Special Interests and Our Democracy

This past weekend we watched the documentary video, The Corporation described by the New York Times as “a smart and fascinating” movie. We found it not only entertaining but also very provocative regarding the history and inner workings of this modern global conglomerate. It took me back to my own American history lessons of the late nineteenth century robber barons, and the Gestapo-like tactics that corporations later used to try and stamp out labor unions in the early twentieth century. This video tells how the corporation was later given “personhood” by the courts under the Fourteenth Amendment, including full civil rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

This morning on public radio I listened to a talk show about another film entitled We’re Holding Our Own. This was about the November 10, 1975 sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald and the loss of a crew of 29 seamen. In the discussion which followed I was reminded again of just how cold and non-compassionate the “soul” of a corporation can be. When a caller called in to ask about to what extent the families of the dead crewman were later compensated by the company, we were told by the guest historian that the survivors reported that they received some fruit and a small plaque or souvenir.

Corporations now dominate and deform our own reality under the guise of “special interests.”. As citizens, we experience these “artificial” humans directly and daily no matter what policy issue or personal concern we have. They are all powerful and all pervasive. But most alarming to me is that they now completely control my state legislature and yours. They have bought our legislature out hook, line and sinker. They own it! These corporate giants or special interests spend their money during legislative budget hearings and at election time. Their personal representatives, the lobbyists, have your legislator’s ear, not yours! These phantom, grasping entities have high-jacked our democracy.

Postscript. We can be thankful at least that the Edmund Fitzgerald survivors reportedly did receive their social security checks. God bless them!