Why do our corporations support the GOP?

[KlatooBNikto]

The most common response to this question would be that the GOP is business friendly. That simply ignores the kind of bind American corporations have put themselves in during the last forty odd years by ignoring research, product development,innovation and quality centered manufacturing.Instead, our corporate leaders have elevated people in finance and marketing.This has given prominence to people who have no interest in improving product quality or innovation.To improve the bottom line, those same corporations have engaged in mergers and acquisitions even at the cost of incurring huge debt loads.This has produced huge debt loads that require so much debt service that it has become a permanent item in the operating costs of the corporations.

Now comes the GOP which gives huge tax cuts to corporations that already know how to play the game of tax avoidance.To top it off the tax cuts also benefit the same corporate chieftains in their personal taxes.The diversion of tax revenues to Defense related activities siphons money away from our general consumer economy.This makes many corporations dependent on government largesse and this is the business most of them gravitate toward.In such an economy it would be impossible for any independent minded business to survive without genuflecting to the powers that be.No wonder we see big defense contractors thriving while consumer related corporations are barely making ends meet.

We have now reached a point where it would be all but impossible for our coorporations to do business without bribery, outright price fixing( as at Halliburton) and associated skullduggery.A Nigeria or Argentina in short.

[jmcgowanjm]

1. Dems vow to move to the right of the GOP

The Democrats will also work to immediately repeal
Social Security and Medicare, throwing millions of seniors
into abject poverty "as God intended," Mayer said. He
also scoffed at the Republicans' proposal for a "Flat Tax."
"What those bleeding-heart liberal Republicans don't tell you
is that it's a flat PERCENTAGE. The rich would still actually
be paying more actual dollars into the system than the
poor, which is clearly unfair. In our plan, every American
citizen over the age of 18 owes the federal government
$30,000 a year. Period. If you don't have it, you and your kids
will be working it off in the coal mines of West Virginia. Or,
better yet, the bloody oil fields of Iraq and Iran."

"The Democratic Party is done making the same mistakes in
the exact same way that we've made them the past 20
years," said Mayer. "Now, we're going to make the
same mistakes, only much, much worse."

http://theactualnews.blogspot.com/2004/11/dems-vow-to-move-to-right-of-gop.html

[kuozzman]

2. Watch CSPAN at 11:00et and you'll see....

Omnibus Bill! That's just one thing on a long list of things GOP does for corps.

[lastliberalintexas]

3. Short answer is that Corporate America

can't see past the next quarterly profit report. Apparently, no one at the Milton Friedman School of Medieval Thought teaches business graduates about the long term anymore.

[KlatooBNikto]

4. This the reason that our auto companies GM and Ford in particular

are in such dire straits.Chrysler has received a reprieve by being picked up by Daimler.The Japanese are handing our car companies their asses because they have put their efforts and money into producing high quality products that the public actually wants to buy.In the past ten years I have not met many people who have expressed any excitement about buying either a GM or Ford car but they go bananas when they talk about a Toyota or a Honda or a BMW. I wouldn't at all be surprised to see the complete collapse or a takeover of GM or Ford in the next ten years.

[KlatooBNikto]

6. The insidious long term role of corporate debt needs to be told here.

Like our deficits, it exacts a price in terms of relegating important activities like Product Development, Quality to the more immediate needs of finding customers for your current crappy products ( marketing) and juggling your books with the help of Andersen or Ernst & Young to make your profits for the next quarter look good.The constant tight rope walking to pay debt service to the banks and other financial institutions has stripped resources from the most important function of the corporation, i.e. to produce a product and back it up with service that produces delight in the customers. How many times have you heard any one express any delight in our products?

Our corporations have finished picking the low hanging fruit of the last thirty odd years.They simply do not know how to compete in a level playing field anymore. Just like the U.S. Government they are scarmbling to maintain the mythology of American superiority.This will only accelerate our decline.

[rustydog]

5. Do you have any clue how much MONEY corporations are making

by slashing staff and outsourcing for pennies on the dollar?
Telemarketing companies are even outsourcing those jobs because they can PAY SO MUCH LESS elsewhere.
These companies don't give a fuck if you and your family starve to death here in America, their allegience is not notto the flag, it is to the share-holder. period.
Stanley tools will be closing its last American plant. Their tools made overseas. I bet the hellacious drop in production cost does not precipitate an equally hellacious drop in the company's prices.
A union-busting Administration, Oil only thought mentality, tax breaks to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars.
come-on, why wouldn't Business be in bed sucking-off the GOP.

[KlatooBNikto]

10. I take the position that the corporations put themselves in that

position by their long term,deliberate avoidance of efforts to improve their products and competing with rivals from overseas. I knew a person who after having worked in the domestic auto industry for over thirty years quit in disgust and joined Honda.He related a story to me that tells the sad tale of our decline very well.The Honda plant in Ohio was built for well under $300MM while the Saturn plant in TN cost several billion.The output of the Honda plant was several times greater than the Saturn plant despite having much lower investment.Not only that, the Honda autos were, of course, in greater demand and people were willing to pay a premium for the Hondas.it does not surprise me that Hondas command premium prices and GM cars require rebates even at the start of the season to sell.

[mastershake]

7. Because they control the government...

Corporations are the ones in control of the government. Corporations are the one the government look to for approval.

We are raised hooked on corporate america and products. Pop music, fast food, designer clothing... commercials telling us what will be cool.

Corporations make so much money and fund government officials. The government passes tax breaks for the corporations which gives them more money, they turns a blind eye to abuses and scandles. The government then does what is in their favor...

Look at laws trying to outlaw file-sharing and even smash "fair-use" for musicians, which will hurt independent music labels most. Why would they do that? It's not a money issue.. it's a control issue. And it's one supported by both democrats and republicans. The corporations will court whoever is in control, but they obviously favor republicans, especially for there tax cuts and less restrictions on corporations.

File-sharing has proven to help underground music the most. As has internet radio which they are attempting to try and control also. This is a no-no for the government and the music industry. They don't want people to hear music they don't endorse.. and it has nothing to do with what the music is saying in regards to being anti-government and such. It has to do with controlling what people think in regards to fashion and the like. If they control the music and have everyone listening to MTV and the like and they decide what is "cool" then they can easily endorse those musicians, and have those musicians endorse what they like and use name recognition to shape future american leaders. If more then the small group of people they selected to gain status in the world through music were then recognized, they lose control of the best form of advertisement they have.

They make money, the government makes money, people stay subdued and under control... and people are less likely to rise up against an oppressive government when they are used to all the fluff surrounding them... numb the minds and they won't care what happens.

[AG78]

8. Why?

Because they're one in the same.

We're a fascist, or corporatist, country.

But in this country, you can't say that word. Mostly because people won't understand it. The first thing most people think of when they hear that word, would be Hitler. Which is fine, because Hitler was a fascist. But fascism is an economic structure. It's a means to an end.

And in no way am I saying this against just any businessman, but rather the multi-national corporations that we know so much about. Hitler was the greatest thing that ever happened to the Halliburton's, Enron's, or Lockheed Martin's of the world. They can take more and more control of society, and if you call them fascist, they can just say, "hey, we're not putting millions of people into camps and ovens". And that would work, because too many people don't understand what the word fascism means.

And the new tax cuts(dividends, and capital gains, etc) are just going to push us even further down this road. Unfortunately, too many Democrats also vote that way as well.

[UNIXcock]

9. the belief in Supply Side ...

... Economics

[jmcgowanjm]

11. Don't worry, get out of debt. Jesus is coming

or What's the Matter w/ Kansas
by Thomas Frank

When Congress is meeting at 5pmC Saturday...

Big $ is involved.

We have now reached a point.