The US Chamber of Commerce blew a mere $39 million on lobbying in Washington in the past three months. Lobbying for the promotion of global warming, the denial of healthcare, the further deregulation (if possible) of the financial "industry", blockage of the right to unionize, the lowering and elimination of minimum wage laws, maintenance of tax breaks for shipping jobs overseas, and protection of the "right" of corporations to bribe politicians. Money well spent: all minority positions, all adhered to by our government.
Several companies have dropped their membership in this chamber of horrors, and others have dropped their seats on its board. Now StopTheChamber.org has done something interesting. We've obtained the personal Email addresses of all the remaining board members. When you go to our website and scroll down and sign in, an Email is sent to all of the board members asking them to resign. And the chamber doesn't like it one bit. Their staff have been visiting the website constantly. And they've sent a message to their member companies stating:
"Please note that these calls against the Chamber are part of a broad-based, multisource campaign against us being carried out by our normal adversaries -- trial lawyers, activist unions, environmental extremists, etc. It is a 'corporate campaign' in the classic sense, where interest groups are looking for public leverage to force us to do things against the best interests of the business community. Frankly, these efforts are simply the result of how effective we have been in opposing card check, as well as aspects of proposed healthcare, capital markets, and climate-change legislation that we believe would be onerous to business and impede job creation. Our efforts to fix these key pieces of legislation are not going to stop."
Oh yeah?
Did you know that Drinking Liberally and Credo are urging the makers of Budweiser to drop off the board of the chamber pot, and you can help.
Did you know Change to Win is targeting the chamber?
Have you seen what the Center for Media and Democracy is up to?
What about the AFL-CIO?
Local chambers of commerce are opposing the US Chamber.
And you'll find a growing list of groups taking part in our campaign at http://stopthechamber.org
You say you're not going away. We say we're not. One of us is wrong. And the law may just get to decide.
Public Citizen has filed complaints against the chamber for filing false tax returns.
Cliff Arnebeck successfully sued the chamber for fraud and campaign finance violations in Ohio which the elections commission and three courts found violated criminal law.
According to another complaint filed by Public Citizen, this illegal conduct appears to be a pattern across the United States.
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has filed a complaint against the chamber for violating election laws.
The chamber has used fraudulent claims to raise funds by inflating its membership numbers by 1000 percent.
Like I said, WE'RE not going away. Some of you just might be.
