Anyone ever read Brave New World?

Holy shit, this came out of fucking nowhere. Mark January 21, 2010 as the beginning of the end for the democratic process in the United States, at least for the foreseeable future. In a landmark decision today, the Supreme Court has shredded nearly a century of laws restricting the power corporations have over our government. This is huge.

Summed up: This ruling now somehow classifies corporations as individual persons, with all the rights reserved for individual human beings. The specific right in question -- the freedom of speech. Because corporations now have the freedom of speech, they no longer have any limits to how much they can spend on political advertisements. Because spending money is freedom of speech.

It's bizarre to contemplate what a nineteenth century slave would think about this. Can you even imagine it? A twenty-first century corporation is entitled to all the rights a human being is inherently given by being born, and yet he is not. What would your reaction be?

Restrictions on spending were made into laws in the first place, because corporate America has a near limitless supply of cash. Before these restrictions were in place, politicians bowed to the will of these people without question, because if they didn't, the people with the green would simply find someone who would. They indirectly funded candidates by financing their campaigns. And it worked terrifyingly well for them. The efforts of Theodore Roosevelt and Franklin Delano Roosevelt are very, very underappreciated, because they basically stamped out all of this legalized corruption. But ever since Ronald Reagan got into power, there's been a slow and steady dismantling of these regulations, by both Democrats and Republicans alike. This is why the economy crashed. Deregulation is directly responsible for the financial crisis, because it all left corporations with too much power. You heard that phrase "too big to fail?" Deregulation is why that phrase exists.

This is the most damning Supreme Court decision in at least a generation. This will now define our politics. Don't even bother donating to your favorite politician anymore. It doesn't matter. It'll barely be a squirt gun against Niagra Falls. This is going to completely solidify all the problems we've been having with elections and governing at least for the next century. I wish this wasn't as bad as I'm making it sound. I want to be optimistic. But what's left of the United States' political process is completely fucked.

And here's the best part of all. This was a 5-4 decision. The five justices who voted in favor of this death sentence were all appointed by Reagan, Bush Sr., or Bush Jr. This was political. Conservative appointees supported this decision, and liberal appointees did not. Mark that down for the history books so the future generations can know exactly who the enemies of human progress were in our day and age, as if that very clear fact wasn't obvious enough already.

What enrages me the most is that the American people either don't know, don't care, or don't understand. All thanks to the embarrassing debacle we call a news media. This was barely mentioned at all today on television, and even when it was, it's not like anyone did a good job at actually explaining what has just happened. Keith Olbermann made a Special Comment on it tonight. You think *I'm* acting like the sky is falling? You should listen to this guy. He really pissed me off because he actually thinks this is comparable to the Dred Scott decision, which prohibited African Americans from becoming citizens. But if you can overlook that bullshit, he does make a number of good points.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy