The New York Times finally listened to MSNBC and just did a breaking news article about how large corporations have been funding the Chamber of Commerce to lobby Congress and to throw this year's election to the Republicans. More below the fold.
This was first headlined as breaking news across the top of the NYTimes online edition about 30 minutes ago:
Top Companies Aid Chamber of Commerce in Policy Fights
The article, written by Eric Lipton, Mike McIntire and Don Van Natta Jr.
details what we already know about the Chamber, particularly if we've been watching Rachel Maddow. I'm really glad this has hit the mainstream press, because this is going to get wide coverage.
The article details how large corporations such as Prudential Financial, Dow Chemical, and And Goldman Sachs, Chevron Texaco, and Aegon, donated 10s of millions of dollars to the Chamber of Congress. Aegon, by the way, is a multinational insurance company based in the Netherlands, and thus not allowed to donate to political parties.
The CoC has been able to cover its tracks by claiming that these "donations" are to a Chamber of Congress charitable foundation.
Also, not surprisings
Good sleuthings by the reporters have been able to track the funds from the tax filings of large donor corporations.
The chamber, which once had an $80 million budget, is now spending $200 million this election cycle to elect a Congress that is more friendly to business. (How could Congress be more friendly than it currently is?)
The Chamber also pretty much shakes down large companies for donations, claiming the Chamber can lobby and influence elections while the corporations doesn't get their hands dirty.
A couple of days ago, Rachel Maddow pointed out how the head of the Chamber of Commerce advocated locating jobs overseas as a wise corporate economic strategy, then ran ads against Democrats because of high unemployment. Talk about having your cake and eating it too.
Let's hope this is the October surprise. I hope this gets covered enough. Having it appear in the NY Times a little less than 2 weeks before the election gives the story a lot of news cycles to circulate through the country.
I just hope some of the people who have been swayed by the astro-turfed Tea Party realize they've been had before it's too late.