Their Money Or Our Lives

Years may pass before we know the full impact of the Supreme Court's recent decision to grant corporations extraordinary and unprecedented political speech rights as if they were real people and not legal fictions of convenience. Though now that the Chamber of Commerce spends more on political action than either the DNC or RNC (via), though still shy of outspending both combined, maybe we won't have to wait all that long, after all.

In just the past decade, corporations, their lobbyists and the corporate-run DC political elite have advocated for, and often passed, numerous policies that killed, sickened and impoverished Americans (and other run-of-the-mill people of no political consequence.) They denied necessary health care until it killed people or threw them out of work, they polluted, they stole, they starved, they poisoned the food and water and air, they damn near bankrupted the entire world.

But the people running all this said it was profitable and anyway, there's really no alternative, so no worries, there's nothing to see here except the inevitable turning of the gears of economic growth. It doesn't matter if they've further corrupted democracy at every turn, shutting people out of their government, making public policy decisions in private corporate boardrooms, turning the courts against the public interest.

I don't pretend to know how it's all going to turn out, even if I have my suspicions. What I have been doing is thinking about two cases of grassroots action against corporate power in Oregon, one failed, one successful, and hoping that there really is a way forward in the fight against those Theodore Roosevelt referred to as the "malefactors of great wealth."

From the transcripts of the documentary, "The Corporation", the Strategies for Change (pdf) section, link added:

Fighting GMOs > Jane Akre, Whistle-blowing Fox Reporter

Labelling has met with limited success in the States although there are an awful lot of grassroots groups that are saying, once we label, that is essentially the death of genetically modified organisms. And there was an attempt in Oregon called Measure 27 to label GMOs and, it was amazing. I actually got out to Oregon and watched it. It was certainly a grassroots citizens group and they had limited budget, they had somewhat of a budget. They did some advertising, they did a lot of public speaking. A lot of grassroots folks were very organized and did a really good job to inform the public.

Then a consortium of biotech companies came in and there was just no limit on the amount of money they spent on advertising. The scare tactics that they used, scaring people that they were going to have to pay 30 percent more on the grocery store shelves if labelling goes into effect. Scaring people about the grassroots folk who were trying to keep consumers informed. Ultimately, that multimillion dollar campaign won out against the grassroots campaign, and that’s the way it’s done.

Other than that, that’s as far as the labelling issue has gone, but that was the seed, that was the genesis and it’s not going to stop. And we now have areas of the country where they’re not allowing genetically modified organisms in. This has just got to be done on the grassroots because that’s the only way it’s going to be effective. Citizens are going to make it happen. It’s not going to happen on the part of the biotech companies and it’s not going to happen from our government.

... You know, people are easily scared and a lot of people are on very tight budgets and it’s tough to think that it’s going to cost you more. I always, I always come back to thinking that an informed consumer is going to do the right thing. I mean, they even had Sir Paul McCartney coming out and doing an ad for them, and that’s pretty powerful stuff. And, they were defeated. I wish I had some kind of words of advice. Unless you have a multimillion dollar campaign, it’s very, very tough.

Just last week, on the same day Scott Brown won the Massachusetts Senate race, links in original text:

... Yesterday Oregon voters delivered a huge victory for progressives by approving Measures 66 and 67, raising taxes on incomes over $250,000 and large corporations to generate $733 million to close the state's budget deficit. The Oregon legislature had approved the taxes last summer, but a corporate/teabagger alliance organized to put it to voters in a referendum.

... The opposition ran a well-funded campaign, led by Nike, Columbia Sportswear, and other big businesses. They were joined by Ari Fleischer's FreedomWorks and the libertarian publisher of the Oregonian, who used to be at the Orange County Register before it went belly-up. Together they ran a campaign arguing that the tax increases would worsen unemployment. But 55% of voters have rejected that, and instead showed that when a truly progressive campaign is waged, the right-wingers can be beaten. Even on taxes.

What it also shows is that progressive policies, supported by smart progressive organizing led by folks such as former US Senate candidate Steve Novick and the Oregon Bus Project, which reached out to younger voters and had a strong ground game, can beat well-funded, well-organized corporate/teabagger alliances. ...

I'd like to be able to tie this all up in with a pithy to-do list, '10 steps to beat corporate power' or somesuch, but I'm not any more sure what to do about all of this than I'm sure of how it will end up. People smarter, wiser, more strategic and stronger than me have offered great advice, implemented very clever plans, and still failed to prevent any number of bad outcomes. I'm not even sure who to listen to.

I'd like to be able to say that because we 'have to' solve this problem of corporate capture of the machinery of government, we will. I'm not an historian, but I know enough about the subject to be well aware that civilizations have failed to solve numerous other issues that threatened them, then had to suffer the consequences for their lack of sense. No one has to fix anything. The world/country/city/farm/democracy/etc. doesn't have to be saved and often hasn't been. Things don't always turn out for the best, even if they might. And they always might.

Indeed, the belief that a good outcome is part of the inevitable sweep of history seems silly, distracting and disempowering. Silly, because it represents a failure to acknowledge grievous tragedies. Distracting because it papers over the intense striving of the powerful to hold onto their ill-gotten reins. Disempowering by way of ignoring how persistent and visionary people had to be in order to bring about change in the face of overwhelming force and uncertainty.

Though still, I'm thinking about this, talking to people, searching out stories about how others fought back, looking for ideas. Maybe I'll find something, I'll tell you about it. Maybe you'll find something, please tell me about it. This all might still turn out for the best.

Views expressed on this page are those of the authors and not necessarily those of Campaign for America's Future or Institute for America's Future