The Kochs and the NRA.
The Senate comes back to work this week, and begins Monday with a cloture vote on a constitutional amendment to overturn
Citizens United, the Supreme Court decision that opened the door for corporations to spend unlimited sums in elections and resulted in the creation of Super PACs. For Mitch McConnell, this vote to take dark money out of politics is nothing but an
"assault on free speech." That's his claim in an op-ed in Politico Magazine.
[…] Democrats who control the Senate say they’re more interested in repealing the free speech protections the First Amendment guarantees to all Americans. Their goal is to shut down the voices of their critics at a moment when they fear the loss of their fragile Senate majority. And to achieve it, they’re willing to devote roughly half of the remaining legislative days before November to this quixotic anti-speech gambit.
The proposal they want to consider would empower incumbent politicians to write the rules on who gets to speak and who doesnt. And while no one likes to be criticized, the way for Senate Democrats to avoid it is to make better arguments, or even better, to come up with better ideas—not shut up their constituents.
Of course McConnell is confusing Super PACs with constituents. It's pretty damned clear where he gets his support, and thus who he answers to. Hint: it's not Kentucky.
Remember, this is the guy who told a secret gathering of Koch cronies and big money men that the "worst day of my political life" was the day President George W. Bush signed the McCain/Feingold campaign spending reform bill into law. Even worse than Katrina, even worse than voting to take America into war in Iraq. Even worse than 9/11.
McConnell isn't the senator from Kentucky, he's the senator from Koch.
Sign and send the petition to your two U.S. senators, urging them to vote “yes” on Senate Joint Resolution 19—a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United and McCutcheon, whether they have come out in support or not.