Freedom of Speech™

In yesterday’s New York Times, Jan Baran wrote an opinion column defending the Supreme Court’s recent decision to, as he puts it, “Declare most of the ... McCain-Feingold law unconstitutional.”

His column’s main point is essentially that “It is a lot easier to legislate against unions, gun owners, ‘fat cat’ bankers, health insurance companies ... when they can’t talk back.”

And thank goodness for that. I have gotten sick of these groups being so maligned in political ads and our culture.

There just isn’t enough respect for our fat cat bankers and HMOs. Those poor, mega-rich people. Finally, they will have the chance, as Baran puts it, to make ads explicitly supporting a candidate because of a policy, instead of implicitly not supporting a policy.

With the bailouts, and the appointment of people like Timothy Geithner and Ben Bernanke, these Wall Street and insurance exec “fat cats” (the victims here) showed America that it was they who control the economy. And with this ruling, America now knows that they who control the economy officially can control the politics of the country.

And Baran tries to use a false equivalency here, equating anti-union legislation with that of legislation against gun owners, bankers, insurance companies et al., when in reality, any legislation that hurts unions is almost universally legislation that helps the bankers, HMOs and other big businesses.

By trying to say this will help unions, he attempts to hit the populist sentiment, essentially stating “hey, unions will be better because of this. And if that means that Exxon Mobil can also now donate much of their profits previously blocked from political ads for that purpose, that’s collateral freedom.”

In grade school, I learned about society in the Middle Ages, when most people were serfs, who worked the land of the rich for essentially no return. In high school, I learned about people like John Brown, who fought tyranny to the death, and Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X, who stood face-to-face against racism, oppression and segregation. And since, I’ve learned that with enough money, you can create “grassroots” organizations (“astroturfing”), through which insurance company representatives trick Americans into thinking health care reform is a strike against freedom. I’ve learned Americans will march on Washington now because of the “plight” of their HMOs but stand idly by while these companies turn around and assure themselves more rights than you.

If you get too many of your friends together to protest, the government can tell you where and when you may protest. However, if you incorporate, you can be treated not only as a person but as a better person. But corporations aren’t people, and they aren’t your friends, even if they are on your Facebook. And just like 999 of your 1,000 Facebook friends, corporations won’t hold your hair while you puke or loan you money to get on your feet. And not being people, corporations don’t deserve the same levels of free speech that citizens get under the First Amendment.


E-mail: mrstraw@indiana.edu