Friday, June 30, 2006

Paying Taxes Is One of the Best Ways for the Wealthy to Be Philanthropic

In face of the deafening media silence this week in response to Warren Buffett's criticism (on Monday) of the Republican plan to repeal the estate tax (I didn't hear about this critique until some fellow bloggers informed me of it today on DailyKos), I’m glad to hear that someone like Mark Kramer is pointing out the limitations of even a large private philanthropic donation like Buffett’s $31 billion to the Gates Foundation. [See here for Kramer's recent Opinion piece in the Chronicle of Philanthropy (excerpted below).]

Ever since I heard about the announcement of Buffett's donation at the beginning of this week, and watched the media blitz, and listened to the interview of Buffett and Gates on the Charlie Rose show (none of which mentioned Buffett's statements in support of the estate tax), the old question I've long had about philanthropy was bugging me: If wealthy philanthropists like Gates and Buffett truly desire to do the most good for the poor of the world, why do they not use the power (of their great status, wealth, and public voice) to focus public criticism on the tax-cutting policies that are reducing this country to ruin?--policies that, in their combined impact, will probably do much more harm than can ever be repaired by many Buffett-size philanthropic gifts?

Wouldn't the greatest philanthropy of wealthy people be for them first and primarily to insist on, and speak out about, the importance of paying taxes--instead of allowing the Bush administration and the Republican Congress to give the wealthy ever greater tax breaks?!!

Here is a brief excerpt from Mark Kramer's piece:

Don't Confuse Generosity With Impact on Society
With the stroke of a pen, Warren Buffett has committed more money to charity in a single transaction than anyone in history.

In current dollars, his $31-billion gift is double the total lifetime philanthropic contributions of Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller combined. Yet this noble gift also casts light on one of the most central dilemmas of philanthropy — the inadvertent sleight of hand that confuses the generosity of the gift with the impact on society. . . . All the attention to the gift has focused on the magnitude of the pledge and the character of the donor — so much so that the much tougher challenge of turning money into a solution for social problems gets overlooked.

The pen stroke that committed these funds to charity does not itself improve anyone's lot... No medical research has yet been financed, no social services subsidized, no schools improved. The money has entered a twilight zone from which social impact will, at best, slowly emerge over many decades.... More and more money is donated to charity every year, yet America's schools continue to fail, poverty continues to rise, and our environment seems ever more precarious. We would like to think that our contributions make a difference — and large contributions make a large difference — but there is surprisingly little evidence that this is so.

The publicity that attends gifts such as this deludes us into thinking that if only more people were more generous, the world's problems would be solved. But the $1.5-billion that Mr. Buffett will contribute each year over the coming decades is only a small addition to the total contributions from the rest of us. In fact, it is just about one-half of 1 percent of the $260-billion that Americans gave to charity last year. The knowledge of how to use charitable dollars effectively turns out to be a much rarer commodity than the dollars themselves.

Mark Kramer is a co-founder and managing director of FSG Social Impact Advisors, a nonprofit consulting firm, a senior fellow at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government, and a co-founder of the Center for Effective Philanthropy. He can be reached at Mark.Kramer@FSG-impact.org

To read more, click here.

What I did not learn from any of the media coverage I heard or saw this week, including the hour-long interview with Charlie Rose on Monday night, was that after signing his large check to the Gates foundation on Monday, according to Reuters, Buffett called for Congress to retain the estate tax:

"I would hate to see the estate tax gutted," Buffett said.... "It's a very equitable tax"... It's in keeping with the idea of equality of opportunity in this country, not giving incredible head starts to certain people who were very selective about the womb from which they emerged."


So, for the record, I want to cite some of the few additional media sources that have documented the opinions of Buffett and Gates, Sr., in support of the estate tax, and in criticism of the tax-cutting policies currently being pursued by Congress. (Perhaps if enough bloggers mention these details, the dominant media will eventually be forced to give them more attention.)

One of the few sources that cited Buffett's critique of tax-cutting policies in some detail this week was a CNN Money interview posted last Sunday. In this interview, Buffett explains how both he and his wife Susie
agreed with Andrew Carnegie, who said that huge fortunes that flow in large part from society should in large part be returned to society. In my case, the ability to allocate capital would have had little utility unless I lived in a rich, populous country in which enormous quantities of marketable securities were traded and were sometimes ridiculously mispriced. And fortunately for me, that describes the U.S. in the second half of the last century.

Certainly neither Susie nor I ever thought we should pass huge amounts of money along to our children. Our kids are great. But I would argue that when your kids have all the advantages anyway, in terms of how they grow up and the opportunities they have for education, including what they learn at home - I would say it's neither right nor rational to be flooding them with money.

In effect, they've had a gigantic headstart in a society that aspires to be a meritocracy. Dynastic mega-wealth would further tilt the playing field that we ought to be trying instead to level.


Indeed, Buffett and William Gates, Sr., have been working together with some other wealthy Americans to oppose cuts in the estate tax ever since 2001. As a February 2001 New York Times article detailed, in 2001 some 120 wealthy Americans including Buffett, Gates, Sr., and George Soros joined together to urge Congress not to repeal taxes on estates and gifts. Gates Sr. even organized a petition drive, arguing that "repealing the estate tax would enrich the heirs of America's millionaires and billionaires while hurting families who struggle to make ends meet." Gates worked together with United for a Fair Economy, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization in Boston that wants to narrow the gap between rich and poor.

The elder Mr. Gates said the money that Mr. Bush wanted to devote to repeal of the estate and gift taxes could be put to better use "to reduce other taxes, which affect the other end of the economic spectrum."

"Ever since I heard that somebody was trying to repeal the estate tax, I have been angry," Mr. Gates said, adding that if it were not for his full-time job, he would organize a group called Millionaires for the Estate Tax.


This New York Times article also quotes Buffett as saying:
"Without the estate tax, you in effect will have an aristocracy of wealth, which means you pass down the ability to command the resources of the nation based on heredity rather than merit."

Another article at Bloomberg.com has noted that
The elder Gates said the estate tax is fair because more than half the assets the wealthy pass on to their heirs has never been taxed. In addition, he said, revenue from other taxes probably helped create the economic conditions and innovation that allowed the richest to build their fortunes.

As USA Today noted in early 2003, Gates, Sr. understands that the wealth achieved by rich Americans would not have been possible without the benefits provided by American society and government: "Most of the things that have generated the enormous advances in our economy are things that started on some campus or in some laboratory," and these things were possible because the government helped to finance them.

Meanwhile, even as some enlightened souls like Buffett and William Gates, Sr., the father of Bill Gates, support the estate tax, many wealthy families (such as the Walton, Mars, and Nordstrom families) are behind the Congressional drive to eliminate it, as this article and the work of Public Citizen suggests. And it is perhaps these efforts, combined with the silence of the majority of wealthy families--in the face of tax policies that will allow wealth to become even more concentrated among the few, while the many get poorer--that explains why the dominant media, which is now owned by increasingly concentrated and wealthy ownership, largely smothered Buffett's brief critique of the estate tax earlier this week.

You can read more of what Gates, Sr., has to say on these issues in his book, Wealth and Our Commonwealth: Why America Should Tax Accumulated Fortunes.

And you can find more details on Warren Buffett's views on tax policy here.

Declare Energy Independence This July 4th!

A July 4th Message from Robert Borosage, of the Campaign for America's Future, and Jerome Ringo, of the Apollo Alliance:
Earlier this month at Take Back America 2006, the Campaign for America's Future and the Apollo Alliance unveiled the Apollo Challenge, asking your help to challenge our nation's leaders to achieve energy independence within the decade.

The 4th of July is a celebration of our nation's independence, our spirit of hope, and our ability to realize audacious dreams. That's why we're asking you to join in signing the "Apollo Challenge" to build a national citizens' movement for clean, homegrown energy and good jobs. We've set a goal of signing up 50,000 Americans over the holiday weekend. Join us in this call for energy independence today!

We all know that our nation is facing a growing addiction to oil. And the folks who decide things in Washington aren't about to solve our oil problem. They owe too much to Big Oil.

It's become obvious that America's oil addiction hurts our security, our economy and our environment. Our troops are bogged down in two ugly wars in the Middle East. Working families are having a tougher time making ends meet because of $3 gasoline. We're running a $1 trillion deficit with the rest of the world, about one-fourth of it in oil imports alone. And as the world's biggest consumers of oil, we contribute the most to the global warming that threatens the future we'll leave our children.

Those who say we can't meet these challenges are simply wrong. If we commit ourselves, we can move to energy independence while generating new jobs and new opportunities for our country.

We must launch a concerted drive for energy independence -- a national Apollo Program to invest in clean, homegrown fuels, renewable power, and efficiency. We can slash oil imports by 50 percent and create up to 3 million good jobs in ten years. Brazil managed to replace enough oil with homegrown ethanol that it has virtually stopped importing oil. If Brazil can do it, America can too.

President Kennedy lifted our nation's sights by challenging us to send a man to the moon. Today we do not have that kind of leadership in the White House. So it will require citizen-leaders to issue the modern day Apollo Challenge, challenging our nation's leaders to create a new Apollo Program to invest in clean energy and good jobs.

This Fourth of July, join this movement by taking the Apollo Challenge now! Together, we can build a grassroots citizens' movement that will challenge our nation's leaders to create new energy, new jobs and declare a new independence for America!

Sign the "Apollo Challenge" now and join us in making this 4th of July a day of hope and "independence."
For more information on the Apollo Challenge, please also check out the Apollo Alliance's "New Energy for America" Job Report, and the Ten-Point Plan for Good Jobs and Energy Independence:

1. Promote Advanced Technology & Hybrid Cars

2. Invest In More Efficient Factories

3. Encourage High Performance Building

4. Increase Use of Energy Efficient Appliances

5. Modernize Electrical Infrastructure

6. Expand Renewable Energy Development

7. Improve Transportation Options

8. Reinvest In Smart Urban Growth

9. Plan For A Hydrogen Future

10. Preserve Regulatory Protections

Wednesday, June 28, 2006

The "Free Press" Under Attack--Remember History, Anyone?

As today's Daily Progress Report of the Center for American Progress has noted:

"The New York Times--which earlier broke the story on President Bush's warrantless domestic eavesdropping program--has been the main target of attacks by the right wing and the administration" for its recent reporting on the Bush administration's not-so-secret program to track international banking transactions." Rep. Peter King (R-NY) argued that the paper's reporters, editors, and publishers responsible for the story should be charged under the Espionage Act, punishable by up to 20 years in prison."

As the CFAP Progress Report argues, however, "While journalists do need to weigh whether reporting classified information will jeopardize national security, the administration's argument jeopardizes the 'aggressive, independent press' that is an 'essential ingredient for self-government.'"

In fact, New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller provided an eloquent defense of the New York Times decision to publish this story in a response to readers. Here is a one paragraph excerpt from his response, which you can read in full here:
It's an unusual and powerful thing, this freedom that our founders gave to the press. Who are the editors of The New York Times (or the Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post and other publications that also ran the banking story) to disregard the wishes of the President and his appointees? And yet the people who invented this country saw an aggressive, independent press as a protective measure against the abuse of power in a democracy, and an essential ingredient for self-government. They rejected the idea that it is wise, or patriotic, to always take the President at his word, or to surrender to the government important decisions about what to publish. [emphasis added]
The Progress Report continues:
Not only did [Rep. Peter] King call the New York Times journalists "treasonous," but he also said the paper is "putting its own arrogant, elitist, left-wing agenda before the interests of the American people." Yesterday on Fox News, he likened the journalists' actions to "handing over confidential documents to Osama bin Laden." Talk show host Melanie Morgan backed up King's argument that the New York Times editor is guilty of treason and right-wing blogger Michelle Malkin told the New York Times and Los Angeles Times to "learn when to shut up." The conservative House leadership has introduced a measure to criticize the New York Times for its SWIFT reporting, which the House will vote upon either today or tomorrow. The resolution is being drafted under the leadership of Majority Leader Rep. John Boehner's (R-OH) office.
Of course, it is not only some radical right Republicans in Congress who are leading this crusade against the free press. Rather, this anti-free press crusade is being egged on by the White House:
Both President Bush and Vice President Cheney came out strongly against the journalists who published the story. On Monday, Bush said that for "people to leak that program, and for a newspaper to publish it, does great harm to the United States of America." Cheney singled out the New York Times in his criticisms: "Some of the press, in particular the New York Times, have made the job of defending against further terrorist attacks more difficult by insisting on publishing detailed information about vital national security programs." Snow went even further on Monday, suggesting the New York Times had undermined Americans' "right to live."
[To read more from the CFAP Progress Report, click here.]

For someone like Snow, who represents the White House, to be suggesting that the publication decisions of the editors of the New York Times in this case are undermining our security, safety, and even our "right to live," can--in the context of the right-wing accusations of treason mentioned above--only be read as a deliberate and calculated campaign of attack on the freedom of the press.

Of course, such attacks are not new to history. Tyrannies of the past, and power-grabs by previous presidents in our own history, have often used the same kinds of attacks on the press as we are now seeing directed against the New York Times, to intimidate and silence. Remember Watergate, anyone?

Ask Ben Bradlee--the Washington Post editor who oversaw the publication of the news stories by Woodward and Bernstein that exposed the Watergate cover-up, and who supported the publication of the Pentagon Papers--about the ways the Nixon administration tried to silence the press by accusing the Washington Post and others on his "enemies list" of undermining the security of the country.

As Bradlee noted in a recently broadcast interview with Jim Lehrer on PBS:
National security is a really big problem for journalists, because no journalist worth his salt wants to endanger the national security, but the law talks about anyone who endangers the security of the United States is going to go to jail. So, here you are, especially in the Pentagon. Some guy tells you something. He says that's a national security matter. Well, you're supposed to tremble and get scared and it never, almost never means the security of the national government.

[It's] more likely to mean the security or the personal happiness of the guy who is telling you something... Because, you know, if he gets caught, why, he may not be so secure. He may be out on his tail.
And, in the end, Nixon's attacks on Bradlee at the Washington Post, and on others in the Press, actually had the effect of strengthening the freedom of the Press as the country and the Supreme Court rallied to support the institution of the free press in the 1970s.

As Bradlee quipped in a 1995 speech at Johns Hopkins, "I want to thank Richard Nixon for his help in furthering my career... It really is ironic, isn't it, that Nixon, who hated journalists and hated The Washington Post in particular, did so much for our current health?"

Bradlee could joke about Nixon, and was able to support Woodward and Bernstein the way he did during the Watergate investigation in the 1970s, largely because of what has been called one of the most important Supreme Court decisions ever on the freedom of the press: the June 30, 1971 decision in New York Times v. the United States, which supported the publication of the Pentagon Papers by the New York Times and the Washington Post.
In its petition to the court [in this case], the executive branch of the government asserted that it should be the sole judge of national security needs and should be granted a court order to enforce that viewpoint. The [New York Times] newspaper countered that this would violate First Amendment press freedoms provided for under the U.S. Constitution. It also argued that the real government motive was political censorship rather than protection of national security.
The Supreme Court ruled in favor of the New York Times, arguing that the Constitution has a "heavy presumption" in favor of press freedom. As James C. Goodale, who served as general counsel to the New York Times when the U.S. Supreme Court supported the publication of the classified Pentagon Papers, has written:
The First Amendment to the United States Constitution provides that "Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom...of the press." Although the First Amendment specifically mentions only the federal Congress, this provision now protects the press from all government, whether local, state or federal.

The founders of the United States enacted the First Amendment to distinguish their new government from that of England, which had long censored the press and prosecuted persons who dared to criticize the British Crown. As Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart explained in a 1974 speech, the "primary purpose" of the First Amendment was "to create a fourth institution outside the government as an additional check on the three official branches" (the executive branch, the legislature and the judiciary).
Of course, the Nixon administration was by no means the first to try to protect itself against public scrutiny by silencing the press. As Justice Potter recognized in his 1974 gloss on the importance of the free press as a "fourth institution" to provide a check on the abuses of governmental power, the first amendment was important from the beginning of our nation's history as a bullwark for protecting press freedom.

But earlier in our history the first amendment by itself did not keep the press from being persecuted and silenced. During the 1790s, Jeffersonian critics of the Adams administration who published their views in the press were accused of being treasonous, and were prosecuted under the Alien and Sedition laws of that time.

Apparently, contemporary critics of the New York Times, like talk show host Melanie Morgan and right-wing blogger Michelle Malkin (mentioned above), as well as this White House, would like to take us back to the 1790s. Fortunately for us today, Supreme Court decisions like the one regarding the Pentagon Papers provide US citizens and our free press a few more protections than existed in the 1790s.

But such freedoms and protections are never completely secure from being undermined by concerted attack.

Let us all struggle to make sure that the current campaign of attacks on the free press, by the White House and others, are not successful in undermining these protections, which are crucial to securing meaningful democracy for all US citizens.

Democratic Rights to Vote Under Assault by "Real ID" Legislation Across the Nation

From "Democracy Dispatches," a DEMOS EJournal:

Impending "Realness:" Transgender Communities Dealt a Blow By REAL ID
by Cole Krawitz

06/27/2006
Recently election reformers have focused a great deal of attention on the real potential for a rollback in voting rights with the flurry of highly restrictive photo ID laws moving across state legislatures. Adding to an already layered system, there have been serious restrictions tacked on the franchise in states like Georgia and Indiana, while Wisconsin's Governor Doyle keeps the disastrous effects of a five-time proposed photo ID bill at bay with his veto pen.

Let's hope he has enough ink.

Rather than protecting, it is estimated that photo ID requirements at the polls will cost millions of eligible voters their vote, most of them elderly, people of color, low-income or recently relocated. The people with the most to say this election season may well lose their vote -- if they haven't already -- in the next presidential election, thanks to their public servants in the U.S. House and Senate.

After the passage of the REAL ID Act -- a dangerous add-on to an $82 billion military spending bill in 2005 -- the Carter-Baker Commission on Federal Election Reform recommended using REAL ID for voter identification at the polls. Election reformers and civil rights advocates responded with a swift outcry. They did so again a few weeks ago, when Senator Mitch McConnell tried to attach a REAL ID requirement for voters to the immigration bill. The challenge continues as photo ID bills sweep state legislatures, and as states move to implement REAL ID legislation by 2008. Hurricane survivors, African Americans, Latinos, grandmas and grandpas, young people -- you might have to kiss even more of your rights goodbye. That should scare you.
To read more of this article by Cole Krawitz, click here.

Friday, June 23, 2006

ACT NOW to Keep Democracy from Being Undermined in Ohio

Dear Friends,

I just learned from ColorOfChange.org that Kenneth Blackwell--Ohio's Secretary of State--is once again trying to manipulate the election in favor of the Republican party by creating ridiculous new rules that will suppress the vote in Black and low-income communities. Please join me in fighting this attack on minority voting rights by sending your message here:

In the 2000 and 2004 elections, Republicans relentlessly attacked the voting rights of Black people. Their dirty politics undermined one of our most precious and hard-won rights, but they also helped the Republicans win the White House--twice--so we know they won't stop suppressing our votes without a fight.

Now, the fight's on in Ohio, where Kenneth Blackwell has created ridiculous new voter registration rules that make it virtually impossible for non-profit and faith-based groups to register voters.

What's unfolding in Ohio is not a localized case of a policy that happens to be bad for Black and poor voters. It's part of a coordinated, nation-wide strategy by Republicans to keep people from exercising their right to vote. If Blackwell gets his way, Ohio will suppress the votes of tens of thousands of Black and low-income voters and set a dangerous precedent for the rest of the country.

On June 26th--this coming Monday--the Ohio Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review (JCARR) will consider Blackwell's new rules, and it has the opportunity to reject them. Please join us in calling on JCARR to stop this anti-democratic scheme in its tracks.

Thursday, June 22, 2006

A Beginning: Dem Leader Pelosi Recognizes What the Fundamental Starting Point Must Be to Establish Effective Democratic Politics for the 21st Century

“Ours must be a government 'of the people, by the people, and for the people.' That means all of the American people. Republicans have made it a government of, by, and for a few of the people. America can do better. We can and we will. With this agenda, Democrats will create the most open and honest government in history, and put power back where it belongs – in the hands of all the people.”

--Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi

Yes, America (and the Democratic Party) can do better!--

Unfortunately, while the so-called "New Direction for America" Agenda announced last week by the Democratic Party leadership is certainly better than the prevaling Republican agenda, this so-called "New"Agenda is still far too thin on both new direction and imagination to provide the inspiration and confidence many voters desire in 2006.

The main problem for Democrats, if they want to win back control of Congress this November, is to reignite the political imagination of the American people, and then provide the kind of political vision and policy framework that can convince voters that the Democratic Party actually understands what it means to offer a new political direction for the country.

An authentic "new direction" for the country must involve at least as much of a change in political vision and policy approach as that embodied by Franklin Roosevelt's "New Deal" in the 1930s. As the election of 2004 so terribly proved, it is not enough to criticize and point out how wrong and harmful to the country the dominant Republican Agenda has been--

The Republican Party achieved its current political position by capturing the political vision of many voters, and by convincing voters that Republicans offered a specific strategy for bringing that vision to fruition in political reality. Sadly, Republicans have been largely successful in doing exactly that, and we have witnessed the tragic consequences of this success. But realizing and denouncing what is wrong with the Republican Agenda is not enough to change the country's direction.

It is also not enough to offer a piecemeal list of Democratic policy positions, and call it a "New Direction." While the specific points listed in last week's Agenda are ok, such a laundry list cannot by itself constitute a "New Direction."

"Without Vision, the People Perish." As this great democratic proverb suggests, and history demonstrates, no democratic political movement can be successful without a clear vision to inspire and guide the creative and collective action of political engagement and policymaking.

If the Democratic Party wants to regain political initiative in this country, and win back to its side this November the kind of democratic majority necessary to begin to govern for the common good, and oppose the destructive course of the Republican Party, it must demonstrate to the American People in the coming months that it has an inspiring vision to offer--a vision of governance and the common good that will convince Democratic, Republican, and Independent voters that their own best interests, as well as the future of this country, depend on their coming out to vote this year for an authentic and clear new political direction.

Short of offering new vision and inspiration, the Democrats may begin to win back some Congressional seats this fall, but they will not be able to renew the political power and confidence of the American people, which is now so desperately needed to allow the people of this country to counter and reverse the destructive direction in which the Republican elite have taken the country.

As a foundation for recreating an inspiring and progressive democratic vision for the country, Pelosi's invocation of the ideal of democratic government begins to strike the right chords:

“Ours must be a government 'of the people, by the people, and for the people.' That means all of the American people. Republicans have made it a government of, by, and for a few of the people. America can do better... With this agenda, Democrats will... put power back where it belongs – in the hands of all the people.”

But if we are to build a truly inspiring democratic political agenda for the future on the firm foundation provided by these opening chords, Democrats must begin to think much more deeply about what it will take to "put power back where it belongs." After the several decades during which the elite of both parties have benefited from allowing power to consolidate itself at the top of the economic spectrum--instead of protecting the democratic interests of the country and of working people--it is no simple or easy task to create a political agenda that will "put power back where it belongs."

If Democratic politicians want to understand what it will take, and what it means, to put power back in the hands of all the people, they will need to begin to listen much more carefully and deeply to what the many community-based social justice and public advocacy organizations created by their constituents have been trying to tell them. They need to begin to listen much more actively to these organized grassroots, rather than to the political consultants and corporations that dominate the Washington DC political sphere. And they need to learn from these grassroots, and begin to think much more creatively about the need to frame a visionary Democratic Agenda for the 21st century that responds to the aspirations and ideas of these grassroots.

Whether or not the Democratic Party is able to rise to the democratic political challenge of this moment in history will depend on whether it can envision and construct an inspiring Democratic Agenda for 2006 and the years to come.

"Without Vision, the People Perish." And as the People perish, so will the country and what remains of the Democratic Party.

As Pelosi said, "America can do better." Indeed, we can and we must....

Monday, June 19, 2006

How Big Money Has Corrupted Our Government and Our Democracy


Trivializing Corruption
By David Sirota


David Sirota is the author of the new book "Hostile Takeover: How Big Money and Corruption Conquered Our Government -- And How We Take It Back" (Crown Publishers, May 2006)

As Sirota wrote in a recent essay related to his appearance this weekend on PBS's NOW show "Crude Awakening" on the corrupting influence of the oil industry lobby:

Today, the lifeblood of American politics is money. Candidates must raise enormous sums of private cash to run for office -- sums that the wealthy and corporate interests are only too happy to provide in exchange for legislative favors. We are told by politicians that this system is "the greatest democracy in the world" when, in fact, it is very clearly the same form of bribery that has marked every corrupt regime looked down on by history books.

Money, of course, does not just buy favors -- it makes sure that the concept of corruption is only presented to the public by political leaders as anecdotes about a few bad apples, not a narrative about a broken system. Why? Because an indictment of the pay-to-play system that produced the bad apples could mean structural campaign finance reforms that challenge the power of the Big Money interests that underwrite our politicians. Thus, in the aftermath of recent congressional scandals, all we get is a pathetical discussion about weak lobbying "reform" proposals and even weaker sanctions against individual lawmakers.

Such narrowing of our political discourse is the most nefarious form of corruption of all. It shows how we now live in a country where the very boundaries of public policy debates are designed to ensure outcomes that never challenge Big Money interests. The truly corrupt interests that own American politics long ago realized that they do not have to pervasively violate our weak anti-corruption laws to get what they want. All they have to do is shower cash on as many lawmakers as possible. These lawmakers, uninterested in biting the hand that feeds them, consequently make sure the overall debate is rigged.

To read more from David Sirota, click here.

Friday, June 16, 2006

AutoWorkers Unite! We have Everything to Lose If We Don't (Our Jobs, Our Environment, Our Future)

From PolicyBusters!:

It is ironic that the UAW has this week decided more or less meekly to cooperate with the US car industry's plans to put hundreds of thousands of auto workers out of jobs, without demanding anything substantial in return for this downward spiral of continual sacrifice from auto workers. The UAW seems unwilling to challenge the fundamental logic governing the decline of the American auto industry. In fact, it seems content, while its workers suffer, to leave in place the very governing structure and policies that are driving the American car industry into extinction.

Workers are literally being "bought out" of their jobs, so that the failed industry leadership that has brought about this bankrupt situation can remain in place. Under this failed management, with its strategy of resistance to true innovation and its continuing addiction to an oil-based economy, there may be no US-owned auto industry surviving by 2020.

While Toyota and Honda continue to take over more market share from US auto companies, the US auto industry and governmental policymakers seem largely incapable of learning from the terrible mistakes of the last decade, and instead persist in defending energy-inefficient and environmentally-destructive technologies, at the cost of the loss of hundreds of thousands of the best industrial jobs in the United States. While the workers continue to lose from this strategy, and are asked to sacrifice even more, what are they getting in return for their sacrifice?

Meanwhile, the new film "Who Killed the Electric Car?" reveals the extent to which the auto industry, and GM in particular, has been guilty of destroying alternative technology cars that over the last decade could have have made the US car industry the world leader in fuel-efficient and clean energy technologies. Instead of moving in this direction, which was the path to growth, innovation, and leadership in environmentally conscious and energy-efficient transportation technologies in the 1990s, GM and the entire automobile industry collaborated in destroying its own investment in electric technologies, and decided to invest in Hummers and SUVs!

As the film's informative website timeline notes, by 2000 GM had finalized its purchase of the Hummer brand name, and in 2001 began to lay off its electric vehicle (EV1) sales team, "starting with its most successful sales specialists." So much for rewarding success!

Far from rewarding successful innovation, GM could not have indicated any more clearly that its strategy for the early years of the 21st century was to betray innovation in order to preserve a commitment to gas-guzzling and inefficient vehicles (the bigger the better)--all in the name of simply following "consumer demand."

Question: How can GM claim to follow consumer demand, when it kills off alternative technology vehicles even as consumers are beginning to demand them? This is the fundamental challenge all consumers and employees of the American car industry should now be asking the heads of the Big 3.

Recent sales figures have made clear that US auto companies are continuing to lose market share to Toyota and Honda because both these companies have been much better at responding to (and honoring) consumer demand by developing much more fuel-efficient hybrid cars (that already yield up to 50-60 mpg). GM could by now have been offering much better than this, but instead it chose to deliberately destroy its entire electric car fleet over the last 5 years. Did the GM workers now being put out of their jobs have any say in these decisions? Shouldn't the people who did have a say in these decisions be the ones losing their jobs?

While it may be too late for the many workers losing their jobs because of the terribly shortsighted thinking that dominates the US car industry, those workers who remain should now (in honor of their departing colleagues, as well as to protect their own jobs) begin to demand something more substantial from their employers and managers. Since the management of the industry has proven that it lacks the kind of vision that can nurture the future growth of the US auto industry, the workers should demand, in return for their many wage concessions, that they now be made a fundamental part of the decision-making process about the future direction of the industry.

If workers are going to be made to suffer for the terrible failures of management and leadership over the last decade, they should now at minimum be allowed to participate more directly in this leadership in order to change its direction. And then they should use their leadership power to demand that the industry immediately transform its strategy, and reinvest in the development of the kind of fuel efficient and technologically innovative automobiles that will lead the industry into the future.

If the US auto manufacturers do not quickly transform themselves to offer the fuel-efficient and innovative technologies consumers will be ever more aggressively demanding in the next decade, Toyota and Honda will continue to win dominance over the auto market, and the next decade may witness the virtual extinction of US automobile manufacturers. Like the dinosaurs that could not adjust quickly enough to a new environment, the US auto industry may not have the vision or managing intelligence needed to survive into the mid-twenty-first century.

If the remaining US auto employees are going to be forced to yield all kinds of concessions in order to hang on to their jobs, they should at least get something substantial in return for those concessions: more direct power and voice in the governance of the corporations for which they are being asked to sacrifice. Since the managers of the last decade have proven themselves perpetually incapable of investing in a strategy that would have saved these jobs, the future of the US car industry will depend on the workers taking more direct control of this industry, and substituting their strategic vision, tied to the future, for the vision of the failed management still tied to the oil-addicted past.

Now, especially, the remaining employees of the Big 3 ought to begin demanding that their employers adopt more visionary leadership in developing and bringing back on line the innovative alternative technologies that they deliberately "deep-sixed," at the terrible cost of the loss of industry leadership and of so many American jobs over the last decade.

When will the UAW's leadership, and the Auto industry's managers, wake up to and admit the serious failures of policy and leadership within the industry over the last decade, and begin to learn from the terrible mistakes of the past? When will the industry's workers stop trusting in this failed leadership, and begin to demand a new kind of leadership and investment in the US car industry that will grow, rather than continue to sacrifice, workers' jobs?

Right now the only people paying for the failures of industry leadership are American auto workers. It is time for the auto workers themselves to unite to demand that the US auto industry take up a new vision, and pursue a new energy-efficient and innovative course into the future, such as that suggested by the Apollo Alliance, our nation's real Apollo Project for the next decade.

Whether or not there is any US car industry left by 2020 will depend on whether the industry's workers, along with all the citizen-consumers of the nation, can unite to demand that the industry reject the failed policies and leadership of the past, and take up new leadership to grow the automobile jobs of the future. Now more than ever it is time for the auto workers of the world to unite to demand such change, since we have everything to lose (our jobs, the environment, a sustainable future) if we fail to bring about such change.

Thursday, June 15, 2006

A Progressive Policy Agenda for America's Future

I am just back from this Week's "Take Back America" Conference, organized by the Campaign for America's Future in Washington, D.C. The Progressive political agenda on the table at this Conference now offers this country a practical framework and new leadership to meet the common needs of the American people, on the basis of a renewed vision of the democratic "Common Good."

Rather than continuing to follow the path of the least common denominator and corporation-first politics of the dominant leadership of both political parties, this Progressive Agenda charts a new course that puts people first, and offers strategic leadership to move this country out of the mess into which the regressive and short-sighted politics of the last generation of political leaders (of both parties) has delivered us--

I will be highlighting and commenting on key aspects of this Progressive Agenda in future posts, as my limited time permits. (Unlike some elite bloggers, I have a regular day job that does not allow me to spend much time in the blogosphere.) But for now everyone should check out the Summary and Talking Points related to this Agenda, which have just recently been posted here by the Campaign for America's Future--

I hope All Americans will give careful consideration to this Progressive Policy agenda, since it offers the best basis for developing the kind of new political and policy leadership needed to move this country out of its current disastrous course--

More to come.....

Friday, June 02, 2006

The Many "Inconvenient Truths" Neither Our President Nor Congress Seem Willing to Confront

In addition to the INCONVENIENT TRUTHs about Climate Change Al Gore is trying to bring to the attention of Americans who continue to buy large gas-guzzling automobiles that produce a large percentage of global warming gasses, there are many other inconvenient truths that our elected representatives in Washington DC and our state capitols continue to ignore.

And our politicians will continue to ignore these truths until the citizens of the United States make it clear that they will lose their jobs representing us if they do not begin to face these truths and create effective policies to address them.

As Policybusters posted today:

While the U.S. and the World Burn for Dramatic Policy Change in Washington on crisis issues such as Global Warming, the Conduct of the War in Iraq, increased Fuel Economy Standards, Human Rights, and Equality in Health, our Congress is playing around with the idea of writing discrimination into the US Constitution, which would incoporate discriminatory principles--destructive of human rights and health--into the fundamental structures of US law for decades to come.

While Europe moves forward, will the United States become the symbol of regression and backwardness on all the major issues of human justice, rights, and health in the twenty-first century--a symbol of shame when the history of the twenty-first century is written?

Instead of defending progress in human rights, environmental protection, real human security, and human health, policymaking in the United States has become an example of some of the most retrograde, backwards, and shortsighted lawmaking in the world.

What will it take to change this reality and lack of policy vision on the ground of Washington DC?

We need a revolution in citizen involvement in policy activism to make sure the November 2006 election does not merely change the dominant party in Congress, but begins to achieve fundamental changes in the policy that governs this nation and determines how it behaves in the world, no matter what party rules in Washington.

If the people of the United States want to make sure their government behaves in ways we can be proud of in the world, we need to make sure the November election puts into place people who are going to fight for policies that will represent the interests of all the people of the United States, and not merely of the wealthy and discrimanotory minorities that continue to speak in our name while betraying all the best values that the people of the United States once represented to the rest of the world.

Every Day, from now to the November Elections, ACT FOR CHANGE in the Policies, not just the politicians, that govern this nation--

From ActForChange.Com:

We haven't seen such a misplaced set of priorities in a very long time. Civil war rages in Iraq. The national debt continues to skyrocket. Tens of millions of Americans lack health care, and good jobs are disappearing every day. But conservatives in the Senate think it's urgent to...write discrimination into our constitution, and hand another gigantic tax break over to the wealthiest Americans.

What in the world are they thinking? Tell your elected representatives in Congress to begin thinking, and to:

1. Stop The Trillion-Dollar Tax Giveaway to the Rich

As if previous tax cuts for the wealthiest of the wealthy weren't enough, conservatives in the Senate are pushing to permanently repeal the estate tax -- a move that will cost $1 trillion over ten years, and benefit only the top one-half of one percent. The national birth tax is now at $28,000 per baby; do the rich really need another huge tax break right now?

Take action -- tell the Senate to reject any changes to the estate tax. Click here


2. Don't Write Discrimination Into Our Constitution

The "Federal Marriage Amendment" would make gays and lesbians second-class citizens by forever banning marriage, civil unions, and domestic partnerships between same-sex couples. They know they don't have the votes to pass it. But Senator Frist still needs to throw some red meat to his conservative base in this election year. Even First Lady Laura Bush said, "I don't think [the Federal Marriage Amendment] should be used as a campaign tool, obviously."

While the religious right might wish otherwise, our society is in fact founded upon the principle of equal rights for all people -- not just heterosexual ones.

Take action -- tell the Senate to toss this bill on the trash heap of history where it belongs. Click here

Thursday, June 01, 2006

We Need Real (not Con-Man) Political Leadership to Increase Fuel Economy Standards

The single best way to immediately begin to save the U.S. millions of barrels of oil each day is to significantly increase national fuel economy (CAFE) standards in automobiles. Yet most of the media and political hype over "kicking the oil habit" and Congressional policy change to achieve energy security seems to be constructed to divert attention from this single most important point. An excellent 2005 report by the Union of Concerned Scientists labeled this kind of deceptive hype the "Fuel Economy Fraud."

The high price of gasoline has recently spawned lots of deceptive campaigns and news hype (see previous posts on this blog) about "alternatives" to deliver future energy security to the nation. But any such "campaign" that does not make achieving dramatic improvements in overall fuel economy standards (to 40 mpg over the next decade) is shortsighted and dumb, at best, and an intentionally deceptive "alternative," at worst.

As the Union of Concerned Scientists pointed out over a month ago, the President's recent "call" for "Fuel Economy Reform" demonstrates how deceptive play with words is being substituted for real policy reform to achieve significant improvements in fuel economy standards for the nation.

April 28, 2006
President’s Call for Fuel Economy Reform Merits a Barrel of Skepticism

Statement by David Friedman, Research Director, Clean Vehicles Program, Union of Concerned Scientists

"After 9/11, two devastating hurricanes and record gasoline prices, we should expect real political leadership on fuel economy. Unfortunately, this just seems like an attempt to play pre-election politics with gasoline prices.

"Real leadership from the president and Congress would be to increase the fuel economy of all cars and light trucks to 40 miles per gallon over the next decade. This would be the equivalent of offering a $600 annual tax break from reduced fuel costs.

"Unfortunately, the president's plan would change the fuel economy system from having one standard for all cars to having lower standards for bigger vehicles, creating a loophole that will encourage manufacturers to produce bigger, less efficient cars. The drop in the bucket savings from the fuel economy increase would drain right through the loophole."


Meanwhile, even the usually progressive Center for American Progress has launched a "KicktheOilHabit" campaign that fails to emphasize the primary importance of demanding that Congress act to require greater fuel economy standards.

If citizens demand that both the media and politicians pay notice to the basic points about fuel economy standards clearly explained by the State Public Interest Research Groups (PIRGs), perhaps we will finally begin to make some progress toward real (rather than the facade of) energy security, and toward real political leadership on energy policy.

For great clarification of what is at stake in debate over Fuel Economy (CAFE) Standards,
see Fuel Economy Standards: Myth And Fact