Google "Powell Memorandum"
http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0223-25.htm
The Pencil Warrior: Lewis Powell's Memorandum Was A Blueprint for Corporate Takeover
<snip>
In 1971, scant weeks before being named to the U.S. Supreme Court by Richard Nixon, Lewis F. Powell, a corporate lawyer and multiple board member, wrote a 6,000 word letter to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on the request of a fellow Virginian and friend serving as the Chamber�s education director. The Powell Memorandum, as it came to be known (mediatransparency.org), warned of a growing threat to the business establishment posed by the rising political power of voices that were awakening public opinion to the costs of the corporate paradigm: environmental degradation, threats to public health and safety, joblessness, race-based neglect of the poor, and corporations� involvement in the Vietnam War. Prophetically and deceptively, Powell used the term �self-interest groups� to lump consumer advocates, environmentalists, and labor unions.
Memories of the great depression were fresher in those days, and the business community was reluctant to do more than, well, business. Powell argued that the American capitalist system was �under attack� and without action �was not likely to survive.� �Business must learn the lesson, long ago learned by labor and other self-interest groups. This is the lesson that political power is necessary; that such power must be assiduously cultivated; and that when necessary, it must be used aggressively and with determination.� Powell emphasized the effort must be organized, specifically targeted, and long-term.
His message did not fall on deaf ears. The Business Roundtable quickly formed, a kind of senate of business elites which established class solidarity among its members. Powell�s analysis of the major sources of harmful liberalism pointed to college campuses, the media, and the courts. In response to the education �problem,� institutions were set up to provide an echo chamber for the corporate agenda: think tanks (such as the Heritage Foundation, et al.), books and magazines, and increasingly sophisticated public relations and lobbying agencies. The message was the same one familiar today: the �free� market (my quotes) is infallible; we just need government off our backs. Significantly, any mention of business�s responsibilities toward social justice was omitted. And, although the Roundtable was and is dominated by multinational corporations, a major propaganda ploy remains the questionable claim of representing small business.
Corporate media of course have remained on message for decades now, ignoring or ridiculing those who dare suggest the corporate structure is anything but �natural� economics. In response to Powell�s assertion that �the judiciary may be the most important instrument for social, economic and political change,� scores of �free enterprise� foundations were bankrolled to press for expanded corporate �constitutional rights� and legal doctrines. Between 1992 and 1998, 237 federal judges reported attending 530 �educational seminars� sponsored by groups such as the Washington Legal Foundation. Justice Powell himself went on to figure prominently in Supreme Court rulings that profoundly expanded corporate �rights.�
<snip>
_________________________________________________________________________
http://www.thomhartmann.com/users/ren/blog/2010/04/powell-memoThe Powell Memo
<snip>
These are the opening paragraphs to the epic memorandum:
Lewis F Powell Jr wrote:
No thoughtful person can question that the American economic system is under broad attack.1 This varies in scope, intensity, in the techniques employed, and in the level of visibility.
There always have been some who opposed the American system, and preferred socialism or some form of statism (communism or fascism). Also, there always have been critics of the system, whose criticism has been wholesome and constructive so long as the objective was to improve rather than to subvert or destroy.
But what now concerns us is quite new in the history of America. We are not dealing with sporadic or isolated attacks from a relatively few extremists or even from the minority socialist cadre. Rather, the assault on the enterprise system is broadly based and consistently pursued. It is gaining momentum and converts.
Sources of the Attack
The sources are varied and diffused. They include, not unexpectedly, the Communists, New Leftists and other revolutionaries who would destroy the entire system, both political and economic. These extremists of the left are far more numerous, better financed, and increasingly are more welcomed and encouraged by other elements of society, than ever before in our history. But they remain a small minority, and are not yet the principal cause for concern.
The most disquieting voices joining the chorus of criticism come from perfectly respectable elements of society: from the college campus, the pulpit, the media, the intellectual and literary journals, the arts and sciences, and from politicians. In most of these groups the movement against the system is participated in only by minorities. Yet, these often are the most articulate, the most vocal, the most prolific in their writing and speaking.
<snip>
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
