http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2011/10/29/us/AP-US-Occupy-Denver.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha23

 

October 29, 2011

Denver Police Move Into Occupy Protest Encampment

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

DENVER (AP) — The simmering tension near the Colorado Capitol escalated dramatically Saturday with more than a dozen arrests, reports of skirmishes between police and protesters and authorities firing rounds of pellets filled with pepper spray at supporters of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Officers in riot gear moved into a park late in the day where protesters were attempting to establish an encampment, hauling off demonstrators just hours after a standoff at the Capitol steps degenerated into a fight that ended in a cloud of Mace and pepper spray.

Denver police spokesman Matt Murray said 15 people were arrested in the evening confrontation, where authorities were moving to prevent protesters from setting up tents in the park, which are illegal. Officals say the demonstrators had been warned several times that the tents would not be allowed and those who attempted to stop police from dismantling the camp gear were arrested. Protesters have been staying in the park for weeks, but tents have repeatedly been removed.

Murray said that most of the protesters were peaceful but there was "just a die-hard group that didn't want to cooperate."

"We showed great restraint," he said. "We were calm. We went in and did what we had to do. There's a group of very committed people who believe in a cause, and then there are a few people who just want to cause trouble."

Earlier in the day about 2,000 protesters rallying against what they see as economic inequality and corporate greed marched downtown toward the Capitol, setting up the most intense moments of the Denver movement, which has lasted weeks.

A group of the marchers advanced toward the building and some tried to make their way up the steps. About eight officers scuffled with a group of protesters and police confirmed that they used Mace and fired pepper balls — hollow projectiles filled with the chemical irritant — to break up the crowd. Protesters told the paper at the time that they believed police used rubber bullets.

Murray said protesters kicked police and knocked one officer off his motorcycle. He said five protesters were arrested, including two for assault and one for disobedience.

Chantrell Smiley, 21, of Denver, said she has been protesting downtown for more than a week, sleeping on the ground in the park. She said she didn't see the officer get knocked from his motorcycle and didn't see any reason for the afternoon confrontation.

"It was just chaos. This wasn't necessary. My friend got hit with rubber bullets in the face. He was screaming and bleeding, then they Maced him. We're being peaceful. We don't want to be harmed. They came through and took everything down — our food, our blankets, everything's gone."

Mike Korzen, 25, told the Denver Post that he was among the group that police dispersed with rubber bullets and pepper spray and suggested that the police force was excessive.

"I was standing there with my hands behind my back," Korzen said, using a water bottle to rinse pepper spray from his eyes.

After nightfall about a dozen Denver police and Colorado state patrol cars remained in the area.

About 100 protesters milled about, most coughing and sneezing from the haze of pepper spray and Mace that still hovered in the air. Some laid out tarps on the ground, preparing to spend another night outside. Throughout the evening vehicles pulled up, dropping off blankets and food with cheering protesters.

© 2011 The New York Times Company

 

Donations can be sent to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD 21218.  Ph: 410-366-1637; Email: mobuszewski [at] verizon.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/

 

"The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives." Eugene Victor Debs

 

Meet the 0.01 Percent: War Profiteers

Posted by Robert Greenwald on @ 10:47 am

Article printed from speakeasy: http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy

http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2011/10/27/meet-the-0-01-percent-war-profiteers/?akid=7788.281826.2fkZrg&rd=1&t=21

There’s the top 1% of wealthy Americans (bankers, oil tycoons, hedge fund managers) and there’s the top 0.01% of wealthy Americans: the military contractor CEOs.

If you’ve been following the War Costs campaign, you already know that these corporations are bad bosses, bad job creators and bad stewards of taxpayer dollars. What you may not know is that the huge amount of money these companies’ CEOs make off of war and your tax dollars places them squarely at the top of the gang of corrupt superrich choking our democracy. These CEOs want you to believe the massive war budget is about security — it’s not. The lobbying they’re doing to keep the war budget intact at the expense of the social safety net is purely about their greed.

In many areas, including yearly CEO salary and in dollars spent corrupting Congress, these companies are far greater offenders than even the big banks like JP Morgan Chase or Bank of America.

Egregious Military Contractor CEO pay

The top 0.01% of earners make at least $9.14 million per year, a rarefied strata of income that includes defense company CEOs and Wall Street bank chieftains alike. But a deeper dive demonstrates how defense companies outpace the big banks’ knack for enriching themselves at the expense of everyone else.

Military Contractor CEO Pay in 2010

• Northrop Grumman CEO Wes Bush: $22.84 million.

• Lockheed Martin CEO Robert Stevens: $21.89 million.

• Boeing CEO James McNerney: $19.4 million.

Just to put that in context, consider how these annual payoffs compare to the people we’re used to thinking of as poster children for the top 1 percent:

Financial Sector CEO Pay in 2010

• JP Morgan Chase CEO James Dimon: $20.81 million.

• Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf: $18.97 million.

• Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan: $1.94 million.

Considering how they stack up to financial sector heads, war industry CEOs aren’t just members of the 1%; they’re the super-elite among them, the one-hundredth of a percent.

Lobbying Domination

Disgusted by the overwhelming corporate influence in Congress? Look no further than the big military contractor companies, whose flagship companies spend enough on lobbying to dwarf even financial sector titans.

War Industry Lobbying Expenditures for 2010

• Lockheed Martin: $12.7 million.
• Northrop Grumman: $15.7 million.
• Boeing: $17.89 million.

Again, just to provide some context, here are the same lobbying totals for some of the most recognized names in the financial sector.

Financial Sector Lobbying in 2010

• JP Morgan Chase:$7.41 million.

• Wells Fargo: $5.43 million.

• Bank of America: $3.98 million.

The war industry gets away with blowing our money on job-killing spending because it can bend Congress to its whim. In the process, the industry is like a vacuum sucking up brain power and engineering resources that could and would establish and grow entirely new wholesome industries. It’s no surprise that Americans confront a 9.1% unemployment rate and an under-employment rate flirting with 20 percent this year.

Want to know where all the money went that could be putting people back to work or keeping U.S. manufacturing industries competitive? The war industry CEOs dumped lobbying cash on Congress and diverted all that wealth to their private bank accounts.

Striking a blow for democracy

The war contractors’ iron grip on the wealth and politics of our country has caught the attention of our friends at Occupy Wall Street, who are targeting war profiteers in its draft list of demands with a call to bring home “all military personnel at all non-essential bases” and to end the “Military Industrial Complex’s goal of perpetual war for profit.”

We’re allies of the Occupy movement, which swells from the 99%’s disgust and dysfunction with our system. A democracy for and of the people that favors the 0.01% at the expense of the 99.99% of us is no democracy at all.

We here at Brave New Foundation and the War Costs campaign have been inspired by the incredible work of the Occupy movement, so we created our latest video to help push this critical piece of their message: war for profit has to end. We’re asking viewers to share our video with their local Occupy groups and organize a guerrilla screening at an Occupy protest in your city.

The Occupy protests have a lot to teach us, and the leaderless movement is at minimum an indictment of our political system. They’ve stopped whispering, and we’ve all started shouting.

Occupy your city and show this video to your community.

 

 

Donations can be sent to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD 21218.  Ph: 410-366-1637; Email: mobuszewski [at] verizon.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/

 

"The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives." Eugene Victor Debs

 

Baltimore Activist Alert - Part 2

35] Remember nuclear weapons program workers – Oct. 30

36] Deluxe Jim Crow – Oct. 30

37] Get on Bridge for Peace – Oct. 30

38] See Mother Jones play – through Oct. 30

39] Philadelphia Peace Vigil – Oct. 30

40] Bill Fletcher in Baltimore -- Oct. 30

41] Red Emma's Meeting – Oct. 30

42] Pentagon Vigil – Oct. 31

43] Study Community Reinvestment Act – Oct. 31

44] Marc Steiner on WEAA – Oct. 31 – Nov. 3

45] Protest the death penalty – Oct. 31

46] Pledge/Fund Our Communities meeting – Oct. 31 

47] Occupy Philly – Nov. 1

48] Bill Barry on WEAA – Nov. 1

49] War Is Not the Answer – Nov. 1

50] Film A QUESTION OF INTEGRITY – Nov. 1

------

35] – Sunday, October 30 is the National Day of Remembrance for Nuclear Weapons Program Workers.

 

36] – Usually, the Baltimore Ethical Society, 306 W. Franklin St., Suite 102, Baltimore, MD 21201-4661, meets on Sundays, and generally there is a speaker and discussion from 10:30 to 11:30 AM.  On Sun., Oct. 30, the program will look at "Deluxe Jim Crow: Civil Rights and American Health Policy."  Karen Kruse Thomas, PhD, The Johns Hopkins University, is a postdoctoral fellow at the Institute of the History of Medicine, where she is writing a history of the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health. Her talk is drawn from her forthcoming book from University of Georgia Press, DELUXE JIM CROW: Civil Rights and American Health Policy, 1935-1954. Call 410-581-2322 or visit the website to be sure at www.baltimoreethicalsociety.org.

 

37] – Maryland Bridges for Peace welcomes you to stand for peace Sundays from noon (or thereabouts) to 1 PM on the Spa Creek Bridge in Annapolis.  Contact Lucy at 410-263-7271 or mdbridgesforpeace@toadmail.com. Signs are not allowed to be on a stick or pole.   If there is interest, people will be standing on the Stoney Creek Bridge on Fort Smallwood Road in Pasadena [410-437-5379 or magicalgodmom@aol.com]. Go to http://BridgePeace.blogspot.com/

38] – "Can't Scare Me - The Story of Mother Jones" will be performed on Sun., Oct. 30 at 2 PM at the Theater of the First Amendment, George Mason Univ., 4400 University Dr., MS 3E6, Fairfax, VA 22030.  The play is written and performed by Kaiulani Lee. Go to http://atlasarts.org/events/2011/07/cant-scare-me-the-story-of-mother-jo...

39] – Every Sunday, 4 to 5 PM, there is a Quaker Peace Vigil at Independence Mall, N. side of Market between 5th and 6th Sts., Philadelphia. Call 215-421-5811.

 

40] – The 9th Annual Ric Pfeffer Lecture presents Bill Fletcher, Jr., who will examine "Observations and Lessons from the 'Arab Spring'" on Sun., Oct. 30 from 7 to 9 PM at 2640 St. Paul St.  He is a long-time labor, racial justice and international activist, an Editorial Board member and columnist for BlackCommentator.com and Senior Scholar for the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, DC.

 

The RIC PFEFFER LECTURE FUND is a program of Research Associates Foundation. It was established in memory of Ric Pfeffer, former Johns Hopkins professor, attorney in the field of worker health and safety, activist in the peace and civil rights movements, and founding member of the Progressive Action Center. The Fund honors his legacy by providing support for radical and progressive lectures that analyze current conditions and promote activism. Go to http://rafbaltimore.org/category/ric-pfeffer-memorial-lecture-fund.

 

To make a tax-deductible contribution to the Lecture Fund, send a check payable to Research Associates Foundation (with "RP lecture" in the subject line) and mail to Research Associates Foundation, PO Box 26152, Baltimore, MD 21210-0052. Email Pfefferlecture@gmail.com.

 

41] – Red Emma's needs volunteers.  Stop in to the weekly Sunday meeting at 7 PM at 800 St. Paul St. or email info@redemmas.org.  The next meeting is Oct. 30. There is no meeting on the first Sunday of the month.  Call 410-230-0450. If you would be interested in volunteering or becoming a collective member of 2640, send an email to 2640@redemmas.org.

 

42] – There is a weekly Pentagon Peace Vigil from 7 to 8 AM on Mondays, since 1987, outside the Pentagon Metro stop.  The next vigil is Mon., Oct. 31, and it is sponsored by the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker.  Call 202-882-9649.

 

43] – The National Low Income Housing Coalition will host a series of brown bag lunch events on most Mondays through the end of 2011. The events will be from noon to 1:30 PM ET in the 8th floor conference room, 727 15th St. NW, WDC. On Oct. 31, the Community Reinvestment Act will be presented by the National Community Reinvestment Coalition. RSVP to policyintern@nlihc.org.

 

44] – The Marc Steiner Show airs Monday through Thursday from 5 to 7 PM on WEAA 88.9 FM, The Voice of the Community, or online at www.weaa.org.   The call-in number is 410-319-8888, and comments can also be sent by email to steinershow@gmail.com. All shows are also available as podcasts at www.steinershow.org.   

 

45] – There is usually a vigil to abolish the death penalty every Monday from 5 to 6 PM, outside the prison complex and across the street from Maryland's Super Max Prison, at the corner of Madison Ave. and Fallsway in Baltimore.  Recently death row was moved out of Baltimore, but it was decided to continue the vigil. The next one is scheduled for Mon., Oct. 31. Call 410-366-1637.

 

46] – The Pledge of Resistance-Baltimore usually meets on Mondays at 7:30 PM, and the meetings now take place at Max's residence.  The next meeting takes place on Oct. 31.  The proposed agenda will include a review of the strategy to pressure the Super Committee to cut military spending, continuing reports on Occupation Baltimore & the Freedom Square occupation, a reminder of the First Thursday antiwar demo and a report on the trial of 18 antiwar protesters in D.C.  Call 410-366-1637 or email mobuszewski at verizon.net for directions.

: 

47] – OCCUPY PHILLY, www.occupyphilly.org, continues at Phila. City Hall, 15th & Market Sts. We Are The 99% Demanding Economic Justice, Democracy, and Peace on Tuesdays at 4:30 until 6 PM, Phila. City Hall.  Join the Brandywine Peace Community and other peace and anti-war activists at Occupy Philly. Call Brandywine Peace Community, 610-544-1818 or go to www.brandywinepeace.com.

 

48] – Bill Barry, Green Party candidate for City Council, will be on the Marc Steiner Show on Tues., Nov. 1 from 5-6 PM on WEAA-FM (88.9) with the incumbent Robert Curran.  Go to www.citizensforbillbarry.org. Go Green - Recycle The Baltimore City Council

 

49] – There is a vigil to say "War Is Not the Answer" each Tuesday since September 11, 2001 at 4806 York Road. Join this ongoing vigil.  The next vigil is Nov. 1 from 5:30 to 6:30 PM.  Call Max at 410-366-1637.

50] – A film premiere of A QUESTION OF INTEGRITY: Politics, Ethics, and the Supreme Court will be shown on Tues., Nov. 1 at 6 PM at the E Street Cinema, 555 11th St. NW, WDC 20004 (entrance on E St. between 10th and 11th Sts.)  Alliance for Justice will be premiering its newest short documentary, narrated by actor, director, and activist Edward James Olmos.  The film exposes evidence that some Supreme Court justices have participated in overtly political activity, and have maintained financial and personal relationships that create the appearance of impropriety. The film explores ways in which this questionable behavior raises concerns about the need to apply the Judicial Code of Conduct to the justices of the Supreme Court, and the importance of enforcing the Ethics in Government Act.  Call 202-452-7672.

To be continued.

 

Donations can be sent to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD 21218.  Ph: 410-366-1637; Email: mobuszewski [at] verizon.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/

 

"The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives." Eugene Victor Debs

The Military Spending Fairy

Published on Wednesday, October 26, 2011 by CEPR Blog

The Military Spending Fairy

by Dean Baker

Faced with the prospect of cuts to the Defense Department's budget, the defense industry is pushing the story of the military spending fairy on members of Congress. They are telling them that these cuts will lead to the loss of more than 1 million jobs over the next decade.

Believers in the military spending fairy say things like "the government can't create jobs," but also think that military spending creates jobs. Under the military spending fairy story, if the government spends $1 billion dollars paying people to do research or to build items related to the civilian economy it is just a drag on the private economy; however if the same spending goes to military related purposes, then it creates jobs.Believers in the military spending fairy say things like "the government can't create jobs," but also think that military spending creates jobs. (image: Pete Simon)

It's not clear exactly how the military fairy blesses projects to make them helpful to the economy rather than harmful. For example, the highways were built in the 50s ostensibly in part for defense purposes. They made it easier to move troops and military equipment around the country in the event of an attack. Government subsidized student loans were also originally dubbed as defense loans since they were ostensibly intended in part to produce more graduates in science and engineering who could help us compete with the Soviet Union in defense related technologies. 

Using this same logic, perhaps President Obama could get the military spending fairy to bless some of his stimulus spending so that it will be economically useful. He could again call student loans "defense loans." He could also have the research into clean energy technologies be viewed as providing alternative sources for energy for the military in the event we are cut off from oil imports in a war. (It makes as much sense as the highway story.) Then the military spending fairy can bless the stimulus as creating jobs.

For people who don't believe in the military spending fairy, the story is simple. During a downturn where there are lots of unemployed workers, any government spending will create jobs, regardless of whether or not it is on the military. In fact, military spending is likely to create fewer jobs than spending in most other areas (e.g. education, health care, conservation) because it is more capital intensive.

When the economy is near full employment, military spending is a drag on the economy. It pulls resources away from private sector uses, lowering investment and increasing the trade deficit. This leads to job losses, which are likely to be felt most severely in manufacturing and construction. 

In short, for those who do not believe in the military spending fairy, military spending will cost jobs in either the short-term of long-term. If the spending doesn't make sense in terms of advancing national security, then it doesn't make sense period: end of story.

Dean Baker is the co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR). He is the author of The Conservative Nanny State: How the Wealthy Use the Government to Stay Rich and Get Richer and the more recently published Plunder and Blunder: The Rise and Fall of The Bubble Economy. He also has a blog, "Beat the Press," where he discusses the media's coverage of economic issues.

Source URL: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/10/26-4

 

Donations can be sent to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD 21218.  Ph: 410-366-1637; Email: mobuszewski [at] verizon.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/

 

"The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives." Eugene Victor Debs

 

http://www.nationofchange.org/meeting-violence-nonviolence-why-occupy-movement-will-succeed-1319895101

 

Meeting Violence with Nonviolence: Why the Occupy Movement Will Succeed

By Jake Olzen

The Occupy movement is under attack. It is facing aggressive police action in cities all over the country while arrests continue over the enforcement of mundane laws that prevent the establishment of permanent encampments. Police attacked Occupy Oakland with rubber bullets and tear gas in the wee hours of Tuesday morning; there were at least a hundred arrests. 130 activists with Occupy Chicago were arrested on Saturday during their second attempt at setting up a camp in Grant Park. Atlanta’s Mayor, Kasim Reed, conducting what appears to have been negotiations in bad faith, ordered Occupy Atlanta cleared of Warren Park last night; 52 were arrested. Occupy Orlando has repeatedly been harassed by changing city policy regarding their camp in Senator Elizabeth Johnson Park, forcing them to vacate the park and their belongings between 11pm and 6am. The Occupy movement may not have it easy right now, but they are being noticed!

The course of social change has often been boiled down to poetic mantras-of-sorts. Utah Phillips and the Wobblies—paraphrasing Joe Hill—were found of saying “Don’t Mourn. Organize!” Margaret Mead made it onto the backs of college service trip t-shirts: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.” I repeated to a college class last night a quote about nonviolent social change that I remember a teacher telling me: “First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.” The quote, often attributed to Gandhi, most likely originated with the trade unionist Nicholas Klein, of the Amalgamated Clothing Works of America at their Third Biennial Convention in 1918. As is often the case with such misattributions (including the Mead quote), savvy organizers and activists still recognize the grain of truth such folkloric wisdom has had over the decades; Occupy Wall Street and the Occupy movement are no different.

First, Occupy Wall Street was ignored. The call from Adbusters in July 2011 for 20,000 people to camp out in Wall Street was barely noticed by the mainstream media—if at all. Waging Nonviolence editor Nathan Schneider was one of the few journalists dedicated to reporting on the burgeoning movement, but it wasn’t until well after September 17—the first day of the occupation—that people outside the progressive newswire took notice. Then, Occupy Wall Street was laughed at. The usual suspects dished out the usual slander—including The Daily Show—casting the movement in any number of simplistic, idealistic, and dismissive ways. Whether for entertainment reasons or to discredit its legitimacy, making fun of Occupy Wall Street is good business for the mainstream media.

Now, Occupy Wall Street is being violently resisted. And expect more of it to come, especially if folks keep at it as they try to assert their First Amendment rights to peaceably assemble. Before demands come, before protracted struggles and campaigns over specific political, economic or environmental policies begin, before the Occupy movement succeeds in turning the tide of the corporate state back toward communities and the common good, it needs a home. A place to put down roots and grow the movement. A place to reclaim the commons – and not just in theory but in actual, physically-manifested ways that say: “Hey, we are here to stay. No more business and politics as usual. Now it’s our turn to have self-determination and self-governance. Let the General Assembly begin (spirit fingers up in the air)!”

As I wrote in my article #OccupyWallStreet: We Make the Road by Walking, this movement is about a new way of being:

#OccupyWallStreet is an experiment in direct democracy and people power that does not have to stop once demands are made and some of them are met. Rather, what #OccupyWallStreet represents is the kind of community we can have in place of Empire.

The crackdown on Occupy movements by mayors and police forces around the country means only one thing: its getting somewhere. The powers that be—and the mayors who represent them—want this movement to go away. And they will not hesitate, as we’ve witnessed, to use violence, arrests, and likely imprisonment, if it gets to that, to make that happen. For the Occupy movement to succeed in making the substantial, lasting change needed, it will need to establish the kind of permanent space it envisions so that the teach-ins, community building, organizing, action-planning and General Assemblies flourish. Meet violence with nonviolence. Respond to police action and arrests with more civil disobedience and vigorous protest via the courts, petitions, sit-ins, and/or walk-outs. As the mainstream media tries to demonize the movement, do more outreach to labor, universities, churches and the ordinary citizens you now represent. As Frederick Douglass said, “Power concedes nothing without a struggle. It never has and it never will.” And then finally – after that struggle – Occupy Wall Street will succeed.

This article was published at NationofChange at: http://www.nationofchange.org/meeting-violence-nonviolence-why-occupy-movement-will-succeed-1319895101. All rights are reserved.

Donations can be sent to the Baltimore Nonviolence Center, 325 E. 25th St., Baltimore, MD 21218.  Ph: 410-366-1637; Email: mobuszewski [at] verizon.net. Go to http://baltimorenonviolencecenter.blogspot.com/

 

"The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and everything to lose--especially their lives." Eugene Victor Debs

 

People Power Winning in Ohio

People Power Winning in Ohio: Anti-Worker Law Repeal Favored

 

By Isaiah J. Poole

October 25, 2011 - 3:53pm ET

http://ourfuture.org/blog-entry/2011104325/people-power-winning-ohio-anti-worker-law-repeal-favored

 

The conservative campaign against worker rights is

losing in Ohio, according to a Quinnipiac University

poll released today.

 

Support for the repeal of SB 5, the law pushed by Ohio

Gov. John Kasich that strips the bargaining rights of

public workers, is up to 57 percent, according to the

poll, with 32 percent supporting keeping the anti-worker

law in place. That's evidence that the grassroots

campaign to overturn the law has momentum: a month ago,

51 percent supported repeal, and 38 percent supported

keeping the law in place.

 

The support for the repeal effort is particularly

noteworthy given the forces arrayed against it. Today

Truthout posted a special report on the effort against

the referendum, which is fueled by literally untold

millions of dollars in corporate cash.

 

A lot of that cash, according to author Mike Ludwig, is

being funneled through the Republican Governors

Association, which was a major contributor to Kasich's

successful 2010 election. "The RGA is using Make Ohio

Great, a nonprofit group, to run ads featuring Kasich

discussing elements of Senate Bill 5, without explicitly

mentioning the ballot initiative. This ensures that the

group can avoid revealing its finances to state

officials. Make Ohio Great and the RGA share the same

address in Washington, DC, but the RGA is also keeping

its finances in the dark," Ludwig writes.

 

We Are Ohio, the grassroots, union-backed organization

leading the repeal effort, has tracked down some of the

opposition spending. "We Are Ohio told media outlets

earlier this month that Building a Better Ohio and Make

Ohio Great spent $2.8 million and $1.2 million on

television ads respectively. We Are Ohio outspent both

with $5.4 million, but a spokesperson told Truthout to

'expect to see the floodgates open up from out-of-state

special interests as we get closer and closer to

election day,'" Ludwig writes.

 

Kasich, as the Truthout article points out, is an

alumnus of the American Legislative Exchange Council,

the arch-conservative organization that is working to

impose its right-wing blueprint for limited, corporate-

centric government on states and localities nationwide.

Among ALEC's chief funders are the billionaire Koch

brothers as well as Bayer, Pfizer, Wal-Mart, Exxon-Mobil

and Coca-Cola.

 

These and other corporations have several conduits

through which they can pour cash in a last-minute effort

to defeat the repeal effort while evading public

exposure, at least during the campaign. A super PAC,

Stop Public Unions Now!, is registered with the Federal

Election Commission and has aired ads featuring Kasich

in support of SB 5, Ludwig reports.

 

"Other out-of-state groups defending Senate Bill 5 are

more visible than SPUN!. Americans for Prosperity, a

conservative group funded in part by the Koch brothers,

has held town halls across Ohio to convince voters that

Senate Bill 5 is good for Ohio. The Arlington, Virginia-

based Alliance for America's Future, founded by a former

Ohio GOP operative and former Vice President Dick

Cheney's daughter Mary Cheney, is sending out millions

of mailers in support of Senate Bill 5, according to

media reports," Ludwig writes.

 

On the other hand, the onslaught of corporate cash may

well backfire, as is Kasich's own high-handedness. What

the poll shows is that other than doctrinaire

Republicans, most Ohio voters support the basic rights

of public workers. Of the poll respondents, 61 percent

support the right of public employees to strike, 56

percent oppose limits on the ability of public employees

to bargain over health care, and 51 percent oppose

eliminating seniority as the sole factor when

determining layoffs. And a majority of nonunion

households support repeal of SB 5, just as an do an

overwhelming percentage of union households.

 

Many voters will no doubt be swayed by the common sense

statement of conservative talk-show host Bill

Cunningham, who said that he is supporting the repeal

because "from my perspective, those affected by

governmental decisions need to have a place at the

bargaining table to determine the outcome of what's

being discussed."

 

At the Take Back the American Dream conference, a

session was devoted to building on the successes of the

Wisconsin push-back against Gov. Scott Walker's assault

on workers rights. The We Are Ohio movement has a hard

fight ahead, but it is taking good advantage of the

momentum that began in Wisconsin.

___________________________________________