Thread by @DenbrotS

THREAD

"Fascism is rising in America": The Koch brothers and democracy's dispiriting demise /1

We're still paying the price for Citizens United, and our oligarchs are poised to capture even more political power
[From 2015]

The coup began long ago

salon.com/2015/02/08/fas…

Fascism Rose In America /2
Fascism is: "A system of government that exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership, together with belligerent nationalism."

Fascism Rose In America /3

“Once the American corporate barons own the institutions that are meant to regulate them, it’s game-over for both rational capitalism (including competition) and for democracy.”

by Thom Hartmann

Fascism Rose In America /4

At David and Charles Koch’s annual winter meeting near Palm Springs, California, it was announced that the Koch Brothers’ political organization would spend close to $900 million on the 2016 election. 
( Far more than The Republican Party)

Fascism Rose In America /5

In 2010, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, presented the best opportunity for the Roberts Court to use its five vote majority to totally re-write the face of politics in America, rolling us back to the pre-1907 era of the Robber Barons.

Fascism Rose In America /6

“In every major case since he became the nation's 17th Chief Justice, Roberts has sided w/the prosecution over the defendant,the state over the condemned,the executive branch over the legislative &the corporate defendant over the individual plaintiff.”

Fascism Rose In America /7
.. the modern Republican Party and the oligarchs that dominated it, knew that the only way to recover power was to immediately clear away all impediments to unrestrained corporate participation in electoral politics.

Fascism Rose In America /8
"Citizens United's atty,former solicitor gen Ted Olson..told the court that it should use the case to overturn the corp spending ban..recognized in Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Comm..&its decision..to uphold McCain-Feingold as constitutional."
R Barnes

Fascism Rose In America /9

The idea of Congress passing laws that limited corp “free speech" was..horrifying to Scalia.  He went after..Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Comm..in which the MCC was limited in their "free speech"in a political campaign because they were a corporation.

Fascism Rose in America /10

“The identity of the speaker is not decisive in determining whether speech is protected";”[c]orp[s]&other associations,like individuals,contribute to the ‘discussion,debate &the dissemination of information &ideas' that the 1st Amdmt seeks to foster."

Fascism Rose In America /11

Scalia “corporations are guaranteed the ‘freedom of speech and of the press...safeguarded by the due process of law clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.'"

Fascism Rose In America /12

The 14th Amdmt,which says that no "person"shall be denied”equal protection of the laws,"was promulgated..to free the slaves.But corps have long asserted that because it says "person" ..it included..full..rts under the Bill of Rights to corporations.

Fascism Rose In America /13
“In Justice Frankfurter's words,they demonstrate a threat to’the integrity of our electoral process,which for a century now Congress has repeatedly found to be imperiled by corporate, &later union,money: witness the Tillman Act,Taft-Hartley, FECA &BCRA

Fascism Rose In America /14
“.. limit’the corrosive &@distorting effects of immense aggregations of wealth,' &the decision could claim the justification..in recognizing Congress's authority to protect the integrity of elections from the distortion of corporate and union funds.”

Fascism Rose In America /15
“The ban on contributions will mean nothing..,now that companies &unions can save candidates the expense of advertising directly,simply by running ‘issue ads' w/o express advocacy,or by funneling the money thru an indep corp like Wisconsin Rt To Life."

Fascism Ross In America /16

Sounding almost depressed, [Justice] Souter closed his dissent with these words: "I cannot tell what the future will force upon us, but I respectfully dissent from this judgment today."

Fascism Rose In America /17

The attempt of corporations (and their lawyers, like Roberts..)to usurp American democracy is nothing new, as David Souter well knew. Fascism has always been a threat to democracy.  Oligarchs have sought to buy the power of gov’t to suit themselves..

Fascism Rose In America /18

“With a fascist the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power."
Henry Wallace

Fascism Rose In America /19

"American fascism will not be really dangerous..until there is a purposeful coalition among the cartelists, the deliberate poisoners of public information..."

Henry Wallace

Fascism Rose In America /20
"They claim to be super-patriots,but they would destroy every liberty guaranteed by the Constitution. They demand free enterprise, but are the spokesmen for monopoly and vested interest..”

Henry Wallace

Fascism Rose In America /21

“..Their final objective toward which all their deceit is directed is to capture political power so that, using the power of the state and the power of the market simultaneously, they may keep the common man in eternal subjection."
Henry Wallace

Fascism Rose In America /22

“The myth of fascist efficiency has deluded many people..Democracy,to crush fascism internally, must..develop the ability to keep people fully employed &at the same time balance the budget. It must put human beings first and dollars second..”

Fascism Rose In America /23

“.. It must appeal to reason and decency and not to violence and deceit. We must not tolerate oppressive government or industrial oligarchy in the form of monopolies and cartels."
Henry Wallace

Fascism Rose In America /24
"These economic royalists complain that we seek to overthrow the institutions of America.What they really complain of is that we seek to take away their power..
"Our allegiance to American institutions requires the overthrow of this kind of power!"
FDR

Fascism Rose in America /25
Roberts' SCOTUS decisions &the plans of the Koch Brothers..now eerily parallels the day in 1936 when Roosevelt said:”In vain they seek to hide behind the flag &the Constitution. In their blindness they forget what the flag &the Constitution stand for."