A hit job on the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) [1] in the Dec. 5-11 Bloomberg Businessweek accepts the liberal mantra that corporations are evil and buy support through shadowy groups. The five page article, "Pssst … Wanna Buy a Law?," [2] is thick with one-sided caricatures of conservative policies could have easily been written by a left-wing blogger.
ALEC is a non-profit that promotes limited government, free markets, and federalism. The do this "through a nonpartisan public-private partnership of America's state legislators, members of the private sector, the federal government, and general public."
That may not sound sinister, but according to authors Brendan Greeley and Alison Fitzgerald, the organization is a dark house of conservative horrors. "ALEC's online library contains model bills that tighten voter identification requirements, making it harder for students, the elderly, and the poor to vote," they wrote. Though they noted that such bills are now law in 34 states, they couldn't find anyone to explain the need for voter identification laws intended to reduce voter fraud.
The "limited government" group also has a history of attracting … conservatives. "A look at former members now on the national stage suggests the organization is a farm team for Republicans with ambition," according to Greeley and Fitzgerald. Apparently, 95 GOP federal legislators and four governors have been members.
Lest there be any doubt about the nefarious corporate interests behind ALEC, Greeley and Fitzgerald revealed that the group has taken money from ExxonMobil. Nothing says evil like Big Oil cash.
Which is funny, because four groups the authors cited in the article are funded by left-wing billionaire George Soros and his Open Society Foundations. The Center for Media and Democracy has an entire section on its website called ALEC Exposed [3] and received $200,000. The Sunlight Foundation, which provided data for the article, received another $250,000.
The article criticized organizers of an ALEC conference for denying credentials to the unhinged, far-left blog Alternet and removing liberal activists from "liberal website" Think Progress. Alternet and Think Progress are also recipients of Soros largess. They're part of the liberal "echo-chamber" that reaches more than 300 million people every month [4] and Soros-funded Media Consortium [5], which received $425,000 and has been busy promoting Occupy Wall Street. Care2, another consortium member, promoted an Occupy protest at an ALEC conference [6] where 24 protesters were arrested [7].