This page was last updated on February 4, 2010.
Court’s decision divides us further; Jerry Miskulin; Beaver County Times; January 28, 2010.
I encourage you to review Mr. Miskulin’s body of work in the archives. Mr. Miskulin has written at least 50 letters since 2004 (I didn’t critique all of them.). Most (all?) are illogical and full of falsehoods (not just wrong).
In recent letters (here and here), Mr. Miskulin expressed displeasure with the tea parties and proclaimed
Below is a detailed critique of the subject letter.
“In regard to the U.S. Supreme Court allowing corporations and unions unlimited spending in elections, one can easily see the folly of such a decision.”
[RWC] That’s not what the decision said. The decision said corporations and labor union management could directly fund political advertising because ruling otherwise violates the free speech provision of the First Amendment. Restrictions on campaign contributions stand. What most people don’t know is that in about half the states, corporations and labor union management already had this right for state and local elections.
“Corporations and unions are artificial entities and hence should not be allowed to contribute at all to elections. Corporations would be spending their shareholders’ money and unions would be spending their members’ dues even if the individual's politics might not uniformly in line with management.”
[RWC] “Corporations and unions are artificial entities …” True, and under existing law, corporations are “legal persons.” The legal person treatment allows corporations to be subject to income taxes. Using Mr. Miskulin’s argument, corporations should not be subject to income taxes because they are not people. Does anyone care to guess what Mr. Miskulin’s position would be on that point?
As for the second sentence, what a hoot. According to FEC data, in the 2008 election cycle, 92% of contributions by labor union PACs went to Democrats. Are we to believe 92% of union membership is Democrat? As for business PACs, the split was 49% for Democrats and 51% for Republicans.
“Letting corporations and unions divide us seems a bit of a folly. Our divisions are already deep enough, yet the Supreme Court wants to throw gasoline onto the fire.”
[RWC] Why are folks like Mr. Miskulin afraid of free speech? As long as there is full disclosure about who paid for a political ad, why would Mr. Miskulin not applaud greater freedom of speech? While we can pass laws making certain forms of speech off limits to certain people, all we do is force people to work around those laws. I believe complete freedom of speech along with full disclosure is the best solution.
“It seems politics has seeped into our Supreme Court and it takes pride in which side it’s on.
“A house divided cannot stand.”
[RWC] Mr. Miskulin appears to be saying we should all have the same opinion or we’ll fail. The Times is run by a corporation but, as far as I can tell, Mr. Miskulin hasn’t complained about its unlimited right to free speech.
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