Republicans - Whoever You are!"The U.S. Chamber of Commerce used to be a notably bipartisan trade association with a limited budget and limited influence. But no longer.
It has hugely increased its political fund-raising and developed new ways to spend money on behalf of pro-business candidates. The chamber has become a significant force in state and national politics and more and more aligns itself with GOP priorities. In the last presidential cycle, 2004, it invested $60,000,000.
Therefore it comes as no surprise that it's a player in 2008. This year's election campaign occurs against a background of mounting popular concern over the condition of the economy beset by a seemingly endless, revenue-draining, occupation of Iraq. A weak record of job creation, the sub-prime mortgage crisis, declining home values and other problems have all helped make the economy a major campaign issue.
Alarmed at the increasingly populist tone of the 2008 political campaign, the president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Tom Donohue, is issuing fiery promises to spend unprecedented millions of dollars to defeat candidates deemed to be anti-business. Their targets are candidates using the code words
- restore the middle class
- reverse global warming
- rescind tax cuts for the rich
- excessive bonus pay for corporate chief executives
- unfettered globalization of workers
With this investment, Donahue expects Democrats
There is special concern about Republican Governor Huckabee. Club for Growth President Pat Toomey has targeted 'Two-Buck Huck':. . . will be gone from power for at least 40 years. . . . I'm concerned about anti-corporate and populist rhetoric from candidates for the presidency, members of Congress and the media. It suggests to us that we have to demonstrate who it is in this society that creates jobs, wealth and benefits -- and who it is that eats them . . . . We plan to build a grass-roots business organization so strong that when it bites you in the butt, you bleed.
Mention of class war used to be forbidden in the Republican playbook. This year the dogs will be unchained.Over the past ten months, Governor Huckabee’s embrace of his liberal economic record as governor and his populist, protectionist rhetoric on the campaign trail has only confirmed the Club for Growth’s original assessment. Huckabee himself admits that he is a ‘different kind of Republican,’ a code word for more government involvement, less personal freedom, and greater dependence on government bureaucrats.
Huckabee is proud of his tax hikes, his spending increases, and his regulatory expansions as governor, and he has not indicated that he would govern any differently as president. Nominating Mike Huckabee for president or vice-president would constitute an abject rejection of the free-market, limited-government, economic conservatism that has been the unifying theme of the Republican Party for decades.
Donohue's promise is one thing that the candidates cannot afford to sidestep. Is there no way they can "shoot down the offending fellow?
ReplyDeleteIt's unbelievable to me that they are openly attacking populism, which is not anti-business on its face, it has more to do with anti-elitism. Donohue should have to answer some questions, like, does he believe supporting decent working conditions and wages for workers is anti-business? This sounds like a fatwa against the people of this country, especially the working class, and as my husband observed, I guess we should expect nothing less from the Bush people.
ReplyDeleteSenator Mike Gravel explains!
ReplyDeleteSource or link?
ReplyDeleteDeclare the class war!
ReplyDeleteLet the sponsors, patrons and cheerleaders pay for the war in Iraq. Soak the rich. Let's have no war but the class war.
I used to get a kick out of watching them eat their own til I realised that they're not just eating their own, they're eating anything that gets in the way of them devouring everything.
ReplyDelete"The U.S. Chamber of Commerce used to be a notably bipartisan trade association with a limited budget and limited influence. But no longer."
ReplyDeleteBoy are you full of shit.
They have been the power behind the thrown since the late 30's.
Am I on the propaganda channel here?
Woodrow Wilson said in his book, THE NEW FREEDOM:
ReplyDelete"Who has been consulted when important measures of government...were under consideration?
"The gentlemen whose ideas have been sought [by Congress] are the big manufacturers, the bankers, and the heads of the great railroad combination. The masters of the government of the United States are the combined capitalists and manufacturers of the United States. It's written on every intimate page in the records of Congress, it is written all through the history of conferences at the White House, that the suggestions of economic policy in this country have come from one source, not from many sources...
"You will always find that while you are politely listened to, the men really consulted are the men who have the biggest stake--the bankers, the big manufacturers, the big masters of commerce, the heads of the railroad corporations and of steamship corporations...
"Every time it has come to a critical question, these gentlemen have been yielded to and their demands have been treated as the demands that should be followed as a matter of course.
"The government of the United States is at present a foster child of the special interests. It is not allowed to have a will of its own."