What is missed in this latest Supreme Court debasing of the Constitution and the Republic is that if Corporations are persons, they can then rightfully be tried in Courts as individuals for such things as, oh, say. . .bribery, collusion, murder, taking advantage of disasters to make money (as with the heating people in Maine a few years ago). Individuals have rights but they also have responsibilities, one being obeying the law. And they can be prosecuted for irresponsibility, that is, not obeying the law. So that by way of this horrid Supreme Court Decision, the Supreme Court has opened up the way out of this predicament of Corporate owner ship of government, Corporate tyranny of the populace: Corporations can be tried in Court for crimes that any natural person would be tried for. With bribery, this would be easy as they are so arrogant, so filled with hubris, that they openly brag about who they’ve given money to in order to influence that Senator’s or Representative’s decision. . .or withheld it from them for the same reason. If the information can be collected that by not providing services death has resulted, then they are, at the very least, guilty of homicide; a little more digging and it might be first degree murder; or even buying a murderer if they farmed the carrying out of the action to another (two birds with one stone?). In our humanitarianism as a nation, we still have the death penalty: Texas and California like it, too!
The argument cannot now be made by the Corporations that they are not individuals, persons. Not any more. The head makes the decision to act, in most cases either head.
Now, how do you punish them by the law? Well, an individual has 4 limbs and a head and, as it’s ridiculous to put a murderer’s arm in jail, it would be as ridiculous to put only one limb of a Corporation in jail. So, decide who is the head: the CEO. Who are the arms? Who are the legs? Decide by action and behavior and the directors of these “arms” of the organization (as they are called) are thus to be jailed, since we do not behead people any more. Anyway, beheading a Corporation does not kill the body of the Corporation as well. They are like Hydras. Or those giants of folklore that, when you kill one head, two more grow back in its place. The entire person must be jailed. Perhaps the entire Board of Directors and the Stock Holders? At the very least, these people are complicit. Maybe we need a Theseus to whack off the head of Medusa by mirror. . .and then hold it up to the Army of representatives and lobbyists (complicitors) in Washington and turn them to stone.
The anti-establishment press, that likes to call itself leftist, is so focused on the horribleness of the decision, the inhumanity of the Supreme Court justices, that they cannot see that this very decision opens up a solution to all of the horror that has been inflicted on the US people. . .and those of other countries. Wow! Blackwater is a person! Cry Murder!!
If the Corporations move to get out of this predicament, they will have to get another Supreme Court decision–going through all of the Court rigamarol to get there will cost money–that will negate this one or make a joke of the entire affair with its diaphanous nature. If a new law is enacted, as it were, it will have to be very species specific and then more and more such decisions will have to be made as more and more Court cases are brought until the landscape will be littered with bits and pieces of bullshit legal paper. The Corporations will be creating their own absurdist drama.
Can you imagine the murder trials–first degree murder at that–the pharmaceutical giants will face? And the Federal Drug Administration becomes complicit. Talk about breaking backs!
Is Ionesco a ghost Supreme Court Justice?! Like those impartial Generals used by Fox News to generate independent decisions.
The Supreme Court did a horrible thing but it is for the best, for now we’ve got them by the balls. Is there anybody with the guts to follow through? Will Margery Cohn continue writing and writing and writing “should” articles and do nothing? Will the ACLU pick up the ball and run with it? Will the Southern Poverty Law Centre really stand up for equality? Especially as many Corporate decisions are racist in nature. Will big name defense attorneys take on such cases, on a contingency basis? No, probably not. What can a prison sentence or a death penalty do for the pocketbook? Nope. Nobody in America does anything for the good of society, at least not for free or out of some sort of ethico-moral principle.
The Supreme Court has effectively put the people in the belly of the beast–with a torch to light its way. Burn, baby, burn! Disney cartoon comes to life. Arabal and Beckett go to Washington.
And when the Courts stick these people in jail, it should be the same kinds of jails that ordinary criminals are put in (because they are ordinary individuals). As they may be murderers, they should be put in high security institutions–maybe even on Death Row in Texas. Amongst all those blacks and Latinos they have so brazenly condemned to prison. Reaming is a favorite activity in prison, violent or otherwise. Isn’t it wonderful to think of a CEO getting fucked? Literally? There is no such thing as gang rape in prison.
JAMES L. SECOR can be reached at: hellecchino@inbox.com
