Category: Business

Corporate news from all over

Mars Says Goodbye to ALEC

Seth Anderson0 comment

Chocolate city
Chocolate city

Yet another corporation whose financial viability depends upon being non-controversial has wised up and left the American-hating group, American Legislative Exchange Council.

Mars Inc., the company that makes everything from Skittles to M&M’s to Uncle Ben’s, has joined McDonald’s, Wendy’s, and a half-dozen other companies in quitting the American Legislative Exchange Council.

ALEC, as it’s known, is a corporate-funded non-profit that writes pro-business and often anti-union draft legislation for state lawmakers to introduce in their legislatures. ALEC has come under fire recently from good-government and civil rights groups for pushing voter identification bills that critics say discriminate against blacks and Hispanics. ALEC foes have also blasted the organization for promoting so-called Stand Your Ground laws like the one at the center of the Trayvon Martin shooting.

Bob Edgar, the president of Common Cause, one of the groups in the anti-ALEC coalition, hailed Mars’ decision. “Its leaders understand that continued support for ALEC’s advocacy of vigilante justice and assaults on voting and employee rights, public schools, and reasonable environmental regulations is neither good business nor good corporate citizenship,” Edgar said in a statement.

(click here to continue reading Mars Inc. Says Adios to ALEC | Mother Jones.)

 

How the NYT Got It Wrong on the FDA’s New Antibiotics Rules

Seth Anderson4 Comments

Wherever I Lay My Head
Wherever I Lay My Head

Not the first time, sadly.

A casual reader taking in my account and the New York Times’ account of yesterday’s big FDA antibiotics announcement might have thought we were reacting to different events. Here’s the Times lead:

Farmers and ranchers will for the first time need a prescription from a veterinarian before using antibiotics in farm animals, in hopes that more judicious use of the drugs will reduce the tens of thousands of human deaths that result each year from the drugs’ overuse.

In the Times’ reading, the FDA placed significant restrictions on antibiotics use. My take was more critical: “The plan contains a bull-size loophole—and is purely voluntary, to boot.”

What gives? In short, the Times delivered a skim-level, FDA-friendly account of the new plan. Let’s start with the loophole. Here’s the Times:

Michael Taylor, the F.D.A.’s deputy commissioner for food, predicted that the new restrictions would save lives because farmers would have to convince a veterinarian that their animals were either sick or at risk of getting a specific illness. [Emphasis added.]

The bolded part is the key. As I reported yesterday, the FDA plan intends to phase out the use of antibiotics as growth promoters, but allows them to continue to be used to “prevent” disease. That’s a major loophole—it means that farmers can continue stuffing animals together in filthy conditions and dosing them with antibiotics to keep them alive. Margaret Mellon, senior scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists and a longtime watchdog of the meat industry’s antibiotic-gorging ways, put it like this in a Wednesday press release:

The outlined process appears to give the companies the opportunity to relabel drugs currently slated for growth promotion for disease prevention instead. Such relabeling could allow them to sell the exact same drugs in the very same amounts

None of this comes out in the Times story.

(click here to continue reading How the NY Times Got It Wrong on the FDA’s New Antibiotics Rules | Mother Jones.)

Critical Mass Griller
Critical Mass Griller

Margaret Mellon responds, angrily:

FDA to Establish Voluntary, Largely Secret Program to Reduce Antibiotic Overuse in Agriculture Statement by Margaret Mellon, Senior Scientist

WASHINGTON (April 11, 2012)—The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today released three documents that constitute its long-awaited response to the problem of antibiotic overuse in agriculture. There is wide recognition among scientists that such antibiotic use is driving up the rate of antibiotic-resistant diseases, which are becoming increasingly severe and more costly to treat. While the documents establish a new, completely voluntary approach to reducing antibiotic use in agriculture, the Union of Concerned Scientists cautioned that the program’s shortfalls are likely to imperil its success.

Below is a statement by Margaret Mellon, senior scientist at UCS.

“The approach announced represents a bold, well-intentioned attempt by the FDA to persuade an entire industry to voluntarily abandon claims that allow them to sell a large number of lucrative products. The agency should be congratulated for finally taking action on a serious and long-neglected public health issue, but we’re deeply skeptical that the approach will work.

“We have no reason to believe that the veterinary pharmaceutical industry—which, to date, has rarely even acknowledged that antibiotic resistance is a serious public health issue—will cooperate with the agency on a plan that could reduce its profits.

“The outlined process appears to give the companies the opportunity to relabel drugs currently slated for growth promotion for disease prevention instead. Such relabeling could allow them to sell the exact same drugs in the very same amounts. The process also allows companies to avoid risk assessments for new drug approvals.

“Unfortunately, the process will also be secret. Companies will have three months to submit voluntary plans and three years to implement them. During this entire time, the public will be kept in the dark. It could be three to four years before anyone knows how well the program is working.

“Ultimately, if antibiotic use is reduced only marginally or not at all much time and taxpayer dollars will have been wasted.

“The agency doesn’t need to embark on this novel but very risky experiment in relying on companies to police their own products. It has – and should have relied upon – its  authority under the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act to cancel unsafe uses of drugs.”

(click here to continue reading FDA to Establish Voluntary, Largely Secret Program to Reduce Antibiotic Overuse in Agriculture | Union of Concerned Scientists.)

ALEC Hunkers Down As Sponsors Run

Seth Anderson0 comment

Get What You Deserve
Get What You Deserve

For today’s update on the America-hating GOP lobbyists who run the American Legislative Exchange Council, Crooks and Liars blogger karoli writes, in part:

Poor, poor ALEC. They’re being victimized, don’t you know? Wednesday they went into full damage control mode even as more corporate donors bailed out on them. The list now includes Wendy’s, Intuit, McDonalds, Coke, Pepsi, Kraft Foods and the Gates Foundation. More on the Gates Foundation in a minute. On Wednesday, ALEC bleated out a statement, complaining that they’re just a little non-profit organization whose sole purpose is to help businesses turn a bit of a profit, don’t you know? And they’re being victimized by those mean, nasty lefty types.

From their statement:

ALEC is an organization that supports pro-growth, pro-jobs policies and the vigorous exchange of ideas between the public and private sector to develop state based solutions. Today, we find ourselves the focus of a well-funded, expertly coordinated intimidation campaign.

Our members join ALEC because we connect state legislators with other state legislators and with job-creators in their states. They join because we support pro-business policies that promote innovation and spur local and national competitiveness. They’re ALEC members because they’re more interested in solutions than rhetoric.

For years, ALEC has partnered with legislators to research and develop better, more effective public policies – legislation that creates a more transparent, accountable government, policies that place a priority on free enterprise and consumer choice, and tax policies that are fair, simple and that spur the kind of competiveness that puts Americans back to work.

Somebody’s going to have to explain to me how Stand Your Ground laws and Voter ID laws help create jobs. That’s left me scratching my head. How is it that laws which blatantly discriminate against people of color and have absolutely nothing to do with jobs create jobs? And then there’s abortion legislation. What does abortion legislation have to do with job creation?

As to their so-called free enterprise and consumer choice policies, let’s look at one area where they’re working hard to interfere: education. And let’s bring the Gates Foundation back into focus on this one. The Gates Foundation has now declared they will not give any further grants to ALEC. Slow clap for the Gates Foundation.

I’m not particularly impressed because there are 17 months remaining on the grant they’ve already given ALEC for “education reform”

(click here to continue reading ALEC Hunkers Down As Sponsors Run, But Untold Damage Has Already Been Done | Crooks and Liars.)

Cry me a river…

Full list of supporters of ALEC’s anti-American agenda is archived here

The Worst Farm Bill Ever

Seth Anderson0 comment

Summer Squash
Summer Squash

The so-called Farm Bill is a five year plan for American agriculture policy, and as usual, rewards food corporations instead of consumers, and is adverse to encouraging sustainable food production.

For decades, groups like Fred Hoefner’s [National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition] have worked hard to create a set of programs designed to at least partially offset US farm policy’s tendency to bolster Big Ag. The programs, which the Obama Administration in 2009 grouped under the banner of Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food, include initiatives designed to assist new farmers to get loans help communities roll out farmers markets, and reduce  costs for farms to transition to organic.

Taken as a whole, Hoefner says, the programs amount to about $175 million per year—less than 1 percent of the non-food stamps portion of the farm bill. “These programs make up an extremely modest portion of the farm bill’s budget, but they’ve had a large impact on communities nationwide,” Hoefner said. Hoefner pointed to a wide-ranging recent USDA study documenting positive impact of the programs.

Corn and Cornier
Corn and Cornier

and of course having lots of money to hire lobbyists always pays off for food corporations:

Big Ag continues to get support for monster corn and soy crops. Large commodity growers will take a nominal hit in the next farm bill. For years, farmers in a few chosen crops—corn, soy, cotton, etc.—have received $5 billion per year in so-called “direct payments” based on the acreage under production. In order to receive direct payments, farmers had to sign so called “conservation-compliance” agreements, which obligated them to create conservation plans for highly erodible land and agree not to drain wetlands for planting. The conservation-compliance agreements were far from perfect, Hoefner says, but they did help slow soil erosion in the Corn Belt for years.

In the next farm bill, direct payments will almost certainly be scrapped, Hoefner says, and replaced by a revenue-insurance scheme that is projected to cost $3.5 billion per year, saving taxpayers $1.5 billion per year. Sounds like a step forward, right? Wrong. First of all, in current negotiations, there is no conservation-compliance requirement for revenue insurance—meaning that farmers will have incentive to drain wetlands to grow crops, as well as expand crops onto erosion-prone land. Moreover, the new scheme will likely insure prices at high levels—meaning that relatively small price dips could cost taxpayers serious money, potentially wiping out that promised $1.5 billion in savings.

The switch to revenue insurance, Hoefner says, will “further reduce the risk of putting the pedal to the metal on commodity production, [with] no incentive whatsoever to diversify crops or leave any ground unplanted.” All of that, of course, is manna to the companies that supply inputs to industrial-scale farmers: seed and pesticide companies like Monsanto and Syngenta; and to the companies that buy corn and soy and transform them into a range of low-quality, profitable foods.

(click here to continue reading The Worst Farm Bill Ever? | Mother Jones.)

Some of my bounty from FreshPicks.com
Some of my bounty from FreshPicks.com

Lobbyists won’t like this suggestion:

The federal government could save about $1 billion a year by reducing the subsidies it pays to large farmers to cover much of the cost of their crop insurance, according to a report by Congressional auditors due to be released on Thursday.

The report raised the prospect of the government’s capping the amount that farmers receive at $40,000 a year, much as the government caps payments in other farm programs. Any move to limit the subsidy, however, is likely to be opposed by rural lawmakers, who say the program provides a safety net for agriculture.

The report, by the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, was requested by Senator Tom Coburn, Republican of Oklahoma, as part of his efforts to cut government spending.

Under the federal crop insurance program, farmers can buy insurance policies that cover poor yields, declines in prices or both. The insurance is obtained through private companies, but the federal government pays about 62 percent of the premiums, plus administrative expenses.

The crop insurance subsidy, according to the G.A.O. report, ballooned to $7.3 billion last year from $951 million in 2000, or about $1.2 billion adjusted for inflation. A Congressional Budget Office study cited in the report estimates that the premium subsidy will cost $39 billion from 2012 to 2016, about $7.8 billion a year.

Unlike other farm programs that have income or payment limits, crop insurance payments have no such restrictions, so farmers can get millions in subsidies regardless of their income. The G.A.O. said a cap last year would have affected about 4 percent of farmers in the program, who accounted for about a third of the premium subsidies and were mostly associated with large farms.

(click here to continue reading Cap on Farm Insurance Subsidy Could Save Billions, Report Says – NYTimes.com.)

City Farm
City Farm

and we ignore climate change at our peril:

One of the biggest challenges facing this planet isn’t simply feeding a growing population — perhaps as many as 10 billion by the year 2100. The challenge is feeding all those people as the climate changes in ways we can barely project. A new report called “Achieving Food Security in the Face of Climate Change” (PDF) illustrates the complexity of the problem and makes clear that action must be taken soon to address it.

Commissioned by Cgiar — a research alliance financed by the United Nations and the World Bank — it recommends essential changes in the way we think about farming, food and equitable access to it, and the way these things affect climate change.

It is tempting to assume that expanding agricultural acreage and using new technology, like genetically engineered crops, will somehow save the day. The report says that efficiency and sustainability will also require fundamental changes in how we grow and consume food: reducing waste in production and distribution and finding ways to farm that reduce greenhouse-gas emissions and other “negative environmental impacts of agriculture,” like soil loss and water pollution. The report also calls for better dietary habits in wealthy countries, which have a disproportionately and unsustainably high calorie intake, and targeted aid to populations whose farming is most at risk.

(click here to continue reading Sustainably Feeding a Changing World – NYTimes.com.)

Sam Zell Ranks Last Among Tribune Creditors

Seth Anderson0 comment

Rich Play - Poor Pay - Chicago Tribune
Rich Play – Poor Pay – Chicago Tribune

Still too high if you ask me1

Samuel Zell, the real-estate mogul behind the disastrous leveraged buyout that plunged Tribune Co. into bankruptcy, came out the biggest loser in an inter-creditor fight over expected payouts from the Chapter 11 proceeding.

Judge Kevin Carey of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Del., found Mr. Zell’s investment ranked dead last in the Chapter 11 payment priority competition, “at the bottom of Tribune’s capital structure.” Mr. Zell’s claims are junior to $759 million of claims from holders of the so-called Phones notes, the judge said.

Mr. Zell has labeled the Tribune LBO “the deal from hell.” The two-step transaction in 2007 piled an additional $8 billion in debt on the publishing and broadcasting operation, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy less than a year later. Tribune publishes the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune and other newspapers as well as TV stations.

(click here to continue reading Sam Zell Ranks Last Among Tribune Creditors – WSJ.com.)

 

Footnotes:
  1. or numerous people who work, or once worked, for Mama Tribune [↩]

Intuit To Drop Voter Suppression Group ALEC

Seth Anderson1 Comment

Sunset Over American Empire
Sunset Over American Empire

Inuit left the hate group, American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a couple of days ago, btw

Software company Intuit, the makers of programs such as Turbo Tax and Quicken, announced today that they will join Coca-Cola, PepsiCo and Kraft as the fourth company to end their partnership with the right-wing American Legislative Exchange Council this week.

The Center for Media & Democracy, which launched ALECexposed.com last year, broke the news:

A stampede seems to be on the way as more and more groups break ties and dump ALEC. Intuit, Inc. (maker of Quicken and QuickBooks accounting software) told the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) that Intuit also decided not to renew its membership after it expired in 2011. That comment came from Bernie McKay, Vice President of Government Affairs. He gave this response when CMD identified that Intuit was no longer listed on the board and contacted the company. CMD began its effort to spotlight Intuit and other corporate funders and tie these corporations to the ALEC agenda when it launched ALECexposed.org in July 2011. … Intuit’s McKay explained to CMD that the company doesn’t “usually issue statements about membership in any organization” and declined to comment further.

Although Pepsi quietly left ALEC as recently as last January, the growing exodus of companies’ from ALEC’s began earlier this week when the progressive group Color of Change announced a petition and boycott campaign targeting ALEC’s corporate supporters. Other corporations that have not yet publicly renounced their support of ALEC include Koch Industries, Wal-Mart, Pfizer, Reynolds American, Altria/Philip Morris, Procter & Gamble, Exxon Mobil and British alcohol firm Diageo (makers of Smirnoff and Johnnie Walker).

(click here to continue reading Intuit Is Now The Fourth Company To Drop Voter Suppression Group ALEC | ThinkProgress.)

Full list of supporters of ALEC’s anti-American agenda is archived here

McDonalds, Gates Foundation to sever ties with ALEC

Seth Anderson0 comment

So Much Unsaid You Won't Say
So Much Unsaid You Won’t Say

Two more wise corporations leaving the hate group, American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)

Two more institutions, one commercial and one non-profit, have announced that they will part ways with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation provided an education grant to ALEC, and will not be making future grants. The foundation said it would not award another grant to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in the face of criticism of the council’s involvement in voting laws and in “stand your ground” gun laws such as one under scrutiny in the Trayvon Martin shooting in Florida. “At this point, we’ve decided that it’s not the right environment to continue working with them,” Gates Foundation spokesman Chris Williams told Reuters on Tuesday.

The split will take effect once the Gates Foundation pays the balance of a $376,000 education grant that it awarded to the conservative group last year, Williams said.

As the result of the Color of Change campaign to educate and agitate among the corporate sponsors of ALEC, McDonald’s has been proactive in clarifying their position with ALEC. They told Mother Jones that “it recently decided to cut ties with ALEC, the corporate-backed group that drafts pro-free-market legislation for state lawmakers around the country.” “While [we] were a member of ALEC in 2011, we evaluate all professional memberships annually and made the business decision not to renew in 2012,” Ashlee Yingling, a McDonald’s spokeswoman, wrote in an email. Yingling didn’t mention any specific campaign or outside pressure as playing a role in the company’s decision to leave ALEC.

(click here to continue reading Daily Kos: McDonalds, Gates Foundation to sever ties with ALEC.)

 

Kraft drops membership in ALEC

Seth Anderson1 Comment

A Monster Maker an Eye
A Monster Maker an Eye

Like I said, a little sunshine goes a long way, and hate groups like ALEC need to hide their agenda from the public, or else publicly traded corporations will flee. Kudos to PepsiCo, Coca-Cola and Kraft for running away earlier than later…

Kraft Foods joined Coca-Cola in bowing to consumer pressure this week to cut ties with the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conservative lobbying group that has recently backed controversial voter ID and so-called “stand your ground” laws.

Kraft said in a statement that it has “made the decision not to renew” its ALEC membership, which is expiring. The company, based in north suburban Northfield, was opaque in its reasoning, citing “limited resources” and saying that its involvement with ALEC “has been strictly limited to discussions about economic growth and development, transportation and tax policy.”

Advocacy group Color of Change launched a boycott against Coca-Cola for its participation in ALEC’s Private Enterprise Board, but within hours, the soft drink giant issued a statement saying that it had “elected to discontinue its membership.”

The company blamed ALEC’s support of “discriminatory food and beverage taxes” instead of “issues that have no direct bearing on our business.”

“We have a long-standing policy of only taking positions on issues that impact our company and industry,” Coca-Cola said.

The withdrawals pleased ALEC detractors, which includes the Center for Media and Democracy. The liberal-leaning nonprofit said it had launched a protest campaign in tandem with Color of Change opposing what it said were ALEC’s efforts to deny climate change, undermine public schools and encourage laws that would require voters to present various forms of identification before voting.

…In January, PepsiCo quietly pulled itself off the board.

(click here to continue reading Kraft drops membership in conservative group amid protest – chicagotribune.com.)

 

Boycotts Hitting ALEC Behind Stand Your Ground Gun Laws

Seth Anderson3 Comments

Silent Witness to Spring
Silent Witness to Spring

Good to see that the America-hating folks at American Legislative Exchange Council are getting a little press. For far too long, ALEC has been able to operate in secret, manipulating the legislative process with their mounds of corporate-donated cash.

Two of America’s best-known companies, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, have dropped their memberships in the American Legislative Exchange Council, a low-profile conservative organization behind the national proliferation of “stand your ground” gun laws.

ALEC promotes business-friendly legislation in state capitols and drafts model bills for state legislatures to adopt. They range from little-noticed pro-business bills to more controversial measures, including voter-identification laws and stand your ground laws based on the Florida statute. About two-dozen states now have such laws. Florida’s stand your ground law has been cited in the slaying of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed teen who was shot and killed by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman on Feb. 26.

…

Until recently, ALEC was best known for its volumes of pro-business legislation: bills to weaken labor unions, as in Wisconsin, to privatize government operations and to reduce regulation.

But this new anti-ALEC campaign comes at a time when some investors have already been pushing for more transparency on corporate political activities.

Tim Smith is a vice president with Walden Asset Management, which does what it calls socially responsible investing. He says corporate boards and top management are paying closer attention now.

“They’re scrutinizing their trade association memberships, their relationships with controversial institutes,” said Smith. “And certainly I think that companies are scrutinizing their ALEC relationship more carefully, too.”

But certainly not every corporation: On Wednesday, another well-known company, Kraft Foods, said it was keeping its membership in ALEC.

A spokeswoman for Kraft said its only concerns at ALEC are business related and have nothing to do with stand your ground or voter ID laws.

(click here to continue reading Boycotts Hitting Group Behind ‘Stand Your Ground’ Gun Laws : NPR.)

Publicly traded companies should be very wary of donating to such partisan organizations – shareholders might not be sanguine. Non-profits such as Susan G Komen For the Cure of Republican Women ought to tread carefully as well. In these days of social media, it won’t take much to bring a firestorm of bad publicity. Of course, some of ALEC’s core corporate sponsors don’t give a shit about such things. Corporations like the Charles Koch Foundation, Richard Mellon Scaife’s Allegheny Foundation, the Coors family Castle Rock Foundation. But I’d be surprised if Johnson & Johnson, FedEx, Visa, Amazon.com, GlaxoSmithKline, Bayer, State Farm Insurance, Walgreens and others wouldn’t get a little nervous if a campaign against them got organized.

Coke Truck
Coke Truck

Coca-Cola’s retraction came in the Examiner’s “Secrets” blog. Blogger Paul Bedard’s interpretation of the facts comes with a strong ideological bias, but the facts are clear: The good guys won.

By contrast, Wal-Mart told the Examiner:

Our membership in any organization does not affirm our agreement with each policy created by the broader group. Wal-Mart has a long history of supporting voter rights, and we continue to be a strong proponent of this issue. In fact, Wal-Mart was an active supporter in 2006 of the renewal of the Voting Rights Act of… One of Wal-Mart’s basic beliefs is respect for the individual, and Wal-Mart will continue to stand with all Americans in ensuring our right to vote. Not good enough. If you support people who are attacking the right to vote, financially and with your reputation, then you are supporting injustice.

Attention Sellers: This could affect your bottom line in a big way. There’s a large majority in this country that feels disenfranchised from the political process — and is. They’ve been, in the crude words of bar patrons everywhere, “screwed, blued, and tattooed.” They’ve lost their jobs, or their wages have stagnated, while organizations like ALEC strip them of organizing rights and the chance for a job at a living wage.

They’ve also been disenfranchised by voter laws like the ones ALEC supports, and by a money-driven, corporate political process. But that disenfranchised majority has enormous economic power — and it’s learning how to use it. One of our most effective tools for responding to the power of corporate money is by cutting off the source of that money.

(click here to continue reading Good Guys Win: With ALEC, Things Go Better Without Coke | Crooks and Liars.)

Union
Union

Some other things ALEC is busy passing: banning living wages, privatizing schools, privatizing prisons, crippling collective bargaining.

The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is the most powerful corporate front group you’ve never heard of. The organization, funded mostly by large corporations, writes model legislation and then sends these bills to state legislators across the country. It has successfully passed scores of laws on various issues.

ALEC has come under scrutiny lately for writing and helping to pass “Stand Your Ground” laws, which allow for an expansive definition of self defense that lets individuals use deadly force if they feel threatened. It is a law like this in Florida which may allow Trayvon Martin’s killer to go free. The National Rifle Association, which is partly funded by the gun industry, worked closely with ALEC to pass the law. (It also sponsors ALEC’s conferences.)

But ALEC’s “Stand Your Ground” is far from the only deadly law that this corporate front group has pushed. ALEC’s network of laws have endangered every area of American life, from the air we breathe to the water we drink to the education our children receive in our schools. Here are five despicable laws that ALEC has helped pass in states nationwide:

(click here to continue reading The Top Five Most Despicable Laws Passed By Corporate Front Group ALEC.)

Dixie Motel
Dixie Motel

The Department of Justice overturned at least a couple of ALEC’s voter ID laws, including in Texas:

The Department of Justice has blocked the Texas voter ID law. Of the 8 states where American Legislative Exchange Council’s (ALEC) inspired voter ID laws were enacted, two have now been struck down for discrimination under the historic 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Under the act, 16 states that have a history of discrimination must get federal approval before changing voting laws. Texas changed their law in May of 2011 to require the following ID: driver’s license, a military identification card, a birth certificate with a photo, a current U.S. passport, or a concealed handgun permit.

The Obama administration’s Department of Justice blocked Texas’ voter ID law because even conservative data showed it discriminated against Hispanics:

“Even using the data most favorable to the state, Hispanics disproportionately lack either a driver’s license or a personal identification card,” wrote Thomas Perez, head of the Justice Department’s civil rights division, in a letter to Keith Ingram, director of elections for the Texas Secretary of State. So what made the voter ID laws such a priority?

Republicans pushed ALEC inspired voter ID laws in over 33 states and passed them in states like South Carolina (whose voter ID law was also struck down by the DOJ for discrimination), Kansas, Alabama, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Wisconsin. This legislation is meant to give Republicans a much needed edge, allowing military ID and concealed handgun permits to suffice for ID, while cutting out student IDs in some states. In fact, the NRA was the corporate co-chair of ALEC Public Safety and Elections in 2011.

 

(click here to continue reading Another ALEC Law Bites the Dust: DOJ Kills Texas Voter ID Law.)

Muted Voice of Angry Fear

Muted Voice of Angry Fear

Governor Christie, the GOP Angry Man in NJ, is a fan of ALEC:

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie denies any connection with the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), but a Star-Ledger investigation finds plenty of evidence to the contrary, particularly when it comes to Christie’s union-busting, privatizing education agenda.

First off: At least three bills, one executive order and one agency rule accomplish the same goals set out by ALEC using the same specific policies. In eight passages contained in those documents, New Jersey initiatives and ALEC proposals line up almost word for word. Two other Republican bills not pushed by the governor’s office are nearly identical to ALEC models. This includes policies on teacher tenure, pay, and hiring and firing; easing training requirements for charter school teachers; waivers of environmental regulations that businesses don’t like; and more.

Beyond the similar legislation and executive actions: […] Christie’s then-chief of staff and former health commissioner were involved in an ALEC policy seminar in Trenton in December. Legislative liaisons inside the governor’s office have mined ALEC for advice on budgetary matters, Medicaid changes and privatizing government services, according to e-mail records, beginning in the earliest days of Christie’s governorship and as recently as December.

(click here to continue reading Daily Kos: New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie denies connection to ALEC while pushing its agenda.)

Benjamins
Benjamins

One last point, so I don’t have to look this up again. Here are the corporations who I will think twice about doing business with because they are sponsors of the radical GOP agenda, and I don’t want to give them my money (and I won’t own any stock from these corporations either):

  • Allergan
  • Altria
  • Amazon.com
  • American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity
  • American Electric Power
  • American Federation for Children
  • AT&T
  • Atmos Energy
  • Bayer
  • BlueCross Blue Shield of Lousiana
  • BlueCross BlueShield Association
  • BNSF
  • BP
  • CashAmerica
  • CenturyLink
  • Chesapeake Energy
  • Chevron
  • Cleco
  • CN
  • ConocoPhillips
  • Cox
  • CSX
  • Dow
  • Encana
  • Energy Transfer
  • Entergy
  • ExxonMobil
  • EZCorp
  • FedEx
  • Franklin Center for Government and Public Integrity
  • Freepont-McMoran Copper & Gold
  • Genesee & Wyoming Inc.
  • Gulf States Toyota
  • Harris Deville & Associates
  • HP
  • International Paper
  • Intuit
  • Jacobs Entertainment
  • Johnson & Johnson
  • Kansas City Southern
  • Koch Industries
  • Kraft Foods
  • Lilly
  • LouisDreyfus Commodities
  • Louisiana Chemical Association
  • Louisiana Railroads Association
  • Louisiana Realtors
  • Louisiana Seafood
  • LouisianaTravel.com
  • Lumina Foundation
  • McMoran Exploration
  • Merck
  • National Rifle Association
  • NetChoice
  • Norfolk Southern
  • Peabody
  • Pfizer
  • PhRMA
  • QEP Resources
  • RestoringFreedom.org
  • Reynolds American
  • Sanofi
  • Shell
  • Society of Louisiana CPAs
  • Southern Strategy Group
  • Spectra Energy
  • State Farm
  • State Policy Network
  • StateNet
  • Takeda Pharmaceutical
  • The Capitol Group
  • TimeWarner
  • TogetherRX Access
  • Union Pacific
  • UnitedHealthcare
  • UPS
  • USAA
  • Visa
  • Walgreens
  • Walmart
  • Walton Family Foundation
  • WellPoint

Francis Ford Coppola: Artists Might Not Get Paid In the Future

Seth Anderson0 comment

DaVinci Wine (or Whine, depending)
DaVinci Wine

Francis Ford Coppola is simply repeating what he has said before, Francis Ford Coppola Sees the Future For Artists, and Francis Ford Coppola Finances His Movie With Wine because it seems like the truth. Mick Jagger and David Bryne concur, btw: Mick Jagger and Internet Piracy and Death of the Music Industry, Rolling Stones Edition

How does an aspiring artist bridge the gap between distribution and commerce? We have to be very clever about those things. You have to remember that it’s only a few hundred years, if that much, that artists are working with money. Artists never got money. Artists had a patron, either the leader of the state or the duke of Weimar or somewhere, or the church, the pope. Or they had another job. I have another job. I make films. No one tells me what to do. But I make the money in the wine industry. You work another job and get up at five in the morning and write your script.

This idea of Metallica or some rock n’ roll singer being rich, that’s not necessarily going to happen anymore. Because, as we enter into a new age, maybe art will be free. Maybe the students are right. They should be able to download music and movies. I’m going to be shot for saying this. But who said art has to cost money? And therefore, who says artists have to make money?

In the old days, 200 years ago, if you were a composer, the only way you could make money was to travel with the orchestra and be the conductor, because then you’d be paid as a musician. There was no recording. There were no record royalties. So I would say, “Try to disconnect the idea of cinema with the idea of making a living and money.” Because there are ways around it.

(click here to continue reading Francis Ford Coppola: On Risk, Money, Craft & Collaboration :: Articles :: The 99 Percent.)

 

Rock Cruises Are A Big Business

Seth Anderson0 comment

Tourist Shot
Tourist Shot – Cruise Ship

Strange concept, but maybe interesting with the right mix of passenger and musician. A friend has gone one a Blues Cruise, with Delbert McClinton (she’s a big fan for some reason), and said she had a great time. I could see this being a disaster with the wrong mixture however…

Of course, this was a music cruise, a floating rock festival grafted onto a passenger ship, and a quietly thriving corner of the music and cruise industries. While the music business has been in decline for over a decade and traditional cruise lines have never quite figured out how to attract the cool crowd, music cruises are both profitable and proliferating.

Fans willing to pony up somewhere between $900 and $1,400 — not including airfare or bar tab — can rub shoulders with their favorite acts and enjoy three to five days of food, music, Caribbean sunshine and extras like a photo with the band (no autographs, please).

Everyone from oldies acts like Frankie Avalon to current artists like R. Kelly and Blake Shelton are taking to the seas. Did the fourth annual New Kids on the Block cruise really sell out in four hours? Of course it did! Can death-metal fans really enjoy Cannibal Corpse and 31 other doom merchants while sailing from Miami to the Grand Caymans? They don’t call it 70,000 Tons of Metal for nothing.

If there’s one thing metalheads know, though, it’s how to party. I was less certain about the Weezer Cruise. The headliners — Weezer and Dinosaur Jr. — were alt rock acts that had turned the sound of disconnection into an audience almost two decades ago. Exactly how that was going to mesh with blue skies and umbrella drinks wasn’t clear to me. But as has long been known by vacation planners, piña coladas are a universal solvent. As the sun set that first afternoon and the Carnival Destiny steamed out of Miami, Weezer took the stage outdoors on the Lido Deck to the ecstatic hoots and hollers of die-hard fans. I lingered with seven new friends from Chicago on a back balcony, where concert attendees waiting to be convinced traditionally congregate. The more we drank, the farther up front we gravitated. I finished the show a few feet from the stage.

(click here to continue reading Rock Cruises, Bright Spots for the Cruise and Music Industries – NYTimes.com.)

 

Android Is a Money Pit for Google

Seth Anderson0 comment

Calumet 5-6969
Calumet 5-6969

The real question is how long will Google be content on losing money, lots of money, on Android? Especially since most of Google’s mobile ad revenue comes from Apple. Seems to me Google is hedging their Android bet by purchasing Motorola.

Brian Hall digs in a bit:

I mean, Android isn’t making a dime for Google. It’s a massive cost center. With the acquisition of Motorola, which isn’t making money from Android, Google will have dropped upwards of $20 billion on Android.Think of that: $20 billion.Twenty billion of shareholder money.…

Then I thought, considering my relentless criticism at Google for not breaking out any costs or revenues associated with Android, that someone at Google was feeding this reporter a story — and he bit, hook line and sinker. Not sure. Fellow seems to genuinely think that all the money Google continues to pour into Android, with no return, is an acceptable — strategic — business practice. Perhaps it’s because I don’t live in Silicon Valley. I mean, near as I can tell, beyond the insiders who are getting rich flipping talent, the only companies actually earning sustained revenues are Apple and Google. I guess earning revenues is no longer the hot trend in Silicon Valley.

(click here to continue reading Android so good it doesnt even have to make Google any money! Ever! | brian s hall.)

Fiat dealer Moving To West Loop

Seth Anderson0 comment

Artificial Notions of Causality
Artificial Notions of Causality

The retail space in R+D 659 has never been leased in the history of the building – it has sat vacant since 2006. Especially since there will not be a garage here, I’m happy to have Fiat as a neighbor.

Fiat of Chicago hopes to open its 12,900-square-foot dealership at 647 W. Randolph St. by July, says Carmelo Scalzo, who will co-own the dealership with his father Antonio Scalzo. They chose the location, on the ground floor of the 15-story R+D 659 condo tower, largely because of its location next to the highway, Carmelo Scalzo says.

After 28 years away from the U.S., Milan-based based Fiat SpA, which also owns Chrysler, began selling its Fiat 500 model here last year and has already opened dealerships in the suburbs. Since its American return, the company has rolled out a publicity blitz including television advertisements featuring Jennifer Lopez and Charlie Sheen. Fiat of Chicago aims to generate its own attention with visibility and easy accessibility to hundreds of thousands of drivers a day.

Fiat 750Fiat 750

“With the right signage, that’s about the heaviest traffic there is in Chicago,” says Greg Kirsch, principal at New York-based Newmark Knight Frank, who represents retail tenants in Chicago but was not involved in this deal. “It kind of follows what Mercedes did on North Avenue. That was a good example of taking advantage of the expressway traffic. The rental income from billboards alone can be tens of thousands of dollars a month, so why not use the high visibility and make it convenient for the customer at the same time?”

The Scalzos already own and operate Volvo of Oak Park. They sought out the Fiat brand because Antonio Scalzo worked as a Fiat technician in his native Calabria, Italy, before coming to the U.S. and eventually owning his own Fiat and Alfa Romeo dealership in Berwyn and later Maywood. “It was an opportunity for my father to get back to his roots with Fiat and Alfa Romeo,” Carmelo Scalzo says. “We’ve been pursuing it for a couple of years, and with our history and heritage they thought we’d be a good fit.”

The younger Mr. Scalzo says he plans to sell 600 Fiats a year out of the dealership, which would give it one of the highest volumes in the country. When the higher-end Alfa Romeo brand returns to the U.S. in 2013 or ’14, those sports cars will become available in the Chicago showroom, he says. That will create price ranges from about $16,000 for the Fiat 500 to more than $60,000 for some Alfa Romeos, Mr. Scalzo says. Fiat of Chicago will have a bright, red-and-white showroom — or “studio,” as the company calls it — with high ceilings. It will not have a service garage.

 

(click here to continue reading Fiat dealer, parking on Randolph, aims to turn heads on Kennedy – News – Crain’s Chicago Business.)

 

Maybe the Scalzos want to purchase some Chicago-esque photographs to hang in their showroom?

Gradient Power
Gradient Power

Stairway to a Two Bedroom Daguerreotype
Stairway to a Two Bedroom Daguerreotype

West Loop Dreaming
West Loop Dreaming

More Alleged Criminal Behaviour By News Corporation

Seth Anderson0 comment

Trying to anesthetize the way that I feel
Trying to anesthetize the way that I feel

Wow, that’s amazingly brazen, if true. The tough part will be proving it, seems as if News Corporation used the mafia model of having a guy tell a guy to suggest to another guy he might do something illegal…

Part of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation empire employed computer hacking to undermine the business of its chief TV rival in Britain, according to evidence due to be broadcast by BBC1’s Panorama programme on Monday .

The allegations stem from apparently incriminating emails the programme-makers have obtained, and on-screen descriptions for the first time from two of the people said to be involved, a German hacker and the operator of a pirate website secretly controlled by a Murdoch company.

The witnesses allege a software company NDS, owned by News Corp, cracked the smart card codes of rival company ONdigital. ONdigital, owned by the ITV companies Granada and Carlton, eventually went under amid a welter of counterfeiting by pirates, leaving the immensely lucrative pay-TV field clear for Sky.

The allegations, if proved, cast further doubt on whether News Corp meets the “fit and proper” test required to run a broadcaster in Britain. It emerged earlier this month that broadcasting regulator Ofcom has set up a unit called Project Apple to establish whether BSkyB, 39.1% owned by News Corp, meets the test.

…James Murdoch, who is deputy chief operating officer of News Corp and chairman of BSkyB, was a non-executive director of NDS when ONdigital was hacked.

(click here to continue reading Questions for News Corp over rival’s collapse | Media | The Guardian.)

Restrictions
Restrictions

and meanwhile, the noose tightens on James Murdoch:

In a continuing effort to distance himself from News Corporation’s embattled British newspaper unit, James Murdoch has stepped down from the board of Times Newspapers Holdings.

The group, established by Rupert Murdoch, chief executive of News Corporation and James’s father, was created to safeguard the editorial independence of The Times of London and The Sunday Times after the media conglomerate bought the British newspapers in 1981, according to public filings with the British government.

James, the youngest son of Rupert Murdoch and once the heir apparent at the $50 billion media company, has over the last several months resigned from a string of corporate boards, both with ties to the British papers and unrelated.

Last week, the auction house Sotheby’s said in a filing with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission that James Murdoch would not return to his board position. Earlier this year he gave up his position on the board of the pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline.

It remains to be seen whether Mr. Murdoch will hold onto his role as chairman of the British broadcaster BSkyB, of which News Corporation holds a minority stake. The company dropped its $12 billion bid to take over BSkyB last summer when a phone hacking scandal thrust News Corporation under increased government scrutiny.

(click here to continue reading James Murdoch Resigns From Times Newspapers Holdings Board – NYTimes.com.)

FTC Should Pursue Case Against Google

Seth Anderson4 Comments

Electric Eye
Google’s Electric Eye sees all

Google really has lost whatever ethics it may have once had1 and should really have to pay a price for their latest lapse. Especially since Google and the Federal Trade Commission had an arrangement already, and Google violated it within weeks…

The Stanford privacy researcher who first uncovered Google evading the default privacy settings for all users of Apple’s Safari web browser believes that the Federal Trade Commission has a “slam dunk” case that Google violated its privacy agreement with the government.

“The facts in this case are unusually clear cut,” Jonathan Mayer, a grad student in computer science and law and a researcher at the Stanford Law Center for Internet and Society, in a phone interview with TPM.

…Aside from further tarnishing Google’s image in the press and public at a crucial time (the search giant was at the time getting ready to roll out a controversial new privacy policy), the news led many writers, including TPM, to speculate that Google could be found in violation of a privacy settlement it agreed to with the Federal Trade Commission.

The settlement, first struck in October 2011 , was the result of the FTC’s year-long privacy investigation into Google over its failed Google Buzz social network. The FTC concluded that Google had indeed misled users and violated their privacy and subjected Google to 20 years worth of privacy audits and ordered that Google no longer “misrepresent” its privacy settings to users. If Google violates any of the terms of the settlement, the FTC can slap the company with a $16,000 civil fine for every day that the company violated any of the terms.

On Thursday night, The Journal reported that the FTC “is examining whether Google’s actions violated last year’s legal settlement,” and another regulatory body in France (the CNIL) and several states attorneys general were also investigating Google over the practice and could levy fines of their own.

 

(click here to continue reading FTC Has ‘Slam Dunk’ Case Against Google, Privacy Researcher Says | TPM Idea Lab.)

Or Pay The Price
Or Pay The Price

and from the WSJ:

In the U.S., the Federal Trade Commission is examining whether Google’s actions violated last year’s legal settlement with the government in which Google pledged not to “misrepresent” its privacy practices to consumers, according to people familiar with the investigation.

The fine for violating the agreement is $16,000 per violation, per day. Because millions of people were affected, any fine could add up quickly, depending on how it is calculated. The FTC declined to comment.

A group of state attorneys general, including New York’s Eric Schneiderman and Connecticut’s George Jepsen, are also investigating Google’s circumvention of Safari’s privacy settings, according to people familiar with the investigation. State attorneys general can have the ability to levy fines of up to $5,000 per violation.

In Europe, the French Commission Nationale de l’Informatique et des Libertés, or CNIL, has added the Safari circumvention technique to its existing pan-European investigation into Google’s privacy-policy changes, according to a person close to the investigation. The CNIL is the agency that levied a €100,000 ($130,960) fine on Google last year for collecting passwords and other personal information when Google vehicles were gathering information for its Street View map service.

(click here to continue reading Google Faces New Privacy Probes – WSJ.com.)

Google power and deep pockets shouldn’t be enough to evade the law, the FTC should make an example of Google, and really bring the hammer down.

Footnotes:
  1. perhaps it never had ethics and was just better at covering up its questionable decisions. No matter [↩]