When Obama populism meets free speech, it’s not pretty:
Congress is vowing to quickly restrict speech once again:
“The bottom line is this: The Supreme Court has just pre-determined the winners of next November’s elections,” Schumer said. “It won’t be Republicans, it won’t be Democrats, it will be corporate America.”
Of course, he and his allies will likely gladly accept the unlimited spending by unions, for instance, on outside ads.
Ben Smith has the best run-down of how this ruling might change (perhaps drastically) the nuts and bolts of campaigns:
501c4s and 501c6s: Likely to emerge as the biggest players in the 2010 and 2012 elections, ideological groups and trade associations also have been granted the ability to engage much more robustly in the political process. Meager disclosure requirements of their donors will make them a favorite repository of funds for independent expenditures.
The Court upheld disclosure requirements for corporate and union donations, which would make pursuing legislation on that front much more fruitful than constructing another, giant, unconstitutional attempt to save us from money in politics:
Lots of freedom and lots of disclosure. Sounds fine to me.
Tim Carney, who literally wrote the book on the intersection of big business and big government, has a great take on Schumer:
But Schumer does have a legitimate gripe. Until now, if corporations wanted to influence politics and policy, their ability to speak directly to politicians was limited by law. That meant they needed to make their case through indirect means, such as contributing to politicians — mostly to Schumer, it seems. Or it meant paying big bucks to hire lobbyists…
Now, set free of from Congress’s speech regulations, non-profits and corporations might not rely so much on these indirect means of political influence. That means less campaign cash coming into Schumer, fewer corporations courting Schumer’s staff, and less sucking up to Schumer by lobbyists.
