"Corporations are people, my friend"?

[Deep13]

22. Me too. But I do support banning corporate money for books.

You are being disingenuous--and frankly I think you only asked about books to set me up for that little dishonest gem. No one is talking about banning books or any other form of expression. We are talking about money. Congress has the power to regulate commerce. Publishing a book is protected press under the 1st Amendment. Paying millions of dollars to lie to the public is not. Corporations do not write books. Only humans can do that. No one can be punished for writing or publishing. But corporations should be prohibited from buying elections. Have you forgotten that? Has your preoccupation with this false reading of the 1st Am. What about the rights of the 100s of millions of Americans who do not own TV networks or newspapers? Citizens United essentially says the 1st Am. only applies to the super rich. I would like the voices of ordinary people not to be drowned out by corporate cash. The Constitution gives us a right to some degree of democracy too, you know. Since when is the 1st Am. supposed to be the mechanism for killing that democracy rather than preserving it?

Your reading of the 1st Am. is elitist and undemocratic because it builds a wealth advantage into the Constitution to the exclusion of everyone else. Wake up.