Next Tea Party Target: Corporate America

Jesse Jackson isn't the only activist that can use corporate boycotts for political purposes. Starting next year, the huge Tea Party organizer FreedomWorks will urge supporters to punish huge corporations like General Electric and Johnson and Johnson for backing President Obama's progressive agenda.

FreedomWorks president Matt Kibbe says: "Tea Party activists are willing to tackle progressive CEOs just as they tackled progressive politicians. Judging by the results of the midterm elections, progressive CEOs should buckle up, because Tea Party activists are going to give them a very bumpy ride."

His project partner, Tom Borelli, director of the National Center for Public Policy Research's Free Enterprise Project, added: "Big businesses are now on notice that there is a measurable business risk for actively supporting the Obama, Reid, and Pelosi progressive public policy agenda."

Their initial focus will be on consumer firms that lobbied for passage of Obama's agenda items that helped their firms. "We are going after the rent-seeking corporations feeding at the public trough," said FreedomWorks' spokesman Adam Brandon.

The groups released a new Wilson Research Strategies poll which shows how companies could suffer when conservatives are told of their support for Obama's agenda. The poll found that when customers are told of a consumer product firm's support for healthcare reform, bailouts, cap-and-trade energy policies or other issues pushed by the administration, their favorability among conservatives plummets.

-- General Electric. The firm has a 51 percent favorable image, but when poll takers were told of it's support for the Obama economic stimulus plan, only 20 percent had a favorably impression of the consumer giant.

-- Johnson and Johnson. Nearly 69 percent had a favorable impression of the health company before Johnson and Johnson's support for health reform legislation was detailed to survey-takers. Afterward, that favorability dropped to 16 percent.

The poll also found that 81 percent of conservative voters active in the Tea Party would be "less likely to buy products from companies that actively lobbied to pass Obama's $787 billion stimulus plan," and 61 percent would blog, Facebook, or upload a YouTube video urging backers to boycott their products.

FreedomWorks and the National Center for Public Policy Research's Free Enterprise Project will first start by releasing the poll on Tuesday. It will then urge bloggers and other activists to spread the news about how companies lobbied for Obama's agenda. And soon after look for the groups to list the ties of major firms to the Democrats and progressives. "To break up this unholy alliance between government and business, we have to shine a light on it," says Kibbe. "This is a next step in a series of battles," adds Borelli.

Consumer boycotts by activists such as Jesse Jackson have a long record of success. But a Tea Party boycott could be bigger and impact the political world in Washington where corporations are generally viewed as supporting Republicans. "For too long, big business elites have leveraged their special interest group politics to profit from the size and growth of government. The poll demonstrates that the days of easy money through back room deals are over," says Kibbe.

Tom Borelli is a good man. I will support him.

On another note, there needs to be a more communicative term than “rent-seeking.” Most people just don't know what the terms means ... and it's a very important message.

I like and use the term “statism/statist” and have flown under the flag of “Making Statism Unpopular” for years.

However, “statism” suffers a similar problem that plagues “rent-seeking.” Mark Levin's wonderful book “Liberty and Tyranny” has helped educated millions as to the term “statism” but we still need to come up with another, more mass friendly way to get the point across.

The article above mentions “trough feeders” and while redundant, helps communicate.

Win the vocabulary, win the debate.

Any suggestions?

Email I sent to Immelt and as many GE board members as I could locate on the net.

TO: Jeffrey Immelt

April 21, 2009

My Dear Mr. Immelt,

My late father worked for GE for many years in the Apparatus Service Division out of Cleveland, Ohio (specialized in marine work) and was always proud of his relationship with a grand old American enterprise. You were growing up down there in Cincinnati at the time and, one could assume, were inculcated with those same traditional values my father developed growing up in Coshocton, Ohio.

My wife and I are longtime GE shareholders and have remained thus through the current tumultuous period.

But we have become concerned, indeed ALARMED, at recent events at GE, the most telling of which is your evident embrace of a man who is clearly hell bent on dragging America into some sort of fascist or socialist nightmare. And make no mistake — that is PRECISELY where he is headed.

My wife and I have both signed the “We Surround You” letter at the Free Enterpriser web site so I shant belabor the points already made therein.

I served in the USAF for four years between ‘62 and ‘66. One day in May of ‘62, I raised my hand and swore an oath to God to “...defend the Constitution of the United States.”

To the best of my knowledge, that oath had no expiration date and is still active.

I would respectfully ask you to reconsider your recent activities vis-a-vis what many out here in fly-over country consider to be aiding and abetting an enemy of that Constitution and the IDEA of America envisioned by the Founding Fathers.

If you do nothing else, pray about that and think about what your continued course of action portends for your kids, your grandkids and, more importantly to me, mine.

Dick Bachert

Since I sent this email — to which I received a polite and completely useless computer generated reply — things have only gotten worse as Obama has hoisted the flag of state/corporate socialism even higher up the pole. And the public outrage now bubbling over the top will, I fear, cost GE far more than Jeffery Immelt can know. I pray that America — THE IDEA — will somehow survive Obama. And I pray that an old and venerable firm like GE will somehow survive what I consider to be potentially death-dealing decisions by Jeff Immelt to throw in with the worst occupant of the White House in my 70 years.

Short video on what's REALLY at stake here:
NOWHERE TO HIDE!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvqb_JcAK18

The new crop of “USEFUL IDIOTS.”

Only if one fully understands the One World/New World Order plan can one grasp WHY ostensibly free-enterprise/free market capitalists would climb into bed with a self-confessed progressive/Marxist. Even I had this guy figured out long before November of ‘08. How was it these bright “Captains of Industry/ Masters of the Universe” didn’t?

It helps to know that there are OTHER sorts of “capitalists:” The MONOPOLISTIC/GLOBALIST sort who, because they believe they will be the princes and nobility in the New World Order, are quick to suck up to the new “king.”

What they fail to remember is that all tyrants and would-be tyrants have used others for their evil purposes, only to discard/eliminate them once their usefulness has ended.

SA chief Ernst Rohm, who helped bring Hitler to power, got a bullet in the head in his jail cell when he became a “problem.”

The thugs who captured Russia in 1917 murdered thousands of fellow revolutionaries.

Mao’s history in this area is well known and his sinister legacy lives on in China.

Pol Pot marched thousands into the killing fields.

You get the idea.

Barack Obama has brought more power into DC than Abraham Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson altogether.

You think the MSM shilled for him in 2008? You haven’t seen nothing compared to whats coming.

If DC has ANY say whatsoever..the Rinocratic Oligarchy isn’t going to let their golden boy go anywhere. Neither will they willingly give back ANY power.

We the People have our work cut out. 2008 was a literal drop in the bucket if we intend to have our country back. It will be a multi-election cycle effort that will require well-delineated gains each time. It will start in each of the local election precincts in each state..because the fraud by which Blue-states keep electing Red candidates is rooted in the community.

Most on FreeRepublic can’t begin to imagine the kind of pre-election runup the powers that be are gonna give ‘Bammy...and what’ve you’ve seen dumped on Palin so far...is just a minimum of what’s to come.

Help me out here... This is from your list:
Dan Rosensweig, COO of Yahoo, 2002-2007
Howard Schultz, founder of Starbucks
Terry Semel, CEO of Yahoo, 2001-2007
James Sinegal, CEO of Costco

Why would I punish (i.e. boycott) a company where the Obama supporter is no longer associated with the company? You list two officers of Yahoo who left (forced out I believe) 4 years ago. Some of your listings have not been associated with the company listed for 15 or 16 years?

I don’t have a problem with the current CEOs, I really don’t have a problem with the actions of GE leading to a boycott of that company, but should I boycott Federated because Norman Matthews was associated with the company in 1988?

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