Some persons are more equal than others

Last updated on: February 5, 2010 at 4:34 am by Fred Clark

Some persons are more equal than others 2010-02-05T04:34:24-05:00 Fred Clark

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

The Supreme Court has ruled that corporations are persons and that money is speech and that, therefore, corporations have a greater right to free speech than other, mortal persons with actual mouths but not as much money. These poorer, merely human persons also don't get to enjoy the apparently divine right of limited liability.

Among the more intriguing repercussions of this astonishing and absurd ruling is that foreign corporations are also now free to buy up all the airtime they can afford to run attack ads against American elected officials. The xenophobic right wing seems only dimly aware of this so far, but I can't help but wonder how they will respond when, say, America Movil — the Latin American mobile phone company owned by Carlos Slim Helu, the world's third-richest man — decides to run campaign ads attacking U.S. politicians opposed to illegal immigration.

The Associated Press' Liz Sidoti cheerfully argues that voters are "winners" in the Supreme Court's decision to gut campaign-finance precedent, because:

Not sure where a candidate stands on an issue? Not sure how to vote?

Need more information to make a wise decision? Never fear. Corporations
and unions are likely to tell you their version of things now that
they're freed from restrictions. But buyer beware: It's still up to
voters to separate fact from fiction.

So celebrate voters! You'll be getting lots more information about candidates — and some small fraction of it might even be true! Isn't that great? Opening the floodgates to corporate political money/speech doesn't mean that any of that money/speech has to say anything at all true or accurate, because elected officials are public figures and cannot claim libel no matter what lies corporations monopolize the airways to spread about them.

So OK then. Sauce for the gander. Corporations are public figures too. As are Supreme Court justices.

And I'm not saying I can prove that Justices Scalia, Roberts and Alito ruled the way they did solely because Exxon/Mobil will now be able to provide even more political support for NAMBLA, but given their clear enthusiasm for that organization and its corporate benefactors, you can draw your own conclusion.

– – – – – – – – –

Delaware's unemployment rate just hit 9 percent. This is Very, Very Bad. Worse than that, according to what we just reported in the paper, it's The Worst It's Ever Been — a new "record high."

Huh? During the Great Depression, the national unemployment rate was more than 28 percent. So if the jobless rate in Delaware in the 1930s never got above 9 percent, then why wasn't there a mass migration into the state? Why didn't the Joads head east to look for work?

It seems this claim of "record" unemployment comes from an authoritative source: the Bureau of Labor Statistics Web site, which publishes "Current Unemployment Rates for States and Historical Highs/Lows." And if you consult that site, you'll see that Delaware's rate of 9.0 percent in December 2009 is, indeed, its historical high.

But if you scroll down, you'll find this rather important note at the bottom of the page: "Data series begin in January 1976."

So it was accurate to report that unemployment in Delaware is now the Worst It's Ever Been in precisely the same way it would have been accurate to report that the Miami Dolphins have never won a Super Bowl. (They've won two — but none since January 1976.)

So I was wondering if other news outlets also failed to note the note from the BLS. South Carolina's Dec. 2009 jobless rate is listed by the BLS as the Historical High. Did news outlets there provide any sort of accurate context — "the highest rate since Dorothy Hamill won gold in Innsbruck" — or did they, like our paper, breathlessly report that South Carolina's Very, Very Bad rate of 12.6 percent was a "record" and The Worst It's Ever Been In All Time?

The second one.

This is depressing. In more than one sense. There's a big difference between Very, Very Bad and The Worst It's Ever Been. ("Your friend here is only mostly dead …") Misleading readers about that difference is bad for a whole host of reasons, including that it encourages them to ignore history. In particular, it encourages readers to ignore the one part of our history we desperately need to be learning from now that our unemployment rates have climbed to Very, Very Bad levels — levels not seen since the theatrical release of Mother, Jugs & Speed.

class warfare

Previous Post

February 1, 2010

TF: The Illuminati

Next Post

February 6, 2010 About the weather

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category class warfare evangelicals Iraq Left Behind Mammon music Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 November 2003 October 2003 September 2003

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What Christian group believes in the doctrine of transubstantiation?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Catholics Pentecostals Baptists Protestants