Katrina vanden Heuvel: "Reversing 'Citizens United'"

Katrina vanden Heuvel:

In just the past two years, corporate money can be blamed for watering down consumer protections and diluting health-care and financial reform. In truth, there is almost no conversation we have in American politics in which corporations don't occupy all the seats at the table. As Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) acknowledged while talking about big banks during last year's financial reform debate: "They frankly own the place."

Changing that dynamic might well be the central challenge of this generation. Reversing Citizens United is about more than any one issue or court case - it is, at its base, a question of whether American democracy itself can beat back a corporate takeover, whether our most cherished principles of self-government can ultimately prevail. MORE...