JG: you make the best point on this board. Let’s return to the original Constitution. I suggest we strike any language that promotes a perceived disparity between the significance--& therefore the rights--of people based on race or sex.

DHD: Your comment illustrates what has become the problem with our Federal government: While we were founded as a constitutional republic, we have become a non-representative representative democracy.

Gene: Capital restructure is not as easy as you suggest, & restructure is rarely a political decision; it is a cost of capital decision. For many corporations, the answer to the government conundrum is outsourcing or complete “exile”, although this introduces a new risk--the expatriation of assets.

Ralph Gizzip: How dare you suggest that shareholders can’t revolt? Maybe they can have a tea party! Oh… options do not carry voting rights.

Buss: Maybe if Kelo’s lawyers had cited Bowie, they’d have won. Maybe we can get a legal action group to oppose BHO’s bailout schemes & base their argument on Rush’s “The Trees”.

Jubilation T Cornpone: The Constitution has been unraveling since inception. It hasn’t “worked well” since at least 1803. Revoke government at will? Maybe that’s the way it SHOULD be, but the last time we tried it, over 600,000 soldiers & 400,000 civilians were killed, & government made its single largest step towards centralization EVER.

Doug Davis: CORRECT. The underlying problem: Corporations are in bed with government. Schumer’s proposal is merely an assertion of who gets to be on top.

$mooth Operator (& Copyleft): Corporations are legal entities. “Legal” implies complicity with government, regardless of level. The judiciary is government. Legislative, executive, JUDICIAL. Is there that big a difference between “State” & “Federal” anymore?

BTW--I'm a capitalist, not a corporatist.

Steve: Conditional suffrage… Not very original, but very right.

Ed: Corporations are in fact little regulated aristocratic democracies. Perhaps they need more oversight, but from the bottom up, not from the top down. Government is a bigger slew of hogs than ANY corporation.

Jake: Mutual funds already vote their shares. While hedge funds can & do trade assets, you will find that the bulk of their activity is in derivatives. There isn’t enough room here to explain the difference, but derivatives carry no voting rights.

HOWEVER… A caveat to all…

There is voluminous evidence that corporate executives & board members often act in their own best interest & not in the interest of shareholders. Sounds a lot like government, no?

Don't hedge funds and mutual funds own a good percentage of the market's stock? How is this going to work, will these fund managers now call the shots?

So your point is what? Checkmate, you merely validated my earlier point--it is the courts, not the legislative branch, that determine the rules of incorporation.

Oh and BTW, can you let us working folks know when you lefties plan to nationalize the economy and do away with "legal fiction" (as you call it)like corporations?

Funny stuff! "This is designated by the courts--not "government"."

Riiiighht. Incorporation, a legal process that creates the legal fiction of a corporation according government regulations, through the courts, somehow isn't "GOVERNMENT." It's just "courts," which aren't part of the government!

LOL. Thanks for another chuckle. And then you go on about MY education... Haaaah! (wiping tears away)

Keep swingin', buddy. This is great entertainment.

By the way: If business folks don't like the rules of incorporation, the solution's very easy: Don't Incorporate!

You don't get the legal and financial benefits if you don't want to follow the rules. Very simple.

Did you mean Chopyheft or Looter in Chief Fauxbamo boma boma whamo or Both?

[For the record I would pick both]

And $mooth Operator's response to Smellycleft; 'Why don't you crawl back to your libtard blogspace/basement and leave intelligent debate to those of us who actually work, run companies and produce things? '

Dittos on that, Great Comment!!

If that's the fair way to manage, it should work for both. Suggest that and watch the fit.

Corporations only exist by consent of the government, but government only exists by consent of the governed. The governed can revoke the government at will.

Copy, you are living proof of what happens when inflated ego/subpar intelligence collide.

You typed: "Remember, incorporation is a process that only government can recognize"

No, no and hell no. Incorporation is a form of legal entity designed to protect assets, establishes taxation, fundraising and governance. This is designated by the courts--not "government".

Your pathetic attempts at cognitive resonance only confirm my suspicions that your education is limited to that of the liberal arts category. Why don't you crawl back to your libtard blogspace/basement and leave intelligent debate to those of us who actually work, run companies and produce things?

John Adams, Amen brother! Crappyleft, try to stay awake for Macro and Micro next time, kthx.

Adding more red tape and administrative burden to hard-pressed businesses when unemployment and foreclosures are at an all-time high? Serious people-what planet did this moron come from? People need jobs, not this POS destroying the few that are out there

I'm not sure his proposal is such a bad thing.

Consider this: in virtually all cases the CEO is also Chairman of the Board. Virtually all board members are executives of other companies. Can you really see a corporate board severing itself from the corporate executives? Can you see board members allowing shareholders to control "golden parachute" packages? Not when the board members would be susceptible to that very same possibility in their own companies.

The bottom line is most of the shareholders have very little if any power to affect change in the board of a corporation. The large majority of voting stock is held by the executives and board members via stock options or large institutional investors who would be subject to the same reforms Sen. Shumer is recommending.

Corporate reform through shareholder revolt? Not in your wildest effing dreams.

Yeah, Shummie is lining himself up for the soon to be vacant Speaker of the House job. And boy, does he want to maximize his potential! This man is reputed to be the smartest man in Congress( look it up, that's what he is considered...)and he believes that business is run best when more regulation by government is present. He's wrong. But he believes it. If I were running a large company with international ties, I would either A)sell it to an overseas buyer or B)close the doors before the feds can totally screw things up, which we all know they will do a masterful job of. When and where did Democrats get the idea that career politicians needed to tell MBA's how to run companies? Yes, ethics is important in business but it's soooo hypocritical to have politicians tell anyone how to run anything. Especially when they haven't done it sucessfully before. So keep your schnozz out of business, Shummie! This is America...even the French think we're becoming wusses.

Too bad the omnipotent government won't apply some of these guidelines to itself. Maybe, each and every time Congress thinks it should move forward with any new bills it should get the approval of it's shareholders...Us.

Let's just stick with the Original, that's done a good job so far.