Today Matt Stout of the Boston Globe continued the healthy habit, when reporting on the Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance, of stating that it hides its donors. (See Baker’s Push to Curb Emissions Draws a Familiar Foe: His Own Party). But since no one can say with any accuracy whose interests MassFiscal represents, why include it in…
Category: dark money
Power Outage: Right Wing Attacks on Black and Latinx Political Power in Massachusetts
Yesterday’s post on the Boston Globe’s suggestion of a future state takeover of the Boston Public Schools discussed Domingo Morel’s Takeover: Race, Education, and American Democracy. Morel’s research shows that state takeovers of school districts usually (not always) bring about the political dis-empowerment of communities of color. Unfortunately we’ve seen several attempts to restrict representation…
Got Democracy? National Parents Union Doesn’t
One interesting thing about privatization fronts like the Walton family’s National Parents Union is that of membership and governance. Who gets to be members, what are the powers of members, how is leadership chosen? In the world of privatization organizations these components are rarely, if ever, democratic. National Parents Union is a union, right? It…
National Parents Union, the Anti-union Union
The National Parents Union front for the Walton family’s dive into the Democratic Party’s primaries decided to adopt the name union, though it is not only not a union but is virulently anti-union—a posture that surely satisfies the WalMart heirs. A union is “An organization of workers, formed for the purpose of negotiating with employers…
Waltons Dive into Democratic Primaries Behind National Parents Union
The Walton family, heirs to the Wal-Mart fortune, are trying to deal themselves in to Democratic primary politics. It isn’t any mystery why. Conservative billionaires feel gravely threatened by Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. Their vehicle is yet another new privatization front posing as a parents group, National Parents Union. National Parents Union appears to…
The Waltons: From Dark Money to Dark Store Theory, It’s All About Taxes
The Walton Family of Arkansas has been funding a robust Massachusetts Political Team—over $3.3 million worth in 2017 and 2018, and all tax deductible! Will their Arkansas retail giant WalMart also bring its dark store tax dodge to Massachusetts soon? WalMart and other big box corporations have been appealing local tax assessments in over twenty…
Walton Family Political Front Disrupts Elizabeth Warren Speech
Last night a southern unit of the Walton family’s national private political operation attempted to shut down a speech by Elizabeth Warren. Ostensibly this was about charter schools. Realistically, it was probably about the wealth tax. Not much gets past Central Massachusetts political observer Lance Harris, who tweeted last night that a Walton family political…
Pioneer Institute Throws Out Welcome Mat for Koch Funded Institute for Justice
It’s getting harder to keep track of the right wing groups operating in Massachusetts but when one interferes in the Green Line extension, dives into cosmetology, and pumps up school privatization, take notice. That’s the Institute for Justice, and when you’re an out of state libertarian law firm you need a friend; that would be…
Charlie Baker Is Trapped. Will His Escape Be a Traditional Conservative Party, or a Charlie Party?
The Boston Globe’s Adrian Walker recently made a good case that Governor Charlie Baker should leave the Republican Party. My colleague Professor Ubertaccio responded with some solid reasons for the governor to stay home. They’re both right. Charlie Baker is trapped. His escape hatch may be a new party, but what kind of party? Walker’s…
Education Funding and the Wal-Mart/State Street Axis
As House and Senate members work out their differences on the education funding bill my thoughts are drawn back to Pioneer Institute Introduces the Beamer vs. Beater Theory of Democracy. That concerned a proposal by Pioneer to keep poor and minority communities from having the same say in their schools as wealthier and whiter communities….