New developments in the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) investigations. Now able to link (with multiple documents) associations of ALEC directly to AFP, State Level Think Tanks and Tea Party and Tax Organizations, which as been one of our goals at the national level. State level awareness of ALEC and activity continues to grow, and action plans coming into place.
ALSO a mass Freedom of Information Act or FOIA request by a Heritage Foundation state-level think tank, the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, are making some news in Michigan, but more elsewhere as people discover from Dr. Bill Cronon who is writing America’s Laws (our statement not his). As professors from 3 whole departments dealing in some fashion labor at the University of Michigan, Michigan State and Wayne State University sort out their responses to the Mackinac Center FOIA, Dr. Cronon talks about his experiences in an extended interview with a Madison paper with the then ‘little-known group’ the American Legislative Exchange Council and a FOIA issued to him by the Wisconsin Republican Party and how the University of Wisconsin handled their response.
Rachel Maddow responds FOIA requests in Michigan in which “Maddow” was one of the terms targeted by Mackinac Center in “Right-wing aims to chill opposition with intimidation” ( April 5, 2011)
Rachel Maddow: “Watching this show and it’s content, should not be an act of bravery…”
Dr. William (Bill) Cronon, a multiple, national award-winning Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin: “I feel like I went down a rabbit hole and I’m in Wonderland, or just a really strange world.”
The story then spread its way into Michigan from a Wisconsin professor’s simple blog, his first ever, about a little-known group called the American Legislative Exchange Council or ALEC: Who’s Really Behind Recent Republican Legislation in Wisconsin and Elsewhere? (Hint: It Didn’t Start Here).
Lord of the Blog vs. Koch & the Mega-wealthy
One Blog to write it all, One Blog to find them,
One ALEC to write the laws, and in the State House sign them
TWIST coming ALEC roach stampers => TEA PARTY connections galore - Documented one and a NEW vane to mine folks...
Deep down in the extended Cronon interview THERE's a TWIST, Tea Party twist (for advanced ALEC Rabbit-hole Spelunkers)...
Crossposted from BFM.
RELATED: Original posting on Blogging for Michigan “Conservative think tank Mackinac Center FOIAs labor faculty at 3 major Michigan universities” (by Eclectablog)
HERE's the TWIST... buried in this great story in the (Madison) The Capital Times about the whole Dr. Cronon affair (which we know well) in "The big chill? UW’s Cronon sees ‘intimidation’ in GOP records request":
"Richard Vedder, an economics professor at Ohio University, concedes that “nobody likes being the focus of an open records request. But they are simply a reality of working at a public institution.”
“This stuff happens all over the political spectrum,” adds Vedder, who was the focus of an open records request about five years ago. “I very much appreciate the academic freedom that’s generally afforded within the academy. It’s the greatest job in the world in that we can more or less say what we want without huge consequences. So it is disturbing when something like this happens. But it’s not unique.”
Some more of interest to folks in Michigan (new POST on that later):
"Indeed, just last week a conservative research group in Michigan issued a public records request to the labor studies departments at three public universities in that state. The Mackinac Center for Public Policy is seeking any emails involving the Wisconsin labor turmoil from professors at the University of Michigan, Michigan State and Wayne State University. This request also is being roundly criticized as an attempt to intimidate academics who may be sympathetic to organized labor."
Who is this Dr. Vedder do you ask? Well... check this out:
Uploaded by AmericanLegislative on Sep 15, 2008
Description:
"Dr. Richard Vedder of the Ohio University discusses the costs of higher education at the American Legislative Exchange Council's 2008 Annual Meeting in Chicago where he received the Adam Smith Free Enterprise Award."
Dr. Vedder is on the Mackinac Center for Public Policy (Heritage in Michigan) "Board of Scholars" and is receiving one of ALEC’s highest awards the “Adam Smith Award”.
But notice Dick Armey to the right of Vedder (OK, interesting same old network). But listen to what he says:
0:55 mins.
“… and at Seattle 18 years earlier encouraged by veteran tax cutter Lew Uhler who’s sitting in the front here [at ALEC National Conference 2008] and others, I spoke to ALEC and have been a participant at every annual meeting since.”
That would be Lewis K. "Lew" Uhler? Who is that you ask?
Lewis K. Uhler: The founder and President of the National Tax Limitation Committee, one of the nation’s leading grassroots organizations. He also serves as the Vice-Chairman and is on the Advisory Board for Move America Forward. Lastly, serves on the American Conservative Union Foundation Board.
Then is off to the races a bit because no Tea Party expert, but from this "Red State Uprising" Details Tea Party's Remaking of GOP" by Grover Norquist 09/24/2010:
Erickson and Uhler have written an informed and informative book subtitled “How to Take Back America,” that speaks to the Tea Party movement: how it came about, what it has accomplished and, importantly, what it can and should do in the future and what pitfalls to avoid. It is full of good history, incisive political analysis and sound policy prescriptions.
Lou Uhler, longtime taxpayer leader from California and member of the board of directors of the American Conservative Union, led the anti-tax fight a decade before Proposition 13’s taxpayer revolt swept California and then the nation. The Tea Party is the second stage in a citizen-led movement to control the size and scope and cost of government. First was the effort to limit taxation: property taxes, income taxes, with requirements for a two-thirds vote for tax hikes. But this movement failed to limit spending at the federal, state and local level. The Tea Party intends to fix that oversight.
Uhler and Erickson describe the power of the Tea Party movement as it cut a swath through the modern Republican Party, forcibly adding “spending cuts” to the “to do” list for all Republican candidates and elected officials.
Unlike standard-issue Republican Party apologists who begin the history of big government with the Obama inauguration, Uhler and Erickson begin with a critique of the Bush years when spending drifted and then lurched upwards. It is painful to read their lengthy indictment of Bush’s agenda of No Child Left Behind—a massive increase in federal control and funding of “education” and Medicare Part D’s explosion of unfunded liabilities for our already most-unfunded entitlement. We are reminded that Teddy Kennedy was cheerfully holding hands with the Bush Administration in both efforts.
OK we know they are all connected, Heritage and the "vast right-wing" conspiracy or rather INDUSTRY is the path Heritage => State-level Think Tank (MI is Mackinac the FOIA idiots) => ALEC with the legislation => Americans for Prosperity => Tea Party movement the "shock troops".
Following Uhler gives one much better trails to follow leading to this from the "Tax Coalition" (lot of different names used here it looks like) to the "Tax Panel" calling to "Dump Static Scoring" in a Letter to President Bush" October 5, 2003".
"We the undersigned share the hope that the work of the President's Advisory Panel on Federal Tax Reform will be of historic value in fundamentally reforming our Nation's moribund federal tax system. We applaud the direction given in your January 7th Executive Order, which ordered the Panel to develop options that 'promote long-run economic growth and job creation, and better encourage work effort, saving, and investment ....' However, we have become deeply concerned that this directive is being undercut, and the work of the Panel needlessly compromised, by the use of 'static' estimates on reform alternatives."
"We urge you to direct the Panel to use 'dynamic,''reality-based' revenue estimating methodology so that the impact of the tax system on the incentives to work, save and invest is properly considered. We urge you to ensure that the methodology chosen acknowledges the reality that the U.S. economy is an 'open' economy where capital can flow to and from the U.S. and where goods and services cross international borders. We urge you as well to direct the Panel to adopt longstanding recommendations of the Council of Economic Advisers, contained in the Economic Report of the President, to measure the distributional impact of tax reform alternatives as a function of taxes paid over lifetime income or consumption. Just as static estimates favor the current regime, distributional measurements of taxes paid over annual income disfavor pro-growth alternatives."
Look at the content (big greed stuff as usual) and A LIST - Everybody and the brother on that including ALEC, AFP, State level folks like the Mackinac Center so forth....
Here is the LIST (print this and others you find to .pdf files - they are not long for this world as the ALEC story goes national):
60 Plus Association, James L. Martin, President
American Conservative Union, David A. Keene, Chairman
Americans for Fair Taxation, Leo E. Linbeck, Jr., Chairman
American Family Business Institute, Dick Patten, Executive Director
American Legislative Exchange Council, Duane Parde, Executive Director
Americans For Prosperity, Michelle L. Korsmo, Executive Vice President
American Shareholders Association, Daniel Clifton, Executive Director
Americans for Tax Reform, Grover Norquist, President
American Producers Council
Argus Group, David R. Burton and Dan R. Mastromarco
William W. Beach, Director, Ctr for Data Analysis, Heritage Foundation*
Center for Freedom and Prosperity, Andrew Quinlan, President
Center for the Advancement of Capitalism, Nicholas Provenzo, Chairman
Center for Global Economic Growth, Richard W. Rahn, Director General
Citizens Against Government Waste, Tom Schatz, President
Club for Growth, Pat Toomey, President
Competitive Enterprise Institute, Fred Smith, President
Discovery Institute, Bruce Chapman, President
Ethan Allen Institute, John McClaughry, President
Free Enterprise Fund, Lawrence A. Hunter, Vice President and Chief Economist
FreedomWorks, Matt Kibbe, President
Galen Institute,Grace-Marie Turner, President
Independent Women's Forum, Nancy M. Pfotenhauer, President
Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI), Tom Giovanetti, President
Institute for Research on the Economics of Taxation, Stephen J. Entin, President
Iowans for Tax Relief, David M. Stanley, Chairman
Kansas Taxpayers Network, Karl Peterjohn, Executive Director
Lone Star Foundation, David A. Hartman, Chairman
Mackinac Center for Public Policy, Michael LaFaive, Director of Fiscal Policy
Maryland Taxpayers Association, Inc., Richard Falknor, Executive Vice President
Dan Mitchell, Heritage Foundation
National Center for Public Policy Research, Amy Ridenour, President
National Small Business Association, Todd McCracken, President
National Tax Limitation Committee, Lewis K. Uhler, President
National Taxpayers Union, John Berthoud, President
George A. Pieler, Former Tax Counsel, Senate Finance Committee*
Public Interest Institute, Dr. Don Racheter, President Veronique de Rugy, American Enterprise Institute*
Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council, Karen Kerrigan, President & CEO
Small Business Association of Michigan, Rob Fowler, President
Taxpayer Protection Alliance, Lori Klein, President
Taxpayers League of Minnesota, David M Strom, President
Tennessee Tax Revolt, Inc., Rick Durham, President
United States Chamber of Commerce
* Institutional affiliation is for identification purposes only
NOTE: Saw a NYT article in 2009 saying that one third of all funding for the US Chamber comes from only 19 companies. This is not just corporations, this is about the MEGA-wealthy. What they want is beyond me.
There are plenty of these "Sign-on" letters, and looks like Lew Uhler, who is a recruited Der Vodder and amany others has a big role at ALEC. He selects the people and directs the content of ALEC conferences (love the ALEC "Boot camps" look for those n your State) and attends all the conferences is the propagator.
Documentation directly from ALEC to the Tea Party and Americans for Prosperity is provable, and a WHOLE LOT MORE.
NEXT TIME: Mackinac Center in National Spotlight: Warts, Witch-hunt, & the Weird (Responses to FOIAs, Bomb threats, etc)
How Michigan Universities, students, professors and others are reacting and what they think about the mass FOIA requests. Whether or not anyone in Michigan is getting the whole story, yet to covered by any media outlet in the state