Geez, I am thrilled by the result in CU and have hardly minimized its impact, particularly on the law, but what I was talking about was the practical effect and I was trying to be candid.  I said an only modest effect on business corps, more of an impact on advocacy corporation, like CU, but the total net effect is now indeterminate.  I only know what I currently know. Jim Bopp

 

On 9/28/10, JBoppjr@aol.com <JBoppjr@aol.com> wrote:
>     By the way, the importance of CU goes way beyond  whether corp and
> labor unions can now do "vote for" ads.  Analytically, the  "corporate
> corruption" interest supported numerous government campaign finance
> restrictions and
> regulations. These are now also bereft of legal support and  await the next
> lawsuit to strike them down.  Jim Bopp

Here  again, is Jim Bopp (or his allies) going to bring these next
lawsuits for reasons of mere theoretical purity or to test the
boundaries of mootness doctrine, or will the lawsuits be brought
because they  will allow still freer and larger political spending by
corporations?  I'm surprised Jim Bopp doesn't embrace his own
victories instead of trying to minimize them.  Every corporate dollar
spent is a dollar liberated by the newly interpreted First Amendment.

That being said, the corporate power of Citizens United operates just
as powerfully when money is not actually spent, because it deters or
influences candidate positions and candidate decisions.  Politicians
often know quite well where most large corporations' bread is
buttered, without the need for another visit from a lobbyist.

Everyone knows politicians calculate with respect to all the available
political warchests in the campaign field, and are nearly obliged to
respond to every attack, so it borders on naive to think there is no
deterrent effect with large corporate potential warchests, just as it
would be naive to think there's no such thing as a nuclear or military
deterrent just because political science may have some difficulties
measuring the deterrence because one can't "see" it.   It's analogous
to the black letter law allowing cases to go to the jury on damages
when the fact of damage is certain, even though the amount is very
uncertain and there may indeed be no hard data to support any
particular amount of damage.

Paul Lehto, J.D.

> In a message dated 9/28/2010 10:58:46 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
> lehto.paul@gmail.com writes:
>
> It  certainly seems fair to conclude, even prior to empirical proof,
> that Jim  Bopp's landmark litigation to remove corporate limits in
> campaign finance  was not a moot case or an academic case with nothing
> truly at  issue.   Corporations freed from these limits would  naturally
> take advantage of  that freedom.
>
> Because  I  believe Congress did not set totally meaningless limits on
> corporate  contributions and that Jim Bopp doesn't bring moot cases not
> capable of  repetition, the only real question is by how much past
> corporate  expenditures increase  in given major election periods, not
> if they  are increasing.
>
> Paul Lehto, J.D.


--
Paul R Lehto, J.D.
P.O. Box 1
Ishpeming, MI  49849
lehto.paul@gmail.com
906-204-2334