If Corporations Are People, Why Isn’t Monsanto on Trial for Murder?
Organic Lifestyle Comments Off on If Corporations Are People, Why Isn’t Monsanto on Trial for Murder?
The Supreme Court has ruled that corporations are people, that they have Constitutional rights just like flesh and blood people, and even that the religious convictions of their owners trump the laws passed by Congress guaranteeing women proper health care. It’s so cool to know that my religious convictions exempt me from the laws of our country. I guess this is what’s meant by freedom.
I was pleased to see that the Satanists have said that their religious beliefs include preventing women seeking abortions from having to endure public slut shaming by rightwing Christians, and pegging their stance to the Hobby Lobby decision. Hey, if Jesus freaks can get Supreme Court backing, why not devil worshippers? Fair is fair.
So let’s agree, for the sake of argument, that corporations are just like flesh and blood people, entitled to equal protection of the law. Aren’t they then also required to abide by the law? Or do they get a free pass? How about those financial criminals at Goldman Sachs—you know, the guys who put together all those worthless sub-prime mortgage-backed securities and sold them at top prices to rubes who believed their assertions that the securities were as good as gold? How come they don’t get prosecuted? If I sold you a deed to the Brooklyn Bridge, the law would call me a con man and I’d be in the pokey plenty quick.
And how about Monsanto? There’s a ton of evidence from all around the world that Roundup herbicide, when used in regions where the water contains lots of dissolved metals, causes severe—and often fatal—kidney damage. Farm workers applying this stuff in places like El Salvador, Argentina, and India are dying in droves.
Now if you or I were going around the world with a bag of chemicals so toxic that our employees who had to spread them were dying, and that hundreds of farmers we forced to buy our genetically engineered seeds were committing suicide because they were going bankrupt as a consequence, and that we made a product so toxic that it is poisoning millions of people around the world and causing malformations in developing babies, and…well, you get the idea. What would happen to us? Do you think we’d be invited to run the government agencies that oversee the health and safety of the American food supply?
I don’t think so. I think we’d be charged with murder. Or, if federal prosecutors believed us when we professed innocence—“Honestly, we didn’t know our product did that”—we’d at least be charged with wrongful death, negligent homicide, and manslaughter.
So how come companies like Monsanto get all the rights, but none of the responsibilities, of actual human beings?
The answer, I think—and don’t laugh—is that huge corporations like Monsanto are superhuman. They are entitled to do what they want because they can buy their way out of trouble. When was the last time you saw the head of a big corporation go to jail for running a company that murders people? Yes, Monsanto, but also General Motors, whose lawyers fudged and hedged and covered up the fact that GM cars were killing people. And many other big corporations, too, fit this profile. Oh, from time to time, the corporations get hit with monetary fines, but paying out a few million or even a few billion, is no biggie. They call it a cost of doing business and write it off as a business expense. Meanwhile, there’s a trail of dead human beings left decaying in the dirt. But that’s what it means to be superhuman. No actual human being goes to jail. No CEO does hard time. And you can’t jail a corporation, which, despite the Supreme Court, is nothing more than a legal fiction created on paper and signed by the miscreants who should be clapped in irons. What—are you going to put a file folder in a prison cell?
I’m sorry, but the Roberts Court is so far removed from reality that it’s breathtaking. And so-called Constitutional scholar Barack Obama and his top cop Eric Holder, who should be yelling bloody murder, roll over like friendly poodles begging for a belly rub.
Big corporations are not superhuman—while they occasionally do good things to polish their image, fundamentally they act subhuman, without heart or mercy, caring only for their bottom lines. That’s their nature. That’s their charter. That’s their function. Those who preside over our Federal government should call out the corporations on their crimes. Should point out their subhumanity. Should stand as bulwarks against their depredations.
What if Barack Obama stood up at a podium and said something like the following: “While corporate America is a driving wheel of our economic system, it must be subservient to the welfare of the American citizenry, not its master. We should support it when it adds to the public welfare, and check its excesses when it doesn’t. And so I’m creating a new cabinet post, one dedicated to making sure that no corporation, financial institution, or governmental regulatory body has so much power that it can ride roughshod over the Constitutional rights of the people.
“Money is power, and so when corporations acquire enough money to work their will on Congress, they will be broken up. As in times past, banks will either be depositories of the citizenry’s wealth, or lenders in the rough and tumble of the free marketplace—but not both. Elections will be paid for by the U.S. Treasury, and no private money at all will be allowed to influence the electoral process. Candidates will stand or fall on their principles, or not at all.”
What would happen?
I for one would say “Thank God.”
***
BONEHEADS RUN AMOK IN HALLS OF CONGRESS
House Republicans have passed an appropriations bill that blocks the EPA from limiting carbon pollution from power plants, slashes the EPA’s budget, and guts clean water protections.
***
BRAZIL FARMERS SAY GMO CORN NO LONGER KILLS BUGS
Brazilian farmers say their GMO corn is no longer resistant to pests, Reuters reports.
The Association of Soybean and Corn Producers of the Mato Grosso region said farmers first noticed in March that their genetically modified corn crops were less resistant to destructive caterpillars that “Bt corn” is supposed to protect against. As a result, farmers have been forced to apply extra insecticide, racking up additional environmental and financial costs.
The farmers’ association is calling on Monsanto, DuPont, Syngenta, and Dow to offer solutions as well as compensate the farmers for their losses. Association spokesman Ricardo Tomcyzk said farmers spent the equivalent of $54 per hectare to spray extra pesticides, and that the biotech companies promised something they didn’t deliver, which he called “deceptive advertising.”
But Monsanto, et al, are unlikely to accommodate the farmers. According to Reuters, “Seed companies say they warned Brazilian farmers to plant part of their corn fields with conventional seeds to prevent bugs from mutating and developing resistance to GMO seeds.” Earlier this year, a similar problem arose in the U.S., when scientists confirmed that corn-destroying rootworms had evolved to be resistant to the GMO corn engineered to kill them.
The industry response to such loss of efficacy is not to encourage biodiversity, but to further modify the organisms, the non-profit GM Watch reports. An unintended outcome is almost certainly an increased use of pesticides, as has already happened in Mato Grosso. Or maybe, knowing Monsanto and the other agricultural chemical giants, the outcome is not so unintended.
***
SAFEWAY SHAREHOLDERS DENOUNCE GMO LABELING
At the recent annual meeting of Safeway shareholders in Pleasanton, California, the overwhelming majority of shareholders followed the advice of the National Center for Public Policy Research (a corporatist right wing think tank) and rejected a shareholder proposal that would have forced the grocery store chain to brand products containing genetically-modified organisms (GMOs) with labels.
Like Safeway shareholders, Monsanto shareholders overwhelmingly agreed with the National Center and soundly rejected a similar proposal.
The Guardian picked up the story and gave lots of space to the National Center’s propaganda about the evils of GMO labeling (labels will cause food prices to rise and hurt the poor) and how organizations with scientific cred all think that GMOs are not only safe, but will contribute to ending world hunger.
I think that The Guardian missed the real story, which is that shareholders who understand that genetically modified foods should be labeled are infiltrating the meetings and floating motions that put Safeway and Monsanto on the defensive.
###
