The Daily Change

Do you want your lawmakers being flown to foreign countries to be boozed by special interest groups? (Photo credit: Flickr user Mel B.)

“When Congressman Yoder disrobed, that was inappropriate and it ceased the activity immediately,”Ai??saidAi??freshman Rep. Tom Reed (R-NY) about his participation in the now-infamous Republican “skinny dipping” trip toAi??Israel. “And we recognize that, donai??i??t condone it. It was inappropriate.”

Politico today has shocking details about behavior on the trip that was far more inappropriate.

The paper reveals that Rob Bassin, the political director of the powerful lobbying group the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), spent hundreds of dollars wining and dining the lawmakers in Tiberias, an “ancient city on the Sea of Galilee“:

After several hours of drinking, Rob Bassin, AIPACai??i??s national political director, paid the tab for the entire evening, which included several hundred dollars for drinks, in addition to the earlier meal. The GOP group racked up a tab of $340 to $500 on booze, ranging from vodka to wine, sources familiar with the trip said.

Politico goes on to note that “Steve Stombres, Cantorai??i??s chief of staff, objected, concerned about ethics rules that prohibited the organization from paying for anything more than dinner. Stombresai??i??s concern was so sharp that he spent the next few days collecting money from lawmakers to pay back” Bassin’s organization.

It then notes that House ethics rules “allow ‘reasonable expenses’ for food and lodging but do not cover ‘entertainment or recreational activities,’ such as late-night drinks.” This means that the Republican congressmen on the trip and AIPAC’s nonprofit arm that hosted the trip, the American Israel Education Fund (AIEF), may have violated ethics rules.

One other new detail has emerged from the Politico report. Republican mega-donor and casino tycoon Sheldon Adelson accompanied …

Did Paul Ryan actually float the idea of using government spending to kill an industry that bankrolls his party? (Photo credit: Flickr user JD Hancock)

In 2008, Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan gave a floor speech in favor of drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Reserve (ANRW). He boasted that this could generate $191 billion in revenue. What did he want to do with this revenue? He suggested that it could be used for a new “Manhattan Project” to put “fossil fuels out of business”:

RYAN: If we just did ANWR, according to the CRS, the federal government would see a surge in revenues. No new taxes, not even cutting spending. $191 billion. $191 billion, according to the CRS from just doing ANWR, that’s the smallest of all our reserves. Think of all we could do with $191 billion. We could cut the deficit, we could create a Manhattan project for research and development of renewables to put fossil fuels out of business. But no, we’re doing none of this.

Watch Ryan’s remarks (the pertinent section starts at around 0:49):

Drilling in ANWR is not actually a good way to create revenue or save the earth. It would destroy a precious environmental reserve and it would take more than a decade to produce oil that would do little to dislodge our addiction to fossil fuels.

Yet it’s interesting that Ryan would endorse the idea of spending up to $191 billion on a Manhattan Project (referencing the public works project that created nuclear technology) Ai??to put “fossil fuels out of business.” Those aren’t exactly the words you’d expect from an Ayn Rand acolyte like Ryan. But now he’s a standard-bearer for a party that relies on Big Oil for …

Eisenhower’s Republican Party was very different from today’s.

In anticipation for its convention next week, the Republican Party has drafted what one committee member called “the most conservative platform in modern history.” The draft platform includes tenets like calling for women to be excluded from combat roles in the military and support for the Arizona anti-immigrant law.

But things weren’t always this way. The Republican platform was at one time surprisingly progressive — in 1956. Let’s take a look at some key planks of the party’s platform that year:

On Labor and Wages: The platform boasted that “the Federal minimum wage has been raised for more than 2 million workers. Social Security has been extended to an additional 10 million workers and the benefits raised for 6 1/2 million. The protection of unemployment insurance has been brought to 4 million additional workers. There have been increased workmen’s compensation benefits for longshoremen and harbor workers, increased retirement benefits for railroad employees, and wage increases and improved welfare and pension plans for federal employees.” It called for changes to the anti-union Taft-Hartley Act to “more effectively protect the rights of labor unions” and to “assure equal pay for equal work regardless of sex.”

On Welfare and Health: The platform demanded “once again, despite the reluctance of the Democrat 84th Congress, Federal assistance to help build facilities to train more physicians and scientists.” It emphasized the need to continue the “extension and perfection of a sound social security system,” and boasted of the party’s recent history of supporting “enlarged Federal assistance for construction of hospitals, emphasizing low-cost care of chronic diseases and the special problems of older persons, and increased Federal aid for medical care of the needy.”

On Civil Rights, Gender Equality, …

Paul Ryan isn’t a budget hawk, he’s just saving spending on Corporate America and cutting programs for the rest of us. (Photo credit: Flickr user monkeyz_uncle)

Among Beltway media, Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan’s budget plan — which privatizes Medicare, slashes Medicaid, and guts the safety net — was viewed as “courageous.” Ryan himself has been praised as being “well-known for his fiscal conservatism” and as a “budget hawk.”

But all of this presupposes that Paul Ryan and the national Republican Party he has come to represent is most concerned with reining in the budget deficit. A closer look at Ryan’s budget proposal finds that while attacking Medicare and other social insurance programs, it actually preserves spending and other deficit-busting measures for some of Ryan and the GOP’s biggest corporate donors. Here’s are some examples:

– Big Insurers: Privatizing Medicare means handing it over to the insurance industry, which would create a windfall of billions of dollars previously used to finance an American-owned public program to instead line the pockets of executives at companies like Aetna and UnitedHealth Group. The insurance industry is Ryan’s second-largest career donor, having given him $815,328, slightly edging out the banking industry. Positioning themselves against health reform, health insurers like Blue Cross/Blue Shield haveAi??funneled aAi??larger portion of their dollars to Republicans over the past two cycles.

– The Drug Industry:Ai??One very easy way to quickly cut the deficit without spending a dime would actually be to cut government — that is, a massive government embargo on cheap Canadian drugs. The U.S. government, at the behest of American pharmaceutical companies, currently bars Americans from freely purchasing re-imported Canadian drugs. These drugs range from 20-80 percent cheaper. Re-importing drugs would save …

After he left government, John Ashcroft started working for corporations who wanted federal subsidies.

Missouri Republican Senate nominee Todd Akin has been facing a firestorm followingAi??his offensive suggestion that women who are victims of what he termed “legitimate rape” cannot get pregnant.

A number of senior Republicans have urged him to quit the race, and many right-wing electoral groups have withdrawn their support.

Akin has insisted on staying in the race, but has until September 25th to withdraw (after that time his name will be locked on the ballot).

Over at Buzzfeed, Ben Smith obtained a list of possible replacements on the ticket that a GOP insider passed along to him.

What’s remarkable about this list is how many corporate lobbyists and other influence peddlers it includes. Here’s a quick rundown:

Former Bush Attorney General John Ashcroft: Although perhaps best known today for his rendition of “Let The Eagle Soar,” Ashcroft passed through the revolving door and quickly formed The Ashcroft Group LLC after leaving government service. The group influence peddles on behalf of a variety of corporations, especially ones related to national security (where Ashcroft has special access due to his government service). Ashcroft also did work for the National Association of Broadcasters and was named as an ethics adviser to Xe — the private security firm formerly known as Blackwater.

Former Senator Talent: Talent is known to most Missourians as the man who was defeated by now-Senator Claire McCaskill. But in between his stint as a member of the House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate, he worked for ten months for Arrent Fox, a lobbying firm in D.C. Currently, he is the co-chairman of Mercury Public Affairs, which does public and government …

Ayn Rand devotee Paul Ryan is often praised as being a mainstream and serious leader.

But the centerpiece of Ryan’s ideology — his budget plan that hands over seniors’ health care to insurance companies that we’ve dubbed “Medicare for None” — is anything but moderate.

A July 2011 CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll found that just 35 percent of American adults supported Ryan’s plan (even 54 percent of self-described conservative voters disapproved).

Let’s put that into perspective by looking at some progressive policies that have much more support. Take, for example, marijuana legalization. Although the issue is often portrayed as fringe in the mainstream media, an October 2011 poll found that half of Americans support legalizing the use of marijuana. You’d have to go back to 2003 to find the cause to be as unpopular as Ryan’s budget plan is today.

Here are a few other progressive policies that are much more popular than Ryan’s proposal:

Ai??Medicare for All:Ai??Ryan wants to end Medicare as we know it by eliminating itsAi??guaranteedAi??benefit and handing it over to the insurance companies. But Americans actually really like this single-payer health care system for theAi??elderly and want to expand it to everyone. In 2007, the Associated Press and Yahoo asked Americans if we should “adopt a universal health insurance program in which everyone is covered under a program like Medicare that is run by the government and financed by taxpayers.” 65 percent of Americans agreed that we should. Majorities of Americans have continued to support the idea since then.
Marriage Equality:Ai??Romney and Ryan oppose marriage equality, but Americans back it. A June 2012 CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll found that 54 percent of Americans want the government to recognize gay and lesbian marriages as valid.
Public …

Why is it that a country as poor as Haiti can give workers the right to paid sick days but the United States doesn’t? (Photo credit: Flirckr user A. Thompson Photography)

38 percentAi??of American private-sector workers do not get paid sick days at work.

The United States stands alone among rich countries in not guaranteeing paid sick leave as a right of employment.

But it isn’t just rich nations that offer this right. On the shores of the Western Hemisphere’s poorest country, Haiti, workers are guaranteed 15 days of paid sick leave. In Nigeria, a country wracked with unrest, the “labor code requires employers to provide employees up to 12Ai??days of paid sick leave a year.”

Why is that all the world’s comparably rich nations and many of its poorest guarantee paid sick leave but the United States does not? Powerful corporations lobby government officials to kill any legislation to guarantee paid sick leave. When Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) in 2009 introducedAi??a bill called theAi??Healthy Families ActAi??that would have required businesses that have at least 15 employees to offer some paid sick time to their employees, the powerful U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Retail Federation, the American Hotel and Lodging Association and others signed up in opposition. The bill never moved forward.Ai??In 2011, , the local chamber of commerce worked with restaurants and business-backed tourism groups toAi??finance aAi??propagandaAi??campaignAi??in against Denver, Colorado’s paid sick leave referendum. Voters were scared off, and the referendum was defeated.

But there is hope for progressives who think the United States shouldn’t be playing catch-up with countries like Haiti and Nigeria. Last year, Connecticut became the first state in the country to guarantee paid sick leave to some …

On Sunday, Politico broke the story about how the FBI has been probing a 2011 House Republican trip to Israel that includedAi??embarrassingAi??debauchery including drinking while swimming in the Sea of Galilee (Rep. Kevin Yoder [R-KS] apparently went skinny dipping).

Embattled freshman Rep. Tom Reed (R-NY) was among these wild Republicans who joined in the revelry (at a price of $10,000 a person that special interests paid for).

While the party in the Galilee is a scandal in and of itself, Reed has been hitting a different party circuit during his short almost-two years in Washington: ritzy fundraisers with K Street lobbyists.

Here are just a few of the lobbyists, consultants, and other special interests he’s been partying with during his time as a freshman congressman:

– The Bellwether Group:Ai??This past February, staffers at this “professional fundraising and consulting firm” organized a fundraiser for Reed at Charlie Palmer Steak (did Reed and the attending lobbyists have Seared Hudson Valley Foei Gras or a $45 dollarAi??rib eye “cowboy cut” steak?). The Bellwether Group’s clients include the pro-fracking Interstate Natural Gas Association and the mother of all corporate front groups, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which served as a conduit for over a hundred million dollars from the health insurance industry used to attack and undermine health reform.

– Corporate lobbyists Mike Zarrelli and Dan Mattoon: Sometimes, powerful lobbyists directly hold fundraisers for Members of Congress. Mattoon — who represents everyone from defense contractor Northrop Grumman to AT&T to charter schools — and Zarrelli — who represents Amway, the corporation founded by the powerful billionare DeVos family that advocate for school privatization — hosted a “Chinese takeout” fundraiser for Reed last November (the invitation is even …

The Progressive Change Campaign Committee is proud to announce our new blog ai??i??Ai??The Daily Change.

It will be spearheaded by former ThinkProgress investigative blogger Zaid Jilani. OnAi??this site, we hope to achieve 3 goals.

1) Investigative activism. Through practices normally associated withAi??investigative journalism, we will break actual news on this blog. There will be a special focus on campaign finance issues ai??i?? including connecting the dotsAi??between politicians, their donations, and their issue positions.

Whatai??i??s unique about this blog is that it will go beyond merely reporting theAi??problems. By connecting this blog with our million-person email list, weAi??will empower people to solve the problems reported on this site. Hence, theAi??concept weai??i??re coining here ai??i?? investigative activism.

2) Elevating progressive movement voices. There are a lot of greatAi??movement thinkers who offer reporting and commentary thatai??i??s much moreAi??insightful than what you hear in the corporate media. Many of these thinkersAi??believed in the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and supported ourAi??activism when we were just getting off the ground, for which we are veryAi??thankful.

PCCC members deserve to be aware of these inspiring voices. On this blog,Ai??we will highlight these progressive movement voices ai??i?? starting today.

3. Fostering community among PCCC members. Email is very useful forAi??communicating with a million bold progressives. Through email activism,Ai??weai??i??ve drafted Elizabeth Warren for Senate, revived the public option fromAi??the dead, successfully pressured the White House and congressional leadersAi??on many issues, flipped control of the Wisconsin Senate, and achieved manyAi??other victories since our launch on January 7, 2009.

But email has its limitations. We hope this blog can go beyond email to foster an ongoing sense ofAi??community and conversation among our members.

We predict that some major activism campaigns will inspired by theAi??comments on this blog. So if something in one of our posts sparks …