my remarks were originally aimed at citizens united, and i asked our friends here at public citizen to broaden them a bit because while citizens united certainly was a landmark decision and not a lot of attention last year, there are a couple of other cases that have been significant in shaping the landscape and abroad for circle to where we are today. and i want to note in particular the fec's role in all of this, the fec doesn't write the laws and we don't decide whether they are constitutional. we have an important but very limited role in this process. that is, to minister that campaign finance act, the public funding provisions of the presidential funding act, and to make sure that the laws is being enforced and to develop regulations when the statute provides them, room for the agency to do so. so while it is a substantial role, it is not that of an article iii courts to decide the constitutionality of it, and is not that of congress to pass the law in the first place. one of the main function of the fec is to enforce the disclosure provisions of the act. disclosures a very impor

. >> and citizens united i broaden the little bit because the citizens united certainly was a landmark decision and got a lot of attention last year. a couple cases have been significant in shifting landscape and brought full circle to where we are today. and i want to know in particular the role in this. the fec doesn't read the law and we don't decide whether they are constitutional. we have an important but limited role in this process is to administer the campaign finance act, this spending provision of the presidential funding act, and to make sure that the law is being enforced and to develop relations when the statute provides some rules for the agency to do so. so while it is a substantial goal, it is not that of the article for free court to decide the constitutionality of it and it is not that of congress to pass the law in the first place. one of the functions is the disclosure of the act. that is everything that happens in the campaign finance area and the commission that does go through publishing all the reports the committees are filing with us. we review every page of t

that is what was at stake in citizens united. while the press has missed this point, the courts have not been lower courts have begun to dismantle portions of the campaign finance system on these grounds. advocates have not missed the lessons of mukasey there. macomis -- and lessons of along either. macomish is not ignoring it. given that quid pro quo corruption is the only run for regulation, why do we need more? why arizona even needs a public finance system? publicly financed candidates, they observe, are no less susceptible to trading of four gym bags full of cash them privately funded candidates. this is why campaign finances so fine. they did have a case involving gym bags full of cash in arizona. what is the justification of public finance other than the now illicit equality rationale? the court does not need to answer that question. but how it answers that question, whether it's does it inmacomish or when it does it more directly in the future, it is not just public finance, but finance more generally. this may not be the

that is what was at stake in citizens united. while the press has missed this point, the courts have not been lower courts have begun to dismantle portions of the campaign finance system on these grounds. advocates have not missed the lessons of mukasey there. macomis -- and lessons of along either. macomish is not ignoring it. given that quid pro quo corruption is the only run for regulation, why do we need more? why arizona even needs a public finance system? publicly financed candidates, they observe, are no less susceptible to trading of four gym bags full of cash them privately funded candidates. this is why campaign finances so fine. they did have a case involving gym bags full of cash in arizona. what is the justification of public finance other than the now illicit equality rationale? the court does not need to answer that question. but how it answers that question, whether it's does it inmacomish or when it does it more directly in the future, it is not just public finance, but finance more generally. this may not be the

they didn't open with citizens united. they opened with a case that happened a few years before that received almost no press attention. at most, citizens united expanded the right of corporations to be more specific about their independent expenditures. so if i can just put it in somewhat crude terms. before citizens united, corporations could run an ad that said senator x kicks puppies. call senator x and tell him to stop kicking puppies. now you can run an ad that says senator x kicks puppies and you shouldn't vote for him. the real significance is what it said about congressional power and that fact has been utterly ignored by the press. but it feetrd heavily in the briefing and i expect to be a speech heavily in the decision as well. so as you all know when congress regulates under the first amendment it has to have a good reason for doing so and the reason that congress is long invoked is corruption. prior to citizens united, the liberals in the court had gradual expand it had definition of corruption to go well beyo

that is what was at stake in citizens united. while the press has missed this point, the courts have not been lower courts have begun to dismantle portions of the campaign finance system on these grounds. advocates have not missed the lessons of mukasey there. macomis -- and lessons of along either. macomish is not ignoring it. given that quid pro quo corruption is the only run for regulation, why do we need more? why arizona even needs a public finance system? publicly financed candidates, they observe, are no less susceptible to trading of four gym bags full of cash them privately funded candidates. this is why campaign finances so fine. they did have a case involving gym bags full of cashn arizona. what is the justification of public finance other than the now illicit equality rationale? the court does not need to answer that question. but how it answers that question, whether it's does it inmacomish or when it does it more directly in the future, it is not just public fince, but finance more generally. this may not be the cas

can't have your cake and eat it too you can't have people going straight and saying citizens citizens united is not a constitutional but at the same time we're going to use it in order to get that million dollars this is the thing i agree with feingold completely i think that you people can say you're fighting an ongoing battle so it's not worth fighting i think that if you believe in something it's worth fighting for and just because people don't think that you can succeed doesn't mean that you should fight for it ask your watch fortunately there's just not that many people that are fighting along with you guys thanks so much for joining me tonight have a good weekend and that's it for tonight so thanks for tuning in may should be back on monday to. christine for. other stuff on a happy hour i mean time cover hits the fan of a lot of show on facebook and follow us on twitter and if you missed any of tonight's show or any other nights you can always catch all the you've seen the flash the whole show coming up next is adam versus matt. me it is easy. to. see. the mission free. education free

out is so pretty and question corporate takeover of our democracy as decided last year in the citizens united case makes that point so how does this really make sense isn't fewer and not more corrupt of corporate dollars in our elections a good thing and if the supreme court just kill off public financing of elections here offer his take on the issue is sean parnell president of the center for competitive politics sean welcome thank you for having me tom great to have you here with us why do you hate democracy. i don't i love democracy i also love free speech simply put the government has no role in deciding how much political speech should be in the campaign process they should not be deciding when a candidate has spoken too much or too little that's up for candidates that's not for their supporters that's for voters that we're not talking about speech or we're talking about money but money enables speech so you're going along with the boston versus actual arguably buckley versus folio decision of the supreme court that money and speech of the same thing i don't think the founders ever would

over the years i'm very happy to hear that you're not stuck on precedent a lot of people when citizens united came out were absolutely hysterical over the idea that supreme court had overturned what turned out to only be a twenty year old precedent so i'm very glad all the overturned it's only come from you know so he did not just tell him act it was not overturned also because the tell because that someone who will dismiss it it's too true it was a campaign that the tillman act concerned campaign contributions to candidates well it was my point frankly i mean you know if you want to get here in the weeds and you stay there for thirty seconds because people's eyes glaze over sure is i think you know the decision that was wrongly decided was smart versus madison and i think the whole concept of judicial review should not exist it's not the constitution but that's you know that's that's where me and phyllis schlafly agree and we'll just you know but shouldn't you know let's assume tomorrow the. mccain feingold was back in place where the dead all across the nation states like laws like arizona

how it is intrinsically authoritarian his piece is even more poignant after the supreme court's citizens united decision that pretty much ended our government over to corporate rule in a songes words that corporate rule looks like this these are the characteristics of a corporation suffrage the right to vote does not exist except for the land of holders shareholders and even their voting power is in proportion to their ownership. all the executive power flows from a central committee. female representation is almost a no there's no divisions of powers there's no fourth the state no press there are no juries and innocence is not presume. failure to submit to any order can result in instant exile. there is no freedom of speech no fright of association love is forbidden without state approval it's starting to sound like something you know something from our distant as the economy is centrally planned there is pervasive surveillance of movement and electronic communications. the society is heavily regulated and this regulation is in force to the group degree many employees are told when where and h

>> perhaps everybody doesn't know the eyes citizens united decision. for many years we had a disastrous campaign finance system which clearly favors those who have a lot of money and corporate interest against those who do not. one year-ago the supreme court passed a disastrous and a absurd decision called citizens united and and the wisdom we found five people and the same room, the only five people in america who actually believe they corporation is a person. five people in america and all happened to be on the supreme court at the same time. [laughter] what that decision does is it says to large corporations that you as a person has a first amendment freedom of speech rights and therefore you're able to express your freedom of speech by birding's days putting 302nd ads on television how terrible bernie sanders or russ feingold is and by the way you can do that and secrecy and not have to reveal who you are. you can come up with a phony name or organization. this is a disastrous decision that makes bad campaign finance situation much worse. we saw in

hand you can't have your cake and eat it too you can't have people ministration saying citizens citizens united is not constitutional but at the same time we're going to use it in order to get that million dollars this is the thing i agree with completely i think that you people can't say you're fighting a non-winning battle so it's not worth fighting i think that if you believe in something it's worth fighting for and just because people don't think that you can succeed doesn't mean that you shouldn't fight for it ask your wod fortunately there's just not that many people that are fighting along with you guys thanks so much for joining me tonight have a good weekend and that's it for tonight's show thanks for tuning in make sure you come back on monday jake. brewer and christine friends al be back for another dollar happy hour and meantime deprecates become a fan of the a lot of show on facebook and follow us on twitter and if you missed any of the night's or any other nights you can always catch it all the you tube dot com flash the show you have next is adam vs the man. through a substantial

was a huge problem ok the fact that our supreme court citizens united was disastrous for this country ok there needs to be regulation we need to have campaign finance reform there needs to be a political revolution and you know and i'm not saying a violent political revolution i'm saying that we need to make sure that there are limits to the amount of money that people can donate to campaigns and when it comes to corporations it's never ending big get what they want because they have the money private.

the citizens united decision is a liberal incumbent -- incumbent's worst nightmare. not only do they have a monopoly over the money and information flow, with our first amendment rights established, americans have the tools necessary to defeat barack obama. he plans to raise $1 billion for his reelection effort. that is $1 billion. an unbelievable amount of money and when your record is as bad as barack obama's, you need it to destroy the republican nominee. because barack obama has nothing positive to talk about. unsustainable debt, deficits as far as the eye can see, inflation, record unemployment, that is the obama record. so we need to make sure we fight back with hard truths. even though democrats attacked victoryitizens united they are taking advantage of it. imagine that, hypocrisy by the democrats. bill burton created his own superpac. president obama has railed against superpacs. if president obama believes that they're bad for america that as he has stated, white does he not pick up the phone and call bill and say, do not do it? but of course, he will not.

> let me just back that excellent question up because perhaps everybody doesn't know what the citizens united decision is about. for many, many years we have had a disastrous campaign finance system which clearly favors those people who have a lot of money and corporate interests against those of us who do not. a year or so ago our supreme court by a 5-4 decision passed a disastrous, absurd decision called the citizens united decision. and in their wisdom we found, actually, five people in the same room, the only five people in america who actually believe that a corporation is a person. five people in america, and they all have to be on the supreme court at the same time. [laughter] and, essentially, what that decision does is it says to large corporations that you being a person have first amendment freedom of speech rights and, therefore, you are able to express your freedom of speech by putting 30-second ads on television telling the world how terrible bernie sanders is or anybody else is. and by the way, you can do that in secrecy. you don't even have to reveal who you are. you can come

. >> but the recent decision of citizens united says the corporations are people, too, and the aim of money they have determines how much speech they have, and so corporations just happen to be better at talking than people are. >> well, that's a good point actually. >> thank you, thank you. so few people say that. thank you, mr. kennedy. robert f. kennedy, jr. the movie is "the last mountain" opening in select cities this friday. we'll be right back. [cheers and] >> stephcaptioning sponsored by comedy central captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org [ gunshots ]

. >> but the recent decision of citizens united says the corporations are people, too, and the aim of money they have determines how much speech they have, and so corporations just happen to be better at talking than people are. >> well, that's a good point actually. >> thank you, thank you. so few people say that. thank you, mr. kennedy. robert f. kennedy, jr. the movie is "the last mountain" opening in select cities this friday. we'll be right back. ♪ knock, knock ♪ who, who, who, who, who, who's there? ♪ ♪ laffy taffy ♪ l-laffy taffy [ zing! ] [ laughs ] ♪ l-laffy taffy ♪ [ female announcer ] wonka feed your imagination. [ horse neighs ] [ whimpers ] ♪ [ crackling ] ♪ [ male announcer ] the story that became a legend, now in 3d. no glasses required. "the legend of zelda: ocarina of time 3d." rated everyone 10 and up.

[laughter] and folks, it's all the more historic because of the supreme court's citizens united ruling, which allowed the creation of super pacs, political action committees that can take unlimited corporate and union cash to create political ads. months ago i announced my plans to set up colbert super pac. our motto: making a better tomorrow, tomorrow. [laughter] in fact, when you google the phrase super pac, i'm the first five results. [cheers and applause] that breaks my previous record of the first four results from googling the phrase "pear-shaped pundit." [laughter] since i brought them to the nation's attention in april, 17 new super pacs have been created, including "turn right usa." who have released some great ads. including one that makes some salient points about congressional candidate janice hahn. >> in an insane effort to reduce gang violence, janice hahn hired hardcore gang members with taxpayer money to be gang intervention specialists. she even helped them get out of jail so they could rape and kill again. ♪ >> give me your cash, bitch, so we can shoot up the street.

. >> but the recent decision of citizens united says the corporations are people, too, and the aim of money they have determines how much speech they have, and so corporations just happen to be better at talking than people are. >> well, that's a good point actually. >> thank you, thank you. so few people say that. thank you, mr. kennedy. robert f. kennedy, jr. the movie is "the last mountain" opening in select cities this friday. we'll be right back. what's the most amazing ...was it something big? ...or something small? ...something old? ...or something new? ...or maybe, just maybe ...it's something you haven't seen yet. the 2nd generation of intel core processors. stunning visuals, intelligent performance. this is visibly smart. >> stephcaptioning sponsored by comedy central captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

. >> but the recent decision of citizens united says the corporations are people, too, and the aim of determines how much speech they have, and so corporations just happen to be better at talking than people are. >> well, that's a good point actually. >> thank you, thank you. so few people say that. thank you, mr. kennedy. robert f. kennedy, jr. the movie is "the last mountain" opening in select cities this friday. we'll be right back. what's up, smart? oh, just booked a summer vaycay. ooo. sounds pricey? nah, with the hotels.com summer sale, you can find awesome deals for places nearby. interesting... wow, i'm blown away. you look great. hotels.com summer sale, save up to 30%. and get a free kindle. hotels.com. be smart. book smart. [ male announcer ] the inspiration for its shape was an archer drawing his bow. ♪ could that have also inspired its 556 horsepower supercharged engine? ♪ the all-new cadillac cts-v coupe. we don't just make luxury cars, we make cadillacs.

. >> i think this is like son of citizens united. court saying, this time in a case out of arizona, that if you are spending money, that's like giving a speech. that the expenditure of campaign money is like -- it should be protected by the first amendment. and basically what they are doing is they are deregulating campaigns. they are getting rid of limits on campaign spending, limits on political contributions, who can give, you know, corporations, companies. i mean, we are basically looking at, soon, the law of the jungle when it comes to political campaigns. >> so you are saying the equation of cash and speech is where we're heading under the supreme court? >> exactly. people remember the citizens united case. corporations can spend money. corporations have free speech rights. this is another case where they are saying, government, get out of the business of regulating things. >> do you think they are wrong about this? if you were sitting up there? >> i do think they are wrong. in this country, we have had rules limiting campaigns

states and western europe is largely about the political system so even before the disastrous citizens united supreme court case the united states we had relatively pay to play politics as against the europeans i think on both sides of the atlantic inside the united states as well as in western europe the financial industry in some cases rightly and some not so fairly enjoys about the same level of popularity that major diseases usually have the difference is that american politicians get their money from powerful lobbies and are much more beholden to corporate interests even when their own popular and the europeans with proportional representation publicly financed campaigns are not quite as much under the sway of the sway of transnational business and so they do a little more legislative responding to what their constituents actually want and many of our politicians are a little bit less worried about that because they all face the real primary which comes before every election which is called fundraising or a very slight change of topic here but you know as a real economist instead of the

weak political parties comes into conflict with the new politics of the twenty first century citizens united error when corporations can spend whatever they want the fact of the matter is there are always going to be primaries it's very easy to get on the ballot in wisconsin and even a recall election you don't need requires a you know eight hundred thousand signatures that can be done by just about anybody and so the fact of the matter is that there are going to be primaries where the democrats are trying to do is you assure that they're primaries in all of the districts so that there isn't a sort of cookie cutter so there isn't sort of a and your regular pattern where you have some primaries no primaries and a lot of disarray you're trying to bring a little bit of order to essentially a disorganized process now you're right if there is a very real possibility to make money folks the koch brothers and others may try to come in and mess with those primaries but i do want to emphasize the time i've been on it. john we just you just froze up and we lost you so john nichols with the nation than

what's your opinion of the court ruling on citizens united? >> well, all right, so this is a little bit outside, you know, my field, so i'm he hesitant to say much about this. citizen united was a supreme court case which struck down certain campaign finance laws on first amendment grounds. i'm not a first amendment absolutist. there's situations where you want to constrain speech. there are ones we're familiar with and have no problem with such as fraud and so forth, and others are more sensitive of that in the electoral setting, but the people worried about money-corrupting politics, they have a point. you don't want to assist them in which the very wealthiest people because of their wealth have more influence than other people do. that said, and i hate to -- my mind is untidy again, but on the other hand, when the government tries to interfere with the way people spend their money in order to promote ideas, you know, you can have bad outcomes, and so, you know, the "new york times" is a wealthy corporation promoting ideas all over the place

people are producing absolutely nothing but they're producing a lot of cash and because of the citizens united decision and in previous ones you know the buckley vs for way oh first national bank versus the audi by the way back to the first national bank of. santa clara county versus other pacific railroad eighty six the string of supreme court decisions and basically said whoever has the cash has to buy the politicians and you can't call it bribery anymore so now that this industry has been created what makes you think that there's any possibility that politicians will be able to resist it i mean these guys are making so much chaos they could yeah and there was a front page story in the new york times yesterday about how obama welcomed the wall street executives to the white house to time and i warm up relations with them before the election campaign starts going because he needs money for it that campaign run thing i can't see you as an alternative it's looking at the european system where leaders there are not immune to the pressures of their financial lobbyists but they have a lot less dep

in twenty ten in the citizens united case the u.s. supreme court mirror image that dred scott ruling by saying that property is people and corporations have constitutional rights like the right to political free speech and frankly a new civil war has started. between the rich and the rapidly disappearing middle class today we are seeing the largest gap between the rich and the poor in america nearly a century there are fifty two million people without health insurance forty million people dependent on food stamps to survive and one in five american children live in poverty they corporations have never been better thanks to their personally game the system in the financial times noted today they're on course to see bigger profits this year than any time since one thousand nine hundred three as warren buffett said the rich are winning the war i say it's time to turn the tide let's strip personhood from corporations and embrace common sense only people should be considered people. no more of our personhood for corporations that it is an

a supportive move towards corporations i mean you've been one of the great voices about this citizens united when that was decided by the supreme court that was basically a wet kiss to the corporate world saying you can basically buy our democracy this is yet the wal-mart case is yet another tap on the back saying thank you big corporations we're on your side the supreme court of the united states is the supreme court of the chamber of commerce now any case that comes before the supreme court will get at least five votes in favor of big business and against regular people in this country it's really quite astounding when you think of in that context you recently wrote a piece arguing that wal-mart is a scar on this country what do you mean would i like to be i'd like to be subtle about the. so is yes and so you know expand on that. well the fact is wal-mart is a scar in this country whatever the supreme court ruled in the legal list of prayer we know that wal-mart discriminates against women wal-mart has been viciously anti union in one famous case a closed down its entire meat packing divis

limited democratic republic that our founding fathers created into a corporatocracy with the citizens united ruling last year as well as a slew of other pro corporate rulings that have become a norm for the roberts court the supreme court has ruled that money is a form of speech and thus can't be restricted in our elections so rich people and corporations those with the most money can now speak the loudest in our democracy and here's what's really important this was not a law debated and passed in any congress it wasn't signed by any president it was the decision of five members of the supreme court who are unaccountable to the american people and that's it in fact previous congresses and previous presidents have passed laws doing just the opposite forbidding corporations from meddling in our politics by its own act passed in one thousand seven that explicitly says it shall be unlawful for any corporation to make a money contribution in connection with any election to any political office that's pretty clear but not clear enough for the kings in the high court and shred of the tillman act la

roughshod over our country for the next hundred twenty five years culminating in the supreme court's citizens united decision last year they gave corporations the right to buy our democracy which brings us to boulder colorado where the city council will soon consider a referendum to be put on the ballot calling for an amendment to the united states constitution to strip corporations how the personhood the corporate court reporter davis deceptively gave them more than a century ago course this resolution in colorado is just a tiny step in other communities of past similar resolutions thirty one point arena california about a decade ago but it keeps the message going and most importantly it keeps waking people up to amend the u.s. constitution congress has passed an amendment in both chambers with a two thirds majority and then three quarters of all state legislatures need to pass it as well so you're a boulder colorado passes the resolution so a long way to go to convince congress to write and introduce and pass an amendment and then send it to the states it could take years on the other hand on marc

personal stake in justice thomas' refugee refusing to budge it's like the same court that brought us citizens united and recently ruled that people can't band together to sue corporations is now officially the best court money can buy. it's time for a daily poll your chance to tell us what you think here is that is question two point five feet two and a half feet stood between a brass coons and the potential for a fukushima like nuclear disaster did you hear about this on mainstream news your choices are yes or no. to let us know what you think a poll be open till tomorrow morning. crazy alert all likely suspects arizona suffering from the state's largest wildfire in history a fire that scorched after million acres five hundred thousand acres in northern arizona so what does that creates a state senator senator mccain think is the reason behind this mammoth fire in his own state here's a hint it's not global warming theory is that a press conference over the weekend. will go consumed with two breweries down on the border where there is substantial evidence some of these fires were caused by we cross

citizen, or they do not have the time to become a united states citizen. we are all living in a democratic society. to vote is the key. and how to get the key to become a united states citizen -- look at them. their base can tell how eager they are to become a real part of us. to the case management, due to the cuts, there will be more than 86 lost opportunities every year. we have a lot of sad stories every day, and enough is enough. we do not want to see this anymore. so, please, do consider the weakest group in our society and restore those funding to the service. thank you for the time, and thank you for the opportunity and for listening to our voice. supervisor chu: thank you. thank you for your time. >> good afternoon. i am with the manila town heritage foundation. the foundation was born out of the international hotel's anti- eviction struggle, which culminated in the eviction back in 1977. some of you may remember that. so we have a legacy of advocating for affordable housing, for low-income seniors. i am here today to ask you to restore the funding

as you'll remember, last year the citizens united decision, the court said the first amendment protectsn spending money in elections. this was another version of that case. this was an arizona law that said the playing field had to be somewhat even between candidates who spend a lot of money and candidates who don't spent a lot of money. supreme court said that's unconstitutional, and where we really appear to be heading here is towards almost deregulating campaigns. no limits on campaign expenditures. no limits on who can give money, and no limits on how much they can give. that's really where the court is heading. this case is really another step in that direction. >> so all of that campaign fund-raising finance reform that so many have talked about in washington over the years, mccain/feingold as a lot of viewers will remember, what happened to all of that? >> in citizens united, the supreme court already got rid of a big chunk of mccain/feingold, but i think the rest of it is only a matter of time as long as the supreme court remains constituted as it is. this court really believes

kennedy: what's your opinion of the court ruling on citizens united? [laughter] >> guest: well, all right. so this is a little bit outside of, you know, my field. so i'm hesitant to say much about this. the citizens united was a supreme court case which struck town certain campaign finance laws on first amendment grounds. i'm not a first amendment absolutist. i think there are situations where you want to constrain speech. one that we're all familiar with and have no problem with such as fraud and so forth. and one is a little more sensitive about doing that in the electoral setting. but the people who are worried about money corrupting politics, you know, they've got a point. you don't want to assist them in which the various wealthiest people because of their wealth have more influee th have more influence than other i people do., yo that said, and i hate to, youeig know, my mind is being untidy again, but on the other hand when the government tries to interfere with the way people to spend their money in order to promote ideas, you know, you can hav