Good News- Clean Elections, GM Labeling, Overturning Citizens United

Image from Citizen Action

Public Financing of Elections One Step Closer!
An unlikely coalition of wealthy individuals, business leaders and grassroots organizations like Citizen Action and MoveOn have joined forces to push for clean elections in New York State! Gov Cuomo backed the idea in his State of the State address in January. This could be the start of something really BIG!
Take action - http://votersnotdonors.org/2009/06/what-is-public-financing-of-elections/
BREAKING- Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has introduced legislation to bring fair elections to NY.
Locally- Attend a screening of the documentary Pricele$$ - May 4, 7PM Rosendale Recreation Center- Join the campaign to win Fair Elections for New York for a special screening of PRICELE$$, and a discussion about why New York needs Fair Elections campaign finance reform.
http://www.fairelectionsny.org/events/rosendale-pricele-screening

Overturning Citizens United 
Vermont became the third state to vote for an amendment to overturn Citizens United - one of the worst decisions of the Supreme Court that basically allows for legalized bribery and negates the bedrock of democracy of One person, One vote.

Sign the petition to "End Corporate Rule and Legalize Democracy" at Move to Amend.. Join Ulster County Move to Amend on FB.

Urge your state legislators to support a Constitutional Amendment at Free Speech for People.

Read more on why the Citizens United ruling is a death knell for democracy here.

Reigning in Exorbitant CEO Pay
Shareholders voted down the $14.9 million annual pay for its CEO at Citibank! "The opening shot in the battle to restore sanity to CEO pay."

Mega bonuses and outlandish CEO pay have contributed greatly to vast income inequality in America. In 2011, the average CEO pay jumped almost 14% to about $13 million a year. The average worker's wages rose 2.8% to $34,053. Three decades ago, the average CEO pay was 42 times the average worker and now it is nearly 400 times greater! "This yawning gap is the largest in the world." Read more.

States Mobilizing to Demand Labeling of GMOs! 

When the federal government fails in its duty to protect its citizens- we have another route to demand fairness and justice. So far, 20 states have introduced legislation to demand labeling of foods that contain GMOs (genetically modified organisms). For more on the health and environmental risks of GMO's- click here.

No where is the fight as dramatic as California. A labeling law is on its way to be voted on this November as a CA Ballot Initiative.

Vermont was well on its way to demand labeling when Monsanto threatened to sue the entire state. Looks like the governor is backing down in the face of it, despite 90% of his constituents wanting it  and sound science behind it. Contribute to the Organic Consumers Association Defense Fund now- so Vermont and other states can stand up to the biotech bullies.

Over 50 countries representing 40% of the world's population have mandatory GM labeling laws. Through the states, Americans are rising up to demand the same!

Join us on FB- GMO? OMG! Hudson Valley for NO GMO

ALEC Exposed
Not only are corporate members leaving the right wing organization in droves (Proctor and Gamble is the 13th to distance themselves from ALEC)  now Common Cause has submitted a formal whistle blower complaint against ALEC to the IRS. They allege ALEC broke federal tax laws by posing as a 501c3 not for profit, but actually engaging in lobbying activities.

"Their ain't no power like the power of the people because the power of the people don't stop!"

Power to the People- Protests, Amendments, State Banks!

1. Reclaim Your Future from the 1%
Tomorrow, Feb 29, there will be a national day of nonviolent, direct action targeting corporations that are a part of ALEC, The American Legislative Exchange Council. It is a corporate-funded, right-wing organization that wines and dines republican legislators and sends them home with "model legislation" that benefits corporations at the peril of people and the earth. ALEC brags that 1,000 of their bills have been introduced across the country.

ALEC is behind some of the most repressive new legislation in our country, like Arizona's anti-immigration law and the rash of voter ID laws that will disenfranchise millions of minority and elderly Americans. Their "model bills" attack workers' rights, deregulate environmental protections, deny climate change (they want to mandate teaching climate change denial in the classroom) undermine public education, fuel the prison industrial complex, privatize medicare, dismantle consumer protections and more.

Actions are planned in over 70 cities- join one near you!

From our Defend Democracy Rally in April 2010- to Oppose Citizens United

2. Corporations Are Not People My Friend!

Most know by now how disastrous the Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United is for our democracy.

Instead of one person - one vote, we now have corporations with their vast wealth backing candidates who will do their bidding and obliterating the voice of the people. But there are signs of hope on this front. There are currently 13 proposed amendments to reverse Citizens United and to get money out of politics once and for all!

One, by Rep Ted Deutch (D- FL) is the OCCUPIED Amendment- Outlawing Corporate Cash Undermining the Public Interest in Our Elections and Democracy.  Los Angeles just passed a resolution demanding Congress pass a Constitutional Amendment saying that "only living, breathing human beings are afforded Constitutional rights." May many other cities and towns do the same.

Also, interestingly, today the Supreme Court is hearing a case that asks if corporations, like real people, can be held liable in American courts for international human rights violations. Three out of four appeals courts have ruled yes. Kiobel v Royal Dutch Petroleum is being brought by about a dozen Nigerians who contend that Shell Oil's parent company helped their government torture and murder environmental and human rights protesters. How can the Court argue that corporations are people when it benefits them and that they are not if they have committed human rights abuses and serious crimes? Stay tuned.

3. Banks By and For the People
Seventeen states have introduced bills to create state-owned banks as an alternative to investing in the big banks of Wall Street. Many are looking to the Bank of North Dakota as a model. It has been in existence for 100 years and has helped that state thrive during the current recession. Instead of investing in Wall Street, that uses state revenues to speculate, invest abroad and buy up local banks, state banks can return money to local communities in loans and help renegotiate mortgages to stem the foreclosure crisis.


4. A Couple of Graphs that Say It All

Next time- the Right to Know- Label GM Food movement- it is growing and may reach a tipping point this year! Join us on Facebook- GMO? OMG! Hudson Valley for No GMOs

Keep Faith.

SOTU Address, Ethical Lapses of SCOTUS

1. A CBS poll showed that 91% of Americans who watched the State of the Union (44% Democrats, 25% Republicans) agreed with Obama's plans for the future. I liked his clarity on the unsustainability of more tax cuts for the wealthiest, but he didn't go nearly far enough in reining in the excessive spending of the military. Once again, it is the people who will suffer with a five year freeze on domestic spending.

Where was the acknowledgment of the foreclosure crisis, the vanishing middle class, climate change? What about the criminality of the finance sector that drove our economy into the ditch and walked away with billions more? How could he begin by paying respect to the victims of the Tucson shooting without mentioning the obvious need for better gun control in our country? Although I liked Obama's pledge for 80% of our electricity to come from clean sources- he lost me when he included gas, coal and nuclear as "clean". And more corporate tax cuts?? Wait, don't they have to pay corporate taxes first? In 2009,  Exxon Mobil made  $45.2 billion in profits, corporate taxes paid- $0 General Electric made $10 billion- they got a $1.1 billion refund!  http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/01/26

2.What could be more important than addressing the threat to democracy of our time? I'm referring to the Citizens United decision one year ago that allows corporations to spend without limits from their vast corporate treasuries to influence our elections and hence to drown out the voices of everyday Americans.

But there is hope. From a leader in fighting this decision, Free Speech for People-

"A widening consensus has emerged over the past year holding that the spending of general treasury corporate funds to influence elections is not "speech," that corporations are not among "we the people," and that Citizens United is wrong. And a growing consensus is emerging that Congress and the States must closely examine and seriously consider a constitutional amendment to reverse Citizens United. Close to a million Americans have signed resolutions calling on Congress to send such an amendment to the States. A bipartisan group of more than fifty leading law professors and former prosecutors and government attorneys has called on Congress to explore the Amendment option. And a fast-increasing group of business leaders now call for a constitutional amendment to overturn the decision because Citizens United corrupts both democracy and a robust, competitive economy." http://freespeechforpeople.org/node/186
Read more about the Movement of the People-  http://www.truth-out.org/at-summit-people-call-action-citizens-united67104

  

3. Supreme Court Justices, Scalia and Thomas have gone too far this time! Scalia, speaking behind closed doors, before new Congress members from the Tea Party. Thomas "forgetting" to report his wife's almost $800,000 in income from groups that benefited from his Citizens United decision- the list of ethical lapses goes on.

“A reasonable person would question the impartiality of Justices Thomas and Scalia in the Citizens United case based on their attendance at political strategy meetings sponsored by a corporation (the right wing Koch brothers) that raises and spends millions to defeat Democrats and elect Republicans.” http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0111/47855.html

"Are Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas the Bonnie and Clyde of Judicial Ethics? 'Citizens Robbed' " http://blog.buzzflash.com/node/12254 

And this just in- Alito also has appeared before right wing political fundraisers. Members of the Supreme Court are supposed to be above the fray! And you notice who boycotted SOTU last night? Scalia, Thomas and Alito.

4. No mention of global warming in the President's State of the Union. Here's a story of a polar bear that was tracked, who had to swim for 9 days to find ice- her cub did not make it.

http://www.care2.com/causes/environment/blog/polar-bear-must-swim-for-9-days-to-find-sea-ice/

5. From Witness against Torture- "We find hope in the community that gathered in Washington DC from Jan 11-22 (visit witnesstorture.org for re-caps of and reflections of their daily activities). We find hope in the men who remain in Guantanamo, whose protest within the prison walls on January 22 (the anniversary of Obama's broken promise) is both haunting and challenging.

Building on this hope, and faced with Guantanamo's tenth year as the shame of the nation, we begin planning... We now know for certain that the president has no plans to shutter Guantanamo before next January 11, so we have no plans to shut down our operations. Another Witness presence in Washington DC will come in June, and we plan to launch a mass education and recruitment drive, reaching parishes, congregations, and college campuses across the nation. When we return to Washington next January 11, we will number in the thousands - marching and witnessing and lobbying and processing and speaking out and being silent and haranguing and incommoding - until the people in power get the message: No Torture, No Bagram, No GTMO, No More"

Here are three videos from Ellen of New Paltz Women in Black who was a part of this DC action. We thank her for her unwavering dedication to peace and justice!
http://warisacrime.org/node/56278
http://warisacrime.org/node/56279
http://warisacrime.org/node/56281
 

"We'd like to thank the protesters from the depths of our heart. They are asking for justice even though they are not imprisoned."

- A Guantanamo Prisoner, in a recent message to Witness Against Torture