Reply #368: CA Op-Ed Meet ALEC: a wolf in sheeps clothing Times Standard N. California Aug 14

[Hector Solon]

Solid Op-Ed with a lot of national level background content.

As It Stands: Meet ALEC: a wolf in sheep's clothing
Dave Stancliff/For the Times-Standard
Posted: 08/14/2011 02:30:25 AM PDT
http://www.times-standard.com/guest_opinion/ci_18679929

CLIPS:

What is ALEC, and why should you care? If you're uncomfortable with corporations writing our laws then you'll be interested in ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council), a group that pairs legislators with corporate heads to pass laws favoring big business.

(National Content and Background)

It isn't just legislators who have membership in ALEC. Corporations sit on all nine ALEC task forces and vote with legislators to approve “model” bills. They have their own corporate governing board which meets jointly with the legislative board. ALEC says that corporations do not vote on the board. Yeah, right. And Tea Party members believe in compromise.

This partisan stalking horse that calls itself ALEC introduces over 1,000 bills every year through its overwhelmingly conservative legislative members. Consider this: One in every five bills they present is enacted into law.
According to everything I've read about lobbying, handing bills to legislators so they can introduce them is the very definition. ALEC says “no lobbying is taking place.” I'm of the opinion, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck.

ALEC operates under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, which limits lobbying activity and allows corporate backers to deduct their contributions. Fact: Corporations fund almost all of ALEC's operations. Participating legislators take proposals home and introduce them in statehouses across the land as their own ideas and important public policy innovations -- without disclosing that corporations crafted and approved the bills.

ALEC is blatantly influencing state laws under the guise of a nonprofit, charitable organization. Their claims at promoting “educational activities” would be laughable if they weren't illegal. ALEC engages in outright power-brokering at the taxpayer's expense. ALEC's operating model raises many ethical and legal concerns. Each state has a different set of ethics laws or rules. The presence of lobbyists alone may cause ethics problems for some state legislators.

Some examples of ALEC's alumni: Speaker of the House John Boehner, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, Congresswoman Michelle Bachman, Congressman Joe Wilson, Gov. Scott Walker and Gov. Jan Brewer. Seems to me, they're part of the group of Congressional conservatives who refuse to raise taxes on the wealthy and corporations. What a surprise!

As It Stands, they should at least be transparent about their past ALEC memberships. Little alumni badges would be nice, don't you think?

Raises "ethic and legal" concerns. Legal is not moral. Greed, is just greed. And buying laws is just... well, America will have to fill in that blank.