The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) Writes Our Laws!

This is a Stalin-era political cartoon that appeared in the Soviet humor magazine Krokodil. The Soviet fist is capturing a Soviet doctor who supposedly took money from the C.I.A. to kill Soviet leaders. This campaign was known as the "Doctors' Plot." As soon as Stalin died, the new leaders denounced this campaign.

I used to be a Republican, but when the "Climategate scandal broke, I read the scientific sites and learned that our great Academy of Sciences, our scientific government agencies, our Pentagon, our CIA, and even the Vatican's Pontifical Academy of Sciences say that global warming is happening.

I also learned that the Republican politicians are spreading denialist propaganda sponsored by wealthy and powerful fossil-fuel companies and disseminated via fake "scientific" organizations.

In exchange for persecuting our scientists and confusing our people with denialist propaganda about the science of climate change, the politicians get campaign donations. The main address of one of these fake "scientific institutes," the Science and Public Policy Institute (SPPI), is nothing but a mailbox in a parcel post store!

These days, I am voting for the Democrats because the Republicans don't care about freedom, science, or the welfare of our people. To me, they are no different than the corrupt, hypocritical Soviet and Russian politicians who claim they serve the people but really only serve themselves.

I think Senators like the despicable stooge James Inhofe and Attorney Generals like the despicable stooge Ken Cuccinelli are really radical totalitarians---corrupt, hypocritical subversives who have kidnapped our government on behalf of the fossil-fuel industry in order to defame our scientists, pollute our environment, and undermine our democracy. These Republicans just tell BIG LIES to the American people.

A site run by the scientist Dr. Joe Romm called Climate Progress (3-28-10) has a long post about the latest campaign of persecution, which was first reported in the New York Times (3-25-11).

The New York Times and Climate Progress also tell about an organization called the American Legislative Exchange Council [ALEC] which is writing anti-climate bills in 16 states funded by Big Oil and Kochs. The Koch brothers make a big deal of being "Libertarians," but their daddy built Stalin's oil refineries. His anti-communism seems to have come after he got his money.

Libertarians just don't want any laws to constrain them. The Koch-funded Libertarian Cato Institute even hired a former Putin advisor named Andrei Illarionov to be their expert on global warming. Illarionov also worked for Victor Chernomyrdin, the head of the Soviet Gas Ministry and its post-Soviet reincarnation, Russia's state-controlled Gazprom.

Our global warming denialist politicians, who take money from the fossil-fuel interests and "scientific" advice from Russian agencies instead of American agencies, are destroying the agencies that protect our people and are turning our country into a company town.

Businesses should be good citizens who operate under laws that benefit the community; instead, they are writing the laws to suit themselves.

Dr. Joe Romm of  Climate Progress (3-28-10)  writes:

ALEC gets “one third of its support from 10 energy companies, including Exxon, Chevron, Amoco, Shell, and Texaco. Exxon, Chevron, Amoco, Shell, and Texaco. Energy industry groups such as Koch Industries, American Petroleum Institute, and the American Electric Power Association pay dues of up to $50,000 a year to support industry-friendly legislation for the fossil energy industry.” SourceWatch notes that “The total from Koch stands at $408,000.”

In particular, ALEC is “literally writing the anti-EPA legislation” for “15 (and now 16) US states.” The “basic resolution opposing the EPA endangerment ruling being adopted in the 16 states was drafted by ALEC’s Natural Resources Task Force.” The “first of the 16 states to pass its ALEC written anti-climate legislation into law is Alabama, which supports the House version of the anti-EPA bill in congress.” [See the full text.]