Class Dismissed: How Teachers Unions Killed D.C. Vouchers

After I wrote my Examiner column in February on teacher union lobbying clout and their campaign against vouchers, I had the opportunity to expand this story for Labor Watch, a publication of the Capital Research Center. Now you can read the full piece in PDF. Here's the precis:

At the urging of teachers unions, the Democrat-controlled U.S. Congress has put the District of Columbia’s pilot educational vouchers program on the fast track to extinction. This in spite of the fact that vouchers enjoy the support of several high ranking D.C. officials and important Democratic constituencies. How did the teachers unions acquire such clout? Timothy P. Carney, lobbying editor and columnist for the Washington Examiner, tells the story of the political struggle that created the vouchers program, and the backroom maneuvering that killed it.

Liberals cheer Wal-Mart's kneecapping of smaller competitors

Big business supports big government once again--and I have the explanation in my Examiner column:

We've read all sorts of airy explanations from liberal bloggers who focus on health care. Ezra Klein at the Washington Post writes that Wal-Mart's endorsement "ensures that its concerns will be heard and heeded," and "repairs ... damage ... done to its reputation in recent years."

CAP, which has received at least $500,000 from Wal-Mart according to the company's website, argued that Wal-Mart was supporting the mandate because "all firms would benefit from the reduction in unpaid medical bills incurred by the uninsured." These are nice, harmless explanations that miss the point.

The New Republic's health-care blogger, Jonathan Cohn, came close to Wal-Mart's true motivation: "Wal-Mart has suddenly found itself ... dealing with unpredictable health costs and facing new competition from businesses that have found ways to spend even less on employee health benefits."

The most important part of that analysis can be put more simply: Wal-Mart sees a way to use government as cudgel with which to knee-cap smaller opponents.

You see, Wal-Mart already offers health insurance to all full-time employees and some part-time employees. Many of Wal-Mart's competitors do not do this, which is why the National Retail Federation opposes the mandate. An employer mandate imposes costs on Wal-Mart's competitors, possibly without imposing costs on Wal-Mart.

Read the whole thing here.

Are plug-in electric cars the new ethanol?

In 2006, I wrote that large-scale ethanol use--although it was being promoted as a green fuel--would not be good for the planet. By 2009, that was nearly consensus.

Today, plug-in electric cars are the new miracle cure to our energy worries. My Examiner column today looks at some of the problems that could arise from widespread adoption of electric cars:

Back to the lithium: The GAO report warns that “extracting lithium from locations where it is abundant, such as in South America, could pose environmental challenges that would damage the ecosystems in those areas.”

Those more concerned with energy independence than green fuels also have reason to doubt electric cars: About half of the world’s lithium reserves are in Bolivia. A major shift to lithium-powered cars “could substitute reliance on one foreign resource [oil] for another [lithium],” the GAO writes.

Read the whole thing here.

Pelosi buys off agri-business to advance climate bill

Global warming legislation is, like most big-government "reforms," becoming a costly porkfest benefiting well-connected corporations. My Examiner column today discusses the favors Democratic leaders have thrown at agribusiness to pass their climate change bill:

Here's how it works: Farmers need to kill weeds around their crops. They can till the ground to kill the weeds--a practice that releases carbon dioxide buried in the soil. Alternatively, they can spray the fields with chemicals that kill the weeds--thus leaving the CO2 underground.

The latter practice requires farmers to buy an herbicide such as agricultural Roundup, made by Monsanto, and also to buy Monsanto's genetically modified "Roundup Ready" seeds, which grow into plants that can withstand repeated Roundup spraying.

With the help of Monsanto, Novecta, a consulting and lobbying arm of the Iowa and Illinois Corn Growers Associations, has called on Congress this spring to grant farmers valuable offsets for shifting to "no-till" farming--a shift that will spur sales of Roundup and Roundup Ready seeds. Thanks to the Peterson-Pelosi deal, this scheme could become law.

Read the whole thing here.

Obama teams with Philip Morris to beat "tobacco industry"

Media accounts let Obama get away with a whopper about the tobacco regulation bill he just signed. My Examiner column sets the record straight:

President Barack Obama signed a bill Monday that the largest tobacco company in America had championed for years. Obama nevertheless claimed he had taken on Big Tobacco and won.

As Obama signed the “Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act,” giving the Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate tobacco, he proclaimed in the Rose Garden: “Today, despite decades of lobbying and advertising by the tobacco industry, we’ve passed a law to help protect the next generation of Americans from growing up with a deadly habit. …”

But on Tuesday morning, the home page of Philip Morris, which controls a majority of the U.S. cigarette market, blared “Philip Morris Supports Federal Regulation of Tobacco.”

Was Obama ignorant of the $40,000-a-day pro-regulation lobbying effort by the country’s biggest cigarette maker?

Was Obama surprised by the applause Monday from Philip Morris’ parent company Altria, calling the bill “an important and historic achievement”

Read the whole thing here.

Health care "reform," Big Business, and the Harry and Louise myth

As the health care reform debate progresses, I've dedicated my Friday Examiner column to puncturing a favorite myth of the pro-regulation side:

Democrats pushing for a health-care overhaul today say they've learned their lessons from the failure of HillaryCare in 1993: This time they are ready to fight back against the HMOs, and to take on "Harry & Louise," the fictional couple that insurance companies used in TV ads opposing HillaryCare.

Alternatively, other Democrats say they've learned their lesson, and this time they're sitting down with the HMOs so that the Big Businesses doesn't torpedo the reform as they did with Harry & Louise.

But this narrative of reformers-vs-Big Business was as false in 1993 as it is today. In both battles, Big Business has sided with Big Government, the pugnacious rhetoric of the pro-regulation side notwithstanding.

The HMOs in 1993 broke away from the smaller insurers, because the big guys knew HillaryCare would be profitable. Big Government would funnel customers into these HMOs more efficiently than the market would.

And today, the insurance industry and the drug industry, which have been at the table crafting the "reform," stand to profit handsomely--at the expense of taxpayers and consumers--if the right plan becomes law.

Read the whole thing here.

Cheney coal plan gets $1B boost ... from Obama

My K Street column in Examiner today follows up on the largest earmark in history, and points out the entertaining fact Obama just directed a billion dollars at Big Coal's greatest prize from that Dick Cheney energy task force Obama spent the campaign season attacking. My column also looks at the lobbying effort behind this billion-dollar coal project called FutureGen:

In 2004, the Energy Department named former lobbyist Mark Maddox assistant secretary of fossil energy and assigned him to promote FutureGen to Congress, to companies and even to China.

But in early 2008, the Bush administration reversed course and pulled funding for the project, arguing there were better ways to test these technologies. Critics charged that Bush was angry Illinois had been chosen over Texas as the site for the FutureGen plant.

By the time the Senate took up Obama’s stimulus this year, that same Maddox was collecting a check from coalition member Anglo American, a mining and natural resource giant, lobbying to restore federal funding to FutureGen. Maddox was part of a lobbying blitzkrieg by the FutureGen coalition, its member companies and the state of Illinois

Read the whole thing here.

UPS vs FedEx: Labor law as a corporate weapon

As government grows, business rivalries will increasingly be played out on Capitol Hill through regulation and legislation. As a preview, witness the UPS-vs-FedEx battle currently. My Examiner gives the story:

Both sides, of course, are engaging in Beltway knife-fighting, which requires campaign cash. On top of their five-figures-per-day lobbying budgets are the companies' PACs. FedEx PAC spent $3.4 million last cycle, and $231,000 so far this cycle. UPS's PAC shelled out $4.7 million last election, and an impressive $522,000 so far this time around.

UPS has a key ally: the Teamsters Union, which gave $2.4 million to Democrats in the last cycle. Teamsters want to unionize FedEx, and Oberstar's provision will make that much easier if it becomes law.

Is it fair for FedEx and UPS to play by different rules? Is it fair to change the rules on FedEx in the middle of the game? Is the NLRA even fair?

Sadly, "fair competition," doesn't really play a role in shipping--an industry that has been subsidized and regulated since its birth. Federal law nearly prohibits UPS and FedEx from competing on price. Other regulations--including labor laws--cramp their ingenuity.

Read the whole thing here.

Connecticut uses lobbying laws to muzzle priests

"Who will rid us of this meddlesome priest?"

That's the question Connecticut's political class seems to be asking about Bridgeport bishop William Lori, who has led the push for conscience protection in gay marriage laws and against a state effort to dictate Church finances. Now the Office of State Ethics seems to be rising to the occasion, as my Examiner column reports:

The home page for the Catholic Diocese of Bridgeport, Conn., included a note last week exhorting Catholics to tell Gov. Jodi Rell, R, to repeal the death penalty. By the standards of Connecticut government officials, this was an illegal act of influence peddling in violation of the state’s lobbying laws.

As the Constitution State fights to exert more control over the Catholic Church there, lobbying laws are the state’s latest weapon. Top officials at the Office of State Ethics have, according to sworn affidavits filed by the local bishop, informed the diocese that it violated state ethics laws and engaged in unauthorized lobbying by holding a statehouse rally and using its Web site to call on citizens to take action.

You can read the whole thing here.

Government Motors will still lobby government

Obama's unprecedented nationalization of GM introduces some uncomfortable ethical quandaries. My K Street column today in the Washington Examiner explores one of those:

General Motors will continue its multimillion-dollar lobbying operation in Washington, even after the federal government takes ownership of it. The automaker may even maintain its high-dollar lobbying contracts with some of the wealthiest and most influential K Street firms.

“We believe we have an obligation to remain engaged at the federal and state levels,” General Motors stated in an e-mail after President Barack Obama announced his plan for the federal takeover of the carmaker, “and to have our voice heard in the policymaking process.”

As a result, some of the jobs that the White House will save with this unprecedented nationalization could be on K Street in downtown D.C., rather than in Detroit.

Read the whole thing here.