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Can you attach a tort to the individual owners and make them personally responsible for the accident ?

If it's due to negligence or intentional acts known to be dangerous or something like that, yes, you should.

That's the problem with corps having rights, the people responsible for whatever damage is done are never held responsible and prosecuted. Instead the company gets a fine and goes about it's business just like it always has.

BTW, if it's the actions of employee(s) and unknown to or against the orders of the owners, then the employee(s) should be held responsible.

You guys seem to be fixated on corporations. Don't waste your time.

Maybe the following will help stop the keyboard clutter. The question boils down to this -

Q. Do corporations possess the same rights as individuals, because after all they are just groups of individuals getting together to act together in their own economic interest?

A. Emphatically no, corporations do not posses the same rights as individuals gathering together. The difference is limitation of liability.

Here's an example - if you, as a person, borrow $10,000 and then invest it in chinchillas and then your chinchilla farm goes bust, you must personally repay $10,000 from your non-chinchilla assets. But if you put $2,000 capital into a chinchilla farm corporation, which borrows $8,000 and then goes bust, then the owners of the corporation aren't responsible for repayment of the $8,000 loan. Big difference!

States charter (incorporate) corporations for the express purpose of allowing owners to have their liability limited. Thus they are creatures of the state, and not simply a group of individuals gathering together. Thus it is perfectly constitutional and moral for the state to decide what and how corporations can operate. For example, state insurance regulations.

FOLKS, THE PROBLEM WITH OUR COUNTRY ISN'T CORPORATIONS. Yes, they've taken advantage of the immense power in Washington DC for their own purposes. But it's the power concentration that's the problem, not those taking advantage of it. Corporate malfeasance is just a symptom.

Asimov wrote..

If it's due to negligence or intentional acts known to be dangerous or something like that, yes, you should.

OK i can buy that too..

But and another but . Under a simple pass thru of rights type of deal which you are advocating why would you even need to know about bad thing x,y,z.

You must attach any and all liability to the individual shareholders, no matter what. The reason ? The only reason a corp has any rights (property or other wise) is because they derive them, via a simple transitive pass thru from the individual owner(s).

So if you are passing rights in one direction for good things like property rights, and if that is the only reason why a corp gets the good thing (property rights), then don't you have to pass them through the other way, and make the individual owners personally responsible for any action taken by the fictional association aka the corp?

Knowledge of bad action x,b,c, is therefore irrelevant. You own one share, then you are liable - no matter what. Under your system, given your axioms, how could it be different then that?

Asimov wrote..

That's the problem with corps having rights, the people responsible for whatever damage is done are never held responsible and prosecuted. Instead the company gets a fine and goes about it's business just like it always has.

It certainly is an issue, i wont quibble about that. However, I can't see how saying corps have no rights solves that.

Prolly coming up on post limit soon... ttyl

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I can drive a motor vehicle for personal reasons on public roads without having to ensure I know how to operate said motor vehicle? I also don't have to buy insurance. I sure don't want to be the person that gets hit by this driver.

The minimum required insurance in Florida is $10,000 in liability coverage. It's meaningless, never mind that the illegal aliens drive all the time with neither insurance OR a license.

Ok, side thought. How are the candidates vetted? For instance, someone says they are running for US Senate from FL. Maybe garnish a little attention.

A spotlight is thrown on the movement, then it turns out the bloke is a child molester and the whole movement gets marginalized.

Thoughts?

This is not a political party and thus there is nothing to vet.

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It certainly is an issue, i wont quibble about that. However, I can't see how saying corps have no rights solves that.

I'm not totally sure myself. I've not spent a lot of time thinking about it. I just know the current system is ****ed.

The intention of this being a set of principles, and the perception (along with the media's portrayal of such) of this being a party or movement will exist side by side. One freak in the mix derails the whole effort. A group of freaks might extend the list of principles. The acceptance, or denial and the discussion that ensues side tracks the entire movement.

How about we find one solid candidate...Say someone like Karl...and the rest of us make the movement happen around him. This will insulate the principles from corruption and unify the supporters around one objective.

Perhaps Karl can hand select candidates he endorces for lesser races. Just throwing it out there for discussion sake.

I have no intention of running for office.

Gen,

I can imagine that others in the media, blog world, and political universe will be reading this platform. The status of the platform as a "work-in-progress" should be stated clearly on the platform's web page to prevent others from quoting the current Platform as final, or to prevent others from quoting something in the current platform that won't be in the final Platform.

I know this is stated in the FAQ, but I feel it would be safer and more accurate to reinforce this work-in-progress status on the actual platform web page.

Done.

@Asimov, et. al.

That is why I make the very clear distinction between a PARTNERSHIP and a CORPORATION.

Corporations are like suicide bombers. If you want to blow up something, form a corporation, have it do a control fraud (read William Black's articles), take the money out, and then have the corporation dissolve, go bankrupt, or otherwise blow up taking a large chunk of the surrounding area with it.

Limiting CRIMINAL and culpable civil liability is evil. If you are CEO, the board, etc. you are responsible if the corporation commits crimes or prima facie frauds or torts. There is a difference between misfortune, market shifts, or wrong ideas and intentionally using the corporate veil to protect criminal or civil wrongdoing. I would go even to the shareholders - if you are investing in "murder, Inc., a provider of assassination services", you know it is a criminal enterprise.

And because there is this limited liability - the ability to personally get away with criminal behavior, I have no problem with demanding regulation, audits and examinations, and high taxation.

But it is the same reason that I would have zero taxes for individuals or partnerships.

I believe a section should be added about how our representatives get funded. Power follows the money and the power should only be in the individual. No pacs!

Only an individual in the district of representation may contribute to someone who runs for any office and it will have a maximum limit of some amount.

Fix this you fix a lot of the problem.

Also the judiciary should be directly funded by the people not through government our courts are here to protect us from the government.

I would like to see something added to limit the scope of presidential power, like NO appointments without consent of congress. No recess appts.

Jane, that's explicitly in the Constitution.

I would like to see FICO scores used ONLY for assessment of credit-worthiness, and barred from other uses. It really bothers me that a debt-oriented statistic is used to screen job applicants, rate insurance risks, assess potential tenants etc.

N/FWIW

The word "god" should not be capitalized in the last sentence.

Lots of people are going to be interested in how they get back to work.

I propose adding planks in the platform for tariffs against dissimilar economies (regulatory environment + labor costs), removal of tax advantages for outsourcing/offshoring, ending H1-B program, enforcing the borders.

To get small business going again, a rollback of failed regulatory systems should be put on the table too. Transparency and disclosure (with enforcement) should be the way these things are handled, let people make their own decisions in all aspects of life.

@Icanhasbailout

Right idea, but I think a better approach is that in order to trade with us (or do financial interaction) you come under our laws. So your workers would have standing in our courts to sue their employers, people damaged by pollution to collect from (escrowed tariffs if needed) corporations, if necessary by pulling cash out of the cash drawers at wal-mart. Also, if they will give 1% loans to their cronies, but not our businesses, we do an instant tariff for the difference. If they devalue their currency 10%, we slap on an instant 10% tariff (assuming we are still doing fiat currency).

Low-cost labor is less productive. If they are "expendable", then it is a difference in the legal structure.

The idea is we add a referee and level playing field. If they cheat, they get punitive penalties.

I might word it something like: "Free trade can only exist if it occurs under the same rules on both sides. Foreigners are only welcome in our markets if they are willing to live under and implement the same laws that our businesses must follow - doing business here will be under that basis - any differences in subsidy, immunity, or privilege will be met with bans or tariffs. If they play by the rules and succeed, then they were better. But on a level playing field the USA has always been the most productive and innovative country."

As to small business, "failed regulatory systems" is a multiple redundancy, and also duplicates all the existing planks about property and private contract. Small businesses are run by individuals, and unless they do damage or commit fraud, there is NO legitimate role for the government. "Transparency" is what the job-killing Sarbanes Oxley is about - does it matter if the regulation means it will cost a billion to install new machinery, or just the same billion to fill out all kinds of papers and other documentation for "transparency".

You cannot fight the evil of having complex regulations by making them even more complex and corrupt by carving out a "small business exception". If the regulation is legitimate, then it should apply uniformly. If it is corrupt it should be eliminated. The rules should be simple and designed to be fair.

H1-Bs should only apply to regulated things like medicine - If the government wants to control health care, then we can have H1b doctors and nurses.

Immigration is only addressed as the problem with illegals, but there is a large, complex, and diverse set of ideas about how to handle legal immigration. I don't see H1bs as a threat although they are in my industry. 20 years ago they hired college noobs - in both cases the employers "get what they pay for". They are not on welfare. There may be other considerations, but the big problem is the 11+ million illegals.

Try that on trade.

My point on the second half is that it is not cool for the government to deliberately import foreigners to compete with its own population.

This is an important point. I've got a candidate in my District running that made his millions by outsourcing good jobs - my job, in particular. I'm a paralegal at a law firm, which if my bosses contacted Mr. Altschuler, "could be done more efficiently and for less in India or Sri Lanka" A tariff would make the Indians and Sri Lankans play on the same field as me.

The sycophantic Republican bandwagon claims this is only free market in play. I disagree.

can someone post a link to the platform

My only suggestion would be to change the font in the stylesheet to be something other than Times New Roman. The content is good, but the presentation layer could use a facelift since marketing is half the battle.