Under the headline, "Bookstores Stoke Trump Resistance With Action, Not Just Words," the New York Times has a 1,300-word article, accompanied by four photographs, about how bookstores are taking action against President Trump.
There's not a word anywhere in the article about how one of the left's grievances against Trump is that he might appoint conservative judges who agree with the Supreme Court's ruling in Citizens United, that the First Amendment gives businesses some significant latitude to participate in politics free of government interference. There's a certain irony, or hypocrisy, here that seems lost on the Times. The left doesn't seem to have problems with businesses getting involved in politics when it is, say, bookstores organizing anti-Trump rallies. But when the business is, say, Koch Industries or some other company advancing the interests of its shareholders, or Citizens United advancing the interests of its members, then the idea that corporations have free speech rights is subjected to all sorts of left-wing denunciation and mockery. It is a double standard. Either businesses should be able to engage in politics, or they shouldn't. But the idea that it's okay for left-wing bookstores to engage in politics, but not for libertarian or conservative businesses to do the same, is inconsistent.