Arthur Jensen: You have meddled with the primal forces of nature, Mr. Beale …. You are an old man who thinks in terms of nations and peoples. There are no nations. There are no peoples. There are no Russians. There are no Arabs. There are no third worlds. There is no West. There is only one holistic system of systems, one vast and …, interwoven, interacting, multivariate, multinational dominion of dollars. Petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars, reichmarks, ren(minbi), rubles, pounds, and shekels. It is the international system of currency which determines the totality of life on this planet. That is the natural order of things today. That is the atomic and subatomic and galactic structure of things today! … You get up on your little twenty-one inch screen and howl about America and democracy. There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM, and ITT, and AT&T, and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide, and Exxon. Those are the nations of the world today. What do you think the Russians talk about in their councils of state, Karl Marx? They get out their linear programming charts, statistical decision theories, minimax solutions, and compute the price-cost probabilities of their transactions and investments, just like we do. We no longer live in a world of nations and ideologies, Mr. Beale. The world is a college of corporations, inexorably determined by the immutable bylaws of business. The world is a business, Mr. Beale. It has been since man crawled out of the slime. And our children will live, Mr. Beale, to see that… perfect world… in which there’s no war or famine, oppression or brutality. One vast and ecumenical holding company, for whom all men will work to serve a common profit, in which all men will hold a share of stock. All necessities provided, all anxieties tranquilized, all boredom amused. And I have chosen you, Mr. Beale, to preach this evangel.
Howard Beale: Why me?
Arthur Jensen: Because you’re on television, dummy. Sixty million people watch you every night of the week, Monday through Friday.
Howard Beale: I have seen the face of God.
Arthur Jensen: You just might be right, Mr. Beale.

— Paddy Chayefsky, Network, 1976. Presented exquisitely by actors, Ned Beatty and Peter Finch.

As is the case of great literature, this snippet from a movie describes the true conflict being waged today in the United States and the greater challenge to democracy: a fundamental system of belief that the organization is forever and always superior in it’s needs and desires to that of its members – humans.

In distinct contrast to what we read, hear, see, and have come to believe as gospel, the purpose of existence of a corporation is: to limit the liability (read: accountability) of the investor(s). Making a profit or having a fund balance is the desired outcome but NOT the purpose. Humans invent corporations out of nothing; we embody a legal being out of thin air – not even ashes or dust.

The case can be made that incorporation has morphed into a replacement for the “divine right of kings” – that the rule of the corporation derives directly from the will of God, therefore not subject to accountability by man.

The contemporary predisposition of legislative, judicial, and administrative government in the USA favors this and it is contrary to the best interests of us as a society and people. And we don’t require permission to stand up to it.www.whatelephant.net