Cartoon but real corruption in the U.S. Senate 100 years ago. The businesses are changed the Senators have changed but the corruption remains the same. All
In an article by the German owned online investigation magazine Vocativ, the reason behind the recent U. S. Senate vote giving away your online privacy to the ISP corporations was revealed: money.
As you know, because of the ruling by the U. S. Supreme Court, Citizens United, corporations are entitled to spend as much money as they want to on our political campaigns. This is not been lost on the politicians in national office. They need lots and lots of money to campaign because any opponent they might have will have equal amount of money from special interests (CEOs who run corporations) running against them.
Right now the most powerful businesses are the digital ones. Media companies like Comcast, Disney/ ABC, Fox, AOL/Time Warner, Time Waner Cable and DirectTV. Here’s what their money looks like handed out to the U.S. Senate that just voted to give our personal search history to these companies.
After the period from the Civil War up to the early 1900s, “trusts” and corporations so monopolized U. S. industries this period of unregulated power culminated in the”Roaring ’20s” and the world economic collapse caused by Wall Street businesses. Antitrust laws were passed finally because corporations had concentrated too much power in too few corporations and destabilized United States industries on which our U.S. economy depends. As a result of the corruption, the U. S. economy, the productivity of the United States suffered United States citizens and the world economy suffered. This simply because there were less people being rewarded for their businesses ideas and innovations because because they could not compete. Instead of hundreds of thousands of businessmen competing and putting forth ideas, monopolies, large corporations, and what was then called trusts, limited competition and limited new ideas. However, these large business concerns made lots and lots of money. We know this because we still know the names of these obscenely rich men J.P. Morgan (J.P. Morgan Chase) , William Chase (Chase bank), John. D. Rockefeller(Standard Oil now known as Exxon) John D. Mellon, (Mellon Bank) Andrew Carnegie (U.S. Steel), Charles W Schwab (Charles Schwab financial) are still with us in our weekly lives. nowadays we have Charles and David Koch (Koch Industries).
How is this corruption Bad? when these people have so much money they spend unlimited amounts of money, for votes of Senators and U. S. House member to help their businesses. One of the best examples is “Americans for Prosperity.” This is a political group that is funded largely by Charles and David Koch who have chemical industries that have eluded a great deal and been fined by the US EPA. They will make more money without U. S. Government. With the recent election, an opponent of the EPA, Scott Pruit, who had sued the agency 14 times, is now running it. It is unlikely under his watch that regulations of the Koch brothers chemical businesses will be put in place.
How does this corruption affect injured people in the state of Florida? Look no further than “The Graves Amendment.” One of the most lucrative businesses in the United States is car rental companies. Because of our poor mass – transit infrastructure, if you fly somewhere you must have a car to get around. This is resulted in untold wealth to the largest car rental companies Avis, Enterprise, Hertz. These large corporations rent cars to anyone. They do no background checks and have rented to criminals, foreigners, and financially insolvent people. Despite being in the best position to find out the driving, financial and criminal history of the people that rent their cars, they don’t.
Everyone who owns a vehicle is responsible for the person that drives a vehicle. If you have a teenager, you are responsible for the safe operation of the car you let him or her drive. This is important because cars kill. In Florida, cars are classified as “dangerous instrumentalities.” This is the same legal classification as a gun. If you lend your car your drunk brother-in-law for him to go to the liquor store and he drives there, drinks in the parking lot and kills two people on the way back, you are legally and equally responsible for those deaths. Make sense, right? You would never trust your car to that brother-in-law. First, it’s your car and second you don’t want to be responsible for what he does with it.
Most people have a certain reaction when they hear about the “Graves Amendment”- What the heck?
Not so with Corporations who rent motor vehicles. Enter the “Graves Amendment” found in 49 U.S.Code § 30106. This is a “get off scot-free” card. Under this special law passed by the U.S. Congress, a rental car companies is not liable when it gives someone a car for the damage that car does.
Five years ago, a rich Arabian from the Middle East rented a luxury car and drove on I-4 in Orlando. He wasn’t a good driver. He ended up killing two people who were on vacation at Disney World. Before he was apprehended, he went to the airport and flew back to the Middle East where he lives today. The families of those two dead people were denied justice.
Who knew he was from Arabia? Who knew what his finances were? Who knew what his driving record was? Who gave him the car he killed two US citizens with? That’s correct, the car rental company. However, because of the “Graves Amendment,” that car rental company or any car rental company is not responsible for the death, maiming, destruction and havoc wrecked by their irresponsible customers on the U. S. citizens who are driving on the roads of the United States of America. Why?
The “Graves Amendment.” Corruption.
Whenever you or a loved one is on the roads of Florida, know that somewhere, a rental just drove out onto the road and the Car rental company who gave it to him has no liability to make sure that driver is safe.
Corruption. That’s exactly what happened the last week of March 2017 when, despite what reasonable people would expect their U.S. representatives to do, those Representatives voted to allow large corporations access to our private, online information. This includes Florida Sen. Marco Rubio. Please note that he also voted for the “Graves Amendment.” Here is a list of the U. S. congress members who voted for this violation of our privacy and the money they took from those corporations who will benefit from your privacy invasion.
I am a personal injury lawyer. I want fair rules for our courts. However, when large corporations, like insurance companies, are too powerful and those powerful companies have unlimited money to spend on our Florida House and Senate members, it’s unlikely we will have laws in the near future that treat injured people fairly.
More examples? if you buy insurance and are injured. When you sue the other person and get a verdict against him, the amount of money your insurance has paid for your medical bills is deducted from the verdict against that person? Does that make sense? Another example: iif you get bad investment advice and lose lots of money and are charged lots of money by a stock broker, you can’t sue that stockbroker. You have to go to arbitration. Arbitration means you have to pay the $2000 a day for a arbitrator and one half of the fee of another arbitrator. Instead of a jury of your peers, three arbitrators hired routinely by stockbrokers for arbitration cases decide your case. Another example? If you going to a hospital for surgery, one of the forms you sign is called a “consent for treatment.” that form says that if the hospital or doctor makes a mistake and kills you, you agree not to sue them or you agreed to go to those same three arbitrators as the stockbrokers hire, i.o.w. people who work for industries all the time that asked them to arbitrate.
Same thing with a credit card. The back of your credit card contract says you agree not to sue a credit card company. (I bet you didn’t read that did you?) In this day of Internet scams and stolen credit cards and scanning machines, if you find charges that you don’t catch on your credit card statement you can’t sue the credit card company to get those charges taken off. How do you “resolve this”? Arbitration. How often as a consumer do you win? .06% of the time. The credit card companies wins 99.4% of the arbitration cases.
Employment disputes. Same thing with credit cards: arbitration clauses are included in the employment contract. Even at the end of your life, arbitration clauses continue to plague us U.S. citizens. Nursing home companies, while promising a wonderful place to live, slip in these and dishonest, underhanded arbitration clauses in the mountain of paperwork you are signing to admit your loved one. Courts have generally upheld these “gotcha” terms. Consumer advocates say to never sign these. Most of the time, consumers never know these arbitration clauses are in there.
How does this all happen? Corruption. Not voting allows this to happen.
If you are injured and searching the web for an attorney,
stop clicking.
I am a full-service personalized, personal injury lawyer with a statewide practice in all 67 counties. I have 31 years of experience to put to work for you. Call so I can answer your questions: 1-800 – 535 – 3002. Email: JSteele@JSteelelaw.com Skype: ScienceCan Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JSteeleLaw/ Twitter: @JsteeleOlmstead or @FlaBicyleLawyr Instagram: jsteeleolmstead.