David Dayen @ddayen: So I read four business books; on the colossus CEOs of our time

[BeckyDem]

Link to tweet

David Dayen bio: is the executive editor of The American Prospect. He is the author of Monopolized: Life in the Age of Corporate Power (2020) and Chain of Title: How Three Ordinary Americans Uncovered Wall Street’s Great Foreclosure Fraud (2016), which earned the Studs and Ida Terkel Prize. He was the winner of the 2021 Hillman Prize for excellence in magazine journalism.
https://prospect.org/topics/david-dayen/

[Carlitos Brigante]

1. K&R nt

[Midnight Writer]

2. Sociopathy is the path to success in a capitalist world.

We have a system in which we give the most power (money) to the very depraved.

[BeckyDem]

3. To his credit, Biden's agenda trying to change that. What do CEO's like those guys do with their

money? We end up seeing obstruction that damages our democracy even further.


More money, less transparency: A decade under Citizens United

By Karl Evers-Hillstrom, with contributions from researchers Doug Weber, Anna Massoglia, Andrew Mayersohn, Grace Haley, Sarah Bryner and Alex Baumgart, Jan. 14, 2020. Download PDF version (3MB).

The proliferation of controversial political advertisements in the past decade isn't a coincidence. It's a direct result of the Supreme Court's 2010 Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission ruling, which helped pump billions of dollars into politics from outside sources that are supposed to be untethered from candidates or political parties.

On Jan. 21, 2010, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that the longstanding prohibition on independent expenditures by corporations violated the First Amendment. With its decision, the court allowed corporations, including nonprofits, and labor unions to spend unlimited sums to support or oppose political candidates. The majority made the case that political spending from independent actors, even from powerful corporations, was not a corrupting influence on those in office.

https://www.opensecrets.org/news/reports/a-decade-under-citizens-united

[Midnight Writer]

4. The sociopathic rich greatly outnumber the public-spirited rich.

That's why we see the "scorched earth" political strategies, and why we don't see rich saviors stepping up for the side of reason, responsibility, and public spirit.

[BeckyDem]

5. That is why ending money in politics as we have currently must end.

[abqtommy]

6. K&R Thanks!