Boycott...Target?

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Gemini Cricket

More so because it shines a light on the new law that lets corporations contribute a lot of money to political campaigns.

While I agree with the larger point (and disagreed with Citizens United) an important distinction is that it is still against the law in Minnesota for corporations (but not unions and other non-human collectives) to contribute money directly to a state candidates campaign.

What Citizen United did (and Target and others have taken advantage of) is allow corporations unlimited advocacy. They didn't give money to Emmer they spent their own money on their own ads advocating in favor of Emmer. So long as there is no coordination between Target et al. and Emmer it's legal.

That's a slim distinction (though one that worked well to Obama's advantage in '08) but does leave open the door that uncoordinated advocacy will not be to the candidates liking since they'll generally still be held responsible for it (if Target ran an ad saying "Vote for Emmer because he's white" I'm guessing Emmer would be pissed but he couldn't do anything about it).

Finally, even though I think all non-human entities should be barred from direct participation in the political process I can't punish anybody for making use of their rights. I may disagree with the right granted but I don't disagree with the process by which it was achieved. So it just goes on the ledger with all the other personally abhorrent things that people (and corporations) have every right to do.