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News :: Miscellaneous |
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Supreme Court rejects Nader challenge to crooked debate commission |
Current rating: 0 |
by Nick Berveiler
Email: naberve (nospam) ilstu.edu (unverified!) |
30 Apr 2001
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Former Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader lost his court fight today to bar corporate underwriting of presidential and vice presidential debates.
The Supreme Court did not comment in turning down an appeal from Nader, celebrity supporters Susan Sarandon and Phil Donahue and other Green Party candidates. |
Top court rejects Nader challenge to debate funding
By Anne Gearan
The Associated Press
Published April 30 2001, 11:36 AM CDT
WASHINGTON -- Former Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader lost his court fight today to bar corporate underwriting of presidential and vice presidential debates.
The Supreme Court did not comment in turning down an appeal from Nader, celebrity supporters Susan Sarandon and Phil Donahue and other Green Party candidates.
Two lower federal courts also considered the case, which arose from Nader's more general complaint that the national debates are unfair to candidates outside the two major political parties.
Nader sued the Federal Election Commission to change the way the elections agency governs debate funding. The FEC rules allow corporate donations to help fund nationally televised debates so long as the debates themselves are organized and staged by a nonprofit organization.
That "opened the spigot of impermissible corporate influence," that Congress created the FEC to address, Nader argued.
"The FEC's illegal regulations have permitted major corporations that have deep financial interests in federal legislative and regulatory affairs to sponsor presidential and vice presidential debates," Nader's lawyers argued.
Nader claimed the debate system denied him a fair shot at the presidency.
Acting Solicitor General Barbara Underwood, writing for the federal government, urged the high court to stay out of the Nader case.
"Although the Supreme Court has upheld some restrictions on corporate campaign spending, the FEC has latitude and is not required "to adopt the most restrictive interpretation possible regarding corporate financial assistance to nonprofit, nonpartisan debate-sponsoring organizations," the government wrote.
Nader sued ahead of the October debates last year. A federal judge in Boston turned him down in September, and the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against him in November.
AT&T, Anheuser-Busch and Sun Microsystems were among companies that made tax-deductible contributions to the nonprofit Commission on Presidential Debates last year.
Nader, a longtime consumer advocate, carried about 3 percent of the vote nationally, and said his main aim was to establish the Green party as a national force.
The case is Nader v. Federal Election Commission, 00-1244.
Copyright © 2001, The Associated Press |
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Supremes Privatize Public Elections |
by Mike Lehman
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
30 Apr 2001
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Effectively, that is what this ruling means.
"Democracy" brought to you by Nike, McDonalds, and GM.
Sheesh, what a joke these folks are. First the W presidential "selection," now this. All respect for the Supreme Court as a deliberative body should be gone in the minds of even the most naive observers. |
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nader case |
by deborah forest hart
dfhart24 (nospam) gateway.net (unverified) |
Current rating: 0
01 May 2001
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One more instance of the supreme's allowing the fox to guard the chicken coop. So what's new? - dfh |
