Heather..;today your report is bloody true and terribly sad….and we have the the Russians, the Iranians, the Orange one and his cohorts to thank for it. I wish I could see some clear solutions….but I can’t. Your painful clarity at least identifies the magnitude of the problem!
Heather..;today your report is bloody true and terribly sad….and we have the the Russians, the Iranians, the Orange one and his cohorts to thank for it. I wish I could see some clear solutions….but I can’t. Your painful clarity at least identifies the magnitude of the problem!
Efforts to undo "Citizens United" and de facto bribery in general, would be a useful start. Calling attention to some forgotten concepts, such as "antitrust".
I've been favoring a coast to coast - every state voter initiative ballot petition for a very long time; in fact since "Citizens United" was first issued. I've seen efforts of others come, go, then get complicated. *If it's to be done, a brilliant legal mind like Joyce Vance and others would be needed for the legal jargon and other expertise. It could be done. I really think voters of all stripes would agree.
This joint resolution proposes a constitutional amendment providing that the rights protected and extended by the Constitution are the rights of natural persons only. Artificial entities, such as corporations, shall have no rights under the Constitution and are subject to regulation.
HJR-54 was introduced by Jayapal Primila: The amendment requires federal, state, and local governments to (1) regulate, limit, or prohibit election contributions and expenditures, including a candidate's own contributions and expenditures, to ensure equal access of citizens to the political process, regardless of economic status; and (2) require that any permissible contributions and expenditures be publicly disclosed.
Additionally, the judiciary is prohibited from construing the spending of money to influence elections to be speech under the First Amendment. (2023-2024)
We need to support the passage of this bill...now!
And Tom, I did not see anything in Amend.org related to HJR-54...Great work there, but am I missing something?
Tom, I LIKE the HJR-54 idea! Seems to strike at the heart of any number of issues confronting us (as in USA) today. I also don't see anything on Amend.org pertaining to this proposed legislation.
You've mentioned this before Tom; I'll do a 'deep dive' into it. My past experiences with such previous initiatives as noted in my above comment ↑. Thanks Tom ~
It is true that a simple reversal of Citizens United would not be the perfect legal solution. It could be at least a major change in attitudes in peoples' tolerance for dark money influence on the few holders of the levers of power, though.
Laws and Regulations are hard to change fast enough to keep up with those clever enough to find new ways to cheat, at least without responsible regulators to able be flexible enough to adjust to the spirit of the most import basic aims of such.
I think I remember mostly his regret that a lot of irresponsible and incompetent risk takers with other peoples' money entered the field. He wanted to see innovators enabled but saw too many at least irresponsible new people take over a large portion of the financial markets. I think I understand enough about the old style derivatives to appreciate the following from the article above:
"...“In derivatives,” says Weill, “we should have an exchange, where you can have a mark-to-market, a place where they can trade, so that you don’t have a problem that can build up over multiple years, and all of a sudden you see a big collapse. If it was marked to market every single day, you'd be able to protect the balance sheets of the different companies.
The world has changed
Does Weill regret what he did at Citigroup? Not really. Weill says that the megabanks were right for their time but the world has changed.
As a result of too much concentration of investments, too much leverage, not enough transparency with a lot of off-balance-sheet items, we had the meltdown of 2008 and trust in the financial system was broken. This has led to efforts to regulate everything in the financial sector, including futile efforts to distinguish market-making trading from proprietary trading. Weill believes that these efforts will continue and in the end will stifle creativity in the financial sector. Instead, the sector should take another route and allow regulation of commercial banking and separate that from investment banking, where creativity and leadership can prosper..."
I have to do some more homework to try to show similarities in what can go wrong when Dark Money hides too much incompetence and evil. I'll start with reading all of Cathy O'Neil's "Weapons of Math Destruction." My initial assumption is that she found amazingly incompetent assessments (or attention to), risk management. Those blindly seeking quarterly profit seem too encouraged by those who do not want their methods and aims revealed, as seems indicated by the following: "...As O'Neil defines it, a weapon of math destruction, or WMD, has three elements: Opacity, Scale, and Damage. Combined, these factors create traps with feedback loops, capturing victims in systems they can't understand and can't escape, all the while exploiting them..."
It reminds me of something my great grandmother told me (which I took to be a warning about hero worship).
She said, "Before you compliment the marksman, ask what the target was."
All dollars can be spent for whatever, but not all dollars are earned from the same sorts of efforts. Great sums can be amassed form all manner of scams, legal ones or not, and not all things should be for sale. It is reasonable for society to regulate theft, be it hard or soft, (it's still theft) and bribery, be it explicit or de facto. If political outcomes can be purchased or excessively influenced by the intervention of money, that is patently and fundamentally anti-democratic. No? It's batdoo crazy the extent to which we allow blatant conflicts of interest and massive dollar "doping" (think of the Olympics) to significantly skew governmental outcomes.
Heather..;today your report is bloody true and terribly sad….and we have the the Russians, the Iranians, the Orange one and his cohorts to thank for it. I wish I could see some clear solutions….but I can’t. Your painful clarity at least identifies the magnitude of the problem!
Efforts to undo "Citizens United" and de facto bribery in general, would be a useful start. Calling attention to some forgotten concepts, such as "antitrust".
I've been favoring a coast to coast - every state voter initiative ballot petition for a very long time; in fact since "Citizens United" was first issued. I've seen efforts of others come, go, then get complicated. *If it's to be done, a brilliant legal mind like Joyce Vance and others would be needed for the legal jargon and other expertise. It could be done. I really think voters of all stripes would agree.
Strongly agree on Citizens United…but not sure how that can happen?
HJR-54.
MoveToAmend.org
Introduced in House (04/10/2023)
This joint resolution proposes a constitutional amendment providing that the rights protected and extended by the Constitution are the rights of natural persons only. Artificial entities, such as corporations, shall have no rights under the Constitution and are subject to regulation.
HJR-54 was introduced by Jayapal Primila: The amendment requires federal, state, and local governments to (1) regulate, limit, or prohibit election contributions and expenditures, including a candidate's own contributions and expenditures, to ensure equal access of citizens to the political process, regardless of economic status; and (2) require that any permissible contributions and expenditures be publicly disclosed.
Additionally, the judiciary is prohibited from construing the spending of money to influence elections to be speech under the First Amendment. (2023-2024)
We need to support the passage of this bill...now!
And Tom, I did not see anything in Amend.org related to HJR-54...Great work there, but am I missing something?
AGREED! ...on both accounts. I didn't see anything on Amend.org about the proposed legislation.
My bad. MoveToAmend.org
Sorry, shouldn’t have been a space there.
MoveToAmend.org
Pensa; I'll do a deep dive there. Thanks~
Tom, I LIKE the HJR-54 idea! Seems to strike at the heart of any number of issues confronting us (as in USA) today. I also don't see anything on Amend.org pertaining to this proposed legislation.
You've mentioned this before Tom; I'll do a 'deep dive' into it. My past experiences with such previous initiatives as noted in my above comment ↑. Thanks Tom ~
On to-do list, after Nov
It's https://www.movetoamend.org/ending_citizens_united_doesn_t_end_money_as_speech_and_corporate_personhood
Beware of Charles Koch
It is true that a simple reversal of Citizens United would not be the perfect legal solution. It could be at least a major change in attitudes in peoples' tolerance for dark money influence on the few holders of the levers of power, though.
Laws and Regulations are hard to change fast enough to keep up with those clever enough to find new ways to cheat, at least without responsible regulators to able be flexible enough to adjust to the spirit of the most import basic aims of such.
An example: I recall Sandy Weill, the biggest supporter of doing away with Glass-Steagall, coming out as regretting his success in getting it overturned. See https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevedenning/2012/07/25/rethinking-capitalism-sandy-weill-says-bring-back-glass-steagall/?sh=645e9ed137d5
I think I remember mostly his regret that a lot of irresponsible and incompetent risk takers with other peoples' money entered the field. He wanted to see innovators enabled but saw too many at least irresponsible new people take over a large portion of the financial markets. I think I understand enough about the old style derivatives to appreciate the following from the article above:
"...“In derivatives,” says Weill, “we should have an exchange, where you can have a mark-to-market, a place where they can trade, so that you don’t have a problem that can build up over multiple years, and all of a sudden you see a big collapse. If it was marked to market every single day, you'd be able to protect the balance sheets of the different companies.
The world has changed
Does Weill regret what he did at Citigroup? Not really. Weill says that the megabanks were right for their time but the world has changed.
As a result of too much concentration of investments, too much leverage, not enough transparency with a lot of off-balance-sheet items, we had the meltdown of 2008 and trust in the financial system was broken. This has led to efforts to regulate everything in the financial sector, including futile efforts to distinguish market-making trading from proprietary trading. Weill believes that these efforts will continue and in the end will stifle creativity in the financial sector. Instead, the sector should take another route and allow regulation of commercial banking and separate that from investment banking, where creativity and leadership can prosper..."
I have to do some more homework to try to show similarities in what can go wrong when Dark Money hides too much incompetence and evil. I'll start with reading all of Cathy O'Neil's "Weapons of Math Destruction." My initial assumption is that she found amazingly incompetent assessments (or attention to), risk management. Those blindly seeking quarterly profit seem too encouraged by those who do not want their methods and aims revealed, as seems indicated by the following: "...As O'Neil defines it, a weapon of math destruction, or WMD, has three elements: Opacity, Scale, and Damage. Combined, these factors create traps with feedback loops, capturing victims in systems they can't understand and can't escape, all the while exploiting them..."
It reminds me of something my great grandmother told me (which I took to be a warning about hero worship).
She said, "Before you compliment the marksman, ask what the target was."
All dollars can be spent for whatever, but not all dollars are earned from the same sorts of efforts. Great sums can be amassed form all manner of scams, legal ones or not, and not all things should be for sale. It is reasonable for society to regulate theft, be it hard or soft, (it's still theft) and bribery, be it explicit or de facto. If political outcomes can be purchased or excessively influenced by the intervention of money, that is patently and fundamentally anti-democratic. No? It's batdoo crazy the extent to which we allow blatant conflicts of interest and massive dollar "doping" (think of the Olympics) to significantly skew governmental outcomes.
She said, "Before you compliment the marksman, ask what the target was."
Solid advice.
Kick Putin’s orange arse. Chump is halfway up it.