Is Georgia on your mind?

[TomC]

More than 100 CEOs gathered online Saturday to discuss taking new action to combat the controversial state voting bills being considered across the country, including the one recently signed into law in Georgia.

WaPo link.

WaPo won't let me read the link without subscribing.

What I'm seeing in your post is the power elite letting a government body know that they are in charge and not the government. CEOs are deciding this, as usual.

It's great that they're behaving ethically for once. But I don't like the concept of unelected officials telling the government what to do.

OR ELSE...
Tom

 

[ZiprHead]

The reason I warned of a WaPo link so people would know to open in an incognito window.

 

[ZiprHead]

From Axios:

Why it matters: American corporations flexed their advocacy muscles earlier this month when more than 100 companies signaled their opposition to Georgia's new voting law, inciting the wrath of GOP leaders, including former President Donald Trump and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

Driving the news: During the call, executives from "major airlines, retailers and manufacturers — plus at least one NFL owner" — discussed possibly stopping donations to politicians who support bills curbing voter access and postponing investments in states that approve the controversial measures.

As first reported by the Wall Street Journal, a new statement from Corporate American could be coming this week, condemning voter discrimination and calling for greater voter access.

Saturday's call between company executives "shows they are not intimidated by the flack. They are not going to be cowed," Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, a Yale management professor and one of the call's organizers, told the Post.

 

[TV and credit cards]

Shut up and donate, my ass. Ain’t corporate personhood a bitch, Mitch?

 

[blastula]

Mitch iow: money is speech, but speech is not speech.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

It's great that they're behaving ethically for once. But I don't like the concept of unelected officials telling the government what to do.

As if it isn't like this with so much US policy and law?

 

[TomC]

It's great that they're behaving ethically for once. But I don't like the concept of unelected officials telling the government what to do.

As if it isn't like this with so much US policy and law?

Are you generally OK with that?
If so, then we disagree.

The fact that I agree with them in this instance doesn't change that.
Tom

 

[Elixir]

I don't like the concept of unelected officials telling the government what to do.

WTF are "unelected officials"? You mean PEOPLE?
Who else is supposed to tell the government (aka "elected officials") what to do?

The fact that people who control vast sums of money coordinate their expenditures among themselves is a simple, predictable consequence of defining money as speech.
Don't blame those people, blame the Republican court for creating and enforcing that definition.

 

[TomC]

I don't like the concept of unelected officials telling the government what to do.

WTF are "unelected officials"? You mean PEOPLE?
Who else is supposed to tell the government (aka "elected officials") what to do?

The fact that people who control vast sums of money coordinate their expenditures among themselves is a simple, predictable consequence of defining money as speech.
Don't blame those people, blame the Republican court for creating and enforcing that definition.

I didn't blame anyone in particular. And, yes, I do consider Citizens United one of the worst SCOTUS rulings ever.

But while it's hypocrisy for McConnell to expect CEOs to "shut up and give us money", it's also hypocrisy to complain when CEOs buy enough influence to ram through environmental deregulation but not social reforms.

And I remember when such corporate pressure has worked for the good before. Similar pressure from big business forced Pence and the Indiana legislature to apologize for and dilute their RFRA legislation. But that sort of thing isn't what CEOs are usually after.
Tom

 

[ZiprHead]

Will Smith announces he's pulling their upcoming film production “Emancipation” out of Georgia in protest of the state’s new voting law, which makes voting harder for the state’s Black population.

 

[Worldtraveller]

More than 100 CEOs gathered online Saturday to discuss taking new action to combat the controversial state voting bills being considered across the country, including the one recently signed into law in Georgia.

WaPo link.

WaPo won't let me read the link without subscribing.

What I'm seeing in your post is the power elite letting a government body know that they are in charge and not the government. CEOs are deciding this, as usual.

It's great that they're behaving ethically for once. But I don't like the concept of unelected officials telling the government what to do.

OR ELSE...
Tom

You want unfettered capitalism, you get unfettered capitalism.

You don't like the consequences of unfettered capitalism, vote differently.

 

[southernhybrid]

I don't know. After all, SCOTUS said that corporations are people and people certainly have the right to speak out against something the government does that they feel is unjust. I guess you can look at it in different ways.

Of course, corporations will always speak out when they believe that something will hurt their profits. Their employees and customers support the right of the people to vote, so I guess they had to do what they believed was in their best interests. Again, the highest court in our country had decided that corporations are people......

 

[southernhybrid]

Now, movie production has been a huge thing in Georgia, but now due to the new voting law, some of it is pulling out.


https://www.ajc.com/life/radiotvtalk-blog/will-smith-movie-emancipation-pulls-out-of-georgia-over-new-voting-law/TJYUWNJDQVD7FFVR2HWQK5TPS4/

A movie starring Will Smith is pulling out of Georgia, citing the Georgia voting law that Gov. Brian Kemp recently signed.

Smith and director Antoine Fuqua released a statement to Deadline: “At this moment in time, the Nation is coming to terms with its history and is attempting to eliminate vestiges of institutional racism to achieve true racial justice. We cannot in good conscience provide economic support to a government that enacts regressive voting laws that are designed to restrict voter access. The new Georgia voting laws are reminiscent of voting impediments that were passed at the end of Reconstruction to prevent many Americans from voting. Regrettably, we feel compelled to move our film production work from Georgia to another state.”

The subject matter of the film may have made the optics of shooting in Georgia especially problematic.

The movie is based on a true story about a run away slave that joins the Union Army.

 

[TomC]

More than 100 CEOs gathered online Saturday to discuss taking new action to combat the controversial state voting bills being considered across the country, including the one recently signed into law in Georgia.

WaPo link.

WaPo won't let me read the link without subscribing.

What I'm seeing in your post is the power elite letting a government body know that they are in charge and not the government. CEOs are deciding this, as usual.

It's great that they're behaving ethically for once. But I don't like the concept of unelected officials telling the government what to do.

OR ELSE...
Tom

You want unfettered capitalism, you get unfettered capitalism.

You don't like the consequences of unfettered capitalism, vote differently.

I vote straight ticket Democrat. I've said so many times on TFT.

Got a better plan? If so I'd love to hear it. I don't much care for the Democrats.
Tom

 

[lpetrich]

[I vote straight ticket Democrat. I've said so many times on TFT.

Even if one is a yellow-dog Democrat, there's a place where one's vote can be meaningful: the primaries.

 

[Patooka]

I vote straight ticket Democrat. I've said so many times on TFT.

Got a better plan? If so I'd love to hear it. I don't much care for the Democrats.
Tom

Stop voting for people and start voting for ideas, maybe? To use an extremely simplified example, your vote in the last election could have been between whether or not you want to see more protesters gassed for photo ops. In that scenario, the people on the ticket are largely incidental.

 

[Swammerdami]

[I vote straight ticket Democrat. I've said so many times on TFT.

Even if one is a yellow-dog Democrat, there's a place where one's vote can be meaningful: the primaries.

Nitpick: I'm no expert on such terminology, but do you mean blue-dog Democrat? (Not to be confused with Blue-Collar Caucus Democrat.) The yellow-dog Ds are extinct, I think.

 

[Elixir]

[I vote straight ticket Democrat. I've said so many times on TFT.

Even if one is a yellow-dog Democrat, there's a place where one's vote can be meaningful: the primaries.

Nitpick: I'm no expert on such terminology, but do you mean blue-dog Democrat? (Not to be confused with Blue-Collar Caucus Democrat.) The yellow-dog Ds are extinct, I think.

Bunch of racists, y'all.

 

[lpetrich]

A yellow-dog Democrat is someone who will vote for any yellow dog of a politician who just so happens to be a Democrat.

Some people jokingly call themselves "yellow-dog Republicans", with a very similar meaning.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Now, movie production has been a huge thing in Georgia, but now due to the new voting law, some of it is pulling out.


https://www.ajc.com/life/radiotvtal...er-new-voting-law/TJYUWNJDQVD7FFVR2HWQK5TPS4/

A movie starring Will Smith is pulling out of Georgia, citing the Georgia voting law that Gov. Brian Kemp recently signed.

Smith and director Antoine Fuqua released a statement to Deadline: “At this moment in time, the Nation is coming to terms with its history and is attempting to eliminate vestiges of institutional racism to achieve true racial justice. We cannot in good conscience provide economic support to a government that enacts regressive voting laws that are designed to restrict voter access. The new Georgia voting laws are reminiscent of voting impediments that were passed at the end of Reconstruction to prevent many Americans from voting. Regrettably, we feel compelled to move our film production work from Georgia to another state.”

The subject matter of the film may have made the optics of shooting in Georgia especially problematic.

The movie is based on a true story about a run away slave that joins the Union Army.

The good news is that Jon Voight is coming to the rescue. Okay, that might be Fake News.