An oligarchy, Webster’s dictionary tells us, is “a form of government in which the ruling power belongs to a few persons.” It’s a shame that the Republican majority on the Supreme Court doesn’t know the difference between an oligarchy and a democratic republic.
Yes, I said “the Republican majority,” violating a nicety based on the pretense that when people reach the high court, they forget their party allegiance. We need to stop peddling this fiction.
That is the beginning of Dionne's pointed and powerful Washington Post column this morning, titled Supreme Oligarchy.
Dionne riightly points out the impact of the combination of decisions, Citizens United several years ago, and now McCutcheon.   He says that five Republican appointees to SCOTUS - the  Chief Justice and Justices Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas and Alito -
always side with the wealthy, the powerful and the forces that would advance the political party that put them on the court. The ideological overreach that is wrecking our politics is now also wrecking our jurisprudence.
Except the wrecking process goes back well before the current makeup of the Court, at least as far back as when the majority of the Court titled cnservative with the addition of Clarence E. J. Dionne on "Supreme oligarchy":

 


Paul Krugman argues for higher inflation
in a New York Times op ed titled Oligarchs and Money.  I am strongly going to suggest that you will want to read the piece and keep it handy. He starts with the latest  World Economic Outlook of International Monetary Fund, which in its analytical sections in effect makes a compelling case for raising inflation targets above 2 percent, the current norm in advanced countries. He provides the histor
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teacherken at Daily Kos This Week 4-5-14
teacherken at Daily Kos:teacherken at Daily Kos This WeekA remarkable op ed on gay marriageI slept with a gay man for six months in Afghanistan. No one asked. He did not tell. So begins A Marine silent no longer on gay marriage, a Washington Post op ed by Roger Dean Huffstetler, a former Marine Corps sergeant, who is also a serious Southern Baptist. He talks about TWO men who he thought he knew we
by mike simpson / 8h