The U.S. Supreme Court today struck down a decades' long ban on corporate and union spending to support candidates. The 5-4 vote, "overturned a 20-year-old ruling that said corporations can be prohibited from using money from their general treasuries to pay for their own campaign ads," says the Washington Post.

The decision may have a major impact in Minnesota -- not just in federal campaigns waged here but in state campaigns, since Minnesota is among two dozen states that ban, with some exceptions, such spending by corperations and unions on so-called advocacy ads. We're still sorting through the implications for the state but meanwhile, take a gander at the lengthy opinion from the court here.