Reply #14: The largest corporations, and their [View All]

trade groups like the Chamber of Commerce, as well as individuals like the Koch brothers, now are able to buy and sell substantial numbers of politicians at all levels of governanace. I fear honest representatives - those not in thrall to corporate interests - infinitely less than those who are owned by private privileged individuals and entities. They can be removed from office through honest elections. Corporate power is forever.

Thomas Jefferson: "I hope we shall take warning from the example of England and crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations which dare already to challenge our Government to trial, and bid defiance to the laws of our country."

Franklin Roosevelt: "The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic State itself. That, in its essence, is Fascism-- ownership of government by an individual, by a group or by any controlling private power."