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( otiasre ( elehriiion
nilfi) April 27th, 2012
I’M KhHii I’M
Nucis Space *
last week was a bad one for those of us in
Athens who die a little inside with each new
piece of evidence that our corporate overlords
are not only succeeding in permeating the
public sphere with their self-serving propa
ganda, but having a laughably easy time
enlisting help in that endeavor from those
who should be arming the citizenry with the
knowledge they need to resist the well-funded
onslaught of disinformation.
In an Apr. 17 op-ed in the Athens Banner-
Herald, Walter C. Jones—the Atlanta bureau
chief for Moms News Service whose
job it is to report on the Georgia
Legislature for the media company's
network of daily papers—offered
the Insightful analysis that liber
als keep "attacking" The American
Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)
because they don't agree with its
conservative agenda, but whatever:
conservatives support it and there
are more of them here. “Some crit
ics have alleged,* Jones shrugged,
“that ALEC was a tool of the corpora
tions." Those critics, one supposes,
might be basing their allegations on
the fact that ALEC basically exists
to pass legislation written by cor
porations in Republican-controlled
state legislatures, but you won't read
that in Jones' piece. And anyway,
Republican Senate Majority Leader
Chip Rogers says that kind of talk
is just silly, so there you go. See?
Whether or not it's OK for corpora
tions to have a handy organization
of state legislators who are happy
to pass laws on issues like voter ID
requirements and privatization of
schools and prisons that are written
especially to increase the corpora
tions' prof ts is just another thing
liberals and conservatives disagree
about. Two opposing viewpoints,
each one perfectly valid. Aren't you glad to
have that explained to you by one of the most
influential political journalists in the state?
The next day, the University of Georgia's
public affairs office sent out a media release
entitled “Minimum wage rates don't affect
hardship among the poor." That alarming
and unqualified statement referred to the
findings of a study co-authored by Robert
Nielsen, a UGA assistant professor of hous
ing and consumer economics, who observed
that "almost no one finds any positive effects
for helping families through minimum wage
increases." The study, the release briefly noted
in its ninth paragraph, was "supported" by
the Economic Policies Institute—just another
inert fact, undeserving of elaboration, right?
Why would anyone care to be informed that
the EPI is a think tank created by a lobbyist
for industries that employ vast numbers of
minimum-wage workers, which is dedicated
to producing and publicizing research that
shows minimum wage increases—and often,
minimum wage requirements in general—are
bad for workers and the economy? Or that our
state's flagship public university is apparently
more than happy to cooperate in that effort?
Oh, well—maybe we should just be grateful
to Pubb'c Affairs for giving the release such a
flagrantly dubious title that it demanded to be
questioned by readers, even if its writer didn't
find it necessaiy to do so herself.
Then last Friday, the Banner-Herald,
apparently unwilling to be outdone by
UGA, ran an op-ed with the catchy header
"Environmentalism is secular religion," which
advanced the fanciful notion that since envi
ronmentalists are just like religious fanatics,
maybe environmentalism shouldn't be taught
in schools. It's a hilarious piece, breathtaking
for the colossal feats of insentience demanded
of its author to sustain the conceit that
believing in facts supported by overwhelming
evidence stemming from scientific research
and believing in dogma supported by religious
i are exactly the same thing. That author
The University of Georgia is using goats to clear invasive plants
along Tanyard Cfeek. Can goats proofread press releases?
is Robert H. Nelson, identified as a University
of Maiyiand environmental policy profes
sor and senior fellow with The Independent
Institute, which is a think tank that advocates
for decidedly market-based environmental
policies. Not mentioned: Nelson's senior fel
lowship with the Competitive Enterprise
Institute, a corporate-backed free-market
advocacy center that aggressively campaigns
against regulation of greenhouse gas emis
sions, or his affitiation with the Koch-funded
Mercatus Center at George Mason University,
which has accurately been called "ground zero
for deregulation policy in Washington." The
"environmentalism - religion" schtick is noth
ing new for Nelson, who's been milking it in
*op-eds, research articles and books for years,
much to the delight of the corporate support
ers of the various "nonpartisan" think tanks
he works for. And our local daily paper either
doesn't realize it's playing the shill for the
world's wealthiest and most powerful com
panies, or doesn't care.
We shouldn't be surprised when people
with money use all the means at their disposal
to try to make more. But we should have the
right to assume that institutions like universi
ties and the journalistic press are casting a
skeptical eye toward those people's heavy-
handed attempts to convince us to fork it over
to them, and like it. More and more, it seems
that's another buck that's being passed.
Dave Marr news@flagpole.com
4 FLAGPOLE.COM APRIL 25.2012
RITA RICHARDSON