High Court Says 'Citizens United' Applies To States
by THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

text size A A A June 25, 2012
The Supreme Court on Monday reaffirmed its 2-year-old decision allowing corporations to spend freely to influence elections. The justices struck down a Montana law limiting corporate campaign spending.

By a 5-4 vote, the court's conservative justices said the decision in the Citizens United case in 2010 applies to state campaign finance laws and guarantees corporate and labor union interests the right to spend freely to advocate for or against candidates for state and local offices.

The majority turned away pleas from the court's liberal justices to give a full hearing to the case because massive campaign spending since the January 2010 ruling has called into question some of its underpinnings.

The same five justices said in 2010 that corporations have a constitutional right to be heard in election campaigns. The decision paved the way for unlimited spending by corporations and labor unions in elections for Congress and the president, as long as the dollars are independent of the campaigns they are intended to help. The decision, grounded in the freedom of speech, appeared to apply equally to state contests.

But Montana aggressively defended its 1912 law against a challenge from corporations seeking to be free of spending limits, and the state Supreme Court sided with the state. The state court said a history of corruption showed the need for the limits, even as Justice Anthony Kennedy declared in his Citizens United opinion that independent expenditures by corporations "do not give rise to corruption or the appearance of corruption."

http://www.npr.org/2012/06/25/155704776/high-court-says-citizens-united-applies-to-states

According to an analysis by the pay research group Equilar, compensation for top bank CEOs grew by nearly 12 percent last year. The Financial Times noted that these increases occurred “despite widespread falls in profits and share prices“:

Top US and European bankers, including JPMorgan Chase’s Jamie Dimon and Citigroup’s Vikram Pandit, have enjoyed double-digit annual pay rises averaging almost 12 per cent, despite widespread falls in profits and share prices, Financial Times research shows. [...]
The analysis of total pay awarded to 15 bank chiefs by Equilar, a US pay research group, shows they received an average 11.9 per cent pay rise last year to $12.8m, the second increase in a row. However, the pace of growth has slowed.
Bankers such as Brian Moynihan at Bank of America, Citigroup’s Mr Pandit and JPMorgan’s Mr Dimon enjoyed the largest gains.


According to a different estimate by Bloomberg News, Wall Street CEO pay grew by 20 percent last year. At the same time, worker wages grew by only 2.1 percent. And inflation adjusted wages actually declined by 0.6 percent between March 2011 and March 2012.





Over the last 30 years, CEO pay has increased 127 times faster than worker pay.

Also Tolstoy said

"The essence of all slavery consists in taking the product of another's labor by force. It is immaterial whether this force be founded upon ownership of the slave or ownership of the money that he must get to live" -Leo Tolstoy

"Loan Me A Dime"
(Felton Robinson, Mike Middlebrook, Jesse Anderson)
Vocals & rhythm guitar - Boz Scaggs
Lead Guitar - Duane Allman
Drums - Roger Hawkins
Bass - David Hood
Piano - Barry Beckett
Rhythm guitar - Jimmy Johnson
Horns - Memphis Horrns
Duane Allman - "An Anothology Volume 1"
Boz Scaggs - "Boz Scaggs"

Recorded at Muscle Shoals Studios, Muscle Shoals Alabama, May 5, 1969


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Thank god for cell phones and skype we don't have to do the blues any more.


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