Fire Prevention Week is observed nationally each year from October 6-12, coinciding with October 9, the anniversary of the Great Chicago Fire of 1871.

This year’s campaign is, “Smoke alarms: Make them work for you!”

It should be “Stop Corporate Arsonists.”

Congress passed a funding bill last week to avoid a government shutdown. The stop-gap spending bill funds all government programs at their current levels through December 20.

Those levels were established in a combined $1.66 trillion package of two spending bills passed in March. The larger of those bills, totaling  $1.2 trillion, funded Defense, Homeland Security and State departments and other aspects of general government. More than 70% of the funding of that package was earmarked for the military. Meanwhile, non-military programs decreased.

The stop-gap spending bill simply extends and locks in the current spending inequities across the federal government. 

Who (or what) benefits from current federal spending? Increasingly it’s corporations as governments increasing “privatize” (or more accurately “corporatize”) what previously were public functions performed by public employees whose work was publicly transparent driven by public service vs. corporate profit.

Joint Statement from Veterans For Peace and Move to Amend

     Veterans For Peace              Move to Amend

Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza has produced increasing calls for an immediate ceasefire, while a pro-Israel, U.S.-based group has waged an increasing war on democracy with little public scrutiny and no end in sight.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is one of the most politically and electorally influential groups in this country. They have bombarded our “democratic” system spending over $100 million just in 2024 to punish opponents of Israeli policies, including the military assault on Gaza that’s claimed over 40,000 deaths and displaced 2.3 million people.

Oil and gas corporations are not only major contributors to the destruction of our climate and overall environment through the burning of carbon. They are also major contributors to the destruction of the limited amount of democracy in our country. 

The reason for both is the same: corporate constitutional rights. 

The granting of First Amendment "free speech rights" to corporations by the Supreme Court in the 1970s and expanded in the 2010 Citizens United ruling has legalized the ability of business corporations to contribute massive sums of funds to corrupt elections and public policies toward the extraction and burning of climate-destroying oil and gas over the mass conversion to renewable energy.

What follows are the the current totals of the 2023-2024 election cycle (which runs through the end of this year).

----

What podcasts do you listen to?

Do you think any of them would be interested in discussing ending corporate rule, big money in elections and the We the People Amendment?

If so, we’d love to hear your recommendations.

NEW RESOURCE:

End Corporate Rule to End Wars & Occupations "bookmark"

Veterans for Peace and Move to Amend developed a "bookmark" originally for distribution during the VFP-sponsored and MTA-endorsed Walk for Peace & Planet, Justice & Democracy that took place from May 7 in Maine to July 5 in Washington DC.

One of the stated reasons for "Why we Walk": 

We are walking to expose and address the power of corporations destroying our environment, driving everyday people and communities into more poverty while they reap enormous profits and power. These corporate entities, given more rights than living, breathing people with none of the accountability or responsibility, have hijacked our democratic ability to establish peace, justice and a livable world.

The copied and cut bookmark can be distributed anywhere at any time -- including around Memorial and Veterans Day.

Download the bookmark HERE

The moderators of the ABC-sponsored Presidential debate offered questions on a range of issues. They ignored, however, a major set of questions.

If MTA instead of ABC had moderated the debate, here are 10 questions we would have made sure to include.

-----

"Good evening. Welcome former President Trump and Vice President Harris. We'd like to begin tonight's debate asking the both of you the following questions. 

Letters to the editor

https://www.crescent-news.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/letters-to-the-editor/article_5fe1c252-986d-11ed-b0b0-932322ea12b4.html

Jan 21,2023

Corporations have “personhood” rights and their money qualifies as “free speech.” They financially back the politicians and, once elected, lobby them to create laws on their behalf. This system has big pay-offs.

Oxfam just published “Survival of the richest,” and revealed that “95 food and energy corporations have more than doubled their profits in 2022. They made $306 billion in windfall profits and paid out $257 billion (84%) of that to rich shareholders.”

We are pleased to share a summary of the survey that 506 of you recently completed.

The complete results will be reviewed and incorporated into our Board and Co-Directors retreat discussions beginning today in Chicago.

-----

The uprising of organized labor over the past year has yielded several impressive victories that have improved the lives of workers. Hollywood writers and actors, UPS workers and United Auto Workers at the Big 3 automakers all won significant concessions. Organized workers continue to be active with 182 labor actions having taken place in 242 locations so far in 2024.

The Republican National Convention (RNC) concludes tonight. The Democratic National Convention (DNC) takes place next month.

The four-day assemblies officially anoint their respective presidential and vice-presidential nominees, present speakers to inspire delegates and those watching to support their campaigns, provide delegates (including current elected officials) opportunities to connect with others in their state and beyond, and serve up plenty of convention hoopla. 

Capitalism and the Market Economy

Summer Reading Circle

Join Move to Amend and individuals from other organizations this summer to read and discuss Jonathan McMillan’s 2024 book, Capitalism and the Market Economy: Bringing Back Together What Banking Pulls Apart. Two times for reading circles are being offered to accommodate an international audience. Each group will be 3, 90 minute sessions discussing 1/3 of the book.

Capitalism and the Market Economy (2024) identifies and critiques the systemic flaw in today’s market economy—namely, banking corporations’ legalized power to create money out of credit. The book provides a concrete action plan to create a more sustainable, democratic, and fair economic system.

There are growing problems with what we call our democratic republic. They go far beyond the concerns of a majority of voters over the mental and physical “fitness” of the aging Joe Biden and Donald Trump.

                     
Photo-illustration by Alex Cochran. Source: Getty.

We've never had an authentic democracy or democratic republic since the founding of our nation. However, our institutional democracy has become increasingly deaf, blind, forgetful, confused and immobile.  

By Deb Hogshead
Guest Columnist

June 22, 2024

“It cannot be right to manufacture billions of objects that are used for a matter of minutes, and then are with us for centuries.” – Roz Savage, environmental advocate

At a Troy City Council meeting this past spring, Rumpke representatives announced a collaboration with Hefty. The new alliance encourages us to buy more plastic so we can recycle more plastic when what we need in our environment is less plastic.

The ReNew program sounds like a good thing. For your convenience, you can spend $8 for a pack of 20, 13-gallon orange plastic bags. Fill a bag with hard-to-recycle items, then toss the bag into your regular recycling bin. At the recycling plant, Rumpke staff will pull the bag from the recycling stream and direct the contents to facilities that can recycle them. It’s better than sending that stuff to a landfill, but not much.

Greg --

The enthusiasm of the political science professor was legitimate. She’d never heard of Move to Amend, but after learning that we were educating and organizing to increase people power by abolishing “corporate personhood” and “money as free speech,” said loudly at the end of a session where she presented: “We need to work together!” 

This pronouncement was a recurring takeaway experienced by Move to Amend Board Member Daniel Lee and Co-Director Greg Coleridge who attended the annual conference of  the Law & Society Association in Denver in early June. 

The “we need to work together” theme arose in numerous contexts during the 4-day conference.

May 29, 2024 - Ohio State House

Greg Coleridge - FirstEnergy Accountability Coalition

Good morning. My name is Greg Coleridge. I’m Co-Director of the national Move to Amend Campaign. This event is sponsored by the FirstEnergy Accountability Coalition, representatives of environmental and democracy, good government organizations and consumers. We are calling today to metaphorically “unplug”, more specifically, dissolve, FirstEnergy Company. 

We believe it’s time to hold FirstEnergy corporation accountable in proportion to the scale of its historic admitted crime of a $61 million payment in 2021 to a nonprofit secretly operated by former GOP Speaker of the Ohio House Larry Householder (now in prison) and another $4.3 million payment to the state’s top utility regulator, Sam Randazzo, who was recently indicted and is now deceased. The bribes were intended to pass House Bill 6 (HB6), a $1.3 billion bailout of two FirstEnergy antiquated, failing nuclear power plants, which would have cost ratepayers hundreds of millions of dollars. Today is  the fifth anniversary of passage of HB6 by the Ohio House of Representatives.=

Numerous individuals connected to FirstEnergy have been and are appropriately being prosecuted. But the admitted corporate criminal, FirstEnergy, has yet to be held legitimately accountable. Simply paying a fine to the federal government is nowhere near the equivalency in magnitude to FirstEnergy corporation’s admission of guilt in what’s been called the largest bribery scheme in the 221year old history of the State of Ohio. It’s time for the State to take action. Attorney General David Yost has the power and authority to call for the dissolution of the company. Yost has filed a civil suit that includes that possibility. FirstEnergy’s corporate charter or license should be revoked.

Corporations are legal creations of the state. Corporate charters or licenses were originally meant to define corporate actions to ensure that the state’s corporate creations obeyed all laws, served the common good and provided useful goods or services. When corporations failed to follow the provisions of their charter, including upholding the law, their charters were often revoked – less as a punishment to the company than to protect Ohioans and our direct and representative democracy.

There is a long and proud history of both the Ohio State Legislature and Ohio Supreme Court revoking corporate charters. 

In one instance, the Supreme Court in 1900 stated in revoking a corporate charter 

The time has not yet arrived when the created is greater than the creator, and it still remains the duty of the courts to perform their office in the enforcement of the laws, no matter how ingenious the pretexts for their violation may be, nor the power of the violators in the commercial world.

In the present case the acts of the defendant have been persistent, defiant and flagrant, and no other course is left to the court than to enter a judgment of ouster and to appoint trustees to wind up the business of the concern.

In 1892, the Ohio AG, David Watson, filed suit to revoke the charter of the Standard Oil Company, the most powerful U.S. corporation of the time, for forming a trust. Watson stated:

Where a corporation, either directly or indirectly, submits to the domination of an agency unknown to the statute, or identifies itself with and unites in carrying out an agreement whose performance is injurious to the public, it thereby offends against the law of its creation and forfeits all right to its franchises, and judgment of ouster should be entered against it.

It should be noted that David Watson was a Republican. 

Following the brief statements from several members of the FirstEnergy Accountability Coalition, we will march across the street to the office of Attorney General Yost. We have sent him a letter seeking a meeting to urge him to do his job to protect all Ohioans, as well as the environment and whatever amount of democracy we have in Ohio, by dissolving FirstEnergy Company. 

Renee Fox / WOSU News

Coalition that wants the state to dissolve FirstEnergy to gather at Statehouse to apply pressure
WOSU 89.7 NPR News | By Renee Fox
Published May 28, 2024 at 5:00 AM EDT
https://www.wosu.org/politics-government/2024-05-24/coalition-that-wants-the-state-to-dissolve-firstenergy-to-gather-at-statehouse-to-apply-pressure

Coalition urges Ohio AG to dissolve FirstEnergy for bribery scandal
WOSU 89.7 NPR News | By Renee Fox
Published May 29, 2024 at 7:46 PM EDT
https://www.ideastream.org/2024-05-29/coalition-calling-for-an-end-to-firstenergy-left-in-the-cold-by-ohio-ag-yost

Calling on Attorney General Yost to dissolve FirstEnergy
https://columbusfreepress.com/article/calling-attorney-general-yost-dissolve-firstenergy

Group calls on Ohio attorney general to ‘unplug’ FirstEnergy
By Jenna Jordan Ohio
PUBLISHED 5:00 AM ET May 30, 2024
https://spectrumnews1.com/oh/columbus/news/2024/05/29/ohio-firstenergy-bribery-scandal-

Activists ask Ohio's attorney general to scrap FirstEnergy's business license over HB 6 scandal
The Statehouse News Bureau | By Karen Kasler
Published May 31, 2024 at 2:00 PM EDT
https://www.statenews.org/government-politics/2024-05-31/activists-ask-ohios-attorney-general-to-scrap-firstenergys-business-license-over-hb-6-scandal

Activists ask Ohio’s attorney general to scrap FirstEnergy’s business license over HB 6 scandal
By: Karen Kasler | Statehouse News Bureau
Posted on: Saturday, June 1, 2024
https://woub.org/2024/06/01/activists-ask-ohios-attorney-general-to-scrap-firstenergys-business-license-over-hb-6-scandal/

FirstEnergy Accountability Coalition
c/o [email protected]

NEWS RELEASE 
For immediate release, May 20, 2024

Contacts: 
Greg Coleridge, [email protected] | Sandy Bolzenius, [email protected] 

Coalition Calls for Dissolving FirstEnergy Corporation for Its Admitted Bribes to Pass House Bill 6 

A group of environmental and democracy good government organizations and consumers will hold a press conference on Wednesday, May 29 to call for the dissolution of FirstEnergy Corporation. The conference, sponsored by the FirstEnergy Accountability Coalition, will take place at the Governor Thomas Worthington Center, ground level at the Ohio Statehouse, corner of Broad and High streets in Columbus, beginning at 11:30 am.

FirstEnergy Accountability Coalition members believe it’s time to hold FirstEnergy accountable in proportion to the scale of its historic admitted crime of a $61 million payment in 2021 to a nonprofit secretly operated by former GOP Speaker of the Ohio House Larry Householder (now in prison) and another $4.3 million payment to the state’s top utility regulator, Sam Randazzo, who was recently indicted and is now deceased. The bribes were intended to pass House Bill 6 (HB6), a $1.3 billion bailout of two FirstEnergy antiquated, failing nuclear power plants, which would have cost ratepayers hundreds of millions of dollars. 

Dissolving the corporation is the proportionate action to respond to the scale of its historic bribery scheme, according to the Coalition.

Press conference speakers will address the harms FirstEnergy has caused to the environment, consumers and to democracy in Ohio. Speakers will also address the historical frequency of corporate charter/license dissolution when companies have violated the terms of their charters/licenses, which have been done to protect the health, safety and welfare of the public and to preserve democratic self-governance over the corporate creations of the state.

Following the press conference, attendees will march across the street to the office of Attorney General David Yost. The march will feature banners, signs and handouts calling for Yost to “Unplug FirstEnergy.”

Yost has filed a civil suit against FirstEnergy Corporation, calling for it to be dissolved or reorganized pursuant to the Ohio Revised Code 2923.34(B)(3). 

A request has been sent to Yost asking for a meeting with Coalition members urging him to proceed with corporate dissolution of the single contributor to the single largest bribery scheme in Ohio history.

May 29 marks the fifth anniversary of passage of HB6

WATCH ON YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkYkqg11qoE 

EXPLANATION

CHAPTER 183
Political Influence by Corporate Entities
https://clevelandheightsoh.portal.civicclerk.com/event/250/files/attachment/1311

TESTIMONY

Greg Coleridge

It’s been 11 years since Cleveland Heights voters passed Issue 32, calling for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution declaring:

1. Only human beings, not corporations, are legal persons with Constitutional rights, and
2. Money is not equivalent to speech, and therefore, regulating political contributions and spending does not equate to limiting political speech.

In many respects, little has changed.

Political money spent in elections - much of it donated or invested by the super rich and corporate entities, continue to increase, with more of it being “dark money” from sources and places that are unknown. The problem is not only federally, but increasingly at the state and even local levels. Legalized bribery has never been more legal and corrupting – with the voices of people who can’t invest in politicians less heard and responded to. 

Additionally, Cash spent on lobbying from special interest groups continues to rise

In both cases, the super rich and corporations have hijacked First Amendment Free speech rights

Communities and states continue to be unable to mandate corporations to include information on food products or renewable energy since it violates corporate First Amendment right “not to speak”

Communities continue to be unable for the most part to conduct surprise inspections on corporate property to protect workers, consumers and the environment since it violates corporate “Fourth Amendment “search and seizure” rights

Efforts to seriously call for keeping fossil fuels in the ground and not burned to prevent further climate destruction is deterred by the prospect that fossil fuel corporations will claim that unmined, drilled or fracked fossil fuels are lost future profits and violate their Fifth Amendment “takings” rights.

And communities continue to be unable to provide preferential treatment of local business over chain stores or to prevent cell phone towers in their communities since such actions are discriminatory, violating corporations Fourteenth Amendment “equal protection” rights

Yet, at the same time, much has changed in 11 years. 

The explosion of money in politics and abuses and harms of corporations to people, places and the planet are becoming ever more blatant, hideous, systemic and unacceptable. Greater realization that simply electing better people, passing better laws, enacting better regulations or declaring better executive decisions are not proportionate in scale to the magnitude of the breadth and depth of corporate rule and money in politics. Merely putting out fires while ignoring the arsonists are just reactive, responsive and defensive. They will never, ever help us create a more just, peaceful, sustainable and democratic community, nation and beyond. 

Discussion about constitutional renewal is becoming more mainstream on many fronts. That includes ending the constitutional doctrines that  a corporation is a person and money is free speech.

The We the People Amendment, HJR 54, have never had more support. Over 518,000 individuals have signed our Motion to Amend. 706 communities have passed resolutions and/or citizens driven ballot initiatives – of which CH has done both. 8 states have done the same. 770 organizations – local, regional and national – have endorsed. And 85 Congresspersons have endorsed, including in April, Shontel Brown. 

We’re under no illusions. Amending the Constitution is a virtual impossibility – the most difficult of any on the planet. In fact, t’s been done 27 times before, often when several were enacted in a relatively short period of time when external conditions warranted them.

Yet, we’re under no illusions. External conditions warrant constitutional change. Our political crisis has reduced the trust in government. Without trust, you can’t have a viable government. And our political economy is based on exploiting people and the planet by promoting perpetual economic growth on a finite planet without severe political, economic or environmental consequences. Talk about fantasy. 

Changing the law is always preceded by changing the culture. “Nothing else in the world…not all the armies…is so powerful as an idea whose time has come.” said Victor Hugo.

The time is rapidly coming to have a just, peace sustainable and democratic community, nation and beyond. The We the People Amendment is one part of what will inevitably become constitutional renewal.

What follows are testimonies on the impact of money in politics and corporate rule on our community and beyond – along with sharing a few notable historical events in June that related to corporate power, money in elections, democracy and the power to define corporate entities.