Miner Queries: Sharpening your pitchfork yet?

As we prepare to begin week three of our federal government shutdown over 45’s border wall tantrum, I’d love to know where individuals’ heads are. While we struggle, living paycheck to paycheck, our out-of-touch legislators seem to think we have unlimited savings to tide us over.

And when I say legislators, I’m talking at the state level, too. In Iowa, we’ve continued to elect Republicans to the statehouse who blindly support the agenda of corporate America. This includes stripping many Iowans’ health and mental health care via our Medicaid debacle, strangling funding for public schools, and cutting corporate taxes and thus shifting the tax burden to individuals and local property owners. I suspect many of these state legislators don’t even realize they’re working against the interests of their own communities and constituents. They simply follow the party line without questioning what they’re told.

Years ago, as a school board director, I was engaged in conversation at the statehouse with a former Iowa senator. We were chatting about education and her work as a senator, and she began to tell me about a fabulous retreat she’d been to out of state at a balmy resort. As she was “educated” about various policies, she had plainly been bedazzled by the setting. Her enthusiasm struck me at the time and stuck with me.

Several years later, I began to read about the work of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). This group, funded and led by the Koch Brothers, works to write legislation called “model bills,” which they introduce to federal and state legislators at swanky conferences. Although ALEC works to influence legislators of both parties, over the years they’ve determined the Republican party fits their agenda best. The Center for Media and Democracy has researched and published about ALEC’s work at https://www.alecexposed.org/wiki/ALEC_Exposed. Suddenly, a light bulb went off over my head. This legislator, a Republican, had been attending ALEC conferences.

Do we want state laws written by corporate attorneys from who knows where? But that’s what’s been happening. Much of Iowa's recent legislation bears a striking resemblance to ALEC's body of model bills. And thanks to corporate media outlets and shrinking independent media sources, citizens don’t know.

How did this happen? Back in the late 70s and early 80s, Terry Branstad was involved in the initiative to build ALEC. Then, Iowans elected him governor. Iowa’s ability to fund schools and other services for the common good have been shrinking ever since. We’re on the road to Kansas.

Meanwhile at the federal level, in 2016, underinformed Americans were scammed into voting for the current occupant of the White House. And what has the 45^th president done for them? He’s alienated our trading partners and allies, wrecked our markets, and now he’s left thousands of federal workers with no income. Congressional Republicans have been no help.

So, I’m ready to get my pitchfork out and protest. If you want to see any progress, you better, too. Because until GOP politicians can feel our pain, I don’t think they intend to move.

What is the right to work?

Last week as my usual Christmas baking frenzy got underway, the mailman delivered a small box from my brother in Texas. Inside was a stack of CDs — or as I termed them, “music to bake by.”

One of the CDs was Americana artist Dave Alvin’s Eleven Eleven, which includes a song called, “Gary, Indiana 1959.” Written from the viewpoint of a former U.S. Steel employee, the middle of the song reflects much of Middle America today.

“Now the years disappeared in the blink of an eye.
And I feel like a stranger in a world that isn’t mine.
Now my dear wife died, and my kids all moved away
‘cause there ain’t nothin’ here to make ‘em want to stay.
‘Cause the factories are in ruins; decent jobs hard to find,
and you can’t get a break no matter how hard you try.
‘Cause the big boys make the rules; tough luck for everyone else,
and out on the streets it’s every man for himself.”

This song echoes events in Michigan as Gov. Rick Snyder attempts to destroy unions via a “Right to Work” law. Like so many Corporate Conservative maneuvers, Right to Work laws are deceptively named. They have nothing to do with workers’ rights. Instead, they are designed to protect corporate political power and profits by gutting unions.

How? These laws do away with unions’ right to ask non-union members to help pay for the collective bargaining unions conduct to benefit ALL workers — union or non-union. Because the bottom line is, all workers at an organization benefit from the pay, benefits and protections union contracts provide. Employees who do not wish to belong to the union don’t have to pay union dues, simply the portion that covers the cost of bargaining. It’s only fair.

But throughout the years, via corporate control of media and campaign financing, efforts to demonize unions and collective bargaining have paid off. By and large Americans have fallen for these efforts. Union membership has declined, and not coincidentally, worker protections and wages have too. As Colin Gordon, professor of history at University of Iowa, writes on his blog for the Economic Policy Institute: “The wage effect alone underestimates the union contribution to shared prosperity... And unions not only raise the wage floor but can also lower the ceiling; union bargaining power has been shown to moderate the compensation of executives at unionized firms.” [http://www.epi.org/blog/union-decline-rising-inequality-charts/ ]

Many worker protections were won because of hard fought union battles, and today, we take most of them for granted: the 40-hour work week, employee benefits, paid vacation and safety regulations, to name a few. Unfortunately, after years of Corporate Conservative political influence, these benefits are no longer guaranteed.

Snyder’s lame-duck passage of a Right to Work law in Michigan follows a similar drive by Scott Walker in Wisconsin a year ago. In both cases, the initiative has been tied to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and Americans for Prosperity, two organizations funded by the Koch brothers and other wealthy corporate moguls. [http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/12/michigan-right-to-work-unions.php]

These are the “big boys” Alvin sings about. Their goal is protecting their power and profit, not workers. So we’d best follow Alvin’s protagonist, who sings:

“I still remember where we marched side by side back in Gary, Indiana 1959.”

Because united we stand; divided we fall.

What do we get with corporate-backed politicians?

Recently, I’ve had an old Tennessee Ernie Ford song rattlin’ round in my head:

You load 16 tons, what do you get
Another day older and deeper in debt
Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store.

I think that pretty well describes working America – a country I often feel like the masters of the universe in Washington D.C. (and our state capital) have forgotten.

And then I live through periods like this first week in June and I have to wonder, “Do working Americans recognize themselves in Ford’s song?”

Of course I am referring to Wisconsin’s recall election, in which voters retained a governor who made it his mission to break state public employees’ unions.

Never mind these unions had already conceded to pay a larger share of benefit costs and to limit pay increases. Walker’s goal was not to ease Wisconsin taxpayers’ burden, but to do away with collective bargaining and worker protections for public employees, and thus for all workers.

Walker’s efforts were bankrolled by a handful of multi-billionaire business owners, led by the Koch brothers.

And they outspent Democrats by a ratio of 7-1 to retain Walker.

Their funds allowed saturation advertising and publicity designed to question the democratic nature of a recall election petitioned for by hundreds of thousands of Wisconsin voters.

Yet by the time the election rolled around, voters suddenly felt recalls should only be held in the case of criminal wrongdoing.

John Nichols outlines events in “Framed: How Redefining Direct Democracy as Anti-Democratic Won Wisconsin.” http://www.thenation.com/blog/168335/framed-how-redefining-direct-democracy-anti-democratic-won-wisconsin?rel=emailNation#

I’ve never been a big believer in advertising, but I’m disappointed to say it worked this time. Walker’s corporate funders managed to manipulate voters into keeping their man in office.

Why? Because big business profits when workers can’t organize. It is no coincidence that since President Reagan broken the air traffic controllers’ union, workers’ wages in this country have stagnated.

And it’s ironic for those Wisconsin voters who cast their vote for the principle that recalls be held only for criminal wrongdoing. They may get it yet because investigations of Walker continue.

But what capped a strange confluence of events was the death of Ray Bradbury the same week. Bradbury was the author of Fahrenheit 451. This prophetic science fiction novel tells the story of a future in which firemen no longer put out fires. Instead, they start them – to burn books.

In this futuristic America, people sit enthralled to their interactive television screens, now three full living room walls.

Meanwhile, the government sends firemen to destroy books and historic documents that would encourage free thinking.

But, one day the book’s main character opens a book perched on the pile for the next bonfire. And it changes his life.

He begins to read and discovers radical texts like the Bible and our founding documents, and he finally questions what he is doing.

He sees his wife mesmerized in front of her TV screen and walks away from his old life.

I keep wondering when we will. Americans must wake up to the fact that government is our responsibility.

Until then, the company store owned by the Koch brothers and their colleagues will continue to buy our government and own our souls.

As they did in Wisconsin and are already doing in the general election, they are flooding the airwaves with ads and appearances by paid representatives for their candidates (chiefly Republican) who will blindly push through policies to benefit them.

So unplug the TV and radio. And before it’s too late, start reading and asking questions. It’s our job, and if we don’t do it, that sixteen tons will never get any lighter.

Do we fear the wrong things?

Do we fear the wrong things?

The killing of Trayvon Martin, an African American youth on an errand to buy candy for his little brother in Sanford, Florida, opens up many questions, mostly about what we fear. And does our fear make us vulnerable to other dangers?

I ask because Martin’s death spotlights Florida’s Stand Your Ground Law, which allows anyone who feels threatened to use deadly force. In other words, fear rules. Some version of this law has been passed in 16 states and debated in even more.

Yet I wonder if it’s in the public interest to have an armed populace. Are we safer? And if a family member is killed, you may watch helplessly, just like Martin’s family, as this law allows the killer to walk free without charges or even an investigation.

In addition, the law is based on model legislation, called the Castle Doctrine Act and developed by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). ALEC is a secretive corporate-financed organization (Think Koch brothers, Exxon Mobil, and not coincidentally, the National Rifle Association.) that writes corporate-friendly legislation and pushes it through state legislatures nationwide.

The Center for Media and Democracy has done extensive research to expose the work of this influential organization. You can view their work at: http://alecexposed.org/wiki/ALEC_Exposed (Check their list of ALEC politicians for your federal and state representatives.)

Are groups like ALEC using our fears to manipulate us? Fear, or any strong emotion, causes humans to stop thinking and react irrationally. When that happens, we are easily led . . . or misled.

For example, do you fear the government? But in America, aren’t we, ultimately, the government? Don’t we elect and monitor our representatives? Or have we abandoned the process and let corporate and special interests take over without a fight?

Which leads me to ask who really benefits from the Stand Your Ground Law and these other corporate-written model bills? Are they being written as part of some corporate business plan to increase market share and corner public contracts?

For example, will the Stand Your Ground Law help gun dealers and manufacturers sell more guns? Another irony of the Trayvon Martin case is the kerfuffle by Geraldo Rivera over Martin’s hoodie. If, as Rivera claims, only crooks and thugs wear hoodies, why does the NRAstore.com sell a Concealed Carry Hooded Sweatshirt? Check it out for yourself at: http://www.nrastore.com/nrastore/ProductDetail.aspx?c=11&p=CO+635&ct=e

Instead of fearing the young black man or the non-English speaker or the stranger in our community, maybe we should be paying closer attention to the legislation being passed as law in state capitals. Perhaps we should be reading the bills our representatives are debating and demanding our newspapers, TV and radio stations report on the substance of said bills. Maybe we should be looking at where our elected officials get their campaign contributions.

Instead of parking in front of our TV sets, maybe we should be meeting on our front porches and talking. Instead of watching The Bachelor and YouTube videos, maybe we should be reading books, especially history, and daily newspapers or news sites. And we should definitely be asking lots of questions.

Instead of running into our separate corners in fear, we should be meeting and sharing information. Because as the saying goes, “United we stand, divided we fall.”