Tocque Deville has shamed me into writing about the repeal of a 1935 utility regulation, called The Public Utility Holding Company Act (PUHCA).
But first, I’m going get all philosophical on your ass.
Let’s be frank, forget Iraq. American oil does not belong to the American people. Neither does our coal, copper, lead, molybdenum, phosphates, uranium, bauxite, gold, iron, mercury, nickel, potash, silver, tungsten, zinc, natural gas, or timber belong to us. It belongs to the great, great grandchildren of people like Deadwood’s Al Swearengen.
We can clearly see how today’s energy moguls are direct descendants of Swearengen by comparing the following:
Cheney, who as president of the Senate was present for the picture day, turned to Leahy and scolded the senator over his recent criticism of the vice president for Halliburton’s alleged war profiteering.
In response to Cheney, Leahy reminded Cheney that the vice president had once accused him of being a bad Catholic, to which Cheney replied either “f— off” or “go f— yourself.”
:::flip:::
Public ownership of natural resources is not the American way. The oil in the ground and the gold in them thar hills has always been the property of the enterprising souls that rolled up their sleeves, drove off the Indians, and found it for themselves. These mini-conquistadors thrived in the libertarian paradise of the Wild West. And while New York bankers consolidated most of their gains, a few of them retained their own stakes and became the power elite of the emerging West.
The history of energy utilities is complicated and I can’t give a comprehensive history here. For a good overview of the economic landscape that led to the passage of the PUHCA, see Meteor Blades recent article.
Briefly, in the 1920’s Sam Insull and J.P. Morgan and a few other East Coast bankers began buying up utility companies and created a classic pyramid scheme. Much like cable television, by the very nature of the method of its distribution, the distribution of electricity is a monopolistic enterprise. But unlike cable television, we don’t have the option to go without electricity. We are captive customers and we are forced to buy electricity at whatever price it is made available.
So, the American public not only has zero ownership of the country’s sources of electricity, the owners of the power grids can charge us whatever they want because there is no competition for their services. That is, they can charge us whatever they want unless the government steps in and regulates the industry and provides some consumer protection against gouging.
That is what FDR did when he signed the PUHCA into law. And the law has been effective for 70 years:
Boston Globe
That is all going to change now that the PUHCA has been repealed by the passage of Dick Cheney’s energy bill.
The repeal removes obstacles to utility corporations owning non-regulated businesses. It will lead to a rapid series of mergers and acquisitions, including by foreign owned corporations. It will become increasingly difficult for state and federal regulators to exert control. These new mega-corporations will have a powerful incentive to squeeze out innovators in alternative energy and maintain our reliance on fossil fuels and foreign oil and gas.
The repeal of the PUHCA is bad for consumers and it’s bad for the environment. The big mystery is why the vast majority of Americans never question the private ownership of all our natural resources, while we think Iraq’s oil should belong to Iraqis.
This must be repealed, no question, for we must take back our country.
It will take time, cool heads, proper planing, but what else do we have now?
Judging from the recent debacle in Iraq, I think we can probably add “a lot of pissed-off soldiers” to our list of assets.
This is also, unfortunately, an addition to our ever-growing list of liabilities.
very valid point, I’m sure our side will grow, when they get back to “reality” ; )
so sad for the troops.
Seth Bullock/Al Swearengen for president/VP.
Saul should be Secretary of State. No question.
Doc can be Surgeon General + drug czar.
Reality check:
We are all so fucked, we can’t even begin to imagine what’s down the road for us and this country.
UNITY FOREVER — or as long as it takes to get Democrats back in control of Congress and the White House.
Then we can fight amongst ourselves to our hearts’ content.
FIRST — and ONLY — TASK, for now: Regain the power.
by a band of Swearengens, and ‘go fuck yourself’ is their mantra.
Oh yeah. Reality check again. (I’m fond of Al, despite the occasional murders and all.)
And Al’s a pussy compared to the psychopath Sy.
Al is a chief organizer in Deadwood, getting things in motion, calling key meetings, choosing the most influential members of the community to participate in said meetings. Al also provides employment for the disabled, a bed for the dying, and mercy killings.
TOTAL DIGRESSION. Sorry. Just had to stand up for Al.
Anyway, I repeat: We desperately need to sublimate our occasional differences, and unite to gain back our power.
But are yoy seriosuly proposing the nationalization of the energy and electric industruies. That’s quite intersting. I’m just curious becuase Italy had nationalized eneryy and electric industries (it’s called communism by the way) up until very recently and they are still partially nationalized. Prices are absolutely unimaginable to any American and there are constant blackouts to this day.
So, I’m sure your not being serious about putting natural resources into the hands of the people (i.e. government).
Or are you? What a horrifying idea for a “liberal” to espouse.
to call it communism. Italy was never a communist nation, although communism had greater popularity there than elsewhere in Western Europe.
But I’m not advocating the nationalization of our energy resources. I’m pointing out the irony of the President feeling the need to spread the fiction that Iraq’s oil will and should belong to the Iraqi people, while he feels no such need to give a similar assurance to the American people about our oil.
Of course I know quite well that Italy has never been a Communist country. It was controlled by Christian Democrats for nearly fourty years. Don’t worry, I know a lot about Italy ;)..
What I meant is that the specific practice of nationalization of industries and resources in the name of the people is a practice that usually falls under the category of socialism/communism. My point is simply this: Be careful of falling into the unconscious ideological habit of so thoroughly demonizing private enterprise and industry, seeing only the negative and destructive elements in it, that governemment control starts to look like and attractive and desirable alterantive.
I guess I’ve hust been debating with too many true-beleiving Marxists lately. Discussion can get pretty darned dogmatic on the left as well as the right soemtimes.
You must not have been around for the enronization of California’s energy industry. This was a preemptive taste of what we have to look forward to. Throwing our energy grid to the open market is throwing the consumer to the wolves. It is as bad an idea as privatizing our water supplies and works. New Orleans defeated efforts to privatize her Sewerage and Water Board, and the citizens are better off for it.
I would say to you, be careful of not realizing just how bad it can get.
An unfettered energy/grid industry is not the way to go.
You must not have been around for the enronization of California’s energy industry. This was a preemptive taste of what we have to look forward to.
You’re damn skippy! Let me define rage for you. Rage is when you learn that while you’ve been enduring rolling blackouts, and energy bills that have suddenly quadrupled — and are still rising — Sempra is making record profits.
Good point but also be careful not to fall into the rights demonization by equating socialist practices with communism. They are different beasts and when one talks about one they are not necessarily talking about the other. Some are. Most aren’t. And so many more don’t know the different. Democracy and capitalism are not the same thing either.
It is important not to demonize business or corporations just for being what they are. I work for a major brand name corporation. I want that company to do well. It is a good company. It is not however, a citizen. I am a citizen. You are a citizen (of some country – this one or another). This country, this democracy is of by and for the people… We the People, in order to form a more perfect Union… Corporations are not a part of that. Not even one little bit.
A good and healthy business environment is a good thing. I am all for it. More jobs, better pay, better benefits, stronger pension and 401k, etc.
But a good and healthy business environment cannot come at the expense of a good and healthy natural environment. A good and healthy business environment must be balanced with that. A good and healthy business environment must be balanced with a working environment that is good and healthy for the employees. Worker protections, benefits, health care, etc.
Free Trade isn’t Free.
Unregulated business comes at a cost, a human cost. Just as we regulate personal and societal behaviors to guard against criminal actions on the part of the individual, we must regulate business behaviors to guard against criminal actions on the part of business entities.
Checks and balances.
Just as we have, or are suppossed to have, checks and balances in our democratic republic form of government we need to have checks and balances in our capitalist form of economy. The problem we are experiencing today, and the repeal of PUHCA typifies, is the elimination of those checks and balances. We don’t want to regulate business into the ground but we don’t want to remove all restrictions and regulations either. Corporations are amoral. They have one purpose, to make money. A free market economy must have checks and balances, regulations, hopefully as minimal as possible, but still regulated, in order to ensure the health of the people in ALL it’s forms. A free market economy will not provide a solution for societies inequities. Corporations don’t have any stake or interest in that. That is not their fault. It is simply not what they are about. That is our business. And the people’s business is handled through our government creating regulation to ensure our corporate well-being… the well-being of ALL of us.
Please see PastorDan’s recent post for more on that… and yes, it’s socialist aspect.
I dont’ really have time to go into this discussion right now. I will only say that there are many subtle distinction which different historicans and/or politcical philopshers make with respect Communism, socialism, social democracy, etc…
The distinctions often change depenging on the perspective of the individual thinker in question. Comminism, for me, is socialism combimbed with a revolutionary and totalitarian aspect.
Socialism is total governement control of the “means of production”, as Karl Marxist sociliasm.
What you, and the others, are talking about are mixed economies,in techinical terms. I agree with most of the things you have cited.
If you eant more specifics on my on views on econimics, or anything else for that that matter, you’re invited to read my posts over at
New International Times
This will give you some idea where I’m coming from hopefully. People seem to forget quickly who there dealing with on-line, especially on these here-today-gone-tommorow Scoop-based sites.
these academic questions to consider the larger point. Take water.
How do we get clean, safe, water into everyone’s home, into businesses, into hospitals? Who owns the water, and what should they be able to charge for it?
If a city taxes its citizens to build a resevoir, and aqueduct system, a purification plant, and a sewer system, then should they charge anything more than what it costs to build and maintain the system?
Is this socialism? Should we allow multiple sewer systems, each competing to provide the best tasting, cleanest, and lowest cost water?
There are some services that do not lend themselves to taking advantage of competition to bring greater efficiency, innovation, and lower costs to the public. Water is one of them.
Electricity can be debated. But it is not socialism vs. capitalism when the debate is over how to protect the public from monopolistic practices/gouging of essential services.
No and I never said it was socialism to regulate the
electric and energy markets any more than the market for water. I don’t see where you are getting the idea that I aid it was socialim to introducee even the strictest regulations on price-gouging and other dishoenst practices which continually take place in a merket economy. I just said that complete nationalization of the gas and eletric industries was not the solution. Is there something wrong with that?
I can see the discussion has gone off the tracks here though. You’re trying to make a straw-man conserative out of me just so you can keep scoring popularity points or something.
misinterpreted your initial email. My apologies.
not email, initial post.
Oh, don’t mind me. I was mostly using your post as a foil for posting my own rant on the whole corporation vs. citizen battle that I think is at the center of much of our political troubles today. I was not intending it as a direct assault on you.
Democracy and Communism are political systems. Socialism and Capitalism are economic systems… on paper. In reality they have been intermingled and most folks can’t or don’t separate them in their minds. That was my only real point there. Likewise each of these things in theory, on paper, are very different form what we have seen in practice, real life, in the history of the world. Often discussions of this sort that turn into arguments can really be tracked back to people discussing different aspects like these (real world vs. theory or econimic vs. political) without defining them as such for each other right up front. When we use the same words to mean different things, when we discuss the same things on different planes of reality then we find discord and disagreement amongst even people that do agree. Defining terms up front is often very necessary.
Peace,
Andrew
Captive markets are inherently different than free markets.
If I have the choice between buying my electricity from PECO, or not having electricity at all, then we aren’t debating capitalism vs. communism.
Interesting. I don’t remenber mentioning a word about free-markets!!
But now that you mention it, if there is demand for product and there certainly is an enoromous quanitity of it in the case of a so-called “captive” market, then there will be an extraordimry rush of private competitors to furnish the services required to fulfill that need. If Petro soenìt supoply it foryou, you don’t go without, a company named Quaatro will be formed by a bunch of people with enough capital whi will hire enginerres from the company PQR to di the excvation and the extracttion, etc.. The possibility of going comltely without a needed product in a capitalist socety is fundnatally absurd and defies the rules of logic as well as fundennatal economic common sense.
But sticj with your notion of a “captive” market.It’s simply that I would indeed prefer to have the captive market, such as television another example which you pointed out of such a market, in the hands of private and competitive industries with appropraite regulations than have them controledd by the govrenement which they were in Italy for about 50 years before the systematic capaign of privatiztion began under the left-wing govermnments of Massimo d’Alema and Roman Prodi .
When I visited Italy twenty years ago, there were exctrly three State television stations and the quality was so god-aweful on two of them, that only one could be viewed. It kept playing reruns of old American sitcoms from the 1960 and 1970s over an over, interspered with some political propganda from one of the major parties. Now there are 7 regular channels and with Sky sattelite I can get 1000s!!! An absoltely miraculous phenomenon broght to me by privatization.
Right now energy and eletricty are still in the hands of the State. And the consequence, as I mentioned eralier, is that Italy has themost expensive and least efficient energy and eletrical system in the Western industrialized world.
If you haven’t experienced what nationalization means for yourself, you don’t know a damned think about it!!
This last comment is completely meaningless. I thouihgt I had read that “cable television” was a captive market in the diary. Disregard that part about captive markets in television.
If it’s defined as “having no choice but to buy at a price defined by the producer”, then television really doesn’t count.
Our electric grid in this country is in terrible need of repair and updating, etc. However, turning the “problem” over to a free market, and there’s no such thing as free, is not the answer. Perhaps the bulging pocketbooks of the energy companies, profiting from the spiked rise in oil and natural gas, perhaps some of that money could be used to upgrade our grid.
Ah, but I’m dreaming there. Bottom line: protect the public assets, then find a way to upgrade them. don’t turn them over to a corporate world gone wild with greed these days.
What’s wrong with publicly owned utilities? Just because Italy and California have problems doesn’t make the general method bad.
And plenty of Republicans support it, too. For example, Colorado Springs, home of all that is reactionary in the GOP, with exactly one elected local Democrat, has a publicly owned electric system (and gas, water, and sewer). Good rates, too. And there’s no proposal I’ve heard of to privatize it.
There are towns in Massachusetts (e.g. Shrewsbury) that have local cable systems, too. That means, for example, that you can have a cable drop in the cemetery where the old geezers stand and give their speeches on Memorial Day, which supports a live feed to everybody in town. And significantly lower cable rates.
Just because California screwed up its deregulation program by requiring long term buy contracts and harsh limits on rates, resulting in a negative balance, doesn’t mean that socialized public services are bad. It just means that California screwed up their “deregulation” project.
On a so-called liberal blog like this I would expect solid support for socialized medicine, roads, schools, and services, and perhaps some discussion about whether natural resources should be more tightly controlled, including oil, gas, coal, and, yes, wind.
For city dwellers there are a number of cost-saving measures people can take to reduce energy consumption. Start there. Rural folk can get off the grid affordably. In the absence of good government policy on conservation – mandated reductions, etc. – it will be up to us.
Also keep in mind that every energy use projection is based on “current trends”. Change the trends by reducing demand. We’ve done it before.
Thanks for the link. I had an immediate reaction to this statement:
“But unlike cable television, we don’t have the option to go without electricity. We are captive customers and we are forced to buy electricity at whatever price it is made available.”
We do have the option to go without electricity of course but it is not a particularly attractive one in this day and age and particularly not for a blogging community.
More seriously though… there are local alternatives that can be implemented to become energy independent. As you say, probably easier for rural rather than urban dwellers. I began looking into going solar at my home. It would take some work but I think most of my electric needs could be handled that way. I need to learn more and put together a solid plan of how to transition there.
Also, a year or so ago there was a plan proposed by a group of grads from a local college to put a small number of wind turbines up on the Taconic Ridge. Their plan would provide power for 3000 homes… more than enough to power my whole town.
I am intrigued by that plan. An energy independent town. Can you imagine that? We burn lots of very, very expensive fuel oil out here in the wilds of the northeast. And lots of wood. What would it take to transform our heating needs to electric (normally much more expensive but with the rising cost of fuel oil…) and how many additional turbines would be needed on that ridge to supply the heating needs as well?
Hmmmm… intriguing. Very intriguing.
In your part of the world underground/earth-bermed housing is one solution. In uban areas super-insulate (roof/attic is most important); triple-glaze windows; use “energy-star” appliances; and newer “tankless” hot water heating.
Small wind turbines, along with a wealth if alternative energy systems at the Dep’t of Energy’s site.
Well… I have an old 1820’s era farm house. Not exactly the model of energy efficiency… and I am loath to give it up. Also, I do not personally have the land (only one acre) to put up my own wind turbine. However, New York follows only California in incentives for alternative, solar in my case, energy. So the challenge in my case is how to transform an existing, old, old home into an energy independent (and more efficient) one.
Rural folk can get off the grid affordably
Yeah, if you think $25K is affordable. I don’t, and most “rural folks” don’t, either. A nice, super-efficient 24 volt refrigerator that you can run off batteries and a PVA is gonna set you back close to three grand, and you’ll wait six months to get it.
The biggest issue for everybody is dealing with the changes in “lifestyle” that the energy crunch is gonna cause. All those things and stuff and activities that you all are gonna have to learn to live without. Those of us who partook of back-to-the-land-ism in the sixties and seventies have had lots of practise.
Planting a garden is now a revolutionary act. Better get into it, ’cause trucked-in veggies and stuff are gonna get real expensive.
If you’re building a new structure, $25k is about right for a complete electrical system. Most back-to-the-landers would have been better off if they’d bothered to learn how to build before they moved to the sticks.
it’s a down payment on minimizing your dollar output for electricity, vis-à-vis: being self-sustaining when you are generating enough electricity to accommodate your demand; running the meter “backwards” and so forth; but you still require a very expensive, self contained storage system-batteries-and a reliable generator-probably lp, nat.gas or diesel powered- to be truly “off-grid”
In the past several years I have designed 3 “off-grid” residences, 1 in the US & 2 in Mexico, and the costs of the electrical systems alone, including lighting fixtures, appliances, inverters [from DC to AC for those elements that are not accomplishable/compatible with DC], have exceeded, on avg. of the 2 that have been completed, 140K.US. That does not include H2O systems; wells, purification, filtering systems, desalinization, etc, nor the additional $’s added to the basic construction cost for passive solar strategies, active solar HW systems for domestic use, etc. etc. Suffice it to say, there is a VERY BIG premium to pay when you build off-grid.
Indeed, with the cost of conventional energy sources rising at unprecedented rates, these alternatives are becoming more “cost effective” but right now it’s a rich man’s game. I’m not designing these things for the average man on the street, these clients don’t care what it costs. They see what’s coming and they’re taking care of themselves.
I’m doing this work because I think it’s important to test the theories, test the equipment and get a real-time, solid data understanding of what can and cannot be achieved. I encourage everyone who can, to do everything possible to control their energy consumption on an individual basis. However, the reality is that until we, the global we, recognize the impact we are having on the resources and ecosystems of the planet; until governments begin to take seriously the consequences of miss-guided economic and energy policies; until corporate and personal greed are constrained in some fashion; until it’s considered fashionable to “live simply so that others may simply live”, I see no change. Eventually, it will reach one of two alternatives…either the pain becomes so great that changes occur…or we continue on this path and retreat, ultimately, into the dark ages.
I have become too cynical with age, and even with that being said, I will not give up hope.
Peace
Having lived through the California energy crisis, I hate to tell you how little measures, like energy efficient appliances and shutting off lights when you leave the room, actually accomplish. When rates go through the roof, you can be as pennywise as you want, you’re final bill will still send you into a rage. The only option is going off the grid — go solar, build an earth ship, etc — which you can’t do if you rent, not for nothin.’ If you rent, you’re fucked.
I saw something on the news about people who had gone solar in California. Here was their deal. They spent thousands of dollars to add solar panels. They drew solar all day, and off the grid at night. When they were getting solar energy, their meter actually ran backwards, as they put energy back into the grid. That’s right, the utility companies were actually drawing power from their solar panels. At the end of the month, they inevitably had a negative balance. For this, they got to pay a fee — $5 or so — for whatever fees and incidental charges such fees are charged. That’s right, they generate energy for the utilities, and pay them for the privilege. Booman is right, our energy resources are not our own, not even the ones, we create ourselves.
And your alternative to regulated utilities is? A nation of MUDs (Municipal Utility Districts)? Rural Electric Coops? Both alternatives are available, but as our local birkenstock nazis found, someone has to pay for the installed infrastructure – PG&E isn’t giving it away.
And what gilgamesh said downstream:
Um…. the problem in CA was DE-regulation. I believe in regulation. And it was proved quite unequivocally, that despite Mr. Cheney’s slams, it was not birkenstock wearing environmentalists who caused this disaster, but market manipulation on the part of Enron and others. They were gaming the system, which they were able to do because of deregulation, remember?
Um….clarifying: I detest deregulation in all forms. Apparently we agree. My question was: what are the alternatives to the State-wide regulated utility demonized regularly by the birkenstock nazis?
I don’t know who the birkenstock nazis are. The major proponents of deregulation I”m familiar with are Cheney’s pals who crafted the energy bill. Some things are not profitable, but they’re necessary. They can’t be made profitable, on the scale that Enron pretended.
Shit. Sorry for the local descriptors. The people in our local community who also brought us a “nuclear-free zone”; a “no-war zone”; and who generally describe anything corporate as “evil” (except Volvos, birkenstocks, and free trade coffee). Well-represented in the bad comedy “PCU”.
The mantra of the right for over a generation has been de-regulation. That is, let the free market decide: it is far more efficient than any government beurocracy and will lead to increased savings and lowered costs for all.
Unfortunately, the mantra has been proven to be wrong, time and time again. I know, because I was a lawyer who represented Savings and Loans in the wake of the de-regulation of that industry. Let me describe for you how it all worked out.
When Reagan initially deregulated the S&L’s many of them jumped into lending businesses in which they had little or no experience. Remember, S&L’s were restricted for the most part to the residential home mortgage market. There purpose was to ensure an adequate supply of funds for home buyers within the communities they serviced. Becuase of the restrictions on ownership and type of business, they primarily remained local. They knew their customer base far more intimately than the large corporate banks, and their business was steady, but not greatly profitable, so their were few mergers and acquisitions.
That changed upon de-regulation. Many S&L’s, now able to obtain fed funds for loans that had previously been denied them by the regulators as being too risky, dived into the commercial real estate and junk bond markets. For them it seemed a no-brainer. They could borrow the money from the Fed, lend it out at much higher rates (and in higher amounts), book large fees (taken directly from the loan proceeds) as income, and book their new assets at whatever value the appraisers they employed had given them. The competition became intense, as more and more S&L’s fought to finance more and more real estate and (where they could be competitive with larger commercial banks) business lending and junk bond deals.
This rapid expansion of their business however came at a cost. They really didn’t know the markets in which they were involved, and often made loans to very iffy people, people who had a track record of defaulting on loans, or who themselves had no experience in commercial development. Further, the S&L often financed projects far from their geographical base, projects that local lenders, more familiar with the marketplace there, wouldn’t fund.
It created a classic bubble. As long as the S&L’s had money to lend, developers found projects to build. And they used the same schemes to siphon off loan proceeds, paying related companies large management fees and hiring related companies to construct the projects. Since most of the loans were non-recourse (i.e., the mortgage the S&L held was it’s only security, as no one personally guaranteed the loans) developers oftened treate the funds as monoply money: i.e., spend it while you got it.
Because of the rising income of the S&L’s (inflated by their accounting practices) they became targets for larger banks seeking to expand their asset base. This led to a great consolidation in the financial industry, as commercial banks and larger S&L’s fought to acquire the smaller fry, often overspending for their assets in the bargain. The result was large layoffs of employees at the acquired firms, since the new parent could perform many of their functions for the entire enterprise at a single back office location.
When the bubble burst, many of these S&L’s went bankrupt or suffered severe financial losses. This only increased consoilidation in the field, however, except this time it was aided by the Federal Government. The feds had had to step in to adminsiter thousands of insolvent S&L’s and desperate to get them out of its hands it cut sweetheart deals with anyone who could bring some cash to the table, or assume liabilities that otherwise the Fed would have been responsible for under FSLIC.
The end result? The S&L industry essentially vanished with taxpayers picking up about 700 billion of the cost. The continuing consolidation of banks and financial intitutions continued apace, until we now have a few large banking corporations providing less service to depositors at greater cost. Check out the number of fees the large banks charge their customers these days to use ATMs, pay bills online, use their credit cards, for missing mortgage payments, etc. That consolidation has created virtual monopolies with decreased competition. It’s been good for the survivors of the merger wars, but not so good for all the employees laid off and the depositors left behind.
can I predict what will happen to public utitlities as a result of my experience? Not perfectly, but some general parameters can be analogous. The utilities will vastly expand into businesses with which they are unfamiliar. Some will succeed, but others will fail miserably. A great period of industry wide distress is almost inevitable at some point, and likely the federal government will have to step in at some point to keep the utilities functioning. At the end of the day we will see a few large energy companies left, who will not only own the utilities, but will also own the means by which the energy is created (ie, coal, oil, what have you). The interests of these large compaies will not correspond to that of the avergae consumer of energy, who I predict will see massive increases in prices for electricity.
The challenge is to recognize that we are losing the battle on several fronts. PUHCA is simply another front. This one slipped below the radar of most progressives, of most democrats, while their “leaders” gave another payoff to the corporate world.
We can’t afford to let this stand, and if we make enough noise and wake up enough people, Congress won’t be able to afford not to repeal it.
Organization is the key, with everyone getting involved, even if it is just to contact Congress on this issue.
Are we up to this challenge?