Amid a growing split in the business community over climate policy, Pacific Gas and Electric, a major California utility, is withdrawing from the United States Chamber of Commerce, citing “fundamental differences” with the chamber’s approach to global warming.
“We find it dismaying that the chamber neglects the indisputable fact that a decisive majority of experts have said the data on global warming are compelling and point to a threat that cannot be ignored,” Peter A. Darbee, the chairman of PG&E, wrote in a letter to the chamber.
Remember, the Chamber of Commerce isn’t just a leading climate change denier—so extreme that utility companies are having problems with it. The Chamber is also a major opponent of just about any change in law that would benefit working people. It’s a major opponent of health care reform. They’ve lobbied against health care reform.
Recent polls have shown that a broad majority of Americans favor a “public option” for health insurance. Yet public opinion may not be as powerful a force as the lobbying efforts of industries seeking to protect the status quo. Consumer groups that favor President Obama’s proposals to lower costs and expand coverage are being decidedly outspent and out-lobbied by drug manufacturers, insurers, HMOS and doctors’ associations.
In the first three months of 2009, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has spent more money on lobbying since 1998 than any other company, trade association, or advocacy group, and the Pharmaceutical Researchers and Manufacturers of America (PhARMA)–the No. 6 all-time spender–paid lobbyists a combined $22.5 million to promote their interests.
The Chamber of Commerce tries to pretend they speak for small business owners, because small businesses are popular. In reality, in the words of one small business owner,
“The US Chamber of Commerce doesn’t speak for small businesses any more than Burger King speaks for cows. While the Chamber works overtime to represent the narrow interests of bloated, wealthy corporations, our nation’s small businesses are struggling simply to keep their doors open.
The Chamber uses small businesses as a cover while it advances the interests of multinational corporations—against small business owners, against working people, against families, against children. Their climate change denialism is a perfect example of how they’ll hurt any and all of us to benefit big money.
Next time you hear the Chamber of Commerce trying to pretend their policies are in your best interest, remember: They’re Burger King, and in their eyes, you’re a cow.
The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (H.R. 3017), introduced by Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA), would prohibit employment discrimination, preferential treatment, and retaliation on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity by employers with 15 or more employees. Currently, it is legal to discriminate in the workplace based on sexual orientation in 29 states and in 38 states based on gender identity.
And the place to start for me is with the testimony of William Eskridge, John A. Garver Professor of Jurisprudence at Yale Law School, it’s short but very pointed.
And next up, another personal story, this one from Vandy Beth Glenn, where she was fired from her Georgia state legislative job
Normally, when I write these posts, I have loads to say, but I honestly couldn’t add analysis or even a thought when presented with the testimony of Vandy Beth Glenn and William Eskridge. Nothing I’ve experienced comes close to being fired from a job that you love and are good at because your boss has an issue with how your co-workers might feel. Feel? Seriously? WTF?
I think we as a society have a long way to go on the issue of equality. From women’s pay, to Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, we have long walk ahead of us. Legislation like ENDA is a major step down that long road, and no one says it better than the men and women most affected by ENDA, like Helen C. Walther:
By Helen C. Walther on September 22, 2009 12:59 PM As a transsexual woman I can directly attest to the need of this legislation. I can directly relate to the fear of losing a job, or not even having a chance for one, because of my gender identity as well as the limiting nature of this fear on my current job search (I’ve been unemployed for 9 months).
ENDA needs to come to the floor and every member of Congress needs to vote for it.
On the third day of the Senate Finance Committee’s markup of the deeply flawed bill offered by chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) a vote on a key amendment may be a bad sign of things to come.
As Jon Walker reports at FDL an amendment to fully close the so-called “donuthole” — the insidious gap in prescription coverage in Medicare part D — was defeated by a 10 to 13 vote.
The amendment, proposed by Senators Bill Nelson (D-FL) and Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) would have expanded coverage and lowered drug costs for 44 million seniors. The amendment would fully cover the cost of filling the donut hole and provide an additional $50 billion in government savings. And it would be paid for through a pharmaceutical industry rebate for overcharging seniors eligible for both Medicare and Medicaid.
Toward the end of the debate on the amendment, chairman Baucus said he’d wished that its sponsors hadn’t brought up the amendment.
And it was clear why. The amendment challenges the limits on drug industry contributions to health reform costs that Baucus agreed to in a reported deal with PhRMA, the pharmaceutical industry’s powerful lobby.
When it came time to vote on the amendment, two Democratic Senators, Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) and Kent Conrad (D-ND) initially “passed”. All 10 Republican Senators on the Committee voted “No” — and they were joined by three Democrats: Thomas Carper (D-Delaware), Robert Menendez (D-NJ)… and the chairman Max Baucus (D-MT). At that point Conrad and Lincoln voted “Yes”, but even then the amendment failed 10 to 13.
There are still several key amendments yet to be brought up that could significantly improve the Finance bill by including a public option. Among them:
1. Rockefeller #C1 (Amendment 181)–Apply health insurance market reforms to the large group and self-insured market effective in 2013
2. Rockefeller #C7 (Amendment 187)–establishes a public option that is tied to Medicare plus 5% rates with the ability to negotiate drug prices, and has an “opt-out” provider network.
3. Rockefeller #C5 (Amendment 185)–creates one national exchange, and strikes state exchanges and regional exchanges.
4. Schumer-Cantwell #C2 (Amendment 267)–Public option as passed by HELP Committee
You can help support these amendments. Call and email the Democratic members of the Senate Finance Committee. A Daily Kos diary from slinkerwink has the full contact list.
Tell them to improve the bill with a public option and support these amendments.
In case you had any doubt that some in the Senate think the health insurance companies are the ones to worry about when it comes to health care reform (if the Baucus plan being written by a former WellPoint VP wasn’t enough for you), well, this sort of speaks for itself.
Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) proposes an amendment to delay the Finance Committee’s health care reform bill. In particular, he wanted to put off a vote until after the text of the bill had been on the committee’s website for at least 72 hours. Before the amendment failed, Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS) explained why this was so important.
All the Senator from Kentucky is asking is for 72 hours to determine the cost. Senator Snowe has spoken eloquently about sunshine, and the openness, and the fact that the American people would support this 90 percent, 95 percent. But the thing that I’m trying to point out is we would have at least 72 hours for the people that the providers have hired to keep up with all of the legislation that we pass around here, and the regulations that we pass around here, to say “hey, wait a minute. Have you considered this?” And that’s all I’m asking for — is not only cost, but also the content of a bill. And that 72 hours, I think, is highly, highly important.
“The people that the providers have hired to keep up with all of the legislation that we pass around here.” Those are insurance industry lobbyists. (They, by the way, probably already have good health care.)
People die every day because they don’t have coverage. But we should give the insurance lobbyists plenty of time to work up more ways to delay reform. That’s the line from Sen. Roberts, anyway—and plenty of his colleagues are clearly unbothered by delay for whatever reason.
The United Steelworkers are fighting back against foreign trade that hurts workers here.
Working America’s health care reform campaign in Maine makes the local tv news there, and a Working America organizer shows up in coverage of a health care rally in North Dakota.
According to a new report, women workers have been hurt as much as men by the loss of manufacturing jobs.
One reason women workers are so adversely affected by manufacturing job loss is because they are concentrated in industries which have been drastically affected by the surge in cheap imports over the past decade, such as textiles, apparel and leather. Women make up more than 50 percent of the total workforce in these industries. Faced with high levels of foreign competition, these jobs have had high levels of trade-related job displacement.
The authors estimate that the industries with the highest percentage of women workers lost nearly 500,000 jobs between 1999 and 2008. Women also received a majority of the trade adjustment assistance during the late 1990s and early 2000s. Today, they make up about 48 percent of TAA recipients.
Many manufacturing jobs pay much better than other jobs available to women workers without a college education. Reports culled for U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics figures show the average weekly wage of $524 for textile industries in 2008 is about 30 percent higher than the average for the retail sector ($386) and almost double that of the average for the food services (restaurants) industry ($233).
Important questions from Robert Reich:
So how can the Dow be flirting with 10,000 when consumers, who make up 70 percent of the economy, have had to cut way back on buying because they have no money? Jobs continue to disappear. One out of six Americans is either unemployed or underemployed. Homes can no longer function as piggy banks because they’re worth almost a third less than they were two years ago. And for the first time in more than a decade, Americans are now having to pay down their debts and start to save.
Even more curious, how can the Dow be so far up when every business and Wall Street executive I come across tells me government is crushing the economy with its huge deficits, and its supposed “takeover” of health care, autos, housing, energy, and finance? Their anguished cries of “socialism” are almost drowning out all their cheering over the surging Dow.
Those are the questions. Follow the link for his answers.
When Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT) decided recently to remain chairman of the Senate Banking Committee you could hear the financial industry lobbyists let out a collective groan.
It was Dodd who earlier this year championed credit card reform in Congress, helping to pass a bill, then signed by President Obama, to end the abusive and deceptive practices of the credit card companies.
Now Senator Dodd is gearing up to take on the banks on several fronts including overdraft fees, consumer financial protection and regulatory reform.
The Washington Post reported Monday that Sen. Dodd plans to introduce legislation to rein in bank overdraft fees.
A backlash is brewing on Capitol Hill against banks that charge large fees for overdrafts without asking or telling customers, the latest sign that the financial crisis is shifting the balance of power from banks toward borrowers.
Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) plans to introduce legislation requiring banks to get permission from customers, rather than allowing overdrafts automatically. If customers decline and then try to overspend, the transaction would be rejected. A similar bill is pending in the House.
With the rapid expansion of bank debit card use in recent years, banks have found it highly profitable to automatically allow most debit transactions to process regardless of whether sufficient funds are available in the account, then charge the customer anywhere from $10 to upwards of $30 per overdraft.
Some banks maximize penalties by processing the largest purchases a customer makes first, draining accounts faster and creating the potential for multiple fees on multiple smaller purchases. Even on point of sale transactions, such as debit card or ATM transactions, banks do not notify the customer when they are withdrawing against insufficient funds. As a result, customers can unknowingly be charged hundreds of dollars in fees for only overdrawing their account on a few small purchases.
As evidence that the tide is beginning to turn against the unfettered power of the banks, even before Sen. Dodd’s legislation is introduced, major banks are scurrying to try to cover themselves.
Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase, two of the nation’s biggest banks, announced plans on Tuesday to drastically overhaul their debit card programs by lowering or eliminating fees, changing the way they credit transactions and allowing customers to opt out of overdraft protection.
The Chamber of Commerce, the business community’s umbrella group in Washington, recently organized a conference call coordinating some 200 representatives of groups who oppose the legislation. The call doesn’t mention any of the serious problems that led to the financial crisis or why consumer regulation is important. Instead, it follows a “death panel” approach to political discussion: Scare the hell out of everyone.
Dodd has been slamming industry opponents of the plan for months. At a Senate committee hearing earlier this session, referring to a story in the Washington Post, Dodd said:
“When I pick up the morning newspaper and I read the first headline that ‘Fault Lines Emerge and Industry Groups Blast Plan to Create Consumer Agency,’ what planet are you living on? The very people who created the damn mess are the ones now arguing that consumers ought not to be protected. They’re the people who paid this price. And the idea that you’re going to first attack the very clients and customers who depend on you every day is not the place to begin.”
Banks and other financial institutions must be held accountable for making this mess that required trillions of dollars of our money to clean up. For the pain they’ve inflicted on families who face financial ruin—unemployment, wiped out pensions, foreclosures and bankruptcy.
We need a different model for our economy, where good jobs, not bad debts, drive our growth. Our real economy needs a financial system that will support it, not a high-risk system that only supports itself and the wiliest speculators.
And:
Our real economy needs a financial system that will support it, not a high-risk system that only supports itself and the wiliest speculators. That means strict oversight of banks and other financial institutions that nearly drove our economy off a cliff.
Regulation and oversight, regulation and oversight, regulation and oversight. Those words can’t be repeated enough—but they have to be coupled with fight. The banks will get scared into claiming they’ll rein themselves in, but as I said earlier with regard to overdraft fees, we can’t trust them to do that. As soon as we turn our backs, they’ll go back to their old ways, and most likely find a few new ways to hurt working people and the real economy as well.
If you’re going to fight someone, the apostles of greed should make a worthwhile opponent.
Remember those ridiculous debit card overdraft fees, where people who didn’t even know they were overdrawn would get slammed with a $35 fee for a cup of coffee, and then another $35 for a tank of gas? And again and again? Well, it seems that now that it’s been in the news and people know what’s going on, and that it’s not just them and not just one or two times, but a major source of revenue for banks that won’t let you opt out of the programs, some of the banks are reining it in a little.
This isn’t bad news, though anyone who’s even a little cynical realistic will guess that they’re doing it in hopes of preventing Congress from passing strong legislation barring them from these practices—and indeed, Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) has said he is preparing such legislation, while the Federal Reserve may require banks to make overdraft protection an opt-in program, rather than a “no, you cannot opt out no matter what” one.
In the meantime, customers of Chase and Bank of America will be getting a little break:
Beginning Oct. 19, Bank of America will stop charging any fees for customers who overdraw their accounts by less than $10 in a single day. It will also limit the number of overdraft fees it charges to four a day, although the bank will continue to charge a fee of $35 per overdraft.
Chase will cap the number of overdraft fees it charges a day to three. It will stop charging fees when accounts are overdrawn by less than $5. Chase’s overdraft fees are $25 for the first fee each year, $32 for the next four and $35 after that.
Both will also allow customers to opt out of overdraft protection (and therefore overdraft fees).
It’s a step, anyway. But don’t let the “largesse” of two banks fool you – we need consumer protection in the law, not as something we get after they’ve taken enough of our money that people kick up a fuss.
Add this to the list of notable achievements for Texas during the Rick Perry regime: between 2000 and 2009, Texas families’ insurance premiums increased 91.6%. No surprise then that Texas remains first in the nation in rates of uninsured residents. Meanwhile, of course, Perry is busy raising the spectre of socialism and invoking the 10th Amendment to prevent real reform from coming to Texas.
Well, this is disgusting, in the most obvious sense of the word.
In measured amounts, that waste acts as fertilizer. But if the amounts are excessive, bacteria and chemicals can flow into the ground and contaminate residents’ tap water.
In Morrison, more than 100 wells were polluted by agricultural runoff within a few months, according to local officials. As parasites and bacteria seeped into drinking water, residents suffered from chronic diarrhea, stomach illnesses and severe ear infections.
“Sometimes it smells like a barn coming out of the faucet,” said Lisa Barnard, who lives a few towns over, and just 15 miles from the city of Green Bay.
Needless to say, that’s even less healthy than it is appetizing. And another reminder of why regulation is important, whether it be regulation of bankers or farmers.
Ok…AIG has stabilized. But AIG may never be able to pay off its federal bailout. The terms of that bailout have already been adjusted three times to AIG’s benefit, and now Rep. Edolphus Towns (D-NY) wants to ease them again. Seem reasonable?
Rep. Towns is also pressing Bank of America hard to disclose relevant information about its merger with Merrill Lynch. Point for him.
Ohio Daily Blog has interviews with AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka and Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler. Both talk about ways the AFL-CIO can reach out to new groups, and Shuler in particular addresses what it means that she’s the youngest-ever Secretary-Treasurer and the first woman.
