While our backs are turned as we are engrossed with the health-care debate, there is a Supreme Court case looming on the horizon that could upend our entire political system. The Roberts court must be salivating to get the chance to help their right wing Big Corp base as they wait to render their decision on the Citizens United case which will for all purposes allow BigCorp. to dump as much money as they can into any election they want.

The most excellent Dahlia Lithwick writes:

Citizens United released the film in six theaters and on DVD, actions not subject to federal regulation. But when they sought to distribute the film by paying $1.2 million to sell it through a video-on-demand service, the Federal Election Commission contended that the film was no different from the kind of "electioneering communication" regulated under the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law. That was the 2002 statute that tried to limit the influence of big money on elections. If subject to the constraints of McCain-Feingold, the film could not be financed by corporate treasuries or broadcast within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election. The federal court of appeals agreed with the FEC, finding that the movie could be interpreted as nothing but an effort to "inform the electorate that Senator Clinton is unfit for office." Citizens United appealed.

With their limitless resources, they can corrupt our system like never before and destroy our democratic process.

In Bush v Gore, the United States Supreme Court, in an unprecedented ruling that proclaimed it should not be used as precedent, decided the 2000 presidential election by a 5-4 decision. Bush v Gore stands as one of the most legally dishonest and the most politically partisan opinion ever issued by the Court.

That is, until the Court hands down its decision in Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, involving a ruling by the FEC that barred a rightwing hit group, partially financed by a corporation, from running a hatchet-job film about Hillary Clinton in the days prior to an election in violation of the McCain-Feingold law.

By another 5-4 decision the Supreme Court will effectively turn the United States government over to corporations, i.e., back to the Republican Party, this time for keeps. The major corporations -- total profits of more than $600 billion per year for the top Fortune 100 -- will be permitted to advertise without limitation in Congressional, Senate and Presidential elections.

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Moreover, corporations often have foreign shareholders. Although barred as individuals from participating either through financial contribution or voting, foreigners will now be able to use the corporate fiction of a 'legal person' to influence profoundly the outcome of US elections.

The Supreme Court will soon allow corporate profits to be spent without limits to "preserve, protect and defend" not the Constitution, but those profits.

Swiftboats will be the fastest growing industry in the United States.
..read on

Sen. Dick Durbin is saying that if the Supreme Court rules in favor of Citizens United, that prove the catalyst for creating new campaign-finance legislation:

As a Supreme Court decision that could weaken campaign finance laws looms, Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., said that a ruling giving an upper hand to corporations and labor unions could be the catalyst needed to pass election-reform legislation.

He and Rep. John Larson, D-Conn., spoke at a Center for American Progress event on Friday to promote their legislation, the Fair Elections Now Act, and discuss the impact of the pending decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. That decision could open the door for unrestricted spending on campaign advertising. "It takes a major scandal to create a major reform," Durbin said. "I don't know that we've reached the level in the Senate or in the nation where people are going to demand this of us.... But if they think that the Supreme Court has tipped the scales so dramatically that they don't have a fighting chance any more, they may be open to this.

Do we really want that to happen? No, the Court must not rule in favor of the wingnut film makers. Something will have to be done, because a single corporation could bully any member of the House or Senate to vote for their profitable benefit or they will unleash their pocketbooks against them and that is a nightmare scenario.

Paul Abrams suggests that we write letters to Justice Kennedy and Alito, which is a worthy endeavor if you wish to partake. The letter is below the fold.

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Chris Matthews cites a recent poll from Public Policy Polling which found that 52% of Republicans think ACORN stole the 2008 Presidential Election for President Obama...and he's shocked!...shocked I tell you to hear that Republicans might actually believe that.

Gee Chris...where would Republicans ever get an idea like that from?

I can't imagine.

Rush Limbaugh, on his radio show yesterday, via Media Matters:

You -- In 2008, in our presidential election, we had a, a, a war veteran, Vietnam War veteran, John McCain, against an elitist, five-minute career senator of a hundred and fifty days. That senator was running as a Democrat, and had actively sought the defeat of the U.S. military in Iraq -- had actively sought to undermine General Petraeus, who was the author of the surge that led to a turnaround in Iraq and a victory. And now that same man is dithering in Afghanistan while American soldiers -- not Bush soldiers, not Obama soldiers, American soldiers -- are dying. At record numbers.

The threat that people in this country who want to be free face is now within our own borders. That's the stark reality. We'll be back.

Obama and the liberals are, in the land of the Limbaughst, the True Enemies of America.

If only Limbaugh really were "just an entertainer." Then we could dismiss him as a clown. But "entertainers" don't have audiences of "dittohead" acolytes who absorb their every word as gospel truth. "Entertainers" don't make condemnations of half the country as being the "enemy within" and actually stand -- and actually stand a chance of the other half nodding its head in agreement.

This, of course, is how you whip up violence: You scapegoat, you demonize, you dehumanize, and most of all, you paint a target on people's backs and say they're they Enemy. And you can't help but suspect Limbaugh is perfectly aware of this.

I devote a fair amount of space in The Eliminationists to Limbaugh. For a lot of reasons. Obviously, he's been doing this for awhile. But he's also stepping it up quite bit.

PROMOTIONAL NOTE: I'll be speaking tonight in Mount Vernon, Wash., at the Lincoln Theater at 7 pm. I'll be discussing my book as well as the recent visit to the city by Glenn Beck.

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(Fala - Resented the right wing smears he heard nightly on the radio)

Take heart. When you think the insanity, the attacks, the lunacy have gotten out of hand, there is always more. There always was. In 1944, at the height of the Presidential election, FDR observed a new low had been reached.

FDR: “These Republican leaders have not been content with attacks on me, or on my wife, or on my sons. No. Not content with that. They now include my little dog Fala.”

And so little Fala, the White House dog, was not immune to the brickbats, smears and innuendos.

Further evidence insanity can always get worse.

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After quitting her job in Alaska while many Americans struggle to make ends meet, a new CBS poll found that most Americans think she's not up to the task of being President---including a huge majority of Republicans.

If Sarah Palin is resigning her position as Alaska's Governor to run for president, she faces doubts – even from Republicans – about her ability to be an effective one, according to a new CBS News poll.

Less than one in four Americans, 22 percent in particular, say she does have the ability to be an effective president. Only 33 percent of Republicans say she does. Sixty five percent of all Americans, and 51 percent of Republicans say she does not.

In this CBS News Poll, conducted one week after Palin announced she would resign, these assessments are even more negative than they were among registered voters before last year's presidential election. Then, 37 percent of all registered voters thought Palin could be effective if it became necessary for her to take on the job, and 53 percent did not...read on

I'd say that's terrible news for her, and it shows that America isn't buying the reasons she gave for quitting with a year and a half left in her term during the nutty press conference she staged. And what was with all the animals quaking in the background?

Another CBS poll, which was released on July 13th, now shows that most Americans believe she quit to help her own political career.

A majority of Americans believe that Sarah Palin is resigning as governor of Alaska not because it's in the best interest of her state but because it will benefit her political career, a new CBS News poll finds.

Just 24 percent of those accept Palin's explanation that she resigned because it was the right thing to do for Alaska. More than twice that percentage – 52 percent – cited her political ambition as the reason for her resignation. An additional 14 percent said they don't know the reason.

Even Republicans are skeptical of the explanation, with a higher percentage saying Palin resigned for her political career (36 percent) than saying she did so for Alaska (31 percent).

Wonder if all those right-wing talking heads who were touting the earlier polls showing strong GOP support for Palin will bring these polls up ...

Wow, Iran is actually more like America than I thought! I wonder when the president's going to send in his thugs to shut down the vote count?

TEHRAN, June 13 -- Iran's election commissioner declared Saturday that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won a decisive victory in most of the country's electoral districts in Friday's presidential election, but the incumbent's leading challenger protested the results, charging widespread vote fraud and vowing to resist a "dangerous manipulation" of the balloting.

Mir Hossein Mousavi, a former prime minister who waged a heated campaign against Ahmadinejad's bid for reelection, urged his supporters to reject a "governance of lie and dictatorship."

"I'm warning that I won't surrender to this manipulation," Mousavi said in a statement posted on his Web site Saturday. He said the announced results were "shaking the pillars of the Islamic Republic of Iran's sacred system" and represented "treason to the votes of the people." He warned that the public would not "respect those who take power through fraud."

Mousavi made the comments after Iran's election chief, Kamran Daneshjoo, said on state television that Ahmadinejad received nearly 21.8 million votes, or more than 63 percent, of the nearly 34.4 million valid votes cast in 346 of Iran's 366 electoral districts. He said Mousavi received 11.7 million votes, or 34 percent.

However, officials delayed without explanation an expected announcement of the complete results, which news agencies said suggested intervention by Iran's Islamic authorities to tamp down a potentially volatile situation.

Riot police cordoned off the Interior Ministry, which directed Friday's voting, and stood guard around key government buildings.

Plainclothes officers fired tear gas to disperse a cheering crowd outside Mousavi's campaign headquarters after the pivotal presidential election ended in confusion, with both sides claiming victory.

UPDATE:

NIAGARA FALLS, Ontario – The U.S. on Saturday refused to accept hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's claim of a landslide re-election victory in Iran and said it was looking into allegations of election fraud.
"We are monitoring the situation as it unfolds in Iran, but we, like the rest of the world, are waiting and watching to see what the Iranian people decide," U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said at a news conference with Canada's foreign affairs minister, Lawrence Cannon.

Minutes after Clinton spoke, the White House released a two-sentence statement praising "the vigorous debate and enthusiasm that this election generated, particularly among young Iranians," but expressing concern about "reports of irregularities."

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Jon Stewart talks to Chris Wallace about how his cohorts at Fox are holding up now that their best efforts to keep Obama from getting elected didn't work.

Dana Bash reporting that the McCain campaign turned off the news at their campaign headquarters at the Biltmore Hotel in Phoenix.

From MSNBC's election coverage after PA being projected for Obama.

From The Cafferty File:

The prescription for tomorrow is comfortable shoes and patience. It’s going to be awesome.

Never in recent memory has there been so much interest in a presidential election. More than one-third of Americans are expected to have already voted by the time the polls open tomorrow, a 50 percent increase from 2004. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be a lot of people in front of you in front of you in line when you get to the polls.

Young people have signed up in unprecedented numbers. New voter registrations have broken records in almost every state. Turnout in many of the primaries was staggering. So be prepared.

Be aware also that tomorrow is a chance for all of us to strike a blow for democracy, and God knows she could use a shot in the arm. We’re at our best as a nation when we’re all involved. But that involvement tomorrow will come with a price. You’re probably going to have to wait. Maybe for a long time.

While you’re standing there grumbling that the line isn’t moving, or the machine is broken, remember what it was that got you into that line in the first place. This may well be the most important election we’ve ever had.

Here’s my question to you: How long are you willing to wait in line to vote?

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Bill Maher stops by the set of Larry King Live to discuss the Presidential election.

Full transcript available here.

During tonight's Presidential Debate Senator John McCain made the claim that he "warned" about the impending economic crisis. That's amazing, seeing as he said in 2007 that he was in fact surprised by it and failed to predict the disaster he, President Bush and the GOP brought upon America. Think Progress has the video and more:

I don’t know of hardly anybody, with the exception of a handful, that said “wait a minute, this thing is getting completely out of hand and is overheating.” So, I’d like to tell you that I did anticipate it, but I have to give you straight talk, I did not.

Obama nails him in tonight's debate:

Obama: Now I've got to correct a little bit of Senator McCain's history, not surprisingly, but let's first of all understand that the biggest problem in this whole process was the deregulation of the financial system. Senator McCain as recently as March bragged about the fact that he is a deregulator. On the other hand two years ago I said we've got a subprime lending crisis that has to be dealt with, I wrote to Secretary Paulson, I wrote to Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke and told them this is something we have to deal with and nobody did anything about it. A year ago I went to Wall Street and told them we have to re-regulate, and nothing happened.

I don't want to tempt fate, but things are looking pretty bad for the GOP in the coming elections.

For instance, Al Franken looks like he's giving incumbent Republican Norm Coleman nightmares in Minnesota. He's ahead by 43 to 34 percent in the latest poll there, published Saturday by Princeton Survey Research Associates International. The new poll suggests that one reason for Franken’s gain is voters’ reaction to the abrasive advertising in the campaign. The Independence Party candidate, Dean Barkley, is also drawing support from Coleman says the poll.

And there's more good news both for Dems looking at voter registration as a way to tip the scales in November, as well as for third party aficionados.

The poll detected a significant increase in Minnesotans who label themselves as Democrats. Forty-two percent of likely voters identified themselves as Democrats, compared with 27 percent who said they were independents, and 26 percent who said they were Republicans.

According to the poll, Coleman’s support has slid among men and those in upper- and lower-income brackets. Last month, Coleman led Franken among men, 46 to 36 percent; in the recent poll Franken is ahead, 45 to 34 percent.

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Democratic Vice Presidential candidate Joe Biden makes a personal introduction to voters in his first official campaign video. Biden seems very much at ease and his no-nonsense, candid demeanor really comes across as he talks about his life, experience and his goals for the campaign. He makes no bones about being outspoken -- and with the ugly, Rove-style campaign the McCain camp is waging, I don't have a problem with that.