November 26, 2012
Dear members of the Securities and Exchange Commission:
I am writing to urge the SEC to issue a rule requiring publicly traded corporations to publicly disclose all their political spending.
Both shareholders and the public must be fully informed as to how much the corporation spends on politics and which candidates are being promoted or attacked. Disclosures should be posted promptly on the SEC's web site.
Thank you for considering my comment.
My personal addition: I shouldn't have to explain why this is important. You know exactly what is going on, and you know that the people are being shuffled about like harmless worker bees while all of their government decisions are made by Big Money. Our politicians are not our own; they belong to companies--pharmaceutical companies, agricultural companies (like Monsanto), insurance companies, banks, mass-production/goods companies (like Amway and P&G), etc etc. Knowing where that money comes from and to what extent doesn't remove the problem, no, but it allows us to SEE it, and that's the first step.
We're not stupid. We're not ALL blinded by consumerism and desperate survival. We know what's happening. Please do your job and care about the people. Better yet, do what you should be doing as intelligent lifeforms and care about other life, in general.
Sincerely,
Michael Linden