Karl Rove's 2011 Election Priority: Busting Public-Sector Unions in Ohio

Original Link: http://www.thenation.com/blog/164168/karl-roves-2011-election-priority-busting-public-sector-unions-ohio

By John Nichols

Mitt Romney swept into Ohio Tuesday to talk about how much he agrees with Republican Governor John Kasich’s aggressive approach to budget issues. He even visited a call center where Republicans were trying to stir up support for Kasich’s signature initiative: a sweeping assault on labor rights so controversial that it faces a “citizen veto” in a November 8 statewide vote.

But, with new polling showing that Ohioans are overwhelmingly opposed to Kasich’s law (a fresh Quinnipiac University poll has voters favoring the repeal of the anti-labor law by a 57–32 margin), Romney blurred the message. Instead of the expected encourargement of a “yes” vote to keep the law on the votes, Romney praised Kasicg and then waffled on the referendum—saying he’s leave the issue up to the voters. It was a messy moment in a messy campaign.

So what the heck was Romney doing in Ohio? Why was the Republican presidential contender veering off his own campaign trail to spend time in a state that won’t hold its presidential primary until June of 2012? And why was he struggling to play all sides of the labor fight?

What’s happening in Ohio this fall is about more than Ohio.

The vote on Kasich’s anti-labor law—which was scheduled after 1.3 million Ohioans signed petitions supporting a repeal effort—is a key contest in the “Karl Rove” primary. Rove has not endorsed a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination. But he’s pretty obviously leaning toward Romney—just ask the recently affronted Herman Cain. Romney wants to be where Rove says to go; he also wants Kasich’s endorsement, as part of a strategy that seeks to reprise the game plan Rove constructed for George W. Bush in 2000, which counted on the backing of Republican governors to help secure the GOP nod.

Rove has for months been indicating that Republicans had better put Ohio on their schedules this fall if they want support next fall.

Since March, when Governor Kasich and his legislative allies moved to strip away the collective-bargaining rights of Ohio’s state, county and municipal employees, as well as teachers—and to render their unions politically dysfunctional—Rove has led the cheering section.
The former White House political czar, who promises he that groups he controls will spend $250 million nationally in the upcoming election cycle, has:

• set up a Government Union Reform Action Center to coordinate anti-labor work in states such as Ohio and Wisconsin
• written columns for the Wall Street Journal about the Ohio and Wisconsin fights
• appeared frequently on Fox News to talk up the importance of what Kasich—an old political ally—has done
• launched a cable advertising campaign attacking the unions that have fought Kasich and the Democrats who have aligned with them
• made Ohio a regular stop on his speaking and political consulting schedule, visiting as recently as late September.

Why the fascination?

Rove has always been obsessed with breaking up and breaking down public-employee unions. On the list of the issues that his heavily funded group Crossroads GPS ranks as top priorities, the highest-ranking specific fight is against organized labor in the states. “It’s time,” declares the message from Rove’s Government Union Reform Action Center, “government stood up for American taxpayers, not the unionized bureaucrat elite.”

Ohio’s November 8 referendum vote has become mission-critical for the people who pull the strings in the national Republican Party, and the network of conservative groups that has powered the party’s surge since the US Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling allowed for unlimited corporate donations to supposedly “independent” organizations.

Rove has made no secret of his determination to protect Kasich and the anti-labor law that was enacted in March despite mass demonstrations by unions and their allies. The Ohio law is actually more draconian in its efforts to diminish the role of unions in the workplace and in political campaigns than the measure that was enacted at the behest of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, and that excited Rove. “Both sets of reforms give local and state governments flexibility to deal with budget shortfalls and looming deficits, rein in unfunded pension liabilities, return control of personnel policies to elected officials, and end counterproductive workplace practices demanded by unions,” chirped Rove in March. “Yet all in all, labor law experts consider Ohio’s new law stronger, broader and more wide-ranging than Wisconsin’s.”

Rove didn’t just talk up the Ohio labor law change. He put his money where his mouth was.
In March, Rove’s Crossroads GPS group launched a $750,000 cable television advertising campaign that demanded to know, “Why are Democrats shutting down state capitols to protect a system that pays unionized government workers 42% more than non-union workers?”

That was a false claim; an Economic Policy Institute study found that public employees were actually under-compensated in comparison with their private-sector counterparts.

The advertising Rove aired in March attacked not just public-employee unions but President Obama, claiming that he was aiding unions that—through their political activities—pose “a threat to democracy.”

It was an absurd charge.

But Rove wasn’t worried about truth or falsehood.

The political strategist was putting his marker down, identifying the Ohio fight as central to the Republican and conservative causes.

He hasn’t backed off. According to the Columbus Dispatch, the shadowy group that was set up to preserve Kasich’s anti-labor law—Building a Better Ohio—expects to spend as much as $20 million on this fall’s campaign. And it is Building a Better Ohio that has been a Rove-style campaign to confuse Ohio voters, and to demonize public employees and their unions.

Building a Better Ohio is running a big-budget campaig. And so are other groups, such as Make Ohio Great—which is backed by Republican operatives and donors around the country—and Liz Cheney’s Alliance for America’s Future, which are playing big in a campaign that will see the same level of spending as a hotly contested gubernatorial or US Senate contest. In fact, the tens of millions spent in Ohio will rival what was spent to win the state in recent presidential elections.

How much of that money is coming from Rove and the billionaire CEOs and hedge-fund mangers associated with his American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS groups? Building a Better Ohio isn’t saying. The group was established as a nonprofit 501(c)4 organization, so that it doesn’t have to reveal its donor list.

The same goes for Make Ohio Great, Cheney’s Alliance for America’s Future and other groups that are backing Kasich’s position.

But no one imagines that Rove—whose Crossroads groups were big players in Ohio in 2010, who promises that they will be even bigger players in 2012 and who has been so outspoken in his support for Kasich’s anti-labor initiative—has been sitting on the sidelines.

Thousands of Ohioans have signed petitions asking Building a Better Ohio to reveal the sources of its funding. “The voters of Ohio—while deciding on which side of Issue 2 they will fall—need to know who is finding the distortions Building a Better Ohio is running other television sets. They deserve to see the list of corporate-backed allies supporting the anti-worker referendum as they make their decision on November 8th,” reads the petition. “The very integrity of our democracy relies on such principles of transparency.”

True enough. But Karl Rove, American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS are not about transparency. Nor is there any indication that Building a Better Ohio will open its books.
Still, the Rove connection is on display this week.

With his criticisms of Rick Perry and Herman Cain, Rove has left little doubt of his leanings in the Republican presidential race. (Rove claims to “have no personal favorite” in the race, but Cain says Rove’s helping Rpmney as part of “a deliberate attempt to damage me because I am not, quote unquote, the establishment choice.”)

As for Romney, he has made no secret of the fact that he would like to enjoy the support of Rove and the network of political organizations that Rove says will spend $250 million in the 2012 election cycle.

So it won’t come as any surprise that Romney’s visiting Cincinnati Tuesday to pump up Republican campaigners for a a “yes” vote on Issue 2—even as the wishy-washy candidate tries to have things both ways by avoiding an express endorsement of Building a Better Ohio’s campaign.
As bumbling as it was, Romney’s was an orchestrated visit, organized and encouraged by the Republican establishment and the corporate infrastructure that sustains it.

Karl Rove has let every Republican know that he is all about Ohio. The question is whether his money and manipulations will succeed in saving an anti-labor law that Rove has been hailing since March—and that has become the top priority of the conservative movement in this year’s election cycle.

Right-Wing Funds State News Source

Original Link: http://www.prwatch.org/news/2011/10/10971/franklin-center-right-wing-funds-state-news-source

By Sara Jerving

As newsrooms across the country shave off staff due in part to slipping ad revenue and corporate media conglomeration, the Franklin Center for Government and Public Integrity, is rushing to fill the gap. The group has 43 state news websites, with writers in over 40 states. Its reporters have been given state house press credentials and its news articles are starting to appear in mainstream print newspapers in each state. Who funds Franklin and what is its agenda?

The Funding Trail Leads to Bradley, Koch, and Other Right-Wing Groups

The websites started sprouting up in 2009. Some of these new sites go by the moniker "Reporter" as with the Franklin Center's Wisconsin Reporter that was launched in January as a website and wire-like service. Others have taken the shared name of "Watchdog.org," or "Statehouse News." The websites all offer their content free to local press -- many of the news bureaus send out their articles to state editors every day. The sites also offer free national stories that media can receive daily by subscribing.

The websites are coordinated and funded by a new non-profit group that calls itself the "Franklin Center for Government and Public Integrity." The Franklin Center told the Center for Media and Democracy that it does not disclose its funders, but some of its funding can been uncovered from foundation reports. Franklin acts as a hub that distributes funding that it receives from right-wing institutions such as the Wisconsin-based Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation and the Chicago-based Sam Adams Alliance. The North Dakota and DC-based center works with reporters embedded in conservative think tanks and others who have their own news bureaus.

According to Media Transparency, a media watchdog group that was acquired by Media Matters Action Network in 2008, the Bradley Foundation's clear political agenda and network has allowed it to have extensive influence on public policy. The media group notes that while the Foundation's "targets range from affirmative action to social security, it has seen its greatest successes in the area of welfare 'reform' and attempts to privatize public education through the promotion of school vouchers." The Bradley Foundation gave the Franklin Center $190,500 last year.
The Franklin Center was launched with the help of Sam Adams Alliance, which calls itself "SAM." The CEO of SAM, Eric O'Keefe, has been featured at events funded by David Koch's right-wing group called "Americans for Prosperity" (AFP). As the Center for Media and Democracy/PRWatch.org has previously noted, O'Keefe frequently and positively profiles the Tea Party and attacks health care reform and other progressive ideas. He also helped launch the "American Majority" group which trains conservatives to run for office. He sits on the Board of Directors of the Club for Growth Wisconsin, which ran divisive ads in support of Scott Walker's radical overhaul of collective bargaining rights for Wisconsin workers. He previously worked for David Koch's AFP predecessor group named "Citizens for a Sound Economy," among other roles.
O'Keefe's latest enterprise, SAM, gets part of its funding from the State Policy Network (SPN), which is partially funded by The Claude R. Lambe Foundation. Charles Koch, one of the billionaire brothers who co-own Koch Industries, and his wife and children, along with long-time Koch employee Richard Fink, comprise the board of this foundation. SAM is named after Founding Father Sam Adams, one of the leaders in the Boston Tea Party tax protests.

In its first year, the Franklin Center had a budget of $2.9 million, much of it from O'Keefe's SAM.

"Franklin Center" Staffed by Right-Wing Activists

Many Franklin staffers have ties to conservative activist groups and the GOP. The Franklin Center’s president, Jason Stverak, is the former Regional Field Director for SAM, and former Executive Director of the North Dakota Republican Party.

In late July, Erik Telford, the Director of Membership Online Strategy for Koch's AFP, announced that he would take on the position of Vice President for Strategic Initiatives Outreach for the Franklin Center. He had worked at AFP for four and a half years. In his farewell letter, he minced no words in explaining the activist role he will play in his new position, "As I move on to a new challenge, I look forward to staying involved with AFP, but now in an even more important capacity: that of a member and grassroots activist."

The Franklin Center's Director of Donor Relations, Matt Hauck, is a former Associate at the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation. The center's Chief of Staff, Gwen Beattie, is the former Director of Development and Operations at America's Future Foundation, an organization committed to "identify and develop the next generation of conservative and libertarian leaders." The Franklin Center's 2009 IRS 990 form lists Rudie Martinson as director and secretary. He formerly worked as the assistant state director for North Dakota's chapter of Koch's Americans for Prosperity.

The Franklin Center was one of the sponsors of the Western Republican presidential candidate debate in Las Vegas this month, along with Americans for Prosperity and other right-wing groups.

Interestingly, unlike traditional journalistic outlets, the screening process for writing for websites like the Wisconsin Reporter asks applicants ideological questions. As the Poynter Institute, a Florida-based school and resource for journalists, has reported, Wisconsin Reporter applicants must answer questions like: “How do free markets help the poor?” and “Do higher taxes lead to balanced budgets?” Such queries likely have optimal answers to a group like the Wisconsin Reporter, just as some of its stories have been criticized for being results-oriented in ways that are consistent with its funders' world view.

The address listed on the Franklin Center's 2011 nonprofit disclosure form is a UPS Store Post Office box, as reported by a North Dakota political blog. The North Dakota phone line on the Franklin Center contact page is re-routed to the DC office.

"The Franklin Center" Supports the American Legislative Exchange Council

At the 2011 American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) annual conference in New Orleans, The Franklin Center was listed as a "Vice-Chairman" level sponsor of the ALEC conference. In 2010, this equated to a gift of at least $25,000. It was also one of about 60 companies and institutions represented in the conference exhibition hall. ALEC brings corporations, such as Koch Industries, and state legislators together in task forces to vote on so-called “model legislation” that benefits the corporate bottom line or ALEC's ideological agenda. These bills are then introduced by legislators in state houses across the country, without any mention that corporations previously approved such legislation behind closed doors, as the Center for Media and Democracy has reported.

Sloppy Reporting, or Manufacturing News?

In August 2010, the West Virginia Watchdog blog reported that an unnamed source said that the former Democratic Governor Joe Manchin's office had been subpoenaed as part of a federal grand jury investigation. The story said that the subpoenas asked for contracts and records for businesses that have done work at the governor’s mansion. "The target may be Manchin himself, according to a source who asked to remain anonymous," the original story said.

The governor’s office responded saying that “Neither subpoena was directed to Governor Manchin or the Governor’s Office. No individual in the Governor’s Office was served with a subpoena…. The State has not been informed that Governor Manchin or any other state employee is under investigation.” The West Virginia Watchdog updated its site with these statements then reported that their "source was ultimately wrong about the purpose of the subpoenas." But the damage had been done. The article was picked up by the Associated Press, Charleston CBS affiliate, Charleston Daily Mail, and other news sites. The story also was reported in outlets like Politico and CNN. The reporter who broke the story is stationed at the Public Policy Foundation of West Virginia. While this group does not disclose its funders, some outlets have alleged it to be linked to the Koch brothers.
The timing was convenient. Manchin had announced in July of that year he would run to fill the unexpired term of U.S. Senator Robert Byrd, who passed away in 2010. Despite the controversy, Manchin did end up taking Byrd's seat.

In February, the Franklin Center's Wisconsin Reporter sponsored a questionable poll asserting that 71% of state residents thought Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker's budget proposal to cut the collective bargaining rights of most of the state's public sector workers was "fair." Several local and national news outlets cited the poll without investigation, including MSNBC. The result seemed completely out of whack with other polling leading some to question the source. The same month, We Ask America, largely owned by the Illinois Manufacturing Association, a leading business organization in the region, conducted a similar poll surveying 2,400 Wisconsin residents and found that 52 percent opposed Walker's plan. The Franklin Center's poll was conducted by Pulse Opinion Research.

In 2009, the New Mexico Watchdog reported that based on data from Recovery.gov, millions of dollars were spent in non-existent congressional districts in the state. The story picked up steam among reporters, even turned into a Colbert Report segment called "Know your Made-up District." The Franklin Center released a national report that said $6.4 billion in stimulus money had been spent in hundreds of “phantom” congressional districts. There was truth to the New Mexico Watchdog report, but it turned out, as reported by the Associated Press, that the culprit was an error-ridden government database. The funds were actually distributed to the right recipients, but errors, such as zip codes entered incorrectly, accounted for the "phantom districts." The money had not, as the report suggested, been unaccounted for or misused.

Even with this new information on the shortfalls of the Recovery.gov site, the Franklin Center failed to set the record straight. In its 2010 Annual report, the Center boasted it broke the story that federal stimulus money was allocated to 440 non-existing congressional districts. It did not mention the errors in the database, but let the record stand as a story of government waste.

Franklin Center Comes Under Fire From Journalism Watchdogs

The journalistic integrity of these sites has been called into question by media watchdog groups. Laura McGann, assistant editor at the Nieman Journalism Lab at Harvard University, wrote in a 2010 piece in the Washington Monthly, that the Franklin Center sites are engaging in distorted reporting across the country.

"As often as not, their reporting is thin and missing important context, which occasionally leads to gross distortions," wrote McGann, who pointed to several instances where the Watchdog websites wrote stories that turned out to be misleading or untrue.
"This sort of misleading reporting crops up on Watchdog sites often enough to suggest that, rather than isolated instances of sloppiness, it is part of a broad editorial strategy," she wrote.
The Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism, using a sliding scale of highly ideological, somewhat ideological and non-ideological, ranked the “Watchdog.org” franchise "highly ideological." Not surprisingly, Glenn Beck, a controversial conservative FOX talk show host, has touted the Franklin Center's network as a nonpartisan trusted source of news and information.
Writers affiliated with Franklin Center groups are asking for accreditation in various legislatures.
Responding to criticisms from the Neiman Foundation, Jason Stverak said: "Obviously, there is skepticism coming from some in the traditional legacy media…. We write for the people, and the content that we produce is at such a high-quality level that it is continually being embraced by consumers in each community."

New Breed of Reporting

Graeme Zielinski, Wisconsin Democratic Party spokesperson, accused the Wisconsin Reporter of using off-the-record comments, butchering quotes, and not correcting the record when errors were called to its attention.

Zielinski told the Center for Media and Democracy that he's never worked with a news outlet that operates like the Wisconsin Reporter. He acknowledges that other outlets across the state are biased, but the difference, he said, is that the Wisconsin Reporter's content is ideologically-motivated and passed off in newspapers across the state as "straight-shooting reporting." He calls their methods of journalism "ambush reporting." He said he has received calls late in the evening and early in the morning on weekends from their reporters, given a short deadline to comment on slanted and inflammatory statements.

Yet, this newsource is gaining traction in the state. Wisconsin Reporter's stories have been picked up by a host of local media outlets in the state, such as La Crosse Tribune, Eau Claire’s Leader Telegram, Wausau Daily Herald, Steven's Point Journal, Chippewa Herald, and Beloit Daily News.
Dave Zweifel, co-founder and long-serving president of the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council, and editor of the Madison-based Capital Times, told the Center for Media and Democracy that the Wisconsin Reporter is a new breed of news reporting. "Of course, many news organizations are owned by corporations or supported by politically active donors, but most keep a hands off approach when it comes to covering the news," he said. "This outfit masks itself as an investigative journalism service that provides free content to newspapers, many of which are cash-strapped these days, and eager for such a product.... You have to give these guys credit for capturing the moment when the press is particularly vulnerable."

This manner of producing and distributing 'news' is such a clever idea that its inspired other right-wing think tanks to devote resource to news production. The Heritage Foundation launched the "Scribe," a blog that features reports complimentary to the Foundation's stance on policy issues. It cites the Franklin Center's successes in expanding think tank journalism as a reason for its launch.

Will you help Senator Sanders Expose the Koch Echo Chamber?

Original Link: http://www.bravenewfoundation.org/2011/06/press/video-will-you-help-senator-sanders-expose-the-koch-echo-chamber/

By GottaLaff

EXPOSE THE KOCHS: The Koch brothers fund multiple think tanks and academic centers to promote their ideology and grow their profits, a Brave New Foundation investigation reveals. Let’s create an echo chamber of truth by using YouTube’s SHARE tools above to protect Social Security and counter the Koch billions. http://KochBrothersExposed.com/socialsecurity

The FACTS:

1. Social Security belongs to you—the workers who contribute to it—not the politicians in Washington.
2. Social Security will never go bankrupt. Its major source of income comes from the contributions of workers and employers; as long as there are workers, Social Security will have income. Closing tax loopholes for wealthy individuals will increase the long term financial health of the program, and protect it for decades to come.
3. Raising the retirement age is a terrible idea and a large benefit cut. If you were claiming benefits as a 66 year-old retired worker and the full retirement age was changed from 66, where it is today, to 69 your benefits would be cut 20 percent. A typical benefit would drop from $14,000 a year to $11,200 a year.
4. Privatizing Social Security would be a disaster. Social Security is so valuable because it provides a guaranteed benefit. Privatizing Social Security would remove this guarantee and have people gamble their retirement savings in the casinos of Wall Street. If the recent financial crisis taught us anything, Wall Street is the last place where our money is safe.
5. For more information, check out the Strengthen Social Security Campaign.

The 1% Loves Socialism

Original Link: http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article31244.html

By Scott Cruickshank

You’ll notice if you’ve been paying attention to the war of propaganda that the 1% and their obedient lickspittles are going all out to frame the 99% VS. 1% showdown as a battle between Capitalists and Commies. Capitalism of course being good, socialism bad. I laugh every time I hear it because logic and common sense just doesn’t support the spin.

What happens when a new 10,000 unit section 8 HUD complex is built in Chicago or Cleveland or Baltimore, wherever? First thing the government does is borrow the money. Who do they borrow it from? Bankers. Bankers love interest payments, bankers love socialism. Next thing they do is take bids from construction companies to build it. Who builds it. The nation’s largest construction contractors. Construction contractors love high paying, built-by-the-lowest-bidder jobs. Construction companies love socialism. Once the structure is built it must be made habitable. The place needs 10,000 stoves, 10,000 refrigerators, 20,000, ceiling fans 5 million miscellaneous electrical fixtures and about 1 million light bulbs. Who provides all that stuff? General Electric. General Electric loves socialism. General Electric loves socialism so much it even went as far as buying the National Broadcasting Company in 1986 to sing its praises throughout the land 24 hours a day 7 days a week. They love it even more when they don’t have to contribute to the socialist state by paying taxes.

Socialism is the last thing the 1% want to see driven out of America. It makes them so much money. The bankers are such fans of socialism that they have so far donated more money to the Obama re-election campaign than to all other Republican hopefuls combined, according to the Washington Post. Those people don’t want to see and end to big government. Big governments borrow money. And it isn’t just socialism, they love the full monty. The last 20 years the Capitalists have been running into communist China as fast as their little feet can take them. Odd for a bunch of dedicated Capitalists isn’t it? The truth of the matter is the 1% don’t care either way. They do whatever it takes to make money. They don’t believe in Capitalism or communism. They believe in interest. Naked self serving interest… and money. That’s all they believe in. Their morals and beliefs are purely situational. If your home sits on a parcel of land they need to build a warehouse for their communist made imports, they have the government force you out of it. They tell you it’s all for the collective good of society that you got the boot. Total by the book Karl Marx communism. The sanctity of private property, they don‘t care. As long as it’s not their property. Talk about nationalizing one of their businesses and all of the sudden then it’s all about private property and freedom... Ayn Rand said ... blah, blah, blah.

Even the blowhards on FOX do their best to support the ripoff system. Only they work on the other angle, keeping the big government tax and borrow and spend war on terrorism and military rackets operating at peak profit generating capacity. There are no small government, balanced budget beliefs in that bunch.

It’s time we took a lesson from the 1%. They gave us communism and capitalism to keep us happy while they looted the place. We can pick one we like and thank god or man we have it, because if we didn’t things would be even worse. The 1% Communists blame all their problems on the bourgeois pigs, the 1% Capitalists blame all theirs on commie pigs. And the 99% eat the crap sandwich they are handed and are grateful to have it. That’s the way the 1% has always liked it. They rip you off and you blame someone else. It‘s time the 99% put aside the foolish isms and started looking out for their own interests. Nothing but pure, naked, self serving interest. What’s good for the 99% is good for America. So what if eliminating child labor is a plank of the communist manifesto. It’s good for you. You don’t want your 10 year old kids working in coal mines and you don’t want them driving down the price of your labor. And if the city smoking ban has killed business at the restaurant you work at, then work to kill the smoking ban and return the right to decide who smokes and when to the owner of the property. That’s capitalism. So what, it’s good for you. From now on you do what’s good for you, period. It’s worked for the 1% pretty well.

The Koch Brothers

Original Link: http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/peopleandpower/2011/10/2011102683719370179.html

By Bob Abeshouse

People & Power asks if the tycoon duo's fortune could put the radical right into the White House.

Charles and David Koch are each worth about $25bn, which makes them the fourth richest Americans. When you combine their fortunes, they are the third wealthiest people in the world. Radical libertarians who use their money to oppose government and virtually all regulation as interference with the free market, the Kochs are in a class of their own as players on the American political stage. Their web of influence in the US stretches from state capitals to the halls of congress in Washington DC.

The Koch brothers fueled the conservative Tea Party movement that vigorously opposes Barack Obama, the US president. They fund efforts to derail action on global warming, and support politicians who object to raising taxes on corporations or the wealthy to help fix America’s fiscal problems. According to New Yorker writer Jane Mayer, who wrote a groundbreaking exposé of the Kochs in 2010, they have built a top to bottom operation to shape public policy that has been "incredibly effective. They are so rich that their pockets are almost bottomless, and they can keep pouring money into this whole process".

Koch industries, the second largest privately-held company in the US, is an oil refining, chemical, paper products and financial services company with revenues of a $100bn a year. Virtually every American household has some Koch product - from paper towels and lumber, to Stainmaster carpet and Lycra in sports clothes, to gasoline for cars. The Koch’s political philosophy of rolling back environmental and financial regulations is also beneficial to their business interests.

The Kochs rarely talk to the press, and conduct their affairs behind closed doors. But at a secret meeting of conservative activists and funders the Kochs held in Vail, Colorado this past summer, someone made undercover recordings. One caught Charles Koch urging participants to dig deep into their pockets to defeat Obama. "This is the mother of all wars we've got in the next 18 months," he says, "for the life or death of this country." He called out the names of 31 people at the Vail meeting who each contributed more than $1m over the past 12 months.

In the 2010 congressional elections, the Kochs and their partners spent at least $40m, helping to swing the balance of power in the US House of Representatives towards right-wing Tea Party Republicans. It has been reported that the Kochs are planning to raise and spend more than $200m to defeat Obama in 2012. But the brothers could easily kick in more without anyone knowing due to loopholes in US law.

The Kochs founded and provide millions to Americans for Prosperity, a political organisation that builds grassroots support for conservative causes and candidates. Americans for Prosperity, which has 33 state chapters and claims to have about two million members, has close ties to Tea Party groups and played a key role in opposing Obama's health care initiative.

This year, Americans for Prosperity spent at least half a million dollars supporting Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker's efforts to cut social spending and roll back collective bargaining rights for public employee unions. The legislation passed by Walker makes it more difficult for unions, which are major backers of Democratic candidates, to secure funds for political purposes. Americans for Prosperity is also very active in a battle against unions in Ohio, another important 2012 presidential state. Its president, Tim Phillips, says that the organisation is winning in Wisconsin and around the country "because on the policies of economic freedom, we're right". He refused to tell People & Power reporter Bob Abeshouse how much the organisation is spending to combat the unions.

The Kochs have also poured millions into think tanks and academia to influence the battle over ideas. According to Kert Davies, the director of research for Greenpeace in the US, the Kochs have spent more than $50m since 1998 on "various front groups and think tanks who ... oppose the consensus view that climate change is real, urgent and we have to do something about it". As operators of oil pipelines and refineries, the Kochs have opposed all efforts to encourage alternative sources of energy by imposing a tax on fossil fuels.

Patrick Michaels, a senior fellow at the CATO Institute, often appears in the media to contest global warming science. CATO was founded by Charles Koch, and the Kochs and their foundations have contributed about $14m to CATO. Since 2009, there has been a sharp drop in the percentage of Americans who see global warming as a serious threat according to Gallup polls. Davies argues that the change can be attributed in large measure to the efforts of scientists like Michaels and others who are funded by the fossil fuel industry.

The Kochs have also promoted their free market ideology and business interests through aggressive lobbying in Washington DC, and financial support of political candidates. Greenpeace has tracked more than $50m that Koch Industries has spent on lobbyists since 2006, when Cap and Trade and other legislation to combat global warming was being considered. The Kochs have been the largest political spender since 2000 in the energy sector, exceeding Exxon, Chevron, and other major players.

The Kochs contributed to 62 of the 87 new members of the US House of Representatives in 2010. Members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee that the Kochs supported have taken the lead in opposing US Environmental Protection Agency efforts to reduce global warming emissions. Other members backed by the Kochs belong to the right-wing Tea Party bloc that took the US to the brink of default in July by refusing to consider a budget deal that would include tax increases.

In 2012, many believe that President Obama can raise a billion dollars for the presidential race, and break all fundraising records. But as Lee Fang of the Center for American Progress tells reporter Bob Abeshouse, in the end it may not matter "because the Koch brothers alone increased their wealth by $11bn in the last two years".

What's That Smell? Keystone XL

Original Link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-brune/keystone-xl-pipeline_b_1007611.html

By Michael Brune

Three months ago, I wrote an op-ed for the L.A. Times that listed the "Koch brothers-backed" Keystone XL pipeline for dirty tar-sands oil as one of the most important environmental issues confronting President Obama. That prompted a stern missive from the Legal Department at Koch Industries, which even got the Times to run a correction saying that Koch Industries "says it has no involvement in the project."

Only problem: It now turns out that three years ago a Canadian subsidiary of Koch Industries said exactly the opposite: That it had "a direct and substantial interest" in seeing the Keystone XL pipeline approved. Whoops.

But, really, I feel like I've been vindicated for observing that "the sun rises in the east." Let's get real here. No reasonable person could have doubted that the Koch brothers, who are in the tar-sands business up to their Windsor-knotted neckties, could possibly not have been in favor of the Keystone XL. (Note to the good folks at Koch Industries Legal Dept: This is called poetic license. I humbly confess that I have no idea how Charles and David knot their ties, so please don't come seize my house.)

Unfortunately, the hypocrisy of the Koch brothers pales in comparison to the State Department's role in the Keystone XL debacle. Last summer, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that her department would leave "no stone unturned" as it prepared its Environmental Impact report. But when the report appeared, there were unturned stones everywhere:

• No study of the consequences of a raw tar-sands oil spills or the difficulties of cleaning up the inevitable spills was done.
• No analysis of the clean-energy alternatives to the pipeline or of how extracting Canadian tar sands oil would affect their development.
• No serious assessment of alternatives to a route that crosses the Ogallala Aquifer (which underlies more than a quarter of our country's irrigated land).
• No study of how more pollution would affect Gulf refinery towns like Port Arthur, TX, which is already one of our country's most polluted communities.
• No analysis of the impact on wildlife, such as the lesser sandhill cranes that use Nebraska's central Platte River valley as a stopover on their migration north.
• An incomplete and faulty analysis of how extracting and burning tar-sands oil will affect climate disruption.

There's more, but you get the gist. How could the Department of State have gotten it so wrong? Keystone XL, after all, is a 1,700-mile pipeline that will do nothing for Americans except seize their land through eminent domain, expose them to catastrophic oil spills and toxic pollution, and make domestic gas more expensive -- all so a foreign oil company, TransCanada, can ship its tar-sands oil overseas from our ports. It's such a bad idea that, in Texas, the Sierra Club and the Tea Party actually allied to oppose it (I think the sun actually did rise in the west on that day).

Sorry to say, the answer is that this was government at its most tawdry. The Department of State allowed a former Clinton campaign staff member, working as a TransCanada lobbyist, inappropriate access to high level officials within the Department and hired a biased pro-oil contracting firm to do the actual evaluation and run public hearings.

The more Americans learn about Keystone XL and the big-money campaign behind it, the worse the whole thing smells. Whether or not to permit this travesty is still one of the most important decisions facing President Obama. It's time for him to clear the air, kill this Koch brothers-backed pipeline, and let the State Department get back to issuing passports and visas.

Herman Cain: ‘I’m Very Proud Of The Relationship That I Have With The Koch Brothers’

Original Link: http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/10/18/346496/herman-cain-im-very-proud-of-the-relationship-that-i-have-with-the-koch-brothers/

By Alex Seitz-Wald

Newly minted GOP frontrunner Herman Cain acknowledged his long relationship with the conservative billionaire industrialist brothers Charles and David Koch yesterday. Cain has “close” and “long ties” to the Koch Brothers, as the AP reported this week, likely making him the conservative political duo’s “favorite presidential candidate,” as ThinkProgress has noted. Yesterday, Cain told CNN he is “very proud of the relationship that I have with the Koch Brothers:”

CAIN: I know the Koch Brothers. The Koch Brothers helped to start to an organization called Americans for Prosperity. And I did some speaking when they were starting that organization, and I’m very proud of the relationship that I have with the Koch Brothers, as well as Americans for Prosperity. I have also attended some of their seminars and have found them very informative. So I don’t have a close relationship with the Koch Brothers, but I know them and I respect them, and they know me and respect me.

Cain’s campaign manager is the former president of the Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity’s (AFP) Wisconsin chapter, his former spokesperson worked for the group’s Louisiana chapter, and his economic adviser was on their advisory board. Cain himself used to hold an official position with AFP as well. He also attended the brothers’ influential private biannual meeting, and has spoken at several events they sponsored.

Last night, ThinkProgress’ Scott Keyes appeared on MSNBC’s Politics Nation to discuss Cain’s ties with the Kochs.

Update

Richard Fink, the executive vice president of Koch Industries, offered praise for Cain today, telling the National Review that the company has “long admired Herman Cain”:

“We have long admired Herman Cain for his success in growing jobs and business in this country, and for his long-standing commitment to the values of economic freedom,” Fink says. “Although we have not formally committed to supporting any presidential candidate, we are certainly glad to see Mr. Cain confront the issues of runaway spending and stifling government interference that are holding back the economy and the lives of all Americans. Anyone that has spent time with Mr. Cain, as we have, can tell you he is a man of deep dedication to our nation and his independence of thought is obviously what is appealing to voters.”

Herman Cain and the Kochs

Original Link: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2011/10/cain-and-the-kochs.html

By Jane Mayer

The Associated Press broke an interesting story recently noting that Herman Cain, who has portrayed himself as an outsider to politics, has in fact worked closely since 2005 with Americans for Prosperity, a corporate front group organized and funded in large part by billionaire industrialists Charles and David Koch, long-time financiers of America’s conservative movement. (I wrote about the Kochs for The New Yorker last year.) The historically publicity-shy Kochs have stepped out of the shadows recently, vowing that Americans for Prosperity will spend some $200 million in the 2012 Presidential campaign in hopes of defeating President Obama. In light of this, it seems fair to ask exactly how Cain fits into this larger project, and how dependent he is on the Kochs.

The AP story described a tangle of ties between Cain’s top campaign advisers and Americans for Prosperity. It also said that in 2005 and 2006 Cain himself travelled the country, speaking on behalf of the pro-corporate, anti-government group. But it stopped short of revealing any past or current financial ties between Cain and the Koch Brothers’ political organization.

Earlier this week, I asked J. D. Gordon, communications director for Cain’s campaign, whether Cain was an employee of Americans for Prosperity. “No,” he said, “He’s not an employee.” I noted that I’d seen Cain speak at an Americans For Prosperity event in Austin, Texas in July 2010. He had the audience laughing and cheering as he said, “Our government has been hijacked by liberals…. Stupid people are running this country! … Don’t buy this malarky that all black people support Obama.” “Did he do it for free?” I asked. Other such speakers have reportedly been well-compensated for appearing at the group’s events. According to Adele Stan of AlterNet, for instance, Stephen Moore, a member of the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board, has earned upwards of $135,000 for speaking at eighteen A.F.P. events in since 2006.

Gordon acknowledged that Cain had received “speaking fees” from Americans for Prosperity. He said he would have to get back to me with details. Meanwhile, I called Levi Russell, the communications director for the Americans for Prosperity Foundation, to ask if he could confirm whether or not the ostensibly non-partisan, non-profit, independent political advocacy group had been paying Cain. He said that the organization’s relationship with speakers prevented it from disclosing how much they paid Cain. He added, “Over the years, Herman Cain has spoken at our events sometimes without charge, and other times we might pick up travel expenses or give a modest honorarium. But I can tell you that since Herman Cain announced he was running for President he has not been paid for any appearances.”

With spokesmen not exactly jumping at the chance to explain the financial ties between Cain and the Kochs, all that was left were public documents. As a charitable organization, Americans for Prosperity Foundation has to file public tax forms, known as 990’s, listing significant expenses. And as a Presidential candidate, Cain has to file a financial disclosure report with the Federal Elections Commission revealing his sources of income. But Cain’s federal campaign disclosure makes no mention of A.F.P., and A.F.P.’s I.R.S. report has no mention of Cain. From reading these documents, which are meant to inform the public of any potential conflicts or questionable entanglements, one would never guess that these two entities have any financial relationship.

A little further reporting, however, reveals how the financial ties between Cain and A.F.P. were hidden. On the bottom of page eight of the A.F.P.’s 2010 I.R.S. tax form, in tiny type, is a line item reporting payment to Washington Speakers Bureau of $127,794. The Washington Speakers Bureau lists Herman Cain as one of its speakers, noting that his “fees vary.” Gordon confirmed that Cain is represented by the Washington Speakers Bureau, and that this may be how he was paid.

Yet, mysteriously, Cain discloses no payments from the Washington Speakers Bureau on his federal forms. Instead, on his 2011 F.E.C. form, he lists unspecified payments of between $50,000-$100,000 to his company, the New Voice, which he describes as a “public speaking” and “publishing” entity.
“There’s no record of payments from Americans for Prosperity to Herman Cain on his financial disclosures or the organization’s 990,” Bill Allison, editorial director of the Sunlight Foundation, a non-profit group favoring government transparency, said. “It defeats the purpose of public disclosure if a candidate’s businesses and speakers’ bureaus obscure the relationships between moneyed interests and candidates.”

Update: Lee Fang, a researcher and writer at the liberal blog Think Progress, writes in to point out that Think Progress reported on the links between the Koch Brothers and Cain prior to the Associated Press. That post is here.

Herman Cain speaks during a dinner sponsored by Americans for Prosperity, Friday, April 29, 2011 in Manchester, New Hampshire. Photograph by Jim Cole/AP Photo.

Ask Herman Cain: Does Cancer Go Better With Koch?

Original Link: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/10/20/1028392/-Ask-Herman-Cain:-Does-Cancer-Go-Better-With-Koch

By BobboSphereFollow

We know that Herman Cain is not actually a happy man. He doesn’t like black people very much because he thinks they’ve been brainwashed into a plantation mentality by evil Democrats. Cain doesn't like brown people very much either. He wants a moat full of alligators, a deadly electric fence and armed sharpshooters on the US-Mexican border. Even the Berlin Wall lacked alligators and high voltage. Women? Nope. He thinks women have no right to an abortion, even after rape or incest. Low income Americans? Nope again. He wants to raise their taxes.

Cain was head of Godfather Pizza and the National Restaurant Association. The former made him a rich man and the latter made him a powerhouse in politics. But he had open contempt for the majority of people in his industry. Food service workers are among the lowest paid employees in the USA. Cain blocked improvements in their wages and fought granting them health care. Sick, underpaid waiters and cooks sneezing on your food didn’t seem to bother him a bit.

But we know he is not completely miserable when in human company. Herman Cain has a deep and worshipful admiration for the Koch Brothers, those wealthy benefactors of the Republican Party whose contempt for working class people easily matches his own. You remember the Koch Brothers. They were the ones who wanted Wisconsin public employees reduced to the status of peons while eviscerating social services to the elderly, the disabled and the very young. Thousands of Wisconsinites braved the cold last winter to try and stop the Koch Brothers onslaught.

We know Herman Cain admires the Koch Brothers because he said so himself:

“I know the Koch Brothers. The Koch Brothers helped to start to an organization called Americans for Prosperity. And I did some speaking when they were starting that organization, and I’m very proud of the relationship that I have with the Koch Brothers, as well as Americans for Prosperity. I have also attended some of their seminars and have found them very informative. So I don’t have a close relationship with the Koch Brothers, but I know them and I respect them, and they know me and respect me.” Source: Think Progress

Mr. Cain is being uncharacteristically modest here. Cain once led the Americans for Prosperity’s Prosperity Expansion Project. PEP (get it?) paid Cain to make speeches across the country on behalf of the Koch Brothers. His speechmaking for the Koch brothers denounced all of their favorite demons: unions, corporate taxes, environmental regulations, the EPA, social services and climate change science.

The Koch brothers spread corporate propaganda like old fashioned farmers spread manure on their fields, but they also spread something else more immediately lethal than their ugly words. They are environmental criminals who have been fined millions for openly flouting the law. Some of the chemicals they dump into the environment are lethal

“Koch Industries units have ...repeatedly run afoul of environmental regulations, resulting in five criminal convictions since 1999 in the U.S. and Canada. From 1999 through 2003, Koch Industries was assessed more than $400 million in fines, penalties and judgments.” Source: Bloomberg Markets

Take the small town of Crossett, Arkansas, a modest working class hamlet near a Georgia-Pacific plant that produces bleached cardboard, the stuff commonly used in paper cups and frozen food packaging. Georgia-Pacific is a division of Koch Industries. Georgia-Pacific also produces prodigious quantities of waste water laced with formaldehyde, a known human carcinogen.

Georgia-Pacific dumps it in the nearby streams. The oily residue floats on top of the water, often giving off visible fumes as it winds through forests and wetlands. This is illegal, but the financial reach of the Koch Brothers is long and not even the EPA seems willing to prosecute them for this crime. The Koch Brothers-linked Formaldehyde Council even tries to downplay its known dangers. Ironically, David Koch was diagnosed with prostate cancer and has donated millions toward cancer research. On the one hand he giveth away charitable donations and with the other he giveth away cancer.

Thanks to the pollution from the Koch Brothers owned Georgia-Pacific plant, people in Crossett are dying of cancer. They end their days breathing into masks with their medical tanks nearby. Then they are laid to rest in the small local cemetery. Flowers are left at the grave sites by grieving relatives...and the dying goes on. The Koch brothers have not sent flowers, sympathy cards or compensation, only vicious personal attacks on the victims and their families.

The Koch Brothers have made it clear that they have not formally endorsed anyone for president. But Herman Cain, their favorite speechmaker and a former cancer patient himself, is their unofficial favorite for the job. Is the Godfather of Pizza really only a PR flack for the Godfathers of Corporate Crime?

The next time you run into Herman Cain, why don’t you ask him yourself,”Does cancer really go better with Koch?”

More Reports of Cancer Near Koch Brothers' Factory

Original Link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-greenwald/more-reports-of-cancer-ne_b_1017997.html

By Robert Greenwald

Lance was one of the tens of thousands who saw our video, "EXPOSED: Koch Industries and Cancer Risks" and was activated to speak out against "Crossett Crud," which is how local doctors describe the sore throats, runny noses, burning eyes and the many other ailments that affect Crossett residents.

Lance went to school in Crossett and spent much of his life. He and his friends nicknamed the brown waterways near their home "Stink Creek." For as long as he could remember, the smell had stained the community, he said in an interview with Koch Brothers Exposed producers.

"It's a sickening thought what's going on in Crossett," Lance said in an interview. "My parents could be next."

Lance is an alumni of a school system that ranks in the top 1 percentile of exposure to cancer causing toxins.

For every one Lance, there's many other individuals who've suffered, or continue suffering, so the Koch brothers could profit. But because the Koch Industries factory is the biggest employer in Crossett, many people are reluctant to speak out. The company donates just enough money to the schools, police department, local churches and the Chamber of Commerce that the company is untouchable, even though the company's pollutants are odorous from the steps of City Hall.

Many of the comments we received from our video at Koch Brothers Exposed were aghast that government regulators allow the Koch brothers' pollution to harm individuals.

But it's permitted by the Environmental Protection Agency. The Koch brothers' billions affords them access to establish or influence politicians, think tanks, family foundations and front groups to weaken oversight and safety laws. The EPA, local agencies and Arkansas state officials are unable to enforce existing laws and precedent in the face of the Koch brothers and their $100 billion Koch Industries.

That's why we're trying to help the people of Crossett with comments they can use to confront the Koch brothers. See their stories and take action to fight back.

You might save lives in Arkansas.

The class warfare the rich don't understand

Original Link: http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/10/2011106141230738325.html

By Heather Digby Parton

The Masters of the Universe evaded responsibility and defiantly demanded more sacrifice from their victims, says author.

"Those who own the country ought to govern it."

- Founding father, John Jay

There have been rumblings in the corners of the Tea party movement for some time, but the minute president Obama announced that he was going to ask wealthy Americans to kick in a small bit more in taxes to help pay for some infrastructure improvements in his jobs proposal, the Republicans have been clutching their pearls and gasping for breath like Aunt Pittypat awaiting the arrival of the marauding Yankees.

GOP leader Rush Limbaugh called for the smelling salts, saying "If [Obama] would get all of this actually passed, it would represent perhaps a fatal blow to the US private sector ... I don't know how anyone could even argue about the fact that this is on purpose anymore. To boldly lie that it's not class warfare? It is class warfare. Specifically and purposefully class warfare."

Republican economic guru Paul Ryan dolefully declared, "Class warfare may make for good politics, but it makes for rotten economics. We don't need a system that seeks to divide people. We don't need a system that seeks to prey on people's fear, envy, and anxiety." Indeed. What could be more destructive to the average American than to ask the upper one per cent to kick in what amounts to tip money? The guilt they will feel at such unfairness is bound to create a profound spiritual crisis throughout the land.

A false hope

One would have thought that in 2011, the term "class warfare" would be as out of fashion as Nehru jackets, but after watching the Republicans spend the first two years of Obama's presidency apoplectic over what they defined as hard core socialism put in practice, it stands to reason the old standard would make a comeback. No matter what you call it, rich people complaining about taxes is evergreen. It is also completely ridiculous.

The fact is that the mega-rich have been gobbling up a greater and greater share of the national wealth for several decades now: in 1976 the top 1 per cent of households received 8.9 per cent of all pre-tax income - by 2008, its share had more than doubled to 21.0 per cent. Between 1979 and 2009, the top 5 per cent of American families saw their real incomes increase 72.7 per cent, according to Census data. Over the same period, the lowest-income fifth saw a decrease in real income of 7.4 per cent (by contrast, the 1947-79 period all income groups saw similar income gains, with the lowest income group actually seeing the largest gains). And perhaps most astonishingly, the tax rate for the highest earners was 91 per cent in 1960, 70 per cent in 1980 and only 35 per cent today, the lowest ever with the exception of a couple of years in the late 80s and early 90s.

And it's not as if these people have been suffering during this recession. Unlike the bottom 99 per cent, they've quite smartly recovered from the 2008 unpleasantness. For instance, according to a recent New York Times report, executive pay at 200 big US companies last year went up by an average 23 per cent over 2009 - the median executive salary was 10.8m USD. Meanwhile, the average American family's household net worth declined 23 per cent between 2007 and 2009.

Considering this somewhat ostentatious disparity, one would think that those who are doing well would decide to lay low and quietly count their money so as not to draw undue attention to their good fortune. One might even have expected them to take up good works and be especially generous in order to deflect the anger and resentment that any sentient being could see might result from such blatant unfairness. But no. They have instead waged a public campaign of extravagant whining, complaining incessantly that they are being scapegoated for the nation's economic ills and throwing tantrums at the mere suggestion that they might need to contribute a little bit more in taxes to make up for the carnage their bad bets left in their wake.

The mega-rich balk back

It started early on in the crisis, when Jake de Santis an executive for the bailed out too big to fail insurance company AIG took to the pages of the New York Times to complain that he was being treated unfairly and so was going to give his $750,000 annual bonus away and then quit his job. Evidently, he expected people to feel sorry for him.

Since then we have been treated to regular scoldings from the masters of the universe (for our own good, mind you.) JP Morgan Chase chairman Jamie Dimon famously declared, "When I hear the constant vilification of corporate America, I personally don't understand it. I would ask a lot of our folks in government to stop doing it because I think it's hurting our country". Blackstone Group Chief Executive Officer Steven Schwarzman said, "Financial institutions will feel under siege and they will retreat. Their entire world is being shaken and they're being attacked personally. We don't need those financial institutions insecure."

Just last month yet another anonymous finance executive sniffed to The Hill, "It's not healthy for rich people to feel maligned."

It's only a matter of time before these poor victimised millionaires seek some sort of anti-discrimination protection.

It's easy to make light of all this - they are just that silly. But the truth is that in the age of Citizens United, these complaints carry a great deal of weight with both political parties. After all, as Willie Sutton said about banks: they are where the money is. The irony is that the more the politicians pander to these besieged plutocrats, the deeper the country's problems become. Their bizarre insistence on austerity in the face of 10 per cent unemployment is making things worse for everyone, including themselves.

Martin Wolf the economics editor of the Financial Times, explained "premature fiscal tightening is, warns experience, as big a danger as delayed tightening would be. There are no certainties here. The world economy - or at least that of the advanced countries - remains disturbingly fragile. Only those who believe the economy is a morality play, in which those they deem wicked should suffer punishment, would enjoy that painful result." Somehow, the Very Serious People have managed to turn the blame back on the people, insisting that it's the average workers who have created America's economic woes with their fat social security checks and extravagant old age medical care. Combined with their irresponsible willingness to take the mortgages the banks were begging them to take, it's a strong indictment. So they must be taught a lesson - the debt shall be laid at their feet so that they will never again make the mistake of thinking that they are better than they ought to be.

Return of the protesters

The problem is that it's not at all clear that the people are willing to be the sin-eaters in this crisis. Having just lost their nest eggs, still reeling from debt, unemployed or career stymied they aren't anxious to sign on to austerity schemes that will make them even more insecure. Being required to do it on the orders of those who caused the problem in the first place - the same people who have recovered quite well and insist that they are far too valuable to waste their time paying for government - is not sitting well.

The polls show that large majorities believe the wealthy should pay more in taxes and that the social safety net should not be sacrificed on the altar of the deficit. They want the government to intervene to create jobs. Those sentiments have been stable throughout the crisis and yet the people's wishes are ignored. As a result they are becoming more and more disillusioned with the system. And they are starting to take to the streets.

It's too soon to know if the nascent Occupy Wall Street movement will grow or if it will have staying power. Who knows if the protesters will be able to endure the police responses or stave off the inevitable infighting. Perhaps it will break into sub groups or morph into something else entirely. But the focus on Wall Street alone should be enough to make the 1 per cent take pause and question their assumptions. When you have everyone from students to airline pilots looking to the same institutions as the source of their woes, it's time to take a look in the mirror (or a position in pitchforks.)

Is this a class war? Yes, probably. And it's one of those really long wars, the kind that goes on forever. But in this latest battle, there's little doubt who fired the first shot. When the financial crisis hit, the Masters of the Universe evaded responsibility and defiantly demanded more sacrifice from their victims. They enlisted their favoured politicians to hold the people hostage and then complained about being unloved despite their crimes. They have won all the early skirmishes - but the people are gathering their forces and starting to fight back.

"The top 1 per cent have the best houses, the best educations, the best doctors, and the best lifestyles, but there is one thing that money doesn't seem to have bought: an understanding that their fate is bound up with how the other 99 per cent live Throughout history, this is something that the top 1 per cent eventually do learn. Too Late."

Joseph Stiglitz

THE SEVEN BIGGEST ECONOMIC LIES

Original Link: http://robertreich.org/post/11329289033

By Robert Reich

The President’s Jobs Bill doesn’t have a chance in Congress — and the Occupiers on Wall Street and elsewhere can’t become a national movement for a more equitable society – unless more Americans know the truth about the economy.

Here’s a short (2 minute 30 second) effort to rebut the seven biggest whoppers now being told by those who want to take America backwards. The major points:

1. Tax cuts for the rich trickle down to everyone else. Baloney. Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush both sliced taxes on the rich and what happened? Most Americans’ wages (measured by the real median wage) began flattening under Reagan and have dropped since George W. Bush. Trickle-down economics is a cruel joke.

2. Higher taxes on the rich would hurt the economy and slow job growth. False. From the end of World War II until 1981, the richest Americans faced a top marginal tax rate of 70 percent or above. Under Dwight Eisenhower it was 91 percent. Even after all deductions and credits, the top taxes on the very rich were far higher than they’ve been since. Yet the economy grew faster during those years than it has since. (Don’t believe small businesses would be hurt by a higher marginal tax; fewer than 2 percent of small business owners are in the highest tax bracket.)

3. Shrinking government generates more jobs. Wrong again. It means fewer government workers – everyone from teachers, fire fighters, police officers, and social workers at the state and local levels to safety inspectors and military personnel at the federal. And fewer government contractors, who would employ fewer private-sector workers. According to Moody’s economist Mark Zandi (a campaign advisor to John McCain), the $61 billion in spending cuts proposed by the House GOP will cost the economy 700,000 jobs this year and next.

4. Cutting the budget deficit now is more important than boosting the economy. Untrue. With so many Americans out of work, budget cuts now will shrink the economy. They’ll increase unemployment and reduce tax revenues. That will worsen the ratio of the debt to the total economy. The first priority must be getting jobs and growth back by boosting the economy. Only then, when jobs and growth are returning vigorously, should we turn to cutting the deficit.

5. Medicare and Medicaid are the major drivers of budget deficits. Wrong. Medicare and Medicaid spending is rising quickly, to be sure. But that’s because the nation’s health-care costs are rising so fast. One of the best ways of slowing these costs is to use Medicare and Medicaid’s bargaining power over drug companies and hospitals to reduce costs, and to move from a fee-for-service system to a fee-for-healthy outcomes system. And since Medicare has far lower administrative costs than private health insurers, we should make Medicare available to everyone.

6. Social Security is a Ponzi scheme. Don’t believe it. Social Security is solvent for the next 26 years. It could be solvent for the next century if we raised the ceiling on income subject to the Social Security payroll tax. That ceiling is now $106,800.

7. It’s unfair that lower-income Americans don’t pay income tax. Wrong. There’s nothing unfair about it. Lower-income Americans pay out a larger share of their paychecks in payroll taxes, sales taxes, user fees, and tolls than everyone else.

Demagogues through history have known that big lies, repeated often enough, start being believed — unless they’re rebutted. These seven economic whoppers are just plain wrong. Make sure you know the truth – and spread it on.

Herman Cain's long ties to Koch Brothers

Original Link: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/10/16/politics/main20121046.shtml

Republican presidential hopeful Herman Cain has cast himself as the outsider, the pizza magnate with real-world experience who will bring fresh ideas to the nation's capital. But Cain's economic ideas, support and organization have close ties to two billionaire brothers who bankroll right-leaning causes through their group Americans for Prosperity.

Cain's campaign manager and a number of aides have worked for Americans for Prosperity, or AFP, the advocacy group founded with support from billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, which lobbies for lower taxes and less government regulation and spending. Cain credits a businessman who served on an AFP advisory board with helping devise his "9-9-9" plan to rewrite the nation's tax code. And his years of speaking at AFP events have given the businessman and radio host a network of loyal grassroots fans.

The once little-known businessman's political activities are getting fresh scrutiny these days since he soared to the top of some national polls.

His links to the Koch brothers could undercut his outsider, non-political image among Tea Party fans who detest politics as usual and candidates connected with the party machine.

AFP tapped Cain as the public face of its "Prosperity Expansion Project," and he traveled the country in 2005 and 2006 speaking to activists who were starting state-based AFP chapters from Wisconsin to Virginia. Through his AFP work he met Mark Block, a longtime Wisconsin Republican operative hired to lead that state's AFP chapter in 2005 as he rebounded from an earlier campaign scandal that derailed his career.

Block and Cain sometimes traveled together as they built up AFP: Cain was the charismatic speaker preaching the ills of big government; Block was the operative helping with nuts and bolts.

When President Barack Obama's election helped spawn the tea party, Cain was positioned to take advantage. He became a draw at growing AFP-backed rallies, impressing activists with a mix of humor and hard-hitting rhetoric against Obama's stimulus, health care and budget policies.

Block is now Cain's campaign manager. Other aides who had done AFP work were also brought on board.

Cain's spokeswoman Ellen Carmichael, who recently left the campaign, was an AFP coordinator in Louisiana. His campaign's outside law firm is representing AFP in a case challenging Wisconsin campaign finance regulations. At least six other current and former paid employees and consultants for Cain's campaign have worked for AFP in various capacities.

And Cain has credited Rich Lowrie, a Cleveland businessman who served on AFP's board of advisors from 2005 to 2008, with being a key economic adviser and with helping to develop his plan to cut the corporate tax rate to 9 percent, impose a national sales tax of 9 percent and set a flat income tax rate of 9 percent

"He's got a national network now that perhaps he wouldn't have had 15 or 20 years ago because of his work with AFP," said Republican Party of Wisconsin Vice Chair Brian Schimming, who has introduced Cain at events in Wisconsin. "For a presidential candidate, that's obviously helpful to have."

He said Cain was smart to hire Block.

Cain's recent victories in straw polls in Florida and Minnesota highlight the importance of organizing supporters and Block, who has a deep network in the tea party, "gets that side of it," Schimming said.

But Block has had his problems as well. He settled a suit in 2001 accusing him of illegally coordinating a Wisconsin Supreme Court justice's re-election with an outside group. Block agreed to pay $15,000 and sit out of politics for three years.

While Cain is quick to promote his career at the helm of the Godfather's Pizza chain, his ties to AFP aren't something the candidate appears eager to highlight.

His campaign did not respond to inquiries seeking comment, and Cain does not include his AFP work on his biography on his website.

But Cain continues to work with the group.

While several other candidates will be at an Iowa Republican Party dinner on Nov. 4, Cain is scheduled to be in Washington mingling with activists at AFP's annual "Defending the American Dream" summit. He is the only confirmed presidential candidate for the event.

AFP spokesman Levi Russell said Cain has spoken at dozens of AFP rallies and events over the years to support a number of the group's activities. AFP has often covered his travel expenses or paid a "pretty modest honorarium" but he has not been paid since becoming a presidential candidate, he said.

"He's a dynamic, pro-business speaker that connects well with our activists," Russell said. "AFP is a very large organization, and there is a natural overlap between Cain's message of fiscal responsibility and the basic principles that AFP advocates for."

A spokeswoman for the Koch brothers did not respond to The Associated Press's request for comment on Cain.

To some liberals, Cain's rise with the help of AFP shows the incredible influence that outside groups controlled by super-wealthy individuals with specific agendas can have on the political process.

"Herman Cain is the first presidential corporate spokes-candidate," said Scot Ross, a liberal activist who leads One Wisconsin Now, which has often mocked AFP as a front group for corporate interests. "The best way to have your issues talked about in the issue debate is to have a candidate in your pocket with snappy comebacks and easily branded policy papers which mask how destructive they would be."

AFP's agenda also includes weakening private and public sector unions, opposing environmental regulations and undoing Obama's health care reform law, among other policies. But before the tea party and Obama, Cain worked with AFP on more local issues.

In 2006, he campaigned all over Wisconsin in support of a proposed constitutional amendment that would have limited state government spending. A slew of officials and analysts said the plan would have ultimately devastated government services, and the Republican-controlled Legislature eventually backed off it.

In a statement announcing Cain's tour, AFP sent out a press release touting his "in-depth understanding of the battle to control out-of-control government taxes and spending." Block promised that Cain was a speaker that activists would not want to miss.

Wisconsin GOP's (Koch-Led?) Plan to Hijack the Presidential Election

Original Link: http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/10/wisconsin-joins-gop-electoral-college-shenanigans

By Nick Baumann

Last month, Pennsylvania Republicans launched a plan to change the way the state votes for president. Badger State GOPers are following their lead.

—By Nick Baumann

Last month, Pennsylvania Republicans attracted national attention—and faced a local backlash—after Mother Jones noted their plan to change how the Keystone State awards electoral votes in a way that could make it much harder for President Barack Obama to win reelection. The plan has since stalled in the Pennsylvania Legislature, but that doesn't seem to matter to Wisconsin GOPers, who recently decided to try the exact same move.

As I reported last month, the rules of the electoral college provide Republicans with an opportunity to undermine Obama's reelection plans. In the presidential election, each state is worth a number of electoral votes equal to the size of the state's congressional delegation. Each determines how its electoral votes are allocated, and all but two states use a winner-take-all system in which the candidate who wins the popular vote in the state gets all of its electoral votes. Under the Republicans' plan for Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, the states would change from this system to one in which each congressional district gets its own electoral vote. (Two electoral votes—one for each of the state's two senators—would go to the statewide winner.)

As in Pennsylvania, the GOP controls both houses of the Wisconsin Legislature plus the governor's mansion—the so-called "redistricting trifecta." Congressional district maps are adjusted after every census, and the last one was completed in 2010. In states where they control the trifecta, Republicans will get to draw the boundaries of the congressional districts without any input from Democrats. Pennsylvania is likely to have 12 safe GOP seats compared to just 6 safe Democratic seats; Wisconsin is expected to have a 5-3 R-D split.

Under the Republican plan, if the GOP presidential nominee carries the GOP-leaning districts in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin but Obama wins both states, the GOP nominee would get 17 electoral votes. Obama would only get 11—9 for winning the blue districts, and 4 (representing each state's two senators) for winning the two states. Obama would lose 17 electoral votes relative to the winner-take-all baseline—a larger effect than flipping Michigan, which has 16 electoral votes—from blue to red.

In Wisconsin, the electoral college change is being pushed by Rep. Dan LeMahieu, whose office told Slate's Dave Weigel that his bill has two cosponsors so far. The state's Democrats are wise to LeMahieu's plan—Kelda Roys, the chair of the Assembly Democratic Caucus, sent an email to her colleagues slamming the bill soon after LeMahieu started looking for cosponsors—but that doesn't mean it's doomed. Unlike the Pennsylvania Republicans, Wisconsin's GOPers have been remarkably good at sticking together on tough votes (like Gov. Scott Walker's controversial, union-busting "budget repair" bill). They hold a one-vote majority in the state Senate—not a lot, but enough to win in a pinch.

[UPDATE, 6:20pm EST Wednesday: The Wisconsin Democratic party has just issued a statement alleging that LeMahieu's bill was "written by a Koch Brothers corporate front group." They probably mean the American Legislative Exchange Council, but there's no publicly available evidence at this point (other than similar bills cropping up in two different states) that ALEC is involved. Here's the Dems' full statement:

MADISON—Following is the statement of Democratic Party of Wisconsin Chair Mike Tate in response to the Republican plot to split Wisconsin's electoral votes.

"The plot to split Wisconsin's electoral votes, written by a Koch Brothers corporate front group, is another bald-faced power grab by Scott Walker's Republican Party. They have sought to suppress votes and bring Jim Crow to the North, they have shut down hearings to the public, they have prevented elected representatives from making votes, they have disregarded the norms and traditions of our Legislature, they have run phony candidates, they have forged signatures, they have coordinated illegally with the corporations that fund them and now this.

Splitting Wisconsin's electoral votes is part of a Tea Party fantasy that seeks power above all. This is offensive to Wisconsin's traditions and it must be denounced."

This story will be updated as more information becomes available.]

Carolyn Fiddler, the communications director for the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, which works to elect Dems in state-level races, thinks LeMahieu's bill is a sign that Republicans haven't learned the lessons of this summer's recall elections, which ousted two Republican state senators. "Just when we thought the Democratic successes in the Wisconsin recalls put the brakes on extreme Republican power grabs there, a GOPer proves us wrong," she says.

Nebraska and Maine already have the system that the Wisconsin is trying to implement, but as I explained last month, the two states' small electoral vote values mean it's mathematically impossible for a candidate to win the popular vote there but lose the electoral vote. (It's theoretically possible in Wisconsin, but unlikely; if the bill passed, the worst Obama could probably do there is an electoral college split.)

The GOP going this direction wasn't entirely unexpected. Weigel calls it "inevitable," and I predicted it might happen:

It doesn't necessarily end there. After their epic sweep of state legislative and gubernatorial races in 2010, Republicans also have total political control of Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin, three other big states that traditionally go Democratic and went for Obama in 2008. Implementing a Pennsylvania-style system in those three places—in Ohio, for example, Democrats anticipate controlling just 4 or 5 of the state's 16 congressional districts—could offset Obama wins in states where he has expanded the electoral map, like Colorado, New Mexico, North Carolina, or Virginia. "If all these Rust Belt folks get together and make this happen, that could be really dramatic," says Carolyn Fiddler, a spokeswoman for the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC), which coordinates state political races for the Dems.

Democrats would not be able to retaliate. The only states that John McCain won where Dems control both houses of the state legislature are Arkansas and West Virginia. West Virginia is too small for splitting the electoral votes to have much effect. That leaves Arkansas, another small state—and one where McCain won every district handily in 2008.

What the GOP is trying may be odd, but it's not illegal or unconstitutional:

"The Constitution is pretty silent on how the electors are chosen in each state," says Karl Manheim, a law professor at Loyola University in Los Angeles. The GOP plan "would certainly increase the political advantage of politically gerrymandering your districts," he adds.