Front Groups

Return of the "American Energy Alliance"

by Sheldon Rampton — August 1, 2008 - 10:22am

An industry front group best known for opposing the BTU tax (an energy tax based on consumption) in the 1990s has resurfaced in New Mexico, where it's running radio ads attacking congressman Tom Udall for his opposition to oil drilling. According to Time magazine, the American Energy Alliance was created in 1993 when the National Manufacturers Association "got together with the American Petroleum Institute, 1,600 large companies, small businesses and farmers to form ... a group designed solely to defeat the BTU tax. The coalition paid more than $1 million to Burson-Marsteller, a public relations firm, to deploy nearly 45 staff members in 23 states during the past two months. Burson's goal was to drum up as much grass-roots outrage about the BTU tax as possible and direct it at the swing Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee." Matthew Reichbach, who reported on the group's current attacks on Udall, noted that "Information on the group is hard to come by. There are no online Federal Energy Regulatory Commission filings, no Internal Revenue Service filings and no way to contact the group."

Main Source: 
New Mexico Independent, July 23, 2008

Drilling Away at Poverty

by Diane Farsetta — July 22, 2008 - 3:36pm

On July 15, "an unlikely alliance" rallied in Washington DC to "stop the war on the poor" by increasing U.S. domestic oil and gas production.

Main Source: 
Greenwire (sub req'd), July 17, 2008

Prescription Propaganda

by Sheldon Rampton — July 21, 2008 - 10:32pm

"The Center for Medicine in the Public Interest, a recently created front group for pharmaceutical interests, has been churning out industry-funded propaganda that demonizes evidence-based medicine, universal health care, the government, and all critics of pharma while attempting to portray industry as a selfless provider of cures and education," write Norman Kelley and Adriane Fugh-Berman.

Main Source: 
Bioethics Forum, June 27, 2008

Meet the Nuclear Power Lobby

by Diane Farsetta — July 1, 2008 - 3:47pm
  • Topics: Front Groups, Nuclear Power, Third Party Technique, U.S. Congress, Corporations, Lobbying, Politics

    • The following article appeared in the June 2008 issue of The Progressive magazine.

    The nuclear power industry is seeing its fortunes rise. "Seventeen entities developing license applications for up to thirty-one new [nuclear] reactors did not just happen," boasted Frank "Skip" Bowman. "It has been carefully planned."

    Bowman heads the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), the main lobbying group for the industry. His remarks (PDF), at a February gathering of more than 100 Wall Street analysts, were part of a presentation on "reasoned expectations for new nuclear plant construction."

    Bowman knew it was important to impress his audience of wary potential investors. "We are where we are today because this industry started many years ago on a systematic program to identify what went wrong the last time," he said, "and develop ways to eliminate or manage those risks."

    Corporate-Sponsored "Slacktivism": Bigger and More Dangerous than the Urban Dictionary Realizes

    by Anne Landman — June 2, 2008 - 2:10pm
  • Topics: Corporate Campaigns, Cause-Related Marketing, Front Groups, Corporations, Education, Environment, Ethics, Health, Propaganda, Public Relations, Women

    • Recently while browsing the Web I came across UrbanDictionary.com, which is sort of a wiki of contemporary slang. I found some of the newer words listed there amusing, like "hobosexual" (the opposite of metrosexual; someone who cares little about their looks), "consumerican," ("a particularly American brand of consumerism"), and "wikidemia" ("an academic work passed off as scholarly yet researched entirely on Wikipedia").

    Waste Not, Want Not for Friends on the Campaign Trail

    by Diane Farsetta — June 2, 2008 - 1:38pm

    After top campaign aides resigned over unsavory lobbying activities, Republican presidential candidate John McCain "adopted a five-point policy ... to help restore his reputation as a Washington reformer," reports the Wall Street Journal.

    Main Source: 
    Washington Post, May 31, 2008
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