A little-known nonprofit has become far too influential in writing the policies that govern our lives - wages, food, fuel, medicine. We are becoming less and less a country of the people, by the people, and for the people - as our forefathers intended, fighting long wars for the right of self-government. But it's not too late, yet, to turn this around.
But first, who is running our country? This past October, as our economy lost billions while sitting for weeks in shutdown mode, the people spoke: a poll showed that a majority of both Republicans and Democrats wanted Speaker John Boehner to bring a clean budget to a vote in the House to open our government again. But the Speaker was answering to a higher power, and it wasn't the Tea Party - not completely. They were a conduit.
There is an ingrained corporate-funded policy-making infrastructure in the U.S. Big industry of every sort (oil and gas, tobacco, gun, chemical, pharmaceutical - and even education and prison) is represented as members in a right-wing state-by-state policy-influencing network called ALEC - the American Legislative Exchange Council.
ALEC also influences the media, such as Fox News, and the Wall Street Journal editorial page. Amy Hanauer, Executive Director of Policy Matters Ohio, explained the group to a crowd at a League of Women Voters gathering last month. ALEC writes laws, has its members introduce them, and then lobbies other legislators to pass them. ALEC brought in $9.2M in 2011, 80% of this from corporate contributors who are members. It uses these resources to influence state legislatures around the country.
According to Amy, ALEC attacks renewable energy, wage standards, product safety, and unions.. ALEC promotes cuts in funding for basics such as health care, human services, and safety. They attack regulation, promote privatization, and change state processes to ratchet down programs that help citizens.
2,000 of 7,382 state legislators are members of ALEC - that's up to one-third of legislators.
There was a temporary weakening of ALEC's powers, since they promoted "Stand Your Ground" laws. After the shooting of Trayvon Martin, Amazon, WalMart and Proctor & Gamble backed out as members. But this only caused ALEC to re-double their efforts to focus on the economy and go after workers' rights.
There are organizations networking to fight ALEC and their influence often led by the Center for Media and Democracy. Others include Common Cause (with Robert Reich as Board Director), and many others, including Bill Moyers. Bill Moyers put together a report titled the "United States of ALEC", featuring public watchdog organizations (http://billmoyers.com/segment/united-states-of-alec).
Why is policy so important? We have all of the answers to be sustainable, and have had them for decades. We could shift to much more use of clean power. Other countries are on this path, including Spain, Germany, and many others. There is truly only one main reason we continue to have mercury in our fish, climate change intensifying, a middle class disappearing, and low income conditions worsening - and that reason is money. Money influences policy and ALEC promotes that approach.
It's not too late to take our government back, and mainly all it takes is knowing who to trust, putting the right people in power, and voting, including with our daily actions such as what we buy and where we buy it. The resources from Policy Matters Ohio, www.policymattersohio.org, can be trusted (as well as similar organizations in other states, including organizations that Policy Matters Ohio lists).
Bill Moyers, another trusted resources, retired to write a book, but came back to work since the stakes are so high. MSNBC is a trusted mainstream news source. The League of Conservation Voters (LCV) gives an annual "Scorecard for Environmental Voting" for each member of Congress, which can usually also be relied upon to indicate those politicians with good records for social issues.
