Tom Toles for October 11, 2012

Now you see ’em, now you see ’em.

The old shell game describes Romney perfectly.

Agreed, simply perfection.

I live about 50 feet from my garden, and about that far from my chicken house

If corporations are people, I want to see one testify at a trial! Not the CEO, not the PR person, not their attorneys. Corporations are fictionalized legal constructs which serve to insulate the officers from most decisions. If you put a corporation on the stand, all you get is a pile of incorporation papers!

It’s somewhat chilling to see how many people eagerly embrace being a serf and zealously attack any sign of lese-majeste to our corporate overlords.

The shell is all hollow with nothing inside, No plan for anything, just empty promises that switch according to the shills.

Corporations are just large (typically) companies with legal status to provide protection for their managers and stock owners. Without corporations, we would get our food from farms / co-ops / farmer’s markets. Just like elsewhere in the world.

Corporation: An ingenious device for obtaining profit without individual responsibility. – Ambrose Bierce.

Without corporations, it would be up to the smaller local businesses to provide the food, goods, and services the people need. There would be more evenhanded competition, allowing the consumers to get the best prices. There would also be more jobs, since there would necessarily need to be more businesses to provide for everything. Essentially, a true republican utopia.

While you’re watching the next debate, guess which candidate thinks his underwear protects him from evil spirits and which candidate thinks his underwear is just underwear. Try to figure out which candidate baptizes dead people into his religion and is a follower of a convicted con artist. Point being; do we really need a President of the United States who lives in a fantasy world?

“Everyone has free speech, but only money talks.”—- Stephen Colbert

Are the Cayman Islands also people?

Dewey, Cheetum, and Howe.

No corporation can enforce any thing on me with the force of a Gun……. Government can and will enforce many things on anyone and can use the force of the Gun.Look up Homestead Riots and Haymarket Affair, et al.They have in the past.

The ‘toon also spells out how easy it is to find any viable facts in “the Ryan Plan”!! Yup, it’s all shill, and no shell.

Carnegie steel, Homestead Steel, and US Steel were publicly traded companies. Corporations are less publicly responsible than the government. When was the last time you voted for a CEO? Can you name not just the CEO’s, but the major shareholders who appointed them of any corporation you buy from? To control a corporation, you need to have enough money to buy up a good portion of the shares. What company are you a major shareholder in? Can you name all the corporations Hector Slim is a majority shareholder in? I trust officials that can be voted out more than a group of unchanging oligarchs. Why do you trust these nameless people more than the people you actually voted for?

You believe that bounty hunters are an arm of law enforcement?

Ok, how about the current miner’s strike in South Africa? If you own stock in gold, platinum, or general precious metals, you are supporting the companies that are hiring the private police forces that are killing the workers.

I don’t have much of a choice anymore. Their prices undercut any local business owner that most competition is gone. In the 90’s, I managed a hardware store with a lumber yard. Within 3 years of a Home Depot opening, the owner had to fold because Home Depot was selling lumber cheaper than we could buy it. Once the lumber yard shut down, there wasn’t enough income to sustain the rest of the business. Your idea of freedom seems to mean being able to shop at one location. You complain about Obama being against small business, but it seems being pro-corporate has a much more direct negative impact on small business owners.

Before you go complaining that the example I gave is not in America, my point is this is a global economy, and American companies buy from these mines. Your stock portfolio probably has a few companies tied to them. Another example is the DeBeers group. DeBeers family members and executives are not allowed to enter the US, but their diamonds still show up here by way of other companies. Jewelry diamonds are usually traceable, but not industrial diamonds. The examples from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries are valid and relative because they took place at a time when the government had fewer regulations. It shows that corporations will not regulate themselves if given the choice, but will abuse their privileges if it means more profit or shareholder return. They do not have your best interest at heart, unless you sit on that board of directors.

Willard did not return even ONE complete tax return. The form identifying how much money was in his Swiss bank account.

“Share Holders Elect Board Members”-Let me know the next time a management selected board member does NOT get elected/re-elected. -Take your time. You’ll need it.-Shareholder democracy is an oxymoron.

We criticize Romney’s tax returns on both accounts because they are just another proof of his flip-flops. He said he never paid less than 13%, but he did not include ALL of his tax deductions so he COULD stay above 13%. Then he doesn’t release his tax returns for PRIOR years, which could PROVE his own claims! It’s interesting that prior years were subject to the “returned” money claims on illegal overseas accounts.

Romney himself disqualifies himself for president. His OWN comment was that if someone pays more than LEGALLY required to pay, they shouldn’t be president. (paraphrased)

and still looking for Obama the Nobel Prize winning genius’s school records….