CT - Re-Elect ALEC - Shame on You

This headline reminds me of the "I am not a witch" commercial

Lavielle: I am not an ALEC member

published today and it's got issues.

This topic happens to be a campaign issue for Lavielle - many in CT are questioning whether this should be a campaign issue.  ALEC is ALWAYS a campaign issue.

One comment at the end of the article suggests it is Mccarthey-esque to ask
Are you now or have you ever been an ALEC member.
Evidently someone - who is ignorant about ALEC and upset that their Repug candidate has been put under a philosophical belief microscope.

To understand this story - you have to understand the mechanisms of ALEC.

In the beginning of November, we the people, elect candidates to serve a public servants in our state house.
In late November, early December ALEC holds a meeting named the "States and Nation Policy Summit".

ALEC gives each state two full paid scholarships to send pro-corporate, newly elected public servants to attend the States and Nation Policy Summit meeting to indoctrinate them into ALEC.

Once indoctrinated into ALEC and once they have paid their dues - they become ALEC members in good standing.

Once they are a member in good standing they are eligible to be a ALEC taskforce member

The membership of a Task Force consists of legislators who are members in good

standing of ALEC and are duly appointed to the Task Force, in accordance with

Section VI

Ms. Lavielle was elected in November of 2010.

Ms. Lavielle was listed by ALEC as a member of the 

Education Taskforce

As of 3/31/2011

Therefore - she was a "member in good standing of ALEC" - which is necessary in order to be a member of an ALEC taskforce.

In August of 2011 - Ms. Lavielle was still listed as an Education Taskforce member, as of 7/11/2011 - a "member in good standing of ALEC", when she attended the ALEC annual conference in NOLA in 2011.

Now let's look at the fantasy she cooked up to tell the reporter.

In the article she notes:

(I believe I also paid $100 to attend the meeting.)

Which means that she paid for two years of ALEC membership.

     (Aug 2011 to July 2012, Aug 2012  to July 2013)

Which means she received two years of ALEC propaganda.

Which means she had two years to access the ALEC secret vault of legislation.

In the article she states

Many members of my House caucus belong to ALEC. I don’t.

What she means is I don't belong to ALEC NOW

   because its an election year.

The pure idiocy of this article is that Lavielle states

I actually don’t know a lot about ALEC. 

which is bullshit! 

She received all the ALEC mailings for two years 

and during those two years she introduced ALEC legislation.

She is listed by NELP as

Twenty-­‐Nine ALEC-­‐Affiliated Bills Aiming to Weaken or Repeal Living Wage and Prevailing Wage Laws

being the sponsor of CT HB5249 in JANUARY 2011

Bills calling for the total repeal of state living wage policies directly reflect the policy objective of ALEC’s model bill titled the “Prevailing Wage Repeal Act,” which states simply that “Any and all prevailing wage laws are repealed.”

And it's important to understand that Ms. Lavielle - took office in January 2011.

And then you have these

In 2013 - Introduced by Ms. Lavielle

Proposed Bill No. 5009

To move state employee pensions to defined contribution plans

           

Proposed Bill No. 5153

To require voters to present valid photo identification prior to voting.

And Lavielle would be very happy serving under ALECer Jan Brewer in Arizona.

Rep. Lavielle Opposes Bill Allowing Driver’s Licenses for Undocumented Immigrants

 Another item from the article

What I noticed in the Education meeting, however, was that the situations and school systems being discussed didn’t bear any resemblance to those in Connecticut

She attended the Education Taskforce meeting in 2011 - a closed door meeting limited to members of the taskforce. 

The membership of a Task Force consists of legislators who are members in good

standing of ALEC and are duly appointed to the Task Force, in accordance with

Section VI

So now she says she quit - an election year.

If ALECer says they quit ALEC 

to be credible 

the ALECer MUST publicly acknowledge membership

publicly condemn ALEC; 

AND actively work 2 repeal ALEC evil

And Lavielle won't do that because her

Many members of my House caucus belong to ALEC. I don’t.

Well, not so much - not many - SOME

According to ALEC documents - only 14%

   (still too many - but 14% doesn't represent "many")

Well - I guess Connecticut can give Lavielle a pass if they want - if they want a pro-corporate representative in their statehouse - go for it.

ALECExposed "updated" their website after Lavielle complained to them that she was not a member "now".

I am not as gracious - as I said above:

If ALECer says they quit ALEC 

to be credible 

the ALECer MUST publicly acknowledge membership

publicly condemn ALEC; 

AND actively work 2 repeal ALEC evil

And she won't - and I will bet - she will rejoin ALEC as soon as the election is over and will be at the "States and Nation Policy Summit" in DC in 2014 and I bet she will be back on the ALEC Education Taskforce in 2015.

Fool me once - - - shame on me

Fool you twice - - - shame on YOU!

Lavielle has been listed - publicly in 2012  - in ALEC documents as an ALEC member since and NOW in an election year, she chooses to kick the American Legislative Exchange Council to the curb.

Too little - too late.

                                          #VoteNo2ALEC

                                               PLEASE