Culture

Dionne: We are at a dangerous crossroads

by Susan Marie Kovalinsky | September 7, 2009 at 06:31 am

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I came across Dionne's OpEd piece this morning in The Washington Post. Certainly, he is sounding the alarm, and with good cause. We stand at a crossroads with this Supreme Court decision, he claims, which is so important, so decisive, that it is alarming to see it going unnoticed:

President Obama's health-care speech on Wednesday will be only the second most consequential political moment of the week.

Judged by the standard of an event's potential long-term impact on our public life, the most important will be the argument before the Supreme Court (on the same day, as it happens) about a case that, if decided wrongly, could surrender control of our democracy to corporate interests.

This sounds melodramatic. It's not. The court is considering eviscerating laws that have been on the books since 1907 and 1947 -- in two separate cases -- banning direct contributions and spending by corporations in federal election campaigns. Doing so would obliterate precedents that go back two and three decades.

The full impact of what the court could do in Citizens United v. Federal ElectionCommission has only begun to receive the attention it deserves. Even the word "radical" does not capture the extent to which the justices could turn our political system upside down. Will it use a case originally brought on a narrow issue to bring our politics back to the corruption of the Gilded Age

Source: washingtonpost.com

Clearly, this is an extremely important Supreme court decision pending, which will have civic resonance in a major way, for good or ill.

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bpulhem

at 07:35 on September 7th, 2009

I certainly wish that the current makeup of the Supreme Court was one in which Judicial Discretion and careful thought about its decisions were cultivated. However-as an older adult I have long since accepted that wishing is the veneer of fairy tales. Some of the individuals sitting on this court today are so mentally incapable of viewing the consequences of their actions that it would be better if no action were taken at all. I find Three of these Judges to be very frightening and extremely shallow creatures who have little interest in advancing strong judicial interests that benefit the people.