Seriously. Not dystopian science fiction or a new novel by an AI version of George Orwell. Actual corporations — what America’s first Supreme Court Justice, John Marshall, in 1819 called “an artificial being, invisible, intangible, and existing only in contemplation of law” — are today voting in elections for everything from the mayor and town council to referendums on corporate taxes and limits on corporate behavior.
What could possibly go wrong?
There are, after all, more corporations than people in Delaware. They can now decide who’s going to run the government, what the laws are, and — through their votes to elect humans who’ll take corporate money to do what corporations want (something else that corrupt Republicans on the Supreme Court legalized) — even what regulations companies must follow and what limits there are on their behavior.
In a few weeks, my next book will be coming out, “Who Killed the American Dream: The Greatest Political Crime Ever Told,” and the timing couldn’t be more synchronous.
Not for nothing, but this whole article reads like an ad for their book.
Not that this isn’t a problem, obviously, but it’s also a new ruling that seems pretty likely to get thrown out on appeal. I don’t think this is worth getting hysterical over.
It’s also not all elections. It’s limited to municipal votes where businesses own brick and mortar. The actual case is a town that’s basically all businesses with few residents, as far as I can tell, and the ruling allows businesses to vote on town business only, as it effects them as well.
That said, I agree it’s a bad ruling. And I agree that it should be overturned (as I think it will.) But to imply that this allows someone to spin up 100k LLCs and rig the vote for Donal Trump or something is a willful misreading of the ruling.
Yes, yes we are.
Yes but we’re just now noticing it.
At least a couple people are.
Who decides what the corporation votes for?
