman. Currently only one of nine positions on the nation’s highest court is a woman.

“Women’s experiences, expectations, and lives are sufficiently different from men’s that men can not represent women no matter how sympathetic they may be,” said Nancy Hopkins, MIT biology professor – a leader in her field and New Agenda co-founder. “Women are best represented by women. The fact that only one of nine Supreme Court Justices is a woman is an enormous injustice to the women of the United States.

We expect – we demand – that President Obama begin to correct this injustice.”

Last week Hopkins was awarded one of Women’s eNews 2009 21 Leaders for the 21st Century – a distinction shared with Lily Ledbetter. Hopkins knows what it’s like to be in a field dominated by men who are highly educated and smart, but often clueless about gender. Hopkins was in the audience when Larry Summers famously stated that girls are genetically inferior to men when it comes to math and science – a statement Hopkins’ life and career strongly refutes.

The field of law would benefit greatly from a feminine perspective. Upon learning that John Roberts would take her place, former Justice Sandra Day O’Connor declared him “good in every way, except he’s not a woman.”

“There is an amazing pool of incredibly talented women who are leaders in the field of law,” said The New Agenda co-founder Amy Siskind. “We look forward to President Obama selecting one of them.”

To reinforce the message that there is a rich pool of candidates, The New Agenda released the following list of exemplar candidates for the Supreme Court seat.

• Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm: Harvard Law School graduate, former federal prosecutor and a county attorney

• Kathleen Sullivan: dean of the Stanford Law School after teaching at Harvard Law School. Has argued key cases before the Supreme Court

• Diane Pamela Wood: longtime professor at the University of Chicago Law School, federal appeals court judge (7th Circuit)

• Georgia Supreme Court Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears: the first black woman to be appointed chief justice in any state

• Kimberly McLane Wardlaw: federal appeals court judge in California, and would be the first Hispanic woman on the Supreme Court.

• Sonia Sototomayor: 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals

• Sandra Lea Lynch: chief judge of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals

• Elena Kagan: U.S. Solicitor General

• M. Margaret McKeown: 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals

• Pamela S. Karlan: Stanford University law professor

WOW! Someone with some common sense! “Scaring people is not leadership.” RIght on, Lindsay! Right on!

I just wish there were MORE MEAT like this, by an intelligent and thoughtful guest, than the filler that passes for news but is NOT news. I’m also bored stiff by the repetitiveness of TV cable news. I try to watch some so I know what they’re emphasizing but I always end up turning to NPR or BBC World News. Today, CNNMSNBCFNN have got the tapes of the plane that landed in the Hudson, and they’ll be playing that every hour, all day and all evening long. It’s perfect fare, because it’s the kind of news that does ALL work for them. It requires no reporters, no investigation, and very little analysis; the networks just toss it up on the screen and let the watchers watch.

But you’re probably like me, and you want MORE actual news, so here’s some of what I’ve found today:

*** Sad news: “U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg had surgery today for pancreatic cancer.” (Via CNN’s breaking news e-mail)

*** “Deluge Is Holding Up Benefits to Unemployed
Decline in Funding Forces Staff Cuts as Claims Swell:

Thousands of people in the Washington area and hundreds of thousands more across the country are waiting longer than they should for unemployment benefits at a time when they need the money the most because rising joblessness is overwhelming claims offices, records show.

The problem is compounded by a simultaneous decrease in federal funding, which has reduced staffing at some local government offices. The result is that the District and many states, including Maryland and Virginia, are failing to meet federal guidelines that require timely processing of unemployment claims. …

It’s likely to get worse. …

*** Eric Shinseki, the brave general who told the truth to Donald Rumsfeld and ended up with his career ruined, is ON THE JOB as Secretary of the Veterans Administration.

According to the WSJ, he’s beginning with a careful analysis which, from all the stories we’ve heard about chaos and inefficiency at the VA, sounds like a plan: He is “launching a top-down review of his embattled department, saying major change is needed soon to ensure the “highest levels of integrity, transparency and performance.” More snippets:

“Our veterans deserve and demand a Department of Veterans Affairs that remains relevant over time, that is responsive to their individual and changing needs, and that cares enough about them to undertake this challenging transformation. We care,” Mr. Shinseki said in testimony prepared for a House Veterans Affairs Committee hearing Wednesday.

… Thousands of veterans currently endure six-month waits for disability benefits, and the VA is scrambling to upgrade government technology systems before new legislation providing for millions of dollars in new GI benefits takes effect in August.

In recent weeks, the Government Accountability Office found that the VA was still lowballing budget estimates to Congress at the expense of tens of thousands of patients needing long-term health care. The VA also acknowledged at least nine cases of giving incorrect doses of drugs — mostly blood-thinning heparin — due to widespread computer glitches that it didn’t disclose to patients. …

*** Ken Rudin, the political blogger for NPR, has a fascinating report on the race to succeed Florida’s retiring senator, Mel Martinez, and also on the future of Minnesota’s Norm Coleman:

FLORIDA:

[...]

Jeb Bush had frozen the GOP field while he was considering the race. Now it’s Charlie Crist’s turn. The popular governor said he would sit down with his new wife and discuss it after the legislative session, which ends in May. Crist, like Bush, could probably have the nomination if he wants it. He is barred from seeking a third term in 2010. Way back in 1998, Crist was the GOP Senate nominee against Democratic incumbent Bob Graham and got clobbered by nearly a million votes. But that was a long time ago.

[...]

The latest news has former Sen. Bob Smith (R) thinking about running. That’s former Sen. Bob Smith of New Hampshire. Smith, who moved to the Sunshine State to sell real estate since losing his seat to Sununu in the 2002 primary, has sent out an email trying to gauge his support.

MINNESOTA:

[...]

After a hand recount of 2.9 million voters, Al Franken, the Democratic challenger, has a lead of 225 votes. For the longest time, the assumption (here at least) was that it’s just a matter of time before Franken is sworn in. But not so fast. On Tuesday, a three-judge panel of the state Supreme Court agreed to review 4,797 previously rejected absentee ballots. This was in response to a motion made by Coleman, who actually wanted the judges to review about 11,000 votes; Franken wanted the scope to be limited to 771 rejected

So the review of nearly 5,000 ballots has begun. Just because they are being looked at does not necessarily mean Coleman will prevail. There’s no telling how many of the ballots will be reinstated, and it’s quite possible that Franken could get a healthy portion of them. And, if after this process Coleman moves into the lead, we know that Franken will come up with his own list of ballots he wants reviewed.

We may not know who won the election until March. At the earliest.

[...]

So: What else is going on in the big bad world?

As Lilly Ledbetter approached her retirement after working as a Goodyear plant supervisor for many years, someone slipped her a disturbing fact. Her male colleagues had been making far more than she was. She sued.

A jury found Goodyear guilty, but the Supreme Court threw out the case. Why? The reason will astound and disturb anyone who works for a private company.

According to enough Bush Supreme Court appointees to reach a 5-4 decision, Ledbetter should have filed her suit within 6 months after the first discriminatory paycheck was issued.

Huh? How’s that again? Exactly how would Lilly have known that fact way back then, given that private companies are still under no obligation to supply salary information to their employees?

President Obama spoke of Lilly Ledbetter’s plight during his campaign, and today he put his pen where his mouth was. (We at No Quarter are watching for what he actually does and give credit when credit is due.) The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act has been signed into law.

Amy Goldstein deftly puts the bill in its proper perspective:

The legislation …essentially rewrites the rules that specify the time within which workers may sue under a part of the 1964 Civil Rights Act that outlaws discrimination based on gender, race, national origin or religion. Under the bill, workers may bring a lawsuit for up to six months after they receive ANY [emphasis added] paycheck that they allege is discriminatory.

The high court had held that such cases could be brought only within six months of the discrimination’s beginning, rejecting a long-held interpretation by lower courts and the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that each paycheck represented a fresh act of discrimination.

Republicans and others have said this is simply a victory for litigators. Perhaps it is one more income source for trial attorneys because a new law can now be broken. But as Congresswoman Barbara Mikulski (D-RI) put it, “If you don’t want to be sued, don’t discriminate!”

So, in the end did Lilly Ledbetter become rich as well as famous? Well, no. Now 70 and recently widowed, she will not receive restitution and her case cannot be retired. As Gail Collins puts it, “She’s now part of a long line of working women who went to court and changed a little bit of the world in fights that often brought them minimal personal benefit.”

A friend sent along a quote by Mary Ann Radmacher that well characterizes the Lilly Ledbetters of the world.

Courage does not always roar.
Sometimes courage is the quiet voice
at the end of the day saying,
“I will try again tomorrow.”