We Can Do This, America. Seven Steps to Reversing ‘Citizens United.’

[n2doc]

BY DEREK CRESSMAN

The first stage in repairing our Constitution from the damage of Buckley and Citizens United is for the American people to rouse ourselves out of the slumber of normal politics and enter a phase of extraordinary political engagement. Once we have corrected the structural flaws big money has wrought, we’ll be able to get back to our private lives.

This first step — raising awareness — is the most time-consuming part of the amendment process. Thankfully, we are fairly well into this stage. Due in part to campaign disclosure laws, the media’s muckraking, and follow-the-money groups that regularly churn out data linking campaign donations to particular issues, the American public is thoroughly aware that big money in politics is a problem. That awareness has bred disgust and cynicism, but it is only now reaching a point of anger and action.

What has been missing over the past 40 years was an understanding that the US Supreme Court intentionally created this problem — and that there is a solution to that problem, namely reversing the Court with a constitutional amendment.

Next Steps

Before it succeeds, the amendment movement will enter a stage where it finds majority support in both houses of Congress but not the two-thirds necessary to send an amendment to the states to ratify. It has already reached that stage in the US Senate. This stage will be similar to the 1890–1911 period during the movement to win direct election of senators, when there was supermajority support among the public and two-thirds support in the House but not in the Senate. Here are seven steps reformers could take to convert supermajority public support into sufficient legislative support.

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http://billmoyers.com/story/we-can-do-this-america-seven-steps-to-reversing-citizens-united/

[2naSalit]

1. Thank you for posting! Love Bill Moyers!!

And he is spot on when he speaks.

(I think you should put paragraph 3 in bold.)

[Nye Bevan]

2. I don't want a constitutional amendment that would enable Congress to ban books,

even if those books say really nasty things about candidates running for election.

[sweetapogee]

3. If I'm understanding correctly

the premise of the article is that the US Constitution will have to be amended to overturn this decision by the US Supreme Court. Ok, probably but in my humble opinion this will never happen because neither side will really wants this. If CU were ever truly overturned then it would also mean that labor unions and other groups that are progressive will also be excluded from supporting our candidates through PACs and other means.

I know that there are those who would disagree with me on this and that's ok but if you take the time to read CU then you will clearly see that the SC lumped unions in with big businesses. It will be almost impossible for the SC to reverse CU removing businesses and corporations while leaving unions alone. Sorry if this offends.