Progressive PR firm Murray Hill does a satirical campaign ad running for Congress in response to the Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. FEC. Screenshot from Murray Hill video on Youtube.

The politicians and media pundits who claim that the U.S. Supreme Court recently “handed our democracy over to corporations” are wrong. The truth is that corporations and other monied special interests have had illegitimate yet intimate access to the inner workings of our supposedly representative, democratic government for some time. This most recent Supreme Court ruling of Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission didn’t change much. Corporations have enjoyed many of the rights of “natural persons” for the past century. Our own Dartmouth College was involved in one of the landmark cases, Dartmouth College v. Woodward, that helped establish the dubious precedent for corporate legal personhood.

This recent decision, which removed ineffective and arguably unconstitutional limits on corporate campaign financial support, came from a case originally about a right-wing anti-Hillary Clinton film that was funded by corporate interests.

That case was then expanded to address the broader question of corporate campaign funding and advertising. On this issue, the Bush-stacked court overturned years of precedent by ruling that corporations should have all the free speech rights of “natural persons.” To the Supreme Court, spending money to advertise for, or otherwise support, a political issue or candidate is equivalent to political speech. We can all thank the Supreme Court for cementing corporations and other powerful (read: financially well off) interests as the loudest political speakers in our “democracy.”

This decision brings about many questions. Are unions included in this new corporate freedom? Can foreign corporations with operations in the U.S. freely inject piles of cash into our politics? Are American corporations American citizens? Can corporations make unlimited direct donations to candidates’ campaigns? Can corporations run for public office? This issue has already come up in Maryland. These debates are far from over and will be big issues in the near future. Most central to the broader issue of corporate personhood, however, is the idea of the corporate person. This fantasy underlies the Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision to allow a new class of “people” more leverage in our political process.

In this case, Justice Anthony Kennedy spoke for the majority when he wrote, “Corporations and other associations, like individuals, contribute to the ‘discussion, debate, and the dissemination of information and ideas’ that the first amendment seeks to foster.”

In other words, corporations and other associations are good democratic citizens that help our democracy function properly. Legally barring them from spending money to alter the political process is a violation of free speech, and a stupid idea if you like democracy. Unfortunately for us, this view of the corporate person clashes with reality. History has proved that corporations, by their very nature, often have decidedly anti-democratic interests.

At its core, a corporation is designed to make a profit and increase in size and prestige. In the 2003 documentary The Corporation, corporate insider and “management guru” Peter Dunker says, “If you find an executive who wants to take on social responsibility, fire him. Fast.”

William Niskanen, chair of the conservative think-tank the Cato Institute, echoed the same sentiment when he said he would not invest in a company that promoted corporate responsibility. These calculating investors stay away from responsible corporations because they think that social responsibility has a way of interfering with maximized profits. The basic idea here, according to investment manager Robert Monks, is that “the corporation is an externalizing machine in the same way that a shark is a killing machine. There isn’t any question of malevolence or will.

The enterprise, and shark within it, has those characteristics that enable it to do that for which it is designed.” Corporations are incredibly efficient at producing goods and making money precisely because they are designed to ignore, among other things, the democratic and social responsibilities that might limit their outputs and profits.

They will destroy environments and poison water supplies to avoid expensive but environmentally appropriate waste disposal costs—that is, if they can get away with it. Why pay for something themselves when they can get someone or something else to bear the cost? They will pay people unfair wages and lock-in their overnight employees. They will sell harmful, lethal, or addictive products while hiding the damning scientific evidence. They can do these things because, according to the CEO of the largest commercial carpet manufacturer in the world, they are specifically designed to “externalize any cost that an unwary or uncaring public will allow it to externalize.”

Far from democratic citizens that constructively contribute to the democratic process, corporations are profit-making machines that are rewarded for any behavior, no matter how anti-social or undemocratic, that increases their bottom line. And they are also frighteningly good at manipulating consumers not only to buy their products, but also to identify with their highly polished and misleading images. The Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission will unleash corporate marketing machines on a largely “unwary or uncaring” public, and their wealth will allow them to speak their mind on a scale that no private citizen can match.

Strengthening the paradigm of corporate personhood in this way clearly gives the “rich” special interests an even greater, ever more unfair advantage in the exchange of political ideas. It gives a certain minority group of entities with some similar interests that are often anti-democratic, anti-social, and non-transparent a megaphone to drown out dissenting viewpoints by supporting favorable political candidates and running political issue and campaign ads. Our electoral system already makes it nearly impossible to run a successful campaign without corporate support (unless you are a billionaire who can finance your own campaign), and this decision will only worsen the problem.

But the alternatives, like limiting the amount of money corporations can give to candidates and barring them from running political advertisements, do seem unfair or even unconstitutional. How can we, as a country that values free speech, arbitrarily deny certain interest groups the right to participate in the political process? It is clearly in our democratic interest to have a more level “playing field” of political discourse, but how do we achieve some semblance of fairness without being unfair in the process?

The Oregon Supreme Court faced this dilemma, and their clever solution is a hopeful sign in the ensuing struggle for parity.

A lobbyist for an Oregon-based corporate firm sued the state for limiting the amount of money a corporation could give a politician as a “gift” (a strange Orwellian term for bribe in our system of legalized bribery).

He argued that it was unfair of Oregon to put a “gifting” limit on corporations but not other organizations, and the state court agreed. They conceded that they could not, in good conscience, restrict the freedom for any particular group or person to give a “gift” to a public servant, but they could restrict the amount of money the public servant could accept from any one group or person. This ruling shows us that it is possible to have a fairer political system without trampling on individual or group rights. It is perfectly reasonable for the state to promote fairness in this way.

A better system of public financing for political campaigns would also make it easier for non-corporate candidates to compete with their privately funded counterparts. Policies and politicians have already become products (the “Obama brand” was wildly successful with consumers in 2008). And now corporations and other interest groups are free to spend as much money as they see fit to manipulate us into buying the political products that serve their interests. But the Federal Election Commission could regulate political messages by trying to eliminate the subversively persuasive marketing techniques that have and increasingly will become commonplace in politics.

The inevitable debate over Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission will predictably break down across political party and ideological lines and will unfortunately descend into all-or-nothing hyperbolic arguments: the complete corporate takeover of American politics thanks to the evil Supreme Court on one side, and the tyrannical federal government’s attempt to restrict our freedom on the other. This oversimplified and sensational debate will boost network TV ratings and might help a few candidates get elected, but it won’t help us.

Right now, we are stuck with a political system that has been heavily favoring those wealthy special interests for the past century. This reality has had a drastic, anti-democratic effect on the laws and political landscape of our country, and this decision only made it worse.

But the Oregon Supreme Court’s decision gives us hope for a fairer system. The Supreme Court decision doesn’t change much, which is a testament to how bad things already were, but it does bring an all-important issue to the forefront of people’s minds. It provides proponents of democracy an opportunity to search for novel ways to challenge the very real problem of corporate dominance in our political process. After all, it’s “We the People,” not “We the Incorporated.”

A journey into hell. International aid agencies find a devastated country in chaos on the tiny island. The earthquake destroyed most of the capital city, Port-au-Prince, and have left countless wounded and thousands dead. Photograph by Globovision.

The rush to relieve the devastated people of Haiti is encouraging. It is reassuring to see that people care about Haiti in its most conspicuous time of need in recent memory. The global relief effort, although troubled by logistical, political, and ideological issues, seem genuine. Dartmouth has responded with exceptional vigor and even the self-congratulatory story on the front page of Wednesday’s The D (“Dartmouth’s Haiti response tops other Colleges’”) can’t sully the authentic motivation behind our efforts to help the earthquake victims.

But Haiti was a desperate country before the earthquake, and it will be after we, in our unimaginable comfort, forget about the images of crumbled buildings, grieving Haitians, and starving children.

Even after the immediate effects of the quake pass and the relief effort subsides, Haiti will still be crippled by poverty and the suffering caused by poverty.

In all likelihood, there will still be crumbled buildings, grieving Haitians, and starving children, but we wont see them on TV and Internet news sites.

This past Tuesday, Students for Haitian Relief sent out an article (along with great information about how to help) called “A Long Road to Hell” that was meant to explain how “Haiti’s history has only compounded the current tragedy.”

The article tells at best a half-truth about the history of the poorest nation in our hemisphere. What is predictably absent is also the reason why we should care (in an “I’m willing to do something about it” way) about the fate of Haiti and its people even after the natural disaster relief effort ends. The article leaves out the ways that our countries policies have made it more difficult for Haiti to survive and prosper as an independent nation.

Direct U.S. interference and meddling in Haitian politics for the past two centuries has had a crippling effect on Haitian prosperity. As the article mentions, Haiti ousted its French oppressors and declared its independence in 1804, becoming the first slave colony to do so. As punishment, France demanded an exorbitant fee and the Haitian people were saddled with reparations until 1947.

What the article doesn’t say is that France could not have extracted those unjust reparations without support from America—a country that should have been able to relate to wars of independence against colonial oppressors.

The U.S. later invaded and occupied Haiti in 1915 and disbanded the Haitian parliament so it could force through unpopular pro U.S. corporation legislation.

And if that is too far in the past to resonate, the U.S. has sponsored two coups within the past 20 years against Haiti’s first democratically elected president Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who remains in exile in South Africa. The coups intensified political unrest and precipitated some of Haiti’s worst years both politically and economically. Aristide, however flawed as a president, was popular among Haitian people, but unfriendly to neoliberal U.S economic policies.

The earthquake was a natural disaster, and no country is to blame for the ensuing devastation. But the poverty and lack of infrastructure that leaves a country of almost nine million with only a couple fire stations made the natural disaster far more tragic for humans. If Haiti has been walking “a long road to hell,” it hasn’t been walking alone.

DFPer Chris Desir climbing with the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club. Photograph courtesy of DMC.

12:14, not 12:15, but 12:14. That’s when John Joline, a Dartmouth alumnus and enigmatic mainstay of the Dartmouth Mountaineering Club, suggested we meet to catch the free shuttle to the Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center. “Does the bus have a bike rack?” I asked in my confirmation blitz, and luckily, it did. So I pack my bag with my climbing shoes and chalk, a water bottle, and some pre-made sandwiches from the Hop—the essentials. I walk down the staircase of Maxwell only to find my beloved bicycle stolen. My initial wave of panic-tinged rage subsides as I realize I left my bike chained to a fence outside of the Hop the previous morning. I retrieve my most prized possession from its burglar proof moor and find a seat in front of the Dartmouth bookstore, waiting for John, and the shuttle, to arrive.

I spot John walking down the street. His signature outdoor attire, free-to-be white hair, and oversized glasses are unmistakable among the Main Street mix of chic Dartmouth students rushing to class and Hanover working folk in their business attire. I tell him my “stolen” bike story and he is easily able to relate; he says he too often misplaces his bicycle. As we wait for the bus, John, in his unusual and effortlessly eloquent English, begins telling me about “new” (he made sure to note that although they were new to us, they had been there for thousands of years) boulders we hoped to climb before the sunset. Given that it is 12:14 on a mid-November day in New Hampshire, we have to hurry. On the ride over, John’s emphatic talk about the beautiful, sculpture-esque objects in the woods draws a few strange looks. One man’s curious glance seems to say, “These guys are talking about rocks!?” Yup. Rocks. And we were excited.

The bus ride is short. We get off at the hospital stop and retrieve our man-powered vehicles from the front rack of the petroleum-powered behemoth and set off for the nearby trailhead. On the brief ride over, we share our mutual amazement at the seemingly endless number of boulders in this part of the world.

The woods surrounding Dartmouth are no exception, and John recounts the countless hours he has spent hiking, bushwhacking, and even snowshoeing through the area in search of, among other things, the most climbable and aesthetically interesting rocks. We use John’s lock to secure our bikes to a tree near the outcrops, and he tells me his lock combination in case I need to leave before he is ready. We plan to hike to what John calls the “UFO” boulder first. Next, we’ll head to the nearby “Stamina Wall,” and finally we’ll end at the “Tip Top” boulder, so named for the disintegrating Tip Top Bakery truck permanently parked nearby—a vestige of the now overgrown road that circumvents the Hanover forest. I had never seen the Tip Top boulder before and its hidden novelty sounds particularly exciting. John goes on to describe other difficult and interesting boulder problems that might satisfy my desire to climb—at least for the day.

We make the short, easy hike to the “UFO” boulder—a 15 foot high, 70 foot long granite beauty— and John shows me his hidden stash of brushes and other tools that he uses to clean lichen and excess climbing chalk from the outcrop. We clean and prepare the boulder for about ten minutes before we begin climbing. John, who is a strong climber for any age, knows every hand and foothold on the rock, and it shows. We traverse back and on forth on a formidable crag for some undefined period of time (neither of us had a timepiece) and sit down to change from our climbing shoes into our walking shoes.

“What’s your major?” he asks during the interim between boulders. “Philosophy,” I answer, which changes the nature of the conversation for the rest of the outing. In between boulders, we talk about our favorite philosophical ideas and traditions. We touch on subjectivity, enlightenment, and the ineffable quality of experience, all before we even get to the Stamina wall. By the time we reach the Tip Top boulder, we’ve covered—in as much depth as a couple hours in the woods will allow—thousands of years of philosophical and spiritual thought. We arrive at the Tip Top boulder and return to the business of cleaning and climbing.

The easier of the two most obvious problems on the 16-foot high, slightly overhung, pure granite boulder stumps me. I fall a few feet from the top three times. We don’t have a crash pad (think of a portable gymnastics pad), but the ground is soft and almost flat—a boulderer’s dream landing. John gives me some helpful tips as to the easiest way up the boulder, but I am unwilling to commit to a high, sketchy heel-hook near the top of the rock that would have me a hanging inverted 10 feet above the ground. Exhausted and running out of light, I resolve to come back later with a crash pad, to give it another try. John draws me detailed map, and we set off into the fast approaching darkness for our bikes.

We hike through the dimly lit trails. John leads and I can barely see the ground as he calmly guides us back to the main trial, politely refusing the headlamp I offer him. “I like to use it as a last resort,” he says, and “I have one in my back-pack.”

John comments on the “bittersweet” sound of cars getting louder as we reach the road. “It’s nice to be able to share this with someone who appreciates it,” he says, and I thank him for the tour. We ride off in different directions and I lament at the darkness; John gave me directions to many more boulders that I now want to visit, but I can barely see the road in front of me—not to mention my bleeding hands and aching muscles. Fortunately, the relatively small area of woods around us has the potential to supply enough boulder problems to occupy a lifetime, and (just in case I get bored) the thoughts running through my head—the aftermath of our free-wheeling philosophical discussion—could occupy a few more.

The Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan. Zoya risks her life as an advocate of RAWA.

Bush removed the Taliban from power, captured or killed the lunatics and, for the next seven years, about the only news we heard out of Afghanistan were occasional announcements of parliamentary elections, new schools, water and electricity plants.” I feel strange saying this, but Ann Coulter, quoted here in a recent column on the war in Afghanistan, is right. Under normal circumstances, it would pain me to admit this, but in this case I have no problem agreeing with Coulter.In a short sentence, she just about covers all that we’ve heard from mainstream news sources about the state of affairs in post-invasion Afghanistan.

My problem is with Coulter’s avowal of the mainstreammedia’s portrayal of life in Afghanistan, which ignores the treacherous conditions in favor of a rosy revisionist depiction. It discounts the lives of ordinary Afghanis like Zoya, an Afghani woman and member of RAWA (Revolutionary Association of Women in Afghanistan) who recently came to Dartmouth to give her account of the state of her country. She had little to say about new schools and electricity plants.

Zoya spent a little over an hour in the basement of Silsby on a cold October night passionately painting a picture of the war-torn Afghanistan she calls home, one that contrasts sharply with the Afghanistan many Americans believe exists. The stark contrast between the Afghanistan we know through media representations and political rhetoric and the one Zoya experiences every day clearly demonstrates that the “fourth branch of government” is failing us, and the results are catastrophic-especially if you’re Afghani.

The audience got a telling glimpse into Zoya’s precarious status as a member of the pro-democracy, secular women’s right group RAWA before she even began her presentation. When a student in the front row started taking pictures of her at the podium, she turned to Professor Jennifer Fluri and reminded her that no pictures could be taken for fear of retaliation against her for her involvement in RAWA. Unfortunately, her fears have merit. Meena Keshwar Kamal, RAWA’s founder, was assassinated in February of 1987 and Afghanistan remains a dangerous place for outspoken pro-democracy and secular women’s rights activists. But Zora persists in her dangerous peace mongering, and she came to Dartmouth with a simple message: The war is not working…for anyone.

I know it’s unfair to use Ann Coulter’s words as a representation of American sentiment, but there is this idea that Afghanistan is the one we got right. Even Obama, who was (mis)branded as an anti-war candidate by his supporters and opponents, called it “a war of necessity” as opposed to a “war of choice” in Iraq. The mentality that large-scale military action in Afghanistan is our only viable option to maintain our national security still persists. As the utopian story goes, our military presence will eventually free the people of Afghanistan from extremist tyranny, ameliorate the oppression of women, and help us “win” the war on terror.

Many point to the same media coverage Coulter cites to show that our military action has already made progress to each of these ends, but this “censored, unreal image” of Afghanistan misses the mark, says Zoya. The real Afghanistan “has been ‘liberated.’” Zoya continues, “Afghanistan is a ‘free’ country for the rapists to rape our children…for the warlords to commit any kind of crime without the least concern. Afghanistan is ‘free’ for the drug lords, the mafia to produce two-third of the opium for the world, and Afghanistan is ‘free’ for the foreign troops to kill our civilians, to kill our children, to kill our women on a daily basis … In this sense, Afghanistanis free.” Zoya focused on this “real picture” of Afghanistan, a country where the stated objectives of American military intervention—spreading democracy, promoting women’s and human rights, and fighting extremist Islamic terrorism—appear unattainable by brute force.

Zoya rhetorically asked, “Are [U.S.] troops liberators or invaders?” and in her answer, she considered the stated objectives used to justify the ongoing occupation of Afghanistan. “After eight years, what happened to these justifications? [Do] we have democracy, [are] women being liberated, [have] we defeated terrorism?” According to Zoya, none of these objectives have been reached and more troops would only make things worse. The recent elections in Afghanistan were “a very dirty game played with the destiny of [the Afghan people].” There will be no democracy to speak of as long as the “warlords and fundamentalists that control everything here” also control the ballot box. Zoya further criticized the U.S. government’s role in helping corrupt government officials gain and hold on to power. “From the one side they are killing our women and children in the name of the so-called war on terror, but from the other side they are negotiating with the leaders of [the] Taliban, they are giving them opportunities, and they try to give them shares in the government.”

Zoya also rejected the notion that legally integrated schools and the election of female members of parliament translated into freedom for the women of Afghanistan. Outside of Kabul, “in the provinces, women are suffering.” She cited instances of unpunished gang rapes (thanks to a pardon from President Karzai) to show that many women justifiably live in fear. And although the schools are integrated, parents are reluctant to send their daughters to school when the possibilities of rape, kidnapping and forced marriage, or acid throwing are very real. As for the female members of parliament, “the majority of [them] belong to fundamentalists parties and do not represent the interests of Afghani women,” said Zoya. And after eight years of war, the viciously misogynistic and anti-American Taliban still controls much of the country. “Instead of [the] elimination of terrorism, it’s increasing in number and getting more powerful,”claimed Zoya. It turns out that bombing civilians doesn’t eradicate extremism or target terrorists—rather, it has the unfortunate effect of turning civilians whose families end up as “collateral damage” into anti-U.S. jihadists.

After eight years of war in Afghanistan, there’s no “winning” in sight. Now this isn’t really about what Obama should do in Afghanistan (although to quote Cornel West, “It’s gonna be hard to be a war president with a peace prize”). This is about us. It’s about what we know and what that knowledge compels us to do. If Zoya’s perspective was given the attention it deserves in the media, who wouldn’t think we need a drastic policy change in Afghanistan? If Zoya’s perspective was even heard at all, beyond the 20 or so people who sat in the basement of Carpenter last Tuesday, would it not have a profound effect on public opinion towards the war in Afghanistan? Zoya’s perspective is certainly legitimate, but it’s conspicuously absent from popular discourse on the Afghan war.

Zoya urged Americans to pressure our government to change its militaristic policies toward Afghanistan. But how could Americans even think to do so when the mainstream media only tells of how our involvement is helping Afghanis build new coed schools, elect female members of parliament, and defeat global terrorism (with civilian and American troop casualties included as a side note, or omitted altogether)? If you spend your time watching the news, this whole war thing seems like a win-win: dead terrorists for us and a shiny new progressive democracy for them! Unfortunately, it’s not that simple, and I doubt CNN or FOX will have Zoya on to explain why.

ometimes rape is okay. Wait, no, that can’t be right. Rape is never okay, is it? Wait, what if she’s super drunk? Is that okay? Only if I’m drunk too? No, that can’t be right either. Wait—now, follow me closely on this—maybe, if we’re having sex at my mom’s house and she’s super drunk and I’m not and I’m in my element and everything is going pretty well mechanically…then maybe if she mutters some drunken comment I can maybe construe to be an approval of my thrusting, perhaps then it is okay?

This is the convoluted logic of Observe and Report, the story of a bipolar Chief of Mall Security named Ronnie Barnhardt (Seth Rogen) and his deranged attempt to gain love and respect. Ronnie pursues Brandi (Anna Faris) relentlessly, finally coercing the attractive, ditsy, and presumably promiscuous makeup counter attendant into accompanying him on a date. While he dreams of spending his life with this newfound love interest, she merely tolerates his presence and is much more interested in downing shots than accepting his ongoing sexual advances. Thanks to the effects of tequila and anti-psychotic medications, Ronnie takes immediate control of their first date. Brandi staggers, vomits, staggers, vomits again and cedes complete control over to Ronnie, who is more than willing to take advantage of the situation. Predictably, the scene transitions to Ronnie’s bedroom, which is romantically located in his mother’s house. Then, the sexual adventure begins: he’s on top, she’s on bottom. She’s unconscious while he’s thrusting away, yelling, “Brandi, Brandi!” Noticing Brandi’s rather unresponsive state, Ronnie, in an apparent state of moral confusion, stops moving and looks down at her as she wakes up just long enough to mutter, “Did I tell you to stop, motherfucker?” Brandi then falls right back into her drug induced sleep and Ronnie, having effectively resolved his ethical dilemma, resumes thrusting.

So what’s the problem? After all, she consented, right? At least that’s what the defenders of the movie claim, including Seth Rogen himself. In an interview with the Washington City Paper, Rogen said, “When we’re having sex and she’s unconscious, like you can literally feel the audience thinking, like, how the fuck are they going to make this okay? Like, what can possibly be said or done that I’m not going to walk out of the movie theater in the next thirty seconds? And then she says, like, the one thing that makes it all okay.” He is, of course, referring to Brandi’s question: “Did I tell you to stop, motherfucker?” However, Brandi’s drunken mutterings do not count as consent; Ronnie raped her. It’s as simple as that.

The problem: the scene confuses the issue of consent and rape, normalizing “date rape” to a target audience most likely to engage in those acts. The joke is not without consequences. According to professor Thomas E. Ford’s (a professor of psychology and researcher at Western Carolina University) research on sexist language and humor, “The acceptance of sexist humor leads men to believe that sexist behavior falls within the bounds of social acceptability.” Ultimately, jokes about date rape make the act more socially acceptable. When the role of the “rapist” is played by such a well-liked comedic actor like Seth Rogen, it can be difficult for the audience to understand the other side of the story. Rape isn’t supposed to be funny, and when it is portrayed in a comedic light, well, people stop laughing. It’s just not funny.

t’s like if you had a house, and you discover that the upstairs bathroom—the floor is a little tilted, so you bring in a contractor and he beefs up the floor and re-lays the tiles and that’s better. And then you’re in your bedroom and you drop a quarter on the ground and the quarter rolls to the other side of the room, and you say, ‘My goodness, another floor that’s tilted.’ Get the contractor back in, he comes and fixes the room. You’ll fix every room in that house, if you’re America, before you say, ‘Maybe the foundation is broken.’ ”

-Eugene Jarecki

In the midst of the current global economic crisis, some Americans are beginning to question the very foundations of our financial system. On April 11, thousands of them will demonstrate in cities all over the country. What they want is “A New Way Forward,” an online initiative describing itself as a prescription for the “real structural change of Wall Street.” Its plan: to ask the government to temporarily nationalize failing banks and restructure their internal workings, break up, and sell the so-called “too big to fail” entities, and enact new anti-trust rules that would prevent future banks from growing so large in the first place. A New Way Forward is a response to the government’s apparent commitment to a Wall Street-endorsed “corrupt ideology,” one that prioritizes short-term profits for a wealthy group of elite financiers over long-term stability and more widespread economic prosperity.

The initiative’s first proposal—to temporarily nationalize insolvent banks—is also its most controversial. In this country, talk of nationalization is usually met with a visceral anti-communist, anti-European, anti-socialist response. Use of the very word seems to preclude reasoned debate on the subject, eliciting only kneejerk responses, given the negative connotations and misconceptions associated with the term nationalization. However, even some die-hard free market thinkers have suggested temporary nationalization as the first step towards a solution to this crisis. Alan Greenspan, a now-notorious champion of deregulation, recently argued, “It may be necessary to temporarily nationalize some banks in order to facilitate a swift and orderly restructuring.” Meanwhile, Nobel prize winning economist Paul Krugman, one of the few to predict the current economic crisis, has described the Obama administration’s current plan as “lemon socialism”: a lose-lose situation for the American people and a win-win for bankers and private financiers. Under the plan, private investors are given the opportunity to partner with the government in buying failed bank assets. Basically, massive failed banks are to be supplied with a seemingly endless flow of capital in an effort to resuscitate the economy. However, the investors are virtually unaccountable. Any losses are subsidized by the government, and the majority of gains are theirs to keep. In essence, investors get to gamble with taxpayer money, and ordinary Americans will be responsible for any losses.

If the banks end up succeeding, taxpayers will find themselves with nearly the same system that brought the country to this point of absurdity. And if banks end up failing outright, then taxpayers will have covered most of the losses incurred by private investors. As William Greider put so well in a recent AlterNet article, “It’s very much like the regular Monopoly game—only better—because this one uses real money, provided courtesy of the taxpayers.”

The banks need large amounts of capital to survive, and if the government is going to give it to them (remember: this is more capital, in most cases, than the banks are currently worth) it seems intuitive that it might take temporary ownership in return. Government-owned banks allow, in theory, for accountability, and would give taxpayers a democratic say in what happens to their money instead of simply handing over billions of dollars to the same high stakes gamblers whose greed and overconfidence helped tank the world economy. Hopefully, this would make it impossible for another bank to follow Merrill Lynch’s example, which in a stunning display of hubris, used almost one third of the bailout money it received (about $3.62 billion) to pay out non-contractual, performance-based bonuses to incompetent and inconsiderate executives.

Among A New Way Forward’s other demands is a call for “the financial elite [to] share in the cost of what they have caused.” In other words, the movement argues that it’s time for some people to get fired. When a normal person utterly, catastrophically fails at his job, he or she loses it. That person does not receive an absurdly lucrative, “performance”-based bonus as a reward for his failure. That person is no longer left in charge of the company he or she ran into the ground at great public cost, and is not trusted as the recipient of billions of public dollars. These same rules do not, however, seem to apply to the recently discredited masters of world finance. Somehow, it is possible to be a complete failure and keep your job as long as you are a well-connected, millionaire banker. A New Way Forward, along with a growing segment of the population, wants to change that double standard. Currently, the government has had little say about the inner workings of the banks it already all but owns, but temporary nationalization would allow for a transparent, government-led restructuring.

A New Way Forward demands that those banks deemed “too big to fail” be broken up and sold in pieces to the private sector, and that the government enforce new anti-trust laws such that no single corporate entity could ever get so big that our economic prosperity depends on its existence. After all, the very existence of a bank that is “too big to fail” seems antithetical to a free market economy. What would keep such a bank from pursuing short-term, risky profit opportunities if it were truly considered “too big to fail”—propped up by a government with a plethora of public funds available in case of emergency? How can an economy be “free” when certain financial institutions are allowed to grow so large, so reckless, and so important to our country’s economic vitality? A New Way Forward, laying claim to the legacy of populists like Lincoln, Roosevelt, and Truman, denies that a truly free market can co-exist with banks that are too big to fail. Populism may not be a perfect force, but it sometimes speaks such stunning truth to power.

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