I'd like to take you down the road of a history of strange alliances for the common good, especially on network neutrality, the Patriot ACT, FISA, and a host of whole other issues. Here are these groups for example on network neutrality:
Verizon's blocking of a NARAL Pro-Choice America text message sent to the group's members sparked an unusual alliance with the Christian Coalition of America. Seeing a greater threat to free speech, these traditional foes co-wrote an op-ed for the Washington Post, calling on Congress to address censorship by phone companies and "guarantee the free flow of information."
The détente recalled 2006 when the Gun Owners of America joined with MoveOn.org to support Net Neutrality. "Without statutory Net Neutrality, there is nothing to prevent big telecom companies from injecting political bias into modern communications," the Gun Owners' Craig Fields said during a press conference with MoveOn.org. "If the telecoms believe they can frame opposition to their power grab as a liberal or anti-free-market attack, they are sadly mistaken."
And here's the list of supporting groups of network neutrality from SaveTheInternet.com:
Our grass-roots coalition includes more than 720 groups, 5,000 bloggers and 800,000 individuals who have rallied in support of net neutrality at www.savetheinternet.com. The coalition is left and right, public and private, commercial and noncommercial.
Supporters of net neutrality include the Christian Coalition of America, MoveOn.org, National Religious Broadcasters, the Service Employees International Union, the American Library Association, AARP, ACLU, and every major consumer group in the nation. It includes the founders of the Internet and hundreds of companies that do business online.
And the ACLU, along with netroots groups, joined with libertarians and conservative groups in opposing the Patriot Act:
The ACLU has joined with such unlikely bedfellows as the Americans for Tax Reform, the American Conservative Union in forming a new coaliton, Patriots to Restore Checks and Balances, to oppose the Patriot Act. The group will be chaired by former Congressman Bob Barr:
The new organization is urging Congress to thoroughly review the most intrusive and constitutionally suspect provisions of the Patriot Act. Specifically, the act allows federal agents to gather highly personal information -- including library, medical and gun purchase records-- without criminal suspicion, permits secret searches of homes and businesses with indefinite notification, and expands the definition of domestic terrorism to potentially include political protest.
"Checks and balances are absolutely essential, even and especially during times of threat," Barr said. "Our message is universal: liberty is not divisible, even in the face of terrorism, and we must not allow any part of it to be sacrificed in our efforts to defeat acts of terrorism."
Here are some interesting numbers:
The ACLU noted that pro-civil liberties resolutions have been passed in 375 communities in 43 states, including the state legislatures of Alaska, Hawaii, Vermont and New Hampshire. Most of the resolutions call upon Congress to bring the Patriot Act back in line with the Constitution. These communities represent approximately 56.2 million people.
Other groups participating: Citizens' Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, the Second Amendment Foundation and the American Association of Physicians and Surgeons. The New York Times has more.
And as for the FISA Act, the netroots groups such as Dailykos, Open Left, and other groups partnered with conservative and libertarian groups in opposing the FISA bill. Here's a good rundown of the history of the FISA bill and the opposition to it here.
And as for the letter that Firedoglake signed onto with major left groups and conservative and libertarian groups, it was also signed by these groups below in opposition to Ben Bernanke's nomination. Letters like these get co-signed all the time in D.C. where common interests verge on populist issues. Here's the list below:
Ryan Alexander, president, Taxpayers for Common Sense
Chris Bowers, founder, OpenLeft
Dean Baker, co-director, Center for Economic and Policy Research
Robert Borosage, co-director, Campaign for America's Future
Danielle Brian, executive director, Project On Government Oversight
Mark Calabria, director of financial regulation studies, Cato Institute
Mark Cohen, executive director, Government Accountability Project
Tom DeWeese, president, American Policy Center
Tyler Durden, founder, Zero Hedge
Sandra Fabry, executive director, Center for Fiscal Accountability
James Kenneth Galbraith, economist
Adam Green, co-founder, Progressive Change Campaign Committee
George Goehl, executive director, National People's Action
Jane Hamsher, founder, FireDogLake
Gary Kalman, Washington director, Public Interest Research Group
Matt Kibbe, president, FreedomWorks
Grover Norquist, president, Americans for Tax Reform
Duane Parde, president, National Taxpayers Union
Aaron Swartz, co-founder, Progressive Change Campaign Committee
Phyllis Schlafly, president, Eagle Forum
John Tate, president, Campaign for Liberty
John Taylor, CEO, National Community Reinvestment Coalition
Stephanie Taylor, co-founder, Progressive Change Campaign Committee
Robert Weissman, president, Public Citizen
John Whitehead, president, The Rutherford Institute
And here's the body of the letter:
December 3, 2009
Dear Members of the U.S. Senate:
In the last two years, the Federal Reserve Board has lent several trillion dollars to banks and other private companies, financial and non-financial institutions through a series of special lending facilities. The total amount of loans made through facilities exceeds the annual budget of the United States. In addition, it guaranteed trillions of dollars of various assets and also made hundreds of billions of dollars available to several foreign central banks through currency swap arrangements.
At this point, neither the public nor members of Congress has any information about who benefited from these loans, guarantees, and swap arrangements. There is no information available on the specific terms of the loans - the interest rate charged, the collateral posted, and whether or not they were repaid. There is no information available on how it was decided who would qualify for the Fed's help and who would be denied assistance.
Almost three quarters of the members of the House of Representatives have co-sponsored a bill calling for an audit of the Federal Reserve Board. This audit will allow Congress to assess how the Fed, under the leadership of its chairman Ben Bernanke, performed in this crisis and whether it acted appropriately in its disbursement of an enormous amount of money and guarantees.
Without this audit, Congress lacks the information it needs to evaluate Mr. Bernanke's performance. Therefore the Senate should delay action on Mr. Bernanke's reappointment until an audit of the Fed's books takes place, the results are made available to the Congress and Mr. Bernanke answers a serious inquiry into the actions he took.
And now comes a massive rant---you are hereby declared pariahs to me for supporting an audit of the Fed, and demanding transparency of our financial markets, and for opposing Ben Bernanke's nomination. How dare you, Chris Bowers, Dean Baker, James Galbraith, Adam Green, Jane Hamsher, and Stephanie Taylor, join with opposing groups on opposing Bernanke's nomination? You should never have signed onto that letter, and I am so, so, so ashamed of you for wanting financial transparency, governmental oversight of the Federal Reserve, and questioning Ben Bernanke's failures as chief of the Fed Reserve Bank.
I swear to God that if a letter being circulated to me asked for greater transparency in our financial markets, oversight of the Fed, and questioning Bernanke's nomination--I would not sign that letter even if my organization supported all of that because I do not believe it's right to join with different groups in supporting a policy.
I don't support the ACLU in joining with different groups in supporting network neutrality. I don't support NARAL Pro-Choice America in joining with a Christian organization in support of network neutrality. Clearly where common interests converge, both organizations should not join together or join a group of bipartisan allies. Oh, and the left netroots and the right netroots should never join together in opposing FISA. Markos is hereby a pariah in my eyes for that. How dare he?
End snarky rant here. I'd love to see people here go after Chris Bowers, Dean Baker, James Galbraith, and Adam Green for signing onto that letter with Freedom Works. Clearly they support teabaggers.