Incredible! With two weeks until Election Day, the insurance billionaire behind Prop 33 finally admitted his auto insurance initiative will raise rates on new customers.

Los Angeles Times columnist Mike Hiltzik drew the admission from Mercury Insurance Chairman Joseph in Sunday’s newspaper.

When the billionaire writing the $16 million check for Prop 33 speaks about his initiative raising auto insurance rates, voters should listen.  

But will voters hear Prop 33’s financier over the deceptive television advertising he has bought claiming only that Prop 33 will “reward responsible drivers”?

You can help us get out the word by posting the link to Sunday’s LA Times column (http://lat.ms/TCDqH4) on your Facebook timeline, tweeting it or sharing it with your friends from the newspaper’s site.

In Sunday’s Los Angeles Times, Joseph acknowledged that Prop 33 is a marketing strategy for his insurance company that will allow him to cherry pick his customers “if I could charge new people the proper rate.”

As Hiltzik reports, “He made no bones about the fact that the ‘proper rate’ for customers coming to Mercury as newly insured policyholders is much higher than what he can charge them now.”

Voters banned the power of insurance companies to raise rates on first time drivers and others who did not previously have auto insurance in 1988. Prop 33 would turn back the clock on auto insurance regulation in this state.

Will you help us spread the word about Prop 33’s big lie?

Joseph said that if Prop 33 doesn’t pass it will be “a tremendous waste of money.” Better his than ours!   Please share this critical news story today.

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Posted by Jamie Court, author of The Progressive’s Guide to Raising Hell and President of Consumer Watchdog, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to providing an effective voice for taxpayers and consumers in an era when special interests dominate public discourse, government and politics. Visit us on Facebook and Twitter.

The $36 million No on 37 campaign, bankrolled by $20 million from the world’s six largest pesticide companies, has been caught in yet another lie, this time possibly criminal.

These companies and their allies in the junk food industry know that their profit margins may suffer if consumers have a choice whether to purchase genetically engineered foods or not.  And that’s why opponents are spending nearly a million dollars per day trying to make Prop 37 complicated. But really it’s simple – we have the right to know what’s in our food.

To date, the No on 37 campaign has been able to repeat one lie after another with near impunity. But has this pattern of deceit finally caught up to it?

Yesterday, the Yes on 37 campaign sent letters to the U.S. Department of Justice requesting a criminal investigation of the No on 37 campaign for possible fraudulent misuse of the official seal of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).  

The No on 37 campaign affixed the FDA’s seal to one of the campaign’s mailers. Section 506 of the U.S. Criminal Code states: “Whoever…knowingly uses, affixes, or impresses any such fraudulently made, forged, counterfeited, mutilated, or altered seal or facsimile thereof to or upon any certificate, instrument, commission, document, or paper of any description…shall be fined under this title, or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or both.”

The letter also provides evidence that the No on 37 campaign falsely attributed a direct quote to the FDA in the campaign mailer. Alongside the FDA seal, the mailer includes this text in quotes. “The US Food and Drug Administration says a labeling policy like Prop 37 would be ‘inherently misleading.” The quote is entirely fabricated. The FDA did not make this statement and does not take a position on Prop 37.

In addition, the three identified authors of the “Rebuttal to Argument in Favor of Proposition 37” include a Dr. Henry I. Miller, who is identified solely as “Founding Director, Office of Biotechnology of the Food & Drug Administration.” Dr. Miller in fact, does not currently work for the FDA in any capacity – as millions of California voters have been erroneously led to believe.

This is not the first blatant act of deception that the No on 37 campaign has been caught perpetrating on the citizens of California – particularly relating to their “top scientist” Dr. Henry Miller.

Consider Miller’s growing “rap sheet”:

• On Oct. 4 the No on 37 campaign was forced to pull its first ad off the air and re-shoot it after they were caught misrepresenting Miller as a doctor at Stanford University  when he is actually a researcher at the Hoover Institute on Stanford’s campus, as the Los Angeles Times reported.

• Last week, the campaign was reprimanded by Stanford again for misrepresenting the university in a mailer that went out to millions of voters. And this week, the campaign was caught sending out yet another deceptive mailer involving the University.

In addition to allowing his university affiliation to be repeatedly overblown, Miller has a sordid history of parroting the talking points of some of the world’s most notorious corporate bad actors: he’s a founding member of a now defunct tobacco front group that tried to discredit the links between cigarettes and cancer, he’s repeatedly called for the reintroduction of DDT – known to cause premature birth, fronted for an oil industry funded climate change denial group for Exxon, claimed that people exposed to radiation from the Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster “may have benefited from it”, and attacked the US Food and Drug Administration’s efforts to ensure proper vetting and testing of new drugs safety while urging it to outsource more of its functions to private industries.

This is the man the No on 37 campaign has portrayed to voters as an arbiter of good science and promoted as an expert worthy of our trust. In reality, Miller is nothing more than a corporate shill that will say whatever his paymasters ask him to, be it Exxon, Phillip Morris, Monsanto, or DuPont.

Does the No on 37 campaign stand behind Miller’s fringe views on tobacco, climate change, nuclear radiation and DDT?

But this pattern of deceit doesn’t end with Miller:

• On Oct. 5, the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, the nation’s largest professional association for nutritionists and dieticians, accused the No on 37 campaign of misrepresenting its position and misleading voters in the official California Voter’s Guide that went to 11 million voters.

• And the anti-Proposition 37 ads that are now blanketing the state have been described as misleading by the San Jose Mercury News, Sacramento Bee, and San Francisco Chronicle.

Perhaps these latest revelations will prompt the mainstream press to begin focusing their attention on the No on 37 campaign’s pattern of deceptions – including a potentially criminal act – rather than on easily discredited pesticide industry Prop 37 “red herrings” like common sense exemptions, phony lawsuit scares, bogus “big bureaucracy claims”, and “cost increase hysteria”.

So who should we trust?

Who should we trust when it comes to our right to know what’s in the food we eat: Monsanto, DuPont, and Henry Miller or the millions of California consumers and leading consumer, health, women’s, faith-based, labor and other groups; 61 countries that already require GMO labeling; and a growing stack of peer-reviewed research linking genetically engineered foods to health and environmental problems?

Who has our best interests at heart, the pesticide and junk food industry, or Prop 37 supporters like Consumers Union, California Nurses Association, California Democratic Party, California Labor Federation, United Farm Workers, American Public Health Association, Consumers Union, Sierra Club, Whole Foods Market, California Council of Churches, Organic Consumers Association, Center for Food Safety, Consumer Federation of America, Public Citizen, and Food Democracy Now!?

To defeat their $1 million a day of discredited falsehoods blanketing California’s airwaves we need your help to fuel our grassroots effort and Contribute here, or follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

Populist governor Hiram Johnson gave Californians the ballot initiative one hundred and one years ago to combat the stranglehold of wealthy scions over the statehouse. Today’s New York Times reports on how California’s ballot measures are dominated by a handful of billionaires, including some trying to buy more power for themselves and their companies. Call it The Billionaire Ballot.

In modern history there has been no slate of ballot measures with so much concentrated wealth behind it. But can we judge a ballot measure by the billionaire behind it? It depends what the billionaire wants.

Here’s a populist guide to the Good, Bad and Ugly of California’s Billionaire Ballot:

The U G L Y: Two insurance billionaires are the big funding behind Proposition 32 and 33. Both initiatives have been rejected before. The tens of millions being poured in by two insurance billionaires are pure power grabs to get more money and power for the backers of Proposition 32 and 33.

Proposition 33 is backed by Mercury Insurance Chairman George Joseph, who has spent $16 million, 99.5% of the funds behind the initiative, to charge drivers more for not having auto insurance previously, even if the reason is they didn’t drive. Billionaires buying the ballot to help their own profits doesn’t get much uglier than Prop 33.

Prop 32 features the heir to the Berkshire Hathway fortune, including GEICO and another insurance company, buying the ballot to gut the power of labor unions in the political process. This of course helps the super-rich and insurance companies have more power. GEICO heir Charlie Munger Jr. poured $22 million into Prop 32, and it isn’t to benefit The People, but His People. Hiram Johnson rating: U.G.L.Y!

The BAD: Molly Munger, the other heir to the Berkshire Hathaway fortune, the liberal one, is funding an altruistic ballot measure, Prop 38, which is backed by the PTA and funds education. The problem is it has little public support and is likely not only to fail, but could bring down Prop 30, Governor Brown’s budget mending ballot measure, which Munger briefly attacked directly. Rule for billionaires in ballot measures: start with 70% approval rating, not 40%. IF you don’t have the public with you at the beginning, you are not likely to win voters over. And if there’s a competing ballot measure, it’s likely to be a pox on everyone’s house.

The GOOD: At least two billionaires have the right idea. Environmentalist and hedgefund manager Tom Steyer is funding Prop 39, an enlightened idea to close the state’s loophole on taking out of state corporations, and generate $1 billion for the beleaguered state treasury. Steyer used his money to stop oil companies from gutting the state’s greenhouse gas emissions law last election, for which he earned my consumer group’s Phillip Burton Public Service Award.

Nicholas Berrgruen’s financing pushed Prop 31 on the ballot at the last minute. It’s a two year budget cycle initiative reform that has positives and negatives, but Berrgruen sponsored the idea because he believed it would benefit Californians, not line his own pockets. In the end, that’s all we can really ask of billionaires that want to play in ballot measure politics: 1) Do it for the state, not to benefit yourself or your class 2) Don’t screw anyone else who has a better idea and is more in sync with public opinion.

It takes big money to play in California’s ballot measure process today, so billionaires are plenty welcome. But if they are in it for themselves, they aren’t likely to fool the voters, who have a remarkable knack for rejecting any ballot initiative with a stink behind it. In the end, the initiative process is still the people’s. Voters decide, and their judgment over the billionaires is the final verdict.

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Originally Posted on The Huffington Post by Jamie Court, author of The Progressive’s Guide to Raising Hell and President of Consumer Watchdog, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to providing an effective voice for taxpayers and consumers in an era when special interests dominate public discourse, government and politics. Visit us on Facebook and Twitter.

Sacramento Bee Ad Watch Says Prop 33 TV Ads “Mislead”

The insurance billionaire behind Prop 33 is asking California voters to believe that he wants to overturn laws that have protected consumers for 24 years to save consumers money. Consumer Watchdog Campaign today released the “Top Five Reasons You Can’t Trust Mercury Insurance,” outlining the company’s troubling history as a renegade insurance company that routinely defies the law and abuses consumers, as reasons this insurance executive and his company can’t be trusted.

Also today, a Sacramento Bee Ad Watch analysis found that a Prop 33 TV ad is “misleading,” because it hides the fact that it will raise rates on good drivers who have a break in their insurance for almost any reason, and because it “features a testimonial from a motorist without disclosing she works for Proposition 33’s campaign team.”

Read the Sacramento Bee story

Mercury Insurance chairman George Joseph has spent $16 million on Prop 33.

“The lies in the Prop 33 ads are the latest but not the last in Mercury Insurance’s long history of deceiving and abusing consumers, and willfully breaking the law to boost its own bottom line at the expense of its customers. Voters should be warned that they can’t trust a word this insurance billionaire says about Prop 33, or a single TV sound bite coming from his $16 million campaign to fool the public,” said Carmen Balber with Consumer Watchdog Campaign.

The California Department of Insurance stated in an agency enforcement action against Mercury: “Mercury has a deserved reputation for abusing its customers and intentionally violating the law with arrogance and indifference.”

Find that statement here (Page 4)

The Top Five Reasons You Can’t Trust Mercury Insurance:

1.  Discriminatory auto insurance pricing.  According to a California Department of Insurance investigation Mercury repeatedly overcharged, cancelled, refused to sell insurance or made insurance more difficult for people to buy, based on customers’ military status, occupation, health, marital status, employment status, prior accidents that were not the driver’s fault, prior insurance coverage and other illegal criteria.

Read the San Francisco Chronicle story here

2. Hiked auto insurance rates by $63 million. Mercury just raised rates on 990,000 auto insurance customers by $63 million, an average 4% rate hike that will take effect by the end of 2012, even as the company promises discounts under Prop 33.

Find the details of the rate increase here

3. Charged customers illegal broker fees.  Mercury allowed its insurance agents to charge illegal broker fees to unsuspecting customers until forced to stop by a California court. The company would advertise one price to customers, and invite them to compare it to other insurers, but not reveal that an additional, illegal broker fee would be added to the final price.

Learn more about the case here

4. Low-balling and delaying accident claims.  An internal training manual produced in a civil trial shows Mercury Insurance trained employees to mistreat, neglect and even threaten customers who file claims.

A portion of the instructional guide was disclosed as part of a 2006 lawsuit against the company by a Los Angeles business that sued Mercury for failing to properly pay a claim. Internal training guides shown to jurors instructed Mercury claims adjustors to low-ball customers, drag out their claims and remind them they could be found at fault in a trial.

Download the Daily Journal article about the lawsuit here

5. Illegally raising rates.  Mercury illegally surcharged hundreds of thousands of drivers based on their history of insurance coverage, the same surcharge Prop 33 would impose, until the Department of Insurance and the courts ordered it to stop.

When Prop 33 proponents claim a continuous coverage discount was in effect in California from 1996-2002, they are referring to these years when Mercury was breaking the law. Mercury’s own customers sued the company and the Court of Appeal put an end to the practice in 2005.

Read more about the case, Donabedian v. Mercury, here

Proposition 33 would allow insurance companies to raise rates on Californians with perfect driving records if they had a break in their insurance coverage for almost any reason, even if they weren’t driving and didn’t have a car. It targets millions of Californians for higher auto insurance rates, including students, mass transit users, the long-term unemployed and the disabled who stop driving for good reasons and then need to get back on the road.

Nearly every newspaper editorial board in the state has urged a No vote on Prop 33. Read their recommendations here

Mercury Insurance sponsored an almost identical initiative just two years ago, Prop 17, which was rejected by voters 48 – 52.

For more information on Prop 33 visit: http://stopprop33.consumerwatchdogcampaign.org/

The people’s movement for our right to know what’s in our food has hit a critical fork in the road: the moment when it’s time to ask ourselves and each other — how hard are we willing to fight for our basic right to know what’s in the food we’re eating and feeding our families?

Proposition 37 is the  litmus test for whether there is actually a food movement in this country, writes Michael Pollan in an article to appear in Sunday’s New York Times Magazine. It may also be the litmus test for whether there is democracy left in this country.

After months of sky-high support in the polls, just 10 days of relentless pounding propaganda by the pesticide industry has made a significant dent in support for Proposition 37 and our right to know if our food is genetically engineered.

So worried are the pesticide companies about California consumers having labels on genetically engineered foods that they are spending one million dollars a day flooding the airwaves with a tidal wave of deception about Prop 37.

As proof of the dishonest tactics in play, in just the past week, the anti-consumer No on 37 campaign has been accused of misleading voters by Stanford University (twice), the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics and by three major newspapers.

Yet most voters are seeing only one face and hearing only one voice in the debate about Prop 37 – that of notorious pesticide-industry front man Henry Miller. Who is Henry Miller? And can easily discredited pesticide-industry lies really win an election?



Easily Discredited Pesticide-Industry Lies

Hour after hour in every media market across the state, Henry Miller appears on TV to explain his views about Proposition 37. The ad campaign was exposed as dishonest at the outset, when Stanford University forced the anti-Prop 37 campaign to yank the ad because it falsely identified Miller as a doctor at Stanford (he is actually a researcher at the Hoover Institution), and used images of Stanford’s vaulted buildings to push a political position in violation of university policy.

The edited ad was soon back on the air — one viewer in San Francisco reported seeing it 12 times in one day — pounding voters with Henry Miller’s message that Prop 37 “makes no sense.” But a lot of things that make sense to the rest of us don’t make sense to Henry Miller: for example, that DDT was banned for a reason, or that exposure to radioactive elements after a nuclear power plant meltdown is not a health benefit. (Read all about the extreme views of the No on 37 science spokesperson here.)

Henry Miller is the perfect poster guy for the lack of credibility of the pesticide giants’ campaign against our right to know what’s in our food.  Who are they going to trot out next, the president of the Flat Earth Society?

The only honest thing about the No on 37 ads is the disclaimer that tells us who’s funding this campaign of deception — Monsanto and Dupont, the same companies that told us DDT and Agent Orange were safe.

Setting the Record Straight

Yet incredibly, it’s working. Henry Miller’s hypocritical script in a misleading ad campaign that was discredited as soon as it began has taken a bit hit out of the support for Prop 37.

In the ad, Miller claims the exemptions included in Prop 37 are “illogical” and included “for special interests.” As if the companies for which he is working – the biggest special interests of all – would be in favor of Prop 37 if it were even stronger.

They would not. For the record, the exemptions are common sense. They follow the trajectory of labeling bills in the Europe Union and all around the world. Prop 37 will cover the vast majority of genetically engineered foods that consumers are eating – the food on supermarket shelves.

Meat, milk and eggs would be labeled if they came from genetically engineered animals. There are no genetically engineered animals in the human food supply right now, but if there were, they would have to be labeled. Which will come in handy since the first GE animal is on its way to our dinner plates – a salmon genetically engineered with an eel to grow twice as fast. Wouldn’t you want to know if you were eating such a thing?

Because Prop 37 is designed to be simple and business friendly, it does not require labeling for cows that eat genetically engineered feed. It would not be a simple matter to track what cows eat. More to the point, that exemption is common around the world. It didn’t make sense for California to try to leapfrog over the rest of the world with our labeling law, when we have been trying to catch up with the rest of the world for 15 years.

Yes pet food would have to be labeled if it contains genetically engineered crops like corn or soy. That’s because the standard definition of food under the Sherman Act considers pet food to be food – so argue that one with the legislature.

As for other story lines the opposition is shopping — there will be no increased costs to consumers with Prop 37. Doesn’t it seem strange that these companies would spend tens of millions of dollars to convince us that adding a little ink to their labels will force them to raise the cost of groceries? And as for “shakedown lawsuits,” that makes no sense when you consider the fact that there are no incentives for lawyers to sue under Prop 37.

The only shakedown lawsuits related to this issue are the thousands of farmers Monsanto is suing for planting their own seeds to grow food. In case you missed it, consider this chilling sentence from last week’s Washington Post: Monsanto “has filed lawsuits around the country to enforce its policy against saving the seeds for the future.” Policy against the future? Sounds about right.

Pet Food for Thought

While Californians are mired in debate about pet food versus steak, the real question facing voters is this:  Are we going to allow out-of-state pesticide and junk food corporations tell us what we can and can’t know about what’s in the food we eat?

“What makes you think you have the right to know?” asks Danny DeVito in a a parody video supporting Prop 37. “Knowing if you’re buying or eating genetically engineered food is not your right.”

“Maybe move to Europe or Japan if you want that right,” says Kaitlin Olson. “Or China,” adds Dave Matthews, because, “Here in American you don’t get the right to know if you’re eating genetically modified organisms.”

Unless, unless: We demand that GMOs get labeled. Unless we vote yes on Prop 37. Unless we influence every single California voter we can to do the same.

The Yes on 37 campaign is a true people’s movement for our right to know what’s in our food. We will not be stopped. When California voters go to the polls this November, they will value their right to know what’s in their food, rather than leaving it up to the pesticide industry and Henry Miller to make those choices for us. But in order to win this, every single one of us has to fight like hell to make it happen.

So join us today on FIGHT BACK FRIDAY by taking action right now to make sure we get the right to know what we’re eating and feeding our families.

Three Things You Can Do Today



SHARE THE TRUTH: Make sure every California voter you know understands what’s going on with the deceptive ad campaigns.

Email, Facebook, and Tweet this blog to your friends and family.

SPEAK THE TRUTH: We can’t match our opposition’s $36 million campaign war chest, but we have what they don’t — the power of a grassroots movement.

Sign up to volunteer today. Then we’ll contact you with instructions on how to join our statewide phone bank, how to find your local area leader to get materials and get out on the streets for the campaign, and other activities that will help us win on Election Day.

FUND THE TRUTH: They are spending a million dollars a day. We can’t match that, but every dollar counts! Your donation large or small will help us get us on the air to help us share the truth! Please donate here

The contentious race between 14-term Congressman Howard Berman (D-CA) and 8-term Congressman Brad Sherman (D-CA) in California’s 30th congressional district took a bizarre turn yesterday, as Rep. Sherman physically confronted Rep. Berman and questioned his leadership role in drafting the DREAM Act.  As video documents, Rep. Sherman put his arm around Rep. Berman, and said: “Do you want to get into this?” in an aggressive manner.

Well, with respect to Rep. Sherman’s claims on leadership around immigration issues and the DREAM Act, leaders from California and national immigration organizations responded today with a resounding “yes, we do want to get into this.”  On a conference call with reporters, California leaders, DREAMers, and national immigration advocates talked about Rep. Berman’s long history of championing immigrant rights behind the scenes and his tireless advocacy on behalf of the DREAM Act, AgJOBs, and numerous other immigration reforms in Congress.

While Rep. Sherman has a generally pro-immigration voting record, his attempts to diminish Rep. Berman’s leadership on the issue or to portray himself as an equal to Rep. Berman on immigration just don’t wash.  No less an authority than Rep. Luis Gutierrez issued a statement today, stating:

It is not a matter of debate that Rep. Howard Berman is the author of the DREAM Act. . . .  When I am in Los Angeles next week campaigning for Howard Berman’s reelection, I will tell everyone that I support Howard Berman because of his authorship of the DREAM Act and the crucial, leadership role Howard Berman has played in every major piece of immigration legislation under consideration in the House.  Howard is our champion.

On the press call today Angelica Salas, Board Chair of CHIRLA Action Fund based in Los Angeles said:

Representative Sherman has not voted the wrong way, but he rarely engages directly with the Latino community in order to speak up on their issues.  Rep. Berman, however, has been a leader in speaking to the needs of the youth in the San Fernando Valley, and in so doing giving a voice to immigrant youth throughout the nation. For decades, he has met with them and heard their stories, heard their frustration at being unable to achieve their dreams, despite their skills, capacities and passions, and he has taken action on behalf of them and their parents, starting with the original Student Adjustment Act. When President Obama granted deferred action to DREAMers this summer, it was the culmination of the work Rep. Berman has been doing throughout his career.  He is a person who doesn’t just say he’s going to do the right thing, but who actually takes action, and has made sure that every part of his capacity and leadership is moved to help the Latino and immigrant community of the San Fernando Valley.

Rep. Berman wrote the original DREAM Act in 2001 after meeting an undocumented honors student who could not go to college because she didn’t qualify for financial aid.  The Congressman was so moved by her situation that he wrote a bill to fix it, along with Senator Durbin (D-IL).  Berman reached out to Republican Rep. Chris Cannon of Utah, and the two introduced their bipartisan bill in the House in May 2001.  The Senate version was introduced in August 2001.

Javiera Infante, a DREAM leader from the San Fernando Valley, said:

For as long as I have been involved with the DREAM Act, the only name familiar to me has been Howard Berman’s name, when it comes to the fight for student rights in the Valley.  It’s appalling to think that Rep. Sherman called Congressman Berman to a physical fight.  On behalf of youth in the Valley, I want to say that we continue to support Congressman Berman and the work he’s done in the immigration fight.

According to Frank Sharry, Executive Director of America’s Voice:

Howard Berman is one of the greatest champions of immigrants and immigration reform the U.S. Congress has ever seen.  He enjoys the support of those who have worked with him for over 30 years on behalf of immigrants and immigrant families.  While Berman often let others’ names come first on the bill-for example, his Republican allies-he was the true author and driver behind this legislation.  It was all part of his strategy to pass the bill.  So while Berman’s essential role may be less known to the media, it’s well-known to those who were in the trenches with him.”

Rep. Berman’s advocacy on behalf of immigrants is not limited to the DREAM Act.  One of his most crucial roles was in brokering the historic AgJOBS deal with Senator Ted Kennedy, the United Farm Workers, and agriculture industry leaders.  The bill would legalize undocumented farm workers in exchange for certain visa reforms sought by growers.  In an industry known for abuse and exploitation, the fact that Berman and Kennedy brought these interests together around a common platform is remarkable.  Berman introduced multiple AgJOBS bills (including in 2003, 2005, and 2007) and successfully courted numerous Republican cosponsors in a tireless effort to pass it.  Unfortunately, the bill has not yet gotten enough backing from Republicans, but Berman’s work on this bill has been nothing short of heroic.

In fact, Berman has been a champion of farm workers since before his days in Congress.  As an Assemblyman in California, Berman was the chief sponsor and negotiator of the state’s historic Agricultural Labor Relations Act– the first legislation in the nation to provide United Farm Workers (UFW) the right to organize on behalf of migrant farm workers.

Efrain Trujillo, an organizer with the United Farm Workers, explained:

All of us involved in the Farm Worker Movement want to tell Brad Sherman that we were shocked by his physical display of violence and want to remind him of Cesar Chavez’s lifelong commitment to nonviolent civil discourse.  Howard Berman is important to the United Farm Workers because since the beginning he has been fighting for workers’ rights and immigrant rights.  As an Assemblymember, Howard Berman worked directly with César Chávez and Dolores Huerta to pass the critical legislation that gave farm workers collective bargaining rights in California.  In the mid-eighties as a congressman, he partnered with the United Farm Workers to pass legislation that granted a path to citizenship to undocumented farm workers and others.  More recently, Howard co-authored and introduced the bipartisan AgJOBS bill.

Cesar Vargas, Managing Partner of DRM Action Coalition, concluded:

As DREAMers we’re not fighting for a party or a candidate, we’re fighting for true supporters. It’s not enough to cast a vote, it’s not enough to voice your support. Howard Berman has set the standard of what it means to lead on the DREAM Act. I was in the House chamber the day the DREAM Act was voted on and I remember him defending the DREAM Act when Rep. Lamar Smith was calling us criminals.  That was really incredible.  Howard Berman’s leadership has involved action and determination to support immigrant youth around the country.

View more resources:

• The recording from today’s call will soon be available here.
• Background on Immigration in Berman/Sherman Race

If there’s one thing that’s been particularly consistent to campaigns of the far right in San Diego this fall, it’s the unusually desperate attempts to hide the real agenda from voters. It’s one that should be cause for optimism as long as voters pay attention, and betrays an almost impressive self-awareness from the top of the GOP that the party’s agenda has drifted well outside the mainstream.

From the special exemptions of Prop 32 to Brian Bilbray’s teetering re-election bid to Carl DeMaio’s bizarre mayoral campaign, extreme conservatives are doing everything they can to hide their record and who they are.

For the backers of Proposition 32, the deception was part of the design from the very beginning. They surveyed the political landscape and found that, unsurprisingly, nobody wants millionaires and corporations to be able to buy off our political process. Rather than abandon a wildly unpopular idea, they came up with a different plan: fake it.  

Cross-posted from San Diego Free Press

That’s Prop 32, from the same white knights of campaign finance reform who broke the system to begin with by using the Citizens United case to overthrow existing regulations on special interest money. This year, they simply took it a step further, called the plan reform and packed in enough special exemptions to create a system that only works for corporations and millionaires.

It makes sense because everyone wants campaign finance reform. But the reason they want campaign finance reform is specifically because of what Prop 32’s backers have done and continue to do.

The hundreds of millions of unregulated, unlimited political cash flowing into SuperPACs exists specifically because of Prop 32’s backers, and now its being funded by the Koch Brothers and other super-rich conservatives that saw Citizens United as the starting pistol to buy off democracy. Prop 32’s hoping to trick voters. Will they see through it?

At the same time, there’s Brian Bilbray. He has cobbled together a decades-long career of faking moderation when election time comes around, but the reality just doesn’t match the myth he’s built for himself when push comes to shove. Bilbray wants to cast himself as an environmentalist, but mustered just a 17% score on the League of Conservation Voters 2011 scorecard. And it was Bilbray’s early work trying to gut the Clean Water Act that once inspired Donna Frye to become a clean water activist.

He’s done his best to avoid the ramifications of the national GOP’s war on women, right on through to Todd Akin’s ‘legitimate rape’ comments. But the reality of his record remains, including a pitiful 8% score from Planned Parenthood’s scorecard. Brian Bilbray may not want to be lumped in with the war on women, but if that’s what he’s hoping for, maybe he shouldn’t have signed up for it in the first place.

All of that could maybe be overlooked if Bilbray had taken up the mantle of the millions of Americans devastated when the economy fell apart near the end of the Bush administration. But while Bilbray will certainly have populist talking points on the stump, it’s worth remembering that he voted for the Paul Ryan plan to dismantle Medicare and destroy Social Security in response to increased economic security.

And Bilbray’s plan for economic recovery? One part rewarding tax-evading corporate interests, one part Let them eat a Yacht Race! Not exactly your tired, your poor, your huddled masses.

For Carl DeMaio, the attempt to whitewash nearly twenty years as a professional politician has been even more depraved than elsewhere. After coming up with the likes of Newt Gingrich, Virginia Thomas, the Jack Abramoff crew, and the Koch Brothers, it seems to have dawned on Carl that the city of San Diego, well… really doesn’t like that at all.

During his tenure on the council, DeMaio has received the lowest cumulative score on the annual Environmental Quality Report Card. And despite being appointed since joining the council, DeMaio hasn’t appeared in the minutes of a single meeting of the San Dieguito River Valley Regional Open Space Joint Powers Authority since January 2011.

Reality didn’t matter to DeMaio though when he took a week out to declare himself an environmentalist. He didn’t get very far with that, so he moved on to a plan to encourage biking by investing in more roads. Doesn’t make sense? It isn’t supposed to. It’s just supposed to distract from his career-long record on the wrong side of these issues.

Word on the street is, DeMaio spent some time recently trying for an endorsement from the Victory Fund, which led to an unexpected declaration from Carl that he was pro-choice. It has to be considered unexpected since it was certainly news to Planned Parenthood. Why? Because despite the clear reasons that choice matters at the local level, DeMaio has always refused to fill out Planned Parenthood’s questionnaire. And today, if you’re looking for pro-choice candidates in November, you sure aren’t going to find Carl DeMaio on the list.

There are still more examples. He runs as a fiscal conservative while voting against hundreds of millions in taxpayer savings and getting the BS treatment from Mayor Jerry Sanders. He tried out medical marijuana but that fell flat once anyone read past Carl’s own statement.

He took a quick stab at being for the middle class and affordable housing over the summer, trying to pass off support from a landlord group as support for tenants. The claims were called “preposterous,” and the former CEO of the San Diego Housing Commission said in no uncertain terms that “Carl DeMaio is not an advocate for more affordable housing.”

Heck, DeMaio has even tried reaching out to the Latino community while trumpeting an endorsement from Pete Wilson, the father of Proposition 187. And after casting the only vote on the council in support of Arizona’s SB1070, his Latino outreach has featured a plan to have local police enforce federal immigration law.

The most amazing part is the special brand of doublethink that DeMaio has going on in all this. He isn’t just making up an entirely new self for the general election, he’s doing it while criticizing others for the same thing. Like last week at the KPBS mayoral debate:

“The U-T CEO mentioned that he got support from labor, and yet labor has not supported it, that he got support from business groups, but very few groups that are out there have supported the plan,” DeMaio said. “And so I just think that the email probably was making some claims that are not grounded in reality.”

Now, it wouldn’t be shocking to discover the UT making claims that are not grounded in reality. But compare that to DeMaio’s recent record. He’s an affordable housing advocate unless you ask affordable housing advocates. He’s an environmentalist unless you ask environmentalists. He’s a medical marijuana advocate unless you ask medical marijuana advocates. He’s pro-choice unless you ask Planned Parenthood. He’s a friend to the Latino community except for wanting them to be harassed by the police. He’s a fiscal conservative except for imposing a billion dollar tax increase without a vote of the public.

But when Doug Manchester and John Lynch — the very same duo who helped DeMaio defeat essentially the same tax increase in 2005 — don’t poll well, then maybe reality has come loose.

Does it work? Maybe not with anyone who has the time and interest to dig into the substance. But those who never catch more than headlines because they have lives full of working to make ends meet, struggling with health care bills, working into retirement thanks to Wall Street, trying to figure out what to do after a foreclosure… they understandably won’t ever have that time.

And that’s the whole idea. Keep up the game of whack-a-mole long enough that voters never get a chance to examine the truth.

It’s said that great writers steal outright, so here’s a heartfelt tip of the cap to the inimitable Ann Richards before saying: Poor Carl.

He’s never once had a job that asked him to appeal to a majority, or even anyone resembling moderates. So now that he’s stuck in a general election, he’s like Columbus discovering America. He’s found the environment. He’s found the middle class and working people. He’s found women. He’s found the sick and suffering. He’s found Latinos.

Poor Carl. He can’t help it. San Diego just doesn’t want what he’s been selling his whole life.

I’m proud to work for San Diegans for Bob Filner for Mayor 2012

A campaign bankrolled by financially motivated pesticide and junk food companies is expected to lie – a lot. It’s what they always do when confronted by inconvenient facts and consumers seeking to protect their rights – like the Right to Know what’s in the food we eat and feed our families.

Prop 37 opponents have run one of the most deceptive misinformation campaigns in recent history – a $35 million deluge of one demonstrable lie after another to try and defeat a common sense measure that most Californians support.    

Today, the No on 37 campaign’s already tattered credibility was dealt yet another big blow with news that its “top scientist” is nothing more than a corporate shill willing to misrepresent himself and the University for which he works.

Meet Henry Miller – a spokesperson the No on 37 campaign has been all too eager to promote as an arbiter of good science and someone we can trust with our families health. Miller has been featured in No on 37 television ads, written outrageously deceptive opinion editorials, and has presented himself as an “unbiased” scientific expert.

And now he’s been caught misrepresenting Stanford University– forcing the No on 37 Campaign to pull and reshoot a statewide television ad identifying Miller as “Dr. Henry Miller, MD, Stanford University,” without disclosing his affiliation with the Hoover Institute, a right-wing think tank at the University. In other words, he works ON the Stanford campus as a corporate propagandist, but ISN’T a Professor at Stanford University.

The ad was pulled after the Yes on 37 campaign attorney sent a letter to Stanford pointing out that the university’s affiliation was being used in a political advertising campaign, in violation of university policy.  

Stanford also demanded that the campaign remove the campus from the ad’s background.

But this isn’t the most disturbing aspect of Miller’s sordid career. Before we trust anything he has to say about something as fundamental as our health, we’d do well to consider his two decades of work dedicated to undermining it:

• Miller shilled for Big Tobacco, where he helped Phillip Morris discredit the links between tobacco products, and cancer and heart disease;

• Miller advocates for the reintroduction of the toxic pesticide DDT, which was banned in the United States and has been linked to pre-term birth and fertility impairment in women;

• Miller aided Exxon’s  efforts to undercut the reality of climate change;

• Miller attacked the US Food and Drug Administration’s efforts to ensure proper vetting and testing of new drugs safety while urging it outsource more of its functions to private industries,

• And Miller claimed Japanese exposed to radiation from Fukushima “could actually have benefited” from it.

Miller isn’t the only dubious character the No On 37 stable, but his  one man “tour of lies” about Prop 37 includes some especially notable whoppers. He often repeats one claim that includes three lies in a single sentence, stating “The World Health Organization, American Medical Association, National Academy of Sciences and other respected medical and health organizations all conclude that genetically engineered foods are safe.”

The only problem is not one of these organizations has come to such a conclusion:

• A National Academy of Sciences report concluded that products of genetic engineering technology “carry the potential for introducing unintended compositional changes that may have adverse effects on human health.”

• The American Medical Association has adopted a position calling for mandatory safety assessments of genetically engineered foods.

• And the World Health Organization / United Nations food standards group, Codex Alimentarius, which sets the global science-based standards on food policy issues, states that mandatory safety studies should be required – a standard the US fails to meet.

In fact, within the past few weeks alone, independent peer reviewed studies have raised even more troubling questions about the impact of GMOs on our environment, and potential risks to our health.

Ultimately, to understand the No On 37 campaign’s credibility problems, just follow the money: the six largest pesticide corporations in the world have contributed nearly $20 million of its $35 million war chest. The two largest donors – Monsanto ($7.2 million) and Dupont ($4.9 million) – told us Agent Orange and DDT were safe. Now they’ve telling us we don’t deserve to know what’s in our food. And the kicker is that while Monsanto spends $ millions to deny our right to know in California, it supported labeling in Europe.

So who should we trust?

On the Yes side stands millions of California consumers and more than 2,000 leading consumer, health, women’s, faith-based, labor and other groups; 50 countries that already require GMO labeling; and a growing stack of peer-reviewed research linking genetically engineered foods to health and environmental problems.  

On the No side stands the largest pesticide, agribusiness and junk food companies in the world dedicated to saying and spending whatever it takes to hide the fact that most of the foods on store shelves right now are being genetically altered in a way  that could pose risks to our health and environment-but we don’t know which ones without labeling.

The central question of the Prop. 37 debate is this—Do consumers have the right to know what’s in the food we eat or is that decision better made by the likes of Henry Miller, Monsanto, and Dupont?

Stand up for your Right to Know-Yes on 37!

If you can spare a few bucks, click here.  Or visit us at www.carighttoknow.org, or on Facebook for other ways to help.