Outsmarting ALEC

DemKOCHracy in America

The powerful American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a corporate backed organization that has been writing massive amounts of legislation for Conservative politicians to march back into their state legislatures for passsage.

This law-making machine went largely unreported until the Conservative takeover of the House of Representatives and most state legislatures in 2010 yielded a gusher of ALEC bills that have left a widespread ALEC slick across the nation this year: Discrimination against family planning coverage in health insurance for women, union-busting, anti-environmental protections, voter suppression, and privatizing schools and penal systems for profit. All organized and coordinated efforts to promote a pro-corporate , pro-wealthy agenda by exploiting the rights of women, middle class workers, school aged children, and the poor .......while passing and protecting tax breaks for corporations and the wealthy.

Corporations fund 98% of ALEC revenues and Petro-Chemical  Koch Industries has been a long term presence on the governing board of ALEC.

CHARLES and DAVID KOCH. With annual revenues of 100 billion dollars, they have grown not only a Tea Party movement, but a sprawling network of foundations, think tanks, front groups, advocacy organizations, lobbyists, and sadly,....politicians parading as the free thinking lawmakers, to push their agenda. On Social Security alone, they have funded think tanks in an 28.4 million dollar effort to manufacture 297 opinions and commentaries, 200 reports, 56 studies, and 6 books distorting Social Security effectiveness and purpose. All in the name of PRIVATIZATION.

Free Markets?. Limited Governmen? It turns out that ALEC seeks not to limit government, but to take over previously held government responsibilities so corporations reap profits from our tax dollars.

How does ALEC do it?
1. Maintain an environment of public fear . ie.The NRA worked with ALEC to pass The Stand Your Ground Laws in 24 out of our 50 states. That's almost half our nation. It didnt work out too well for the" freedom and liberty" of a black kid as he walked home on a public street in Florida

I felt "threatened" recently by a motorist with an NRA sticker on his bumper. He pointed to my bumper sticker and proceded to harrass me and drive erratically around me all the way up Highway 49. I guess when you pack a gun, it gives you the " freedom and liberty" to do that.
My husband urged me to remove the patriotic bumper sticker for my own safety. A few days later, some old duffer took it upon himself to assist me in that regard as my car sat parked at the Alta Sierra Country Club. So much for my freedom from fear and freedom of speech.

2. Exploit those public fears. ie., The Voter Fraud bills were based on allegations of widespread fraud which negated the vote of certain" freedom and liberty" loving Americans . Upon actual investigation, however, voter fraud was found to be virtually non-existent and these laws only end up suppressing the very basic right to vote for mostly elderly, poor, students, and non driving women in our country. State legislatures have been pushing these laws all across the nation.  In the Pennsylvania legislature, Rep Tarzai recently bragged,"Voter ID, which is gonna allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania. Done!"

Following pressure and exposure by several watchdog groups such as the Center for Media and Democracy, ALEC recently disbanded its Task Force responsible for Voter ID laws and the Stand Your Ground Law after several corporations left the ranks.

Who else will leave the ranks?
We can take a lesson from the recent resignation of one of our own local citizens from his position as co-founder and spokesperson of the National Tea Party Patriots. In part, he cited the reason for his departure to have been the corporatization (his word) of the organization calling it a "big top-down organization" raising millions of dollars with only a very small portion trickling down to grassroots on the ground. He also cited its association with Americans for Prosperity and the .....wait for it....Koch brothers.  The same Koch brothers that the Romney camp referred to as "the financial engine of the Tea Party" while being wined at dined by the oligarchs at their Park City, Utah compound recently.

You can search the Union archives over the years for the times I have alerted readers of this "association" between the Tea party and the Oil and Gas billionaire Koch brothers. They sowed the seeds. You bet they intend to reap the benefits. And if a near-sighted old biddy like me could trip over them on her way to researching the movement, why cant those who still follow them?

Several members of the local Tea Party, and one member in particular, has attacked my freedom to speak with an attempt to shackle my writing wrist in the stockade of public ridicule each and every time I wrote to TheUnion regarding special interest ties to the Tea Party.

  Kamikazee drivers packing guns in the trunk, old golfers who bow to the spire that transmits talk radio three hours a day, and harrassing ad hominum attacks may attempt to threaten my personal right to free speech; but I bet you $10,000 they can never intimidate, rip, or harrass away the spirit of Americans who understand that real freedom is never gained at the expense of someone else's freedom.

The real and far reaching fear for all freedom loving Americans is the passage of Citizens United and the unlimited amount of Corporate campaign contributions politicians will be receiving if they step to the right, to the right, to the right while marching to the ALEC tune.
Because when Citizens United allowed Corporations to fund political campaigns without restraint, they allowed a well greased path for "We The Wealthy" and special interests to get politicians voted into office, take a pledge to cripple government, and remove those who wont. And fill the void with corporate power.

While  profit continues to drown the 1% and their shareholders.....  that  so- called   trickle has dried up before reaching  the jobholders.

We the People may not have their billions to buyout this country. They can harass, obstruct, concoct, distract, and disparage.........but We still have the VOTE.  The question is.... do voters have the smarts to outsmart ALEC?











　

Holy War on Women

　
Holy War against Women
March is Women's History month. In the middle to late 1800's, Aaron A. Sargent, a Republican US Senator from Califonia resided right here on Broad St. in Nevada City with his wife Ellen Clark Seragent. Ellen Sargent formed the first Suffragist movement in Nevada City in 1869 and Susan B. Anthony was a friend and vistor to their home. Aaron Sargent was moved by their struggle for an equal political voice and is attributed with the wording of what would become the 19th amendment. The bill would be introduced unsucessfully each year for 40 years, but it wasnt until after their deaths that the 19th amendment was voted into law in 1920.
So, where are the men who stand up for women's rights today?
President Obama has been a friend to women's health with new contraceptive guidelines under the Affordable Care Act. The ACA ended the discriminatory practice of insurers charging women 50% more than men for health coverage. He has made sure that ALL women have access to contraception by compromising wih religious institutions who will not have to provide contraceptive coverage that conflicts with religious beliefs. A woman's insurer will be required to offer her coverage without additional cost. The compromise resolved religious liberty concerns while respecting the health needs of women. The Catholic Health Association has lauded the decision. But that's not good enough for some.

The League of Women Voters has issued an alert regarding the Blunt-Rubio amendment being introduced in the Senate which would limit access to contraceptive services for women if any employer or insurance plan had a "moral objection" to it. Since when is an employee's medical record the business of an employer? What is the boss doing in our bed?
And can I hear the word Vasectomy? Just once? Vasectomies are covered by most health insurance. But Conservatives dare not mess with the male vote. Let's be clear, women, if men were the ones to get pregnant, it would interfere with their golf swing.
All four standing candidates in the Republican Presidential Primaries have stated their intent to repeal the health care reform law which eliminates the economic barriers to contraception. In other words, wealthy women will still be able to shop till they drop for contraception, undergo abortions in spa-like surroundings , and hand pick surrogate mothers to carry their children. Working women, not so much.

Why are the voices we hear not from women, but from fanatical politicans like Rick Santorum and religious celibates like Archbishop Tim Dolan, who blur political platform and Church Law. It has become a holy war for Rick Santorum. Like a comical Jughead in a lopsided mitre, Santorum continues to spew his personal religious edicts from the bully pulpit in a flagrant disregard for American women under the Constitution: their needs, their rights, their choices, their voices, and their place in society.
The truth is.... family plannng is a moral responsibility. Not a sin. And Abstinence rarely works.
If an American woman does not have freedom over her own reproductive health choices, made in most cases with her own husband and her doctor, then that woman is as much imprisoned in a radical religious culture as her counterparts in the Muslim world.
Republican Governor Bob McDonald of Virginia recently introduced an invasive Intravaginal Ultrasound bill which would require a woman seeking an abortion to submit to a mandatory Intra Vaginal ultrasound. Alabama, Virginia , and Pennsylvania quickly followed suit. Lets get this straight........Rep. Rand Paul refuses to go through an airport security patdown because it is an invasion of his liberties. A patdown. But a woman seeking an abortion must submit to a mandatory 10 inch ultrasound wand intravaginally?
We cannot wait for Darrel Issa to ask a woman or a woman's health advocate to speak before Congress on the issue of Religious Rights and Women's Health. It didnt happen. Apparently, women ovulate, lactate, and dilate, but only men can dictate when it comes to womens reproductive health. Women in this nation need to sit up in the stirrups and ask the question....Whose body is this, anyway? We must speak loud and clear with the vote handed down to us by the women, and men, who fought long and hard for a woman's voice in politics almost 100 years ago. We must use our voice in our vote and speak out for ourselves.
Pssst, Contraception prevents Abortion.