By Gar Smith
Under the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling, corporations are now granted the rights of living people -- specifically the right to make unlimited financial contributions to political campaigns in the name of "free speech."
Of course, "the law in all its majesty" also allows the homeless and the poor the same right to given massive amounts of personal wealth to politicians and political campaigns.
But if we accept that corporations are people, what other rights follow?
Well, human individuals have the right to marry. And that is why those who cherish the traditional definition of marriage support DOMA, the Defense of Marriage Act.
And make no mistake -- corporations DO marry. Except the procedure is better known as "merger."
Under law (as informed by GOP-centric "family values" advocates), marriage is a contract between a single man and a single woman granted for the sole purpose of procreation -- having and raising children.
Under this definition, it would seem that US corporate lifestyles exist in flagrant violation of these bedrock family values.
When we consider Exxon-Mobil, is Exxon the gentleman and Mobil the lady? Is it Mr. Goldman and Mrs. Sachs? Mr. Merrill and Mrs. Lynch?
No. The fact is that corporations are neither male nor female and thus, under neo-con lore, they are ineligible to participate in the sacred practice of marriage/merger.
These corporations are, in short, involved in impermissible liaisons --- same-sexless-marriages, to be precise.
There is an added behavioral problem with these disreputable corporate citizens. Many of them are so fond of illicit marriage/mergers that they overdo it and engage in multiple engagements -- committing polyandry, a practice banned by federal law.
Case in point: AOL Time Warner.
Such serial mergers/marriages must be seen as an affront to all right-thinking neo-cons. Such abominations cry out for swift condemnation and require a call for a speedy and public divorce/dissolution.
Corporate marriages also fail to pass muster because they do not lead to procreation. Corporations -- even under the most robust and fertile mergers -- do not produce true offspring. (And, as a matter of fact, no "living" corporation has yet produced a detectible heartbeat.) Worse, the activities of many multinationals result in explosions, fires and industrial accidents that create widows and orphans.
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