The Commonweath Foundation

Found in The Nation:

The Commonwealth Foundation, a right-wing think tanks in Harrisburg, is plotting to go after public sector employee unions. In a letter from Senator Pat Toomey (R-PA) on behalf of the Foundation, the think tank announced “Project Goliath,” a new effort to make Pennsylvania the next Wisconsin or Michigan. The Commonwealth Foundation is one of a fifty-nine-state network of similar think tanks that have vastly expanded since 2009. The letter makes clear that conservatives believe that right-wing political infrastructure—the organizing institutes, the partisan media outlets, the rapid response efforts—has helped turn the tide against labor unions.

The piece posts (and quotes) the letter and you can read it for yourself here.

There's something I want to add to the piece (but this isn't a criticism of the writers reporting - he was looking at a particular section of the story and so there's no reason he had to include anything else).  If it's a warning for PA residents about an upcoming effort by the legislature to undermine the state's labor unions, then we can probably expect to see some reporting about it by the Tribune-Review.

And if Toomey's letter lauds the Commonwealth Foundation (a right-wing think tanks in Harrisburg) and if the Trib covers the story in some way, then we want to get out front to point out (yet again) Trib owber Richard Mellon Scaife's financial connections to the Commonwealth Foundation.

Check out this page from the Bridge Project.  It lists all the foundational support given to Commonwealth.  By my math and at this time it adds up to a little over $6.6 million dollars (unadjusted for inflation from 1988 to 2011).  Of that foundations controlled by Scaife make up more than a third ($2.5 million out of $6.6 million).  In fact, in the first five years of foundation support all but $25,000 of it came from foundations controlled by Richard Mellon Scaife ($450K out of $475K).  In the first ten Scaife's foundations constituted about 57% of all the foundational support ($900K out of about $1.6 million).

The fun part is to look at Toomey's letter itself or more specifically the Commonwealth document attached to it.  Included in the letter are some accolades about the Commonweath Foundation from some other conservative think tanks.  There's praise from:

• Cato Institute ($2.4 million in Scaife money)
• Competitive Enterprise Institute ($3.6 million in Scaife money)

So whenever the Trib starts reporting on the Commonwealth Foundation's efforts (or the legislature's efforts spawned from it) to pass any sort of "right to work" legislation, we should keep in mind the millions Scaife's already spent on it.

Well, THIS Is New

And what might that be, you ask?

Well, dear friends, it looks like I've been endnoted.  (For those of you bibliographically challenged, an "endnote" is kinda like a "footnote" except it's at the end of a book or a chapter and not at the bottom or foot of a page.)

And where have I been endoted?

Here.  I'm the 88th endnote in chapter 4 of David Lampo's book A Fundamental Freedom: Why Republicans, Conservatives, and Libertarians Should Support Gay Rights.

And who is David Lampo?  From the Huffingtonpost:

He is also the director of publications at the Cato Institute and a member of Log Cabin Republicans.

I was endnoted by a Log Cabin Republican/Cato Institute sort of guy??

While I have to admit that's really not my thing, I also have to admit it's certainly very flattering to see my name on his pages.  The only problem is that I now have to go find a copy of the book to see why I was endnoted in the first place.

All I can tell you is that this was the blog post that was cited - it's a blog post criticizing The Trib editorial board (now that's a surprise!) for calling U.S. District Judge Vaughn R. Walker, he who declared California's ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional, a "liberal activist judge."

Speaking of Cato, my friend Eric, he who writes Da Funk, sent me some links from there that he thought might appeal to my more progressive friends.  Eric and I agree on few things but he's a good guy - very thoughtful and smart.  I just disagree with his politics.  Doesn't mean we can't be friends.

Here's the links:

• Rand Paul may be giving a big boost to immigration reform
• The Iraq War: 10 Years Later
• How Minimum Sentencing Hurts Minorities
• Google's Transparency Regarding National Security Letters

I haven't had a chance to check these out yet but if they trigger a conversation (even if you disagree) then that's a good thing.

Craig Smith Does It Again

And that "it" means "withholds important information from his audience."

Take a look at this in today's Tribune-Review:

Ilya Somin is an associate professor at George Mason University School of Law. His research focuses on constitutional law, property law and the study of popular political participation and its implications for constitutional democracy.

The name sounded familiar so I looked him up on 2PJ and found this.

While his description above seems politically neutral (he's just described as "an associate professor at George Mason University School of Law") parts of Somin's bio was conveniently omitted by the Scaife-employed Craig Smith.

Somin is also an Adjunct Scholar at the Scaife-funded Cato Institute - and from that page we also learn that Somin blogs at the conservative/libertarian Volokh Conspiracy.

However brilliant Professor Somin may be, politically neutral he isn't. Smith should have pointed out Somin's connections to the political right.

Also omitted, of course, are the millions of dollars Smith's boss Richard Mellon Scaife has shuffled of to Cato, where Somin's a scholar.

Another lesson (actually it's the same lesson, only resubmitted) on how the Right Wing Noise Machine works.

My Gawd!

How did this get onto the pages of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review?

It's an essay by Naomi Oreskes & Erik M. Conway, authors of "Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming" and it describes how conservative think-tanks seek to undermine science. It begins with:

If some of the attacks on the credibility of climate science feel familiar, there's a reason. With their unattributed claims downplaying the severity of the problem and their vague allegations of scientific impropriety, the assaults are the latest in a long tradition of organized efforts by industry and free-market enthusiasts to undermine the credibility of science they don't like.

Yea, I know - on the pages of Richard Mellon Scaife's "news" paper.

So let's fast forward a little:

The strategy was expanded beyond the cigarette industry in part because of the efforts of physicist Frederick Seitz, a former president of the National Academy of Sciences who went on to direct R.J. Reynolds' biomedical research program. In 1984, he joined forces with astrophysicist Robert Jastrow and nuclear physicist William Nierenberg to establish the George C. Marshall Institute.

That would be the same George C. Marshall Institute that:

• received $230,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2009.
• received $255,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2008.
• received $155,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2007.
• received $200,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2006.
• received $200,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2005.
• received $155,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2004.

By my count that's $1.165 million.

Mediamatters goes further (and let's be honest, they have more time to plow through this stuff). They're reporting that since 1985, the Scaife controlled Carthage Foundation has given $707,500 to the George C. Marshall institute and the equally Scaife controlled Sarah Scaife Foundation has given $2,785,000 to the institute between 1986 and 2007.

That's about $3.5 million to fund free market/conservative science skepticism.

Then there's this from the essay:

The network of institutions attempting to undermine science (with funding from industry) is vast. The top tier of the network is a set of political think tanks dedicated to promoting free markets and advocating for limited government.

They include the Cato Institute, The Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute, The Heartland Institute and the Competitive Enterprise Institute. In turn, they are linked to myriad smaller groups. The Competitive Enterprise Institute, for example, organized the Cooler Heads Coalition, which describes itself as "focused on dispelling the myths of global warming by exposing flawed economic, scientific and risk analysis."

I'll just take the numbers from Media Matters, just to expedite things.

• Cato Institute: $2,192,500 since 1985 ($245,000 from Carthage, $1,947,500 from Sarah Scaife)
• Heritage Foundation: $23,894,000 since 1985 ($100,000 from Allegheny, $2,559,000 from Carthage, $21,235,000 from Sarah Scaife)
• American Enterprise Institute: $7,336,000 since 1988 ($900,000 from Carthage, $6,436,000 from Sarah Scaife)
• Heartland Institute: $335,000 since 1986 ($10,000 from Carthage, $325,000 from Sarah Scaife)
• Competitive Enterprise Institute: $2,300,000 since 1985 ($60,000 from Carthage, $2,240,000 from Sarah Scaife)

By my count that's a skosh over $36 million for institutes or foundations dedicated (among other things) to pushing free market/conservative "skepticism" of science.

The piece ends with this:

As science found more and more evidence of the environmental and health effects of industrial activity, which suggested the need for regulation, market fundamentalists increasingly turned against that science. In the name of "freedom," the American public has been deliberately misinformed about important issues of human health and environmental protection.

But it remains difficult to imagine how lies can set us free.

Again this is on Richard Mellon Scaife's editorial page?? Have we shifted into an alternative reality while I was asleep? A backwards universe where Sarah Palin has an engaging intellect? Where Simon Cowell is a nice guy? Where Spock has a beard?

I'm so confused.

Fact-Checking The Trib

Interesting "research" over at DickieCougarMellonScaife's editorial board this morning.

We begin with today's editorial. It's about the "Nanny State Band-Aid" known as SCHIP. Note this paragraph:

This is just more medicinal snake oil cooked up by liberals, because out of every 10 kids who will be added to the SCHIP scheme, six are currently covered by private insurance.

The new bill includes kids in families of four earning up to $80,000 per year. But the Congressional Budget Office reports that 77 percent of such children already have private health insurance, according to Michael F. Cannon, director of health-policy studies at the Cato Institute, a free-market think tank.

Remember the name Michael Cannon. It'll pop up again and again, I assure you.

Like here. It's from October, 2007 and it's a list of suggestions on how to argue against SCHIP. Numbers one and two on the list:

About 60 percent of children currently eligible for SCHIP already have private health insurance, while 77 percent of those targeted by this expansion (i.e., children between 200-300 percent of the federal poverty level) already have private health insurance.

Economists Jonathan Gruber and Kosali Simon estimate that, in effect, 60 percent of children covered by SCHIP expansions already had private coverage.

Does something look familiar?

Then there's this sleight of hand:

Expanding SCHIP could make a bad situation worse by discouraging work. The Urban Institute offers an eye-opening example of the Law of Unintended Consequences:

"A single mother of two earning minimum wage in New Mexico who increased her earnings by $30,000 would find no change in her net income: She would pay an additional $4,000 in taxes and lose $26,000 in SCHIP and other government benefits," the institute concludes.

Wonder who said that? You got it. Michael Cannon in September of 2007:

SCHIP discourages these families from climbing the economic ladder. If a single mother of two earning minimum wage in New Mexico increases her annual earnings by $30,000, her net income does not change: She pays an additional $4,000 in taxes and loses $26,000 in SCHIP and other government benefits. Why should families expend that extra effort if it will leave them no better off financially? Expanding SCHIP would pull even more families into that low-wage trap.

Note that there's NO reference in Cannon's sentence about the "Urban Institute." But if you add that into The Google search you'll find this (again written by our new friend Michael Cannon):

One thing SCHIP does accomplish is to discourage work. SCHIP and similar programs create enormous disincentives to climb the economic ladder. A single mother of two earning minimum wage in New Mexico who increased her earnings by $30,000 would find no change in her net income: She would pay an additional $4,000 in taxes and lose $26,000 in SCHIP and other government benefits, according to data compiled by the Urban Institute for the federal government.

And where does that link lead to? ANOTHER piece by Michael Cannon. Here's the text:

For example, a low-income single mother of two in New Mexico is eligible for a number of income-related subsidies from the federal and state governments. These include the Earned Income Tax Credit, cash assistance, Food Stamps, WIC,22 housing subsidies, child care subsidies, and Medicaid.23 Figure 3 shows what happens if that hypothetical mother increases her earnings. The combination of progressively higher taxes and the progressive loss of government subsidies means that even if she increases her earnings from about $15,000 to $45,000, her net income remains the same at about $40,000.24

That last footnote tells the tale:

24 Data compiled using the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Marriage Calculator, available at http://marriagecalculator.acf.hhs.gov/marriage/. The calculator was created by scholars at the Urban Institute’s Income and Benefits Policy Center (http://www.urban.org/center/ibp/index.cfm).

Could that really be? It was just the calculator that comes from the Urban Institute? Any anyway how many single mothers in New Mexico can "raise their incomes" by 30 grand?

Don't you think the Tribune Review should do some broader research instead of relying on ONE Cato Institute guy?