ALEC Allegedly "Vilified" - Right Counterfarts

But the one thing the vast left-wing media do want you to forget

is that there is a vast left-wing conspiracy supporting it.

That was the closing sentence in an op-ed yesterday – but NOWHERE in the entire op-ed did the writer display anything remotely tied to the preponderance of  “vast left wing media”

Wake up this morning and turn on the TV - and all I see on the Sunday talk shows is a gaggle of righties - telling me what they think I should believe.

Would someone PLEASE point out the “vast left wing media" to me?  I sure as hell can’t find it in Minneapolis/ St Paul or on the crappy 15 channels I get with basic Charter – that BTW includes Faux News, but not MSNBC. "Vast left wing media" - one left of center radio station in Minneapolis - WOW.

Another instance of RWNJ’s throwing around  RWNJ talking points for no reason at all.

Venting - but that's not why I am here today.

It is getting more amazing to me and funny, in a sad, pathetic kind of way – how ALEC defenders are grabbing at any straw they can find to get media space to defend ALEC.  If the left burps ALEC - the right needs to do a big 'ol counterfart.

I keep thinking – these folks are on drugs – they have to be.

But really – it’s just hot air.
The good thing is that this hot air - continually being expelled for ALEC will drive a wedge within the Republican party - as moderates continue to connect their parties extremist policies to ALEC.

The latest piece of comedic right-wing extremist pro-ALEC hot, stinky air comes out Arizona.

I tried to connect the dots of the author directly to ALEC – but could not, so I have to just guess that there is an extraordinary amount of mind numbing hot air pollution floating around in this particular part of Arizona.  Maybe it's that Arizona climate change has already fried this guys brain.

  

Vilified right-wing ALEC has its left-wing counterpart

By Doug MacEachern The Republic | azcentral.com Sat Mar 23, 2013 3:38 PM

An easy pop quiz for liberals who are up to snuff on the hottest lefty obsessions:

What organization claims to “serve as a leading national voice for state legislators,” crafts “model” legislation for all 50 state legislatures, offers coordinated services for state lawmakers at national legislative conferences, and even provides a “war room” for up-to-the-minute policy information because, as everyone knows, “state policy matters.”

Surprise! Trick question. The answer isn’t the wicked ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council, which, as every activist liberal knows, exerts undue corporate influence at state legislatures.

The group I’m referencing is called Progressive States Network, the liberal doppelganger of ALEC in every discernible respect.

Yeh – you read that correctly,

The Progressive States Network

Bashing the Progressive States Network is new in pro-ALEC editorials.

Evidently – the RWNJ’s have figured out they can’t compare ALEC to NCSL anymore.

Probably the reason that he focused on The Progressive States Network (PSN) is because someone told him to, after the huge publicity success of the ALEC Exposed in Iowa educational session that was held in Iowa last week, attended by the Chair of The Progressive States Network

    Sen. Joe Bolkcom,
    Iowa Senate

Could be he spoke with the same people who told another pro-ALECer to focus on PSN after the extremely successful Iowa ALEC educational session.  Don't kid yourself - they don't come up with these connections all by their lonesome - pro-AELCer writers are like ALEC "copy/paste" legislation - repeat the same ALEC premise in different states, different newspapers, within days.

The Progressive States Network - really???? really????

That is the most inane comparison that could be made.

I'm giving this guy four raspberries for absolute lack of substance in his argument on a PSN/ALEC comparison..

There is nothing of substance to compare.
Hot stinky air.

Last night when I was pondering this editorial I envisioned ALEC-ers (legislators or staffers) getting in touch with these op-ed writers and saying, “Please, please, please help us out – ALEC is going down the crapper fast and we need some help.”  And I wondered - "Did this guy get paid well for writing this "op-ed" piece?  "Is he going to the ALEC 40th Birthday Bash in Chicago in August on a "scholarship"?   Is he hoping to win the ALEC reporter of the year award (yes, they do have one)?

Then he gets to what he thinks is his real basis of his argument.
PSN is a 5013c and accepts donations.
OMG!!!!!
That's the only thing he can hang his hat on for a comparison - get real!!!

The AZ pro-ALECer goes on to note:

ALEC, which promotes free-market-oriented legislation among state lawmakers, is supported by a lot of individual donors but also by corporations, including many very large ones. PSN, on the other hand, is supported by unions, including, reportedly, several very large national ones.

NOPE

Not a lot of “individual donors”

Who funds ALEC?

More than 98% of ALEC's revenues come from sources other than legislative dues, such as corporations, corporate trade groups, and corporate foundations.

According to ALEC's IRS filings, over the past three years it has raised $21,615,465 from corporations,

$21,615,465 from right-wing corporate donors in only three years

$21,615,465

TWENTY ONE MILLION

PSN is supported by "unions" - I can't believe he wrote that!
Let's see - ALEC has 300+ corporate sponsors - ALEC brags bout it.
I don't think there are 300+ unions supporting PSN.

Then the AZ pro-ALECer goes somewhere no one in their demented right mind would go:

We do know, however, that PSN has received at least $300,000 over two years from its own puppeteer-plutocrat, George Soros — the liberal billionaire whose own Koch-level lucre helps fund countless advocacy groups, many of which are working together now to wrap a tight noose around ALEC’s neck.

From his keyboard to the higher powers ears – A tight noose around ALEC’s neck.

BTW – where is my Soros money?????

I don't bring up the Koch funding  in every piece I write - but it seems RWNJ's  have to bring up Soros in every piece they put out about left organizations.

        There they go again – Soros funding.

Maybe they are just whining, "We're SORE he didn't give US his money."

Evidently the left nonprofits aren't supposed to have any funding – just funding to the right-wing nonprofits.

BTW - for those of you new to the topic - The Koch's do fund ALEC:

From 1997 to 2010, the Kochs funneled $858,858 to ALEC.

Charles Koch’s Lambe Foundation donated $150,000 in 2011 to ALEC.

Koch brothers gave ALEC two loans of a about a half a million each to ALEC, when ALEC started to go belly up in the mid 90’s.

Then he goes on for nine paragraphs about liberal “attacks” on RWNJ thinkless tanks.

RWNJ’s get so riled up when their thinkless tanks are exposed. 

But in his closing paragraphs he notes:

In a 2012 interview, Graves, the Center for Media and Democracy director, told the conservative Washington Beacon, “The one thing I don’t want folks to forget is ALEC is able to exist because of the vast right-wing conspiracy supporting it.”

“ALEC is able to exist because of the vast right-wing conspiracy supporting it.”

A right-winger supporting ALEC – trying to write to their “base” - trying to rile up their “base”
Which is so sad - yet exhilarating -cause we can sit back and watch them destroy their own party by supporting ALEC.

The right-wing “base” being destroyed because of RWNJ keyboard militia supporting the extremist policies and views held by ALEC legislators.

Editorials supporting the extremist, right wing ultraconservative American Legislative Exchange Council – will continue to push moderate GOPers farther away from the party. 

It would be ironic, if in the end - it was the existence of ALEC that decimates the GOP.