To understand the motives and intentions of corporations imagine no govt regulation...

[Blackhatjack]

How low would any wage have to go to be too low for a corporation to pay? (How many would insist on a minimum wage?).

How bad would contamination of the air and water have to get to be so bad that corporations would act on their own without governmental rules and regulation to be part of the solution?

How much money paid to the officers of a corporation would be too much?

How low would the amount of taxes paid have to be for a corporation to say 'too little, we must pay some taxes?'

If corporations could 'outsource' all their labor positions, would they?

If corporations could give unlimited amounts of money to any candidate seeking office who might help them, would there be any amounts that it determined are too much?

So if you want to know what corporations consider to be the utopian existence, and their ultimate goals, just imagine a country in which corporations are not regulated by government and are free to use their influence to pursue their own interests.

George Bush and the Republican Party have promoted the goals of corporations during their reign of power. And it should now be clear that the next Presidential election will be about changing the power balance between the people and those who are super rich and control corporate power.

When you make up your mind about which candidate to support, keep in mind what their likely stance will be on this important interest. And look at who is supporting their campaign with huge campaign contributions and ask yourself, 'Will He/She Stand Up To The Corporations IF He/She is Elected?'

A wrong vote during this next election will affect each one of us for years to come.

[blondie58]

1. good post

and I do feel that Hilary is "owned" by the corporations and the lobbyists. I think that she is too much a a chameleon, changing to whatever she thinks to become elected.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

13. But in the end, it's people who will vote for her, not corporations.

But how do you get people to vote for you without money from corporations to use for getting your message across to the people? This is why I'm for full public financing of elections.

[Blackhatjack]

18. Without substantial campaign finance reform we will never affect the corrupt influence of money...

.... and it is people who are influenced by the exposure that money buys that go to the polls and vote.

I raised the same point in a later reply on this thread. I agree.

Unfortunately you have to win within the system in order to change the system.

[Blackhatjack]

2. There is a saying that money flows freely in an open economy, except that given to politicians....

The implication being that political contributions always have strings attached.

[porphyrian]

3. Everyone who hasn't yet needs to watch The Corporation.

http://imdb.com/title/tt0379225/

[Blackhatjack]

5. Syriana also depicted the corporate philosophy in a stark light....

You cannot understand the economics of 'war all the time' and its affects on our military decisions until you understand the industrial military complex corporations and their goals.

People mistakenly believe that we invaded Iraq for some 'higher noble purpose', but in the end it was all about wealth, and the power to control wealth. I have serious doubts that any corporation plugged into the military industrial complex ever cared about the number of Iraqi dead that would result, and their concerns over the Americans who would die was driven by the fear that the American people would object and interrupt the flow of taxpayer money into their coffers.

Corporations have no conscience. period.

[KG]

4. it's safe to assume the no candidate from either party will stand up to the corps

none has for the last 60 years or so...

[Blackhatjack]

7. I believe John Edwards comes the closest, and he cannot do it without first being elected...

The way fundraising is structured you have to work within a corrupted system to have the opportunity to change the system.

I think Edwards would put the needs of the people first, and that scares Republicans. It could mean the end of the system they have cultivated and used for success.

[Clark2008]

21. Is that why he wrote legislation favoring Big Banking?

Edwards played a critical role in brokering legislation to allow banks to sell mutual funds and insurance, and to engage in other speculative ventures. This law, worth hundreds of billions to the banks, blasted a gigantic hole in the Glass-Steagal banking law’s firewall of protections designed to prevent the kinds of bank collapses that marked the Great Depression of the ’30s — meaning that it put the money of Joe Six-Pack depositors at risk. Such a gigantic boon to the banking lobby can hardly be classed as a populist victory.

Sorry - I don't see in him what you see.

[Blackhatjack]

22. Ok you made the accusation, now prove it! Name the bill, the sponsors, who shepherded it through...

You have unfairly characterized Edwards' role in this matter.

Here is a question for you once you have provided the 'proof' to back up your accusation -- Is it better to be involved with a 'bad bill' making as many improvements as possible if it is going to pass anyway, or should Edwards have thrown up his hands and not tried to do anything to help people who will be most affected? (It was a Republican Majority in the Senate, and the vote counters knew that it would pass regardless).

You have every right to support whoever you like(Clark I assume, who BTW is not a candidate) but if you are going to make negative accusations against other candidates, be prepared to be challenged to provide the proof.

[Blackhatjack]

23. I'll help you out -- Edwards did not sponsor nor write, and voted No on S 900 -- LINK

Which passed on May 6, 1999, the Senate voted 54-44 to approve S. 900, the Financial Services Modernization Act.

LINK http://www.opensecrets.org/news/banks/senate_breakdown.htm

[tbyg52]

6. K,R,&bookmarked

IT'S THE CORPORATIONS, STUPID!

(Oh, I wish someone would pick that up, but "the hand" feeds them all.....)

[Rosemary2205]

8. Ahhhh -- the conservative wet dream. - but you forgot part 2

You forgot the part about crippling the justice system so "greedy" people can't sue the Corp's for their faulty and dangerous products and behavior.

But yes, the powers that be would very much love it if all the laws were off and Corp's could do any damn thing they please to anyone they please. The only laws conservatives want regarding corporations is to protect thier intellectual property and patents.

[Greyhound]

30. Already more than halfway there, remember the class-action "reform"

that arbusto_® & company passed two, three, years ago? That was specifically the purpose of that shitty deal. Takes all class action suits and directs them to the Republik stacked (except the 9th, may they live forever) circuit courts.

We also used to have a list of all the traitors that voted in favor of it here. Maybe someone has the time to find it.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

9. "To understand the motives and intentions of people, imagine no gov't regulation."

Works just the same.

[The Backlash Cometh]

11. Or imagine a local government owned by the chamber of commerce.

It's easy if you try.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

12. Who has to imagine?

Plenty of local governments are effectively "owned" by the CoC.

[The Backlash Cometh]

20. Effectively?

A two edged sword. Many of them were only too happy when the Republicans mounted their anti-government surge because it meant they could show the local people they were willing to cut back on local taxes. And you know what they did? They legislated out pesky public infra-structure like parks and recreation. In Florida what they did was claim they were cutting duplication in legislation, and what they did was eliminate mandates for park and rec setbacks. Then they lawyered what was considered recreational land. i.e. wetlands and retention ponds suddenly passed for recreational land. Now a kid has to ride a bike a mile or two just to get to a park, and a dog needs to be driven ten or more miles to get to a dog park. And any mother who wants to meet people in the community, better get a car to get to the local park.

Yes, developers loved getting rid of those pesky setbacks. But the benies didn't stop there. Suddenly, they were even having cities give them public water and electricity for enducers to build in their municipality.

Effectively, my ass.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

25. I think you misunderstood what I was saying.

I used "effectively" in the sense that the CoCs and their ilk do not have outright legal control of the government, just as corporations don't have outright legal control of the federal government. I was in no way attempting to minimize their influence.

[The Backlash Cometh]

28. Thanks for the clarification YH.

You can also add the Rotary Club to the collection.

[IChing]

10. US corporations are lobbying China's Congress to weaken new Labor Laws

Chinese heat is on US sweatshop lobby

Editor's note: This article is adapted from a recently released report by Global Labor Strategies, "Undue Influence: Corporations Gain Ground in Battle over China's New Labor Law". The full report is available at www.laborstrategies.blogs.com .

In a historically unprecedented visit, influential Chinese scholar and labor-law expert Liu Cheng arrived in Washington, DC, to garner support from US legislators and labor leaders for a law that is pending not before the US Congress but before the National People's Congress (NPC) in China. Liu Cheng has been a key adviser to the drafters on a labor-law reform bill currently working its way through the Chinese legislative process.

His visit is part of a behind-the-scenes battle that is raging worldwide over reforms in China's labor law. On the one side are Wal-Mart, Google, General Electric (GE) and other global corporations that have been aggressively lobbying to limit new rights for Chinese workers. On the other side are pro-worker-rights forces in China, backed by labor, human rights, and political forces in the US and around the world.

In March 2006, the Chinese government, with considerable popular backing, proposed a new labor law with limited but significant increases in workers' rights. But the American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) in Shanghai, the United States-China Business Council, and US-based global corporations are lobbying to gut the proposed law. They have even threatened to leave China for such countries as Pakistan and Thailand if the law is passed.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China_Business/ID05Cb01.html

[valerief]

14. Isn't the vote a govt regulation of sorts? There'd be no vote. Just what we have now. nt

[Blackhatjack]

15. There is a difference between corporate goals and goals of corrupt individuals...

A corporation is a 'legal fiction' that provides an entity with the power to do things that individuals are not allowed to do.

The corporation has no 'conscience' but rather was constructed to carry out its 'purposes' without consideration of how it affects others.

Individuals do operate corporations, and profit handsomely from those protections afforded corporations and are protected from loss and liability for their acts by creating the corporations.

Corrupt individuals can be held criminally liable for their wrongful acts, even imprisoned.

Corporations provide a veil between their activities and those who direct and benefit from those activities. Individuals are directly identifiable and their benefits from activities are more easily associated with them.

We must reform corporate structure and practices in this country, and we need a Presidential candidate who will take up that challenge.

[Blackhatjack]

16. We need to start with Energy, Banking and Pharmaceutical Corporations...

as they stand to negatively affect the lives of all Americans in the present and near future.

[Morgana LaFey]

17. Right: Will He/She Stand Up To The Corporations -- OR

are they already owned by those Corporations?

[Blackhatjack]

19. We surely deserve to know that answer to that question, and the MSM will not tell us...

they have their own corporate owners with their own agenda.

[Morgana LaFey]

27. Oh, I don't think it's as inscrutable as that

Who are they taking money from, for starters? Who HAVE they taken money from? Who has been the beneficiary of their votes?

And perhaps most important (or telling) of all, IMO: where do they stand re the DLC? Are they ardent DLCers? Then they can't be for The People first and foremost but rather corporations and their agendas.

[Blackhatjack]

24. Only by the use of Corporate privileges could Energy Companies bank $1 Trillion Profits ....

... and stand up and say that the higher prices had to be charged to the consuming public because the shareholders demand it.

If individuals running those enterprises went on TV and made the same claims about their owners demanding that they charge the higher prices --people would not only scream with outrage, they would likely run them out of town.

Of course the same is true for pharmaceutical companies, for profit healthcare providers, banks, etc.

Somehow the public has been brainwashed to believe that it is ok for corporations to act this way, and individuals to suck out the profits without being held accountable.

[GeorgeGist]

26. Profit [AKA legalized theft] ...

is King.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

29. Profit is legalized theft?

That's a curious notion. I work for a company that makes tools that allow people (most notably DJs and studio musicians) to do their jobs and feed their families. I certainly wouldn't deny them compensation for their efforts, and neither should they deny me compensation for mine. I hardly consider that theft. We provide goods to them for a price. They provide services to their customers for a price. People deserve to be compensated for their efforts. I assume, based on your post, that you disagree. I'm curious as to what you would suggest as a replacement.

[lapislzi]

31. I have 3 words for you

...if you entertain the idea that corporations could in any way be self-regulating in an ethical context.

They are: child labor laws.

If it were up to corporations, there wouldn't be any.

Sadly, though, I have yet to see a viable candidate that isn't suckling at the corporate teat.