Friday, March 30, 2012

Mitt Romney´s Labor Mole and more


Mitt Romney’s labor adviser, Peter Schaumber, has gone too far. The inspector general of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) found that improper, unethical disclosures of privileged information to Schaumber were used to benefit his consulting practice and attack the NLRB—the federal agency tasked with protecting workers’ rights.1

Rep. Elijah Cummings, the ranking member on the House Oversight Committee, says the concerns raised in the inspector general’s report are “very serious and involve potential criminal implications.2

How candidate Romney responds to these findings is a test of his character. Will Romney embrace Washington insiders who trade on confidential and even attorney-client privileged information? Or will he demand they abide by the same ethical standards the rest of us—the 99%—pride ourselves on and expect others to live up to?

Please join the AFL-CIO in demanding that candidate Romney renounce Peter Schaumber’s involvement with these ethical breaches and fire him immediately.

According to the report of the NLRB’s Office of the Inspector General and news reports, here’s what we know about Romney adviser Peter Schaumber:
  • He was named to the NLRB by President George W. Bush and served until Aug. 27, 2010. After he left the agency, Schaumber marketed himself as a “consultant” with “[NLRB] agency connections.” During that time, he did press work to attack the NLRB and the modest workplace protections workers have.2
     
  • Schaumber benefited from the improper and unethical receipt of confidential, inside information to support his anti-worker consulting business and his press work aimed at giving the NLRB a bad name. The inappropriate disclosures were made to Schaumber from his former staffer, Terence Flynn—who remained at the NLRB and became a board member.1
  • Flynn acted as Schaumber’s mole inside the agency, feeding him internal, confidential, attorney-client privileged information. According to the IG report, this broke government ethics rules. Flynn needs to resign immediately, and Romney needs to hold Schaumber accountable.1,3
Join the AFL-CIO in calling on candidate Romney to immediately dismiss Schaumber from his campaign.

This funneling of privileged information is an outrageous example of how the 1% gets things done at the 99%’s expense. If candidate Romney allows Peter Schaumber to remain as an adviser, it will speak volumes about the value he places on ethics in government officials.

Merely firing Schaumber isn’t enough: Candidate Romney needs to make it clear his campaign will not tolerate those who benefit from unethical conduct.

Thank you for all the work you do.

In Solidarity,

Manny Herrmann
Online Mobilization Coordinator, AFL-CIO

1   
http://democrats.edworkforce.house.gov/sites/democrats.edworkforce.house.gov/
files/documents/112/pdf/letters/DOCFlynnTransmittal.PDF

2   
http://www.salon.com/2012/03/27/team_romneys_alleged_labor_mole/singleton/
3    http://www.aflcio.org/Press-Room/Press-Releases/Statement-by-AFL-CIO-President-
Richard-Trumka-On-Ethical-Violations-by-NLRB-Member-Terence-Flynn

Dear Mark RegroMontiero,
Save the date! The Green Festival is coming to New York City for the first time ever over Earth Day Weekend, April 21 - 22.
Get in for FREE when you RENEW with Green America today! Renewing is simple.
  • Make a secure tax-deductible donation to Green America.
  • Bring a print-out your renewal receipt to the Festival
  • Step right up to the "members only" box office, skip all the lines, and get into the festival for FREE!
Festivities start Saturday at 10AM and Sunday at 11AM at the Javits Center (map). As a member, you can bypass the lines and walk right up to the members-only booth to get in absolutely FREE.
Visionary main-stage speakers will include Frances Moore Lappe, Van Jones, Katrina vanden Heuvel, Helen Caldicott, Jeffrey Smith, John Perkins, Amy Goodman, Russell Simmons, and more.
Special stages and pavilions include activities like:
  • Green cooking demos (green smoothies, vegan hors d'oerves, macrobiotic sushi, and more),
  • Green economy jobs & opportunities fair,
  • Fun and games in the Green Kids' Zone,
  • Green fashion shows, urban gardening, and banking for the 99%,
  • Green America's Elizabeth O'Connell and our Fair Trade stage,
  • Green America's Desiree Reese and our Green Business stage, and more.
You'll also find the best green shopping for Mother's Day, Father's Day, and graduations; live music; organic food and drink; and sustainable home and garden demos, and much more. Check out the Green Festival Web site for more specifics, and be sure to drop by the Green America booth. We can hardly wait to meet you in person.
Renew your membership with us today! You'll get in free at Green Festival, and you'll continue to receive all of our green-living resources, the National Green Pages™, our Green American magazine, and our Guide to Socially Responsible Investing.
See you over Earth Day weekend, April 21 and 22,
http://ecologyfund.mail.everyone.net/eonapps/images/grayfiller.gif
Alisa Gravitz,
Executive Director,
Green America
P.S. Tell your Midwest friends to save the date: Our Chicago Green Festival is coming soon, May 5 and 6.

Last year it sold out. This year it’s even bigger.

What is this very popular event?

It’s “Stand Up for Main Street: An All-Star Comedy Benefit for Public Citizen”!

Come celebrate Public Citizen with big-time comedians like Ray Romano, Marc Maron, Dana Gould, Wendy Liebman, Rick Overton, Erik Rivera and Morgan Murphy.

How did Public Citizen get into the stand-up comedy business?

It’s not just because I wanted a venue to try out some new one-liners.

Public Citizen is lucky enough to have a board member, Steve Skrovan, who is a successful writer and producer in Hollywood helping to shine a comic spotlight on what Public Citizen does.

And what Public Citizen — that’s me, and you, and hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens — does is stand up for America’s consumers, families and working people.

We stand up for Main Street.

Not Wall Street and the Frankensteins of finance.

Not K Street and its legions of lobbyists.

“Stand Up for Main Street” is on April 29, 2012, at the Writers Guild Theater in Beverly Hills, a quaint little borough tucked away in the outskirts of Los Angeles, California, which I have on good authority is known for its swimmin’ pools and movie stars.

April 29 is just one month from today. It will be here before you know it. Get all the details about “Stand Up for Main Street” and order your tickets today, before they sell out.

www.citizen.org/stand-up-for-main-street

Don’t miss out on all the fun.
Reserve your seats now!
photograph of Robert Weissman

Sincerely,
Robert Weissman's signature
Robert Weissman
President, Public Citizen

At this time of year, Cadbury Creme Eggs are some of the most visible -- and popular -- chocolates sold as treats for children's Easter baskets.
What you might not know is that in the US Cadbury products are Hershey products. In 1988, the Hershey company purchased Cadbury's US business, including the exclusive rights to sell well-known brands like York Peppermint Patties, Cadbury Chocolate Bunnies, and Cadbury Eggs.
And while Cadbury has demonstrated its commitment to ending forced child labor in the cocoa supply chain by selling Fair Trade chocolate through its operations overseas, the US arm, controlled by Hershey, falls short. Chocolate lovers in the UK, Ireland, Japan, South Africa, and Australia can purchase Cadbury chocolates for Easter that include fairly traded cocoa, why shouldn't the same be true for chocolate lovers in the US?
Tell Hershey to bring Fair Trade Cadbury products to the US »
We know you've sent repeated messages to Hershey demanding better -- persistence pays! Here's why you should take this action today: This time we're copying our message to Cadbury executives as well, reminding them that their good name suffers in the US from Hershey's business practices. Let's thank Cadbury for doing a good job in other countries, and get them on board to push for change in this country.
Recently, Hershey committed to improve the supply chain for its "Bliss" line of chocolate. Let's push them to the next level with its Cadbury products as well. We won't stop until we've achieved meaningful change across all Hershey's products.
Thanks for all you do,
Alisa (signature)
Alisa Gravitz,
Executive Director,
Green America

Vote for the Biggest Fossil Fool!Ladies and Gentleman! We present to you: the Fossil Fools!
These distinguished members of society are best known for polluting our communities and the planet — and making a pretty penny while they’re at it!
Unfortunately, these titans of industry don’t always get the recognition they so richly deserve. We want to change that. That’s why we decided to give them their own holiday: April 1st is officially Fossil Fools Day!
And to embrace their spirit of competition and meritocracy, we’re holding a contest to determine who is the biggest Fossil Fool of them all.
http://ecologyfund.mail.everyone.net/eonapps/images/grayfiller.gif

On April 1st we will announce the winners… and then the Fossil Fools Day pranks begin!
Throughout April we will continue to show our “appreciation” by joining with organizers trained in the 99% Spring to take direct action against the Fossil Fools Day winners. We’ll build a movement of people ready to take action and join the fight to stop massive giveaways to Big Oil and King Coal.
http://ecologyfund.mail.everyone.net/eonapps/images/grayfiller.gif

Let’s give these Fossil Fools the recognition they deserve!
Jeff Mann
Online Director
Dear Mark ,

Wouldn’t it be great if the answer to every decision could be “all of the above?” It would make life easier. But I'd be a bad father to my newborn son if I told him there's no difference between right and wrong, good and bad -- if I taught him the moral ambivalence of “all of the above.”

When it comes to protecting the environment, President Obama is refusing to choose. He’s now touting “all of the above” as his energy answer, all the while staying appallingly silent on the accelerating climate crisis we face.

It’s a cop-out -- an excuse to continue to embrace dirty, dangerous energy sources, including climate-wrecking tar sands oil and dangerous, outdated nuclear reactors, while purporting to be a leader.

Friends of the Earth has been fighting for the right energy choices since our founding 42 years ago, not because it’s easy, but because it’s necessary. Make a contribution of just $5 or more today and help strengthen our campaigns to stop harmful choices like dirty tar sands oil and dangerous nuclear reactors.
We face steep challenges, which is why we cannot sit back and accept pandering to the purveyors of a “drill baby drill” mentality.
When President Obama stood in front of pipes intended to build the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline and promised to fast-track the southern portion to the Gulf Coast, we stood with David Daniel, a Texas landowner and father who is organizing to stop the pipeline. Our Stand with David photo petition is showing the resilient grassroots opposition to Keystone XL and its threats to our climate, air and water.
Your pressure has stopped this pipeline and the dirty tar sands oil it would carry for more than two years. Your support will enable us to continue fighting every step of the way, from the streets to the media to the courts.
The president’s “all of the above” energy policy also means he’s embraced more nuclear reactors. After the meltdown and radioactive crisis in Japan -- a disaster that has left an area almost twice the size of Manhattan contaminated with radiation -- the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is acting as if safety upgrades are not urgent, and even approved the first new reactors in 30 years.
We’re working in the courts to block the new reactor design, and we're not stopping there:
  • We're working to prevent a potential crisis in California, where nuclear reactors at San Onofre, situated within fifty miles of millions of people, are shut down because of serious malfunctions. A nuclear engineer's analysis we released Tuesday was covered by the Associated Press and Los Angeles Times -- and compelled federal regulators to intervene.
  • We're on the ground in Iowa campaigning to stop legislation that would allow a utility company to raise consumers' electric rates to pay for new reactors, guaranteeing windfall profits while passing the risks on to Iowans.

Global Tuna Infographic
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One of the world’s most popular fish makes an incredible journey from sea to plate. View our infographic to learn more about why we need to better manage tropical tunas.
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CAFO
During the past 50 years, animal agriculture in the U.S. has gone through a seismic shift. Family farms no longer dot the landscape, and concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) have replaced them. Read our new blog to learn about the environmental concerns associated with these industrial farms.
Pew Environment Group advocacyemail@pewtrusts.org
This week marks the release of the latest feature film from acclaimed director Robert Greenwald and our friends at Brave New Foundation: Koch Brothers Exposed.
Brave New Foundation is making the film available immediately on DVD with an Action Guide so that you can watch with family and friends and then do something to make a difference.
Get the DVD now, for only $20 (including shipping and handling), and $5 of each DVD purchased will go to support the work of People For the American Way.
The film features expert interviews, investigative exposés and extras about what the billionaire Koch brothers are doing to our democracy.
After you sign up to receive the DVD, please register to host a screening at your home, library, church or local community center. There is a downloadable Action Guide for you to use in preparing your discussion of the film and helping your audience take effective action on the issues you care about.
The Koch brothers’ elitist agenda includes aggressive union busting and promoting countless policies that benefit the 1% at the expense of the 99%. Charles Koch has been reported as saying, “I just want my fair share, and that’s all of it.”
Get the DVD now, and find out how the Koch brothers were behind the Tea Party effort to resegregate schools in North Carolina and the Wisconsin Republicans’ attack on working families. Find out about their work to subvert democracy by buying politicians, and to get the government to look the other way on corporate polluters that are making real people fatally sick with their reckless abuse of the environment. And remember, $5 from each DVD sold goes to support PFAW.
Then, sign up to organize a screening, or check back at the Screening page to find and attend one near you. After watching, we encourage you to discuss the film with your family and friends then look through the Action Guide to decide on which actions you can agree to do.
With your help we can start to reverse the damage that has been done.
Thank you,
Ben Betz, Online Strategy Manager
P.S. Join Koch Brothers Exposed on Facebook.

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