The Powell Legacy, As It Continues

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

When I last mentioned Lewis Powell's now-infamous memorandum, I did so in a fairly limited scope, in explaining the silliness that might be behind the IRS investigation. I also found and quoted excerpts from a book, Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer—And Turned Its Back on the Middle Class by Jacob S. Hacker & Paul Pierson. I've since read that book, and just in time for Money And Ethics In Politics month! If you want a good run-down on the real story of how money got into politics in such unprecedented amounts, start with Mr. Powell's Memo, then head over to Hacker and Pierson's book.

Here, I'll try to give a brief run-down and show some irony in the results Mr. Powell may have unleashed on our society.

---

First, the run-down. Late last year I noted that something big seems to have happened to the United States in 1980. Simply too many economic indicators—from the comparison between productivity and compensation, to the number of good jobs available to college graduates, to union membership as a percentage of the work force—took a nose dive after 1980. I suggested the Baby Boom cohort's entry into the workplace had a significant impact (which I still maintain). What I missed, according to Hacker and Pierson, was the sheer volume of money corrupting the democratic process from the early 1970s onward, a progression of warping influence that finally out-paced more progressive forces in 1978.

As an instructive example, the authors note a famous Hillary, this one Edmund, the first Westerner to reach the summit of Mt. Everest. We more seldom hear of his companion in that climb, Tenzing Norgay, a sherpa that accompanied Hillary all the way to the top of the world. And we certainly never hear about the thousands of other people below Hillary that made their ascent possible, including bearers that stocked the route upward with supplies in advance of the summit attempt and the hundreds that waited at the highest base camp for Hillary and Norgay to return. Without those thousands, it is highly unlikely that Sir Edmund would have made summit at all.

Likewise, though the conservative cheering squad cite President Reagan as the force that changed everything in 1980, the organizational power and money that put Mr. Reagan in office really did the changing to our fair country, and continues to do so today. And that organization started with men like Lewis Powell pointing the way. The evidence of this organization can be found in the numbers for all who care to look. Take once again, by way of reintroduction, Mr. Powell's call for the US Chamber of Commerce to "consider assuming a broader and more vigorous role in the political arena."

Business must learn the lesson, long ago learned by labor and other self-interest groups. This is the lesson that political power is necessary; that such power must be assidously (sic) cultivated; and that when necessary, it must be used aggressively and with determination — without embarrassment and without the reluctance which has been so characteristic of American business.

His call was headed, as the evidence suggests. Hacker and Pierson note that to win, conservative activists "needed to nurture a generation of conservative idea merchants. And to do that they needed to build idea factories, rapidly and on a massive scale." They did, working "with corporations and wealthy conservative families to build an industry of new foundations and think tanks":

Some, like the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), sought to create a mirror image of traditional policy shops like the mildly liberal Brookings Institution. . . .

Over the course of the 1970s, this project was enormously successful. The AEI, which had one-tenth the budget of Brookings in 1970, was roughly the same size by 1980. The Heritage Foundation was born in 1973. Backed by money from beer magnate Joseph Coors and the Sarah Mellon Scaife Foundation, it had equaled the size of AEI and Brookings by the early 1980s. Arguably, the reach of an outfit like Heritage was far greater, for it devoted far more energy than its traditional counterparts to proselytizing. Brookings spent less than one-twentieth of its budget on public relations and outreach; Heritage, around a fifth.

And that spending was unabashedly directed at pushing conservative ideas into the mainstream and, specifically, into the hands of the GOP.

(Jacob S. Hacker & Paul Pierson, Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer—And Turned Its Back on the Middle Class, Simon & Schuster, 2010, pp. 123-124.)

How much money are we talking about? In his book Blinded by the Right, David Brock gives some rough numbers: "According to calculations made by the Washington Post, Scaife gave more than $200 million to conservative institutions between 1974 and 1992. . . ." (Brock, Blinded by the Right, Three Rivers Press, 2002, p. 87, emphasis mine.) Though Scaife was, according to Brock, "the most important single figure in building the modern conservative movement and spreading its ideas into the political realm," he was far from alone.

This massive organization building finally started to fruit just before 1980. Hacker and Pierson note the first major casualty year for the progressive movement in 1978. In that year, a Democratic House, Senate and President could not pass two widely-popular and widely-supported bills into law, one a tax increase on richer citizens and the other a codification of law affecting union organization. The built organization of the right had stymied passage of both, and energized givers and organizers to tackle even larger targets.

---

Here, I'd like to reiterate my portrayal of these forces as "corporatist" as opposed to intellectually "conservative." Nothing in the organizational forces Powell inspired cared much for small government per se. Note Reagan's massive military build-up as proof. No, when Scaife gave that money, he was making an investment in his future, the size and scope of government be damned. In 1974, the first year Brock notes Scaife giving money to institutes like Heritage, the top income tax bracket was 70%. By 1992, the last year Brock notes, it was down to 31%. When one includes other legislation that re-categorizes income and allows for enormous tax breaks (legislation all pushed by the same forces over time, again, funded by the very people what would benefit the most from them), that top tax bracket has fallen precipitously.

Which leaves more money in the hands of the top fraction of the top 1% to invest in continuing to fund programs that funnels more money into the hands of the top fraction of the top 1%. Rinse, lather, repeat.

This creeping corporatism is a process. Money from the top undermines legislation and regulation, allowing more money to accumulate at the top later.

And what does the so-called "free market" have to say about all of this? Ah, see, the simple concept of a free market is part of the propaganda spewed by these funded mouthpiece outlets. 100 years ago, a more pragmatic theory was popular, that of "legal realism," which challenged more classical market theory today once again so prevalent. Teddy Roosevelt put it nicely: "Corporate expenditures for political purposes, and especially such expenditures by public service corporations, have supplied one of the principal sources of corruption in our political affairs."

Echoing this seemingly lost observation, the Winner-Take-All authors note, "The libertarian vision of a night-watchman state gently policing an unfettered free market is a philosophical conceit, not a description of reality." Why?

Governments do redistribute what people earn. But government policies also shape what people earn in the first place, as well as many other fundamental economic decisions that consumers, businesses, and workers make. Practically every aspect of labor and financial markets is shaped by government policy, for good or ill. . . .

[Thus] the treatment of the market as some pre-political state of nature is a fiction. Politicians are there at the creation, shaping that "natural" order and what the market rewards. Beginning in the late 1970s, they helped shape it so more and more of the rewards would go to the top.

(Hacker & Pierson, ibid., pp. 55-56.)

---

Yes, the quote notes that the policies and regulations are the result of "politicians," and here I've been discussing some shadow organization. Isn't there a disconnect there? Of course not. How do you think the organizations exert their control? It's through the politicians, who finance the candidates they wish to succeed. And they chose mostly GOP pro-business candidates.

Beginning in the 1970s, first unions and then (on a much larger scale) business groups formed PACs and began to channel unprecedented amounts of money into campaigns. In 1976, there were 224 labor PACs, a number the would increase modestly to 261 a decade later. Over the same period, corporate and trade PACs increased from 922 to 2,182. Both sides ramped up spending over the period, but throughout the decade, trade and corporate PACs were able to outspend labor two or three to one.

(Hacker & Pierson, ibid., p. 171, me again going boldly.)

For a real-world example, take 1982. Yes, Reagan was President; what most people don't remember, though, was that people were sick to death of Reaganomics. A mid-term rout of the GOP was in the offing. What's troubling to Hacker & Pierson, though, was the fact that, although GOP lost members in that election, the public opinion polls, when correlated with past elections, dictated that they should have lost a lot more. The reason? Organization.

What saved the GOP [during the 1982 mid-term rout] was its pronounced organizational edge. The decisive races involved those where credible Democratic challengers confronted vulnerable Republicans. It was here that the organizational resources of the parties came into play. The Republican national committees—the RNC and the House and Senate campaign committees—were able to raise over six times as much as their Democratic counterparts, and they contributed almost six times as much to individual House and Senate candidates.

(Hacker & Pierson, ibid., p. 166.)

In fact, things were looking bleak for Democrats, and had for years:

Democrats effectively had no organization. In July 1982, just months before the Democrats' best shot to derail Republican momentum, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) was so broke it was forced to lay off fifteen people from its ninety-member staff. Candidates had to rely on the money they raised themselves. Much of it ended up being wasted by powerful incumbents who didn't need the help.

(Hacker & Pierson, ibid., p. 166.)

In 1982, in fact, the DNC was still paying off old campaign debts they had incurred . . . for the election in 1968!

Over time, a few Democrats positioned themselves as "business Democrats" to better attract that sweet, sweet campaign cash. Thus money skewed the politicians' priorities (or perhaps "focused" them would be a better choice of words). One researcher, Larry Bartels at Princeton, looked into what politicians did and how their constituents felt should be done. It turns out the politicians did what the wealthy third they represented felt.

Bartels looked at how closely aligned with voters U.S. senators were on key votes in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It turns out there is a pretty high degree of congruence between senators' positions and the opinions of their constituents—at least when those constituents are in the top third of the income distribution. For constituents in the middle third of the income distribution, the correspondence is much weaker, and for those in the bottom third, it is actually negative. (Yes, when the poorest people in a state support a policy, their senators are less likely to vote for it.)

(Hacker & Pierson, ibid., p. 111, I emboldened what should be obvious.)

---

So we have money skewing policy toward those that have it and, most importantly, away from those who don't. Fine. I'm sure the number of people thinking this is a good idea is growing, yes?

No. Take union membership.

The conventional view is that American labor's collapse was inevitable and natural, driven by global economic changes that have swept unions aside everywhere. But a quick glance abroad indicates that extreme union decline was not foreordained. While unions have indeed lost members in many Western nations (from a much stronger starting position), their presence has fallen little or not at all in others. In the European Union, union density fell by less than a third between 1970 and 2003. In the Untied States, despite starting from much lower levels, it fell by nearly half. Yet we do not need to gaze across the Atlantic to see a very different picture of union fortunes. In Canada, where the rate of unionization was nearly identical to the United States' a few decades ago, unions have seen little decline despite similar worker attitudes toward unions in the two nations.



If economic forces did not dictate the implosion of American unions, perhaps American workers have simply lost interest in joining unions. Wrong again. In fact, nonunionized workers have expressed an increasing desire to be unionized since the early 1980s. In 2005, more than half of nonunionized private-sector workers said they wanted a union in their workplace, up from around 30 percent in 1984. Compared with other rich democracies, the United States stands out as the country with the greatest unfulfilled demand for union representation.

(Hacker & Pierson, ibid., pp. 57-58. I big bad bolded. Graph source here.)

Okay, people want unions just as the likelihood that they can get a job with such representation is falling. What about the bugaboo of dreaded wealth redistribution? Aren't people fine with the wealthy keeping their booty? No again. Though "as measured by roll-call votes, the already dramatic rate of rightward movement in the GOP has actually accelerated in the past two election cycles (Hacker & Pierson, ibid., p. 264), today about "half of Americans advocate heavy taxation of the rich in order to redistribute wealth, a higher percentage than was the case in 1939." (How could I not underline?!?) Further, polling on the public mood finds that "in 2004, the public mood was more liberal than at any point since 1961." (Hacker & Pierson, ibid., footnote.)

So the non-moneyed are skewing left, just as the monied drive policy right. The media, bought by those monied few with every commercial interruption, fall into the same pattern and fail to even note these simple facts.

On that note, I'll let President Kennedy have the last prediction:

"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."

Comments

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Compared with other rich democracies, the United States stands out as the country with the greatest unfulfilled demand for union representation.

What demand?

The problem with your timetable is that it's picking a date arbitrarily to make a point about those evil, evil rich peoplecorporatists. Why, it must have been 1980 (even though the trend for union decline started in the 1960s and has not necessarily accelerated over time), or maybe a hair earlier based on the opinion of one guy who effectively fell out of favor with the guy he's attacking (http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2004/09/republican-noise-machine). People with an acrimonious split are always excellent sources on each other, after all.

I've loved a lot of your early posts, but these are getting more and more conspiratorial.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

What demand?

From people. People who work. As in, " In 2005, more than half of nonunionized private-sector workers said they wanted a union in their workplace, up from around 30 percent in 1984." You know, from the OP. You read it, right?

Why, it must have been 1980 (even though the trend for union decline started in the 1960s and has not necessarily accelerated over time). . . .

The graphed comparison with Canada, with a similar population distribution, shows that now you're just making stuff up.

People with an acrimonious split are always excellent sources on each other, after all.

Often, yes. Brock also happens to document what he says.

I've loved a lot of your early posts, but these are getting more and more conspiratorial.

I thought about including more supporting information to back the claims I made, but that would pretty much be a transcript of the book, when I was just going for a book report. The "conspiratorial" nature of what Hacker & Pierson lies not in their reporting, but in the well-funded organizational impetus driving the changes I only noted earlier.

And again, I don't think noting why our country has apparently shifted from its former path is in any way conspiratorial. People with wealth want to keep more of it, so they fund organizations (with donations that are a matter of record) to help them do just that. Over time, politics shifts and opinions drift, enough that more people with money keep more of it after taxes. Not a conspiracy. No lizard overlords, no weird Judeo-negroid coalition needed.

Or are you just bitter that I I included quotes that called out the Libertarian philosophy as bollocks?

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Or are you just bitter that I I included quotes that called out the Libertarian philosophy as bollocks?

Ding, ding, ding. We have a winner.

[comeonyouspurs.livejournal.com]

peristaltor loses points for referring to libertarianism as a "philosophy".

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

Ooh! You're right! "Philosophy" literally means "lover of knowledge," and we all know libertarians ain't ones of those.

My bad.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

Corporatism is not libertarian philosophy, so the only thing bollocks here is that claim.

Also, liberals/socialists have been running the schools for a lot longer, so they're much more of an influence on society.

[vehemencet-t.livejournal.com]

Could you please explain how exactly U.S. "libertarianism" (perhaps defining the school of which you refer to as welll) would effectively prevent corporatism as it leaves capitalism and its intrinsic effects upon society intact?

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

The only thing that can prevent evil is people actively opposing it. No system can ever prevent evil or progress towards evil. Adherents to libertarianism are more likely to prevent the negative things that capitalism allows for (note, does not create) as they would be following the maxim of no initiation of coercion.
http://laissez-fairerepublic.com/libertar.htm

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

The only thing that can prevent evil is people actively opposing it.

And since either good or evil (or any action supposedly within a continuum of either) are purely arbitrary designated by the observer, the act of prevention is likewise arbitrary and therefore impossible to determine as to efficacy.

Bummer. Even sadder for the libertarian, "coercion" (as defined by a libertarian, at least) likewise has no intrinsic meaning. Like "evil" it is a word devoid of existence outside the observer.

Double bummer.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

And since either good or evil (or any action supposedly within a continuum of either) are purely arbitrary designated by the observer

That would certainly hinder your ability to prevent evil.

Even sadder for the libertarian, "coercion" (as defined by a libertarian, at least) likewise has no intrinsic meaning.

That would help explain why you can't grok libertarianism.

I pity you.

[vehemencet-t.livejournal.com]

Except that the kinds of detriment (I, likewise, agree with Peristaltor that evil is a meaningless term without a universally applicable definition beyond my personal preferences) that I refer to and which I believe we would both oppose on principle can be prevented or curtailed far better than they are under the current system, by abolishing and changing the conditions and institutions which *enable* them, or even (such as capitalism) encourage and reward them, to so consistently arise over and over again like a bad dream.

From what I have heard/read many libertarians to advocate, they desire to go back even to before the anti-trust reforms era and free business entirely to embrace a laissez-faire economic system so that deregulated competition can ensure quality and people can succeed on their merits and hard work in a truly "free market".

However, because this still leaves the theft which is private property fully intact as well as the profit motive as central for societal production and individual growth, little is changed, and much is made worse. Corporate espionage, private mercenaries, cartels, cuthroat competition, consumer deception, sacrificing the environment, safety, quality, etc. for the sake of profit and covering it up afterwards, all remain and, in fact, would surely increase as they could be done without impunity or fear of government harassment/penalty.

You claim there would be no "initiation of force". So what, practically, would exist to prevent a corporation from driving off the indigenous inhabitants of a resource-rich space that the company wants to develop but the people insist must not happen? Do they, realistically, pack up their things and say 'oh well'. Or do they hire mercenaries quietly and drive them off that land? Or send in missionaries to "educate/convert them" and hope they are abandon their traditional ways and will be more compliant? Or any number of dirty, underhanded tactics.

What happens when destitute people who for, whatever reason, cannot seem to succeed in the artificial cuthroat competitive labor market, get together and decide to set up libertarian socialist enclaves on unused lands, ignoring whoever claims to own that "private property" and grow food and such? Are they simply left alone even though they are "violating someone's property" or is force not "initiated" against them. Or is that actually retaliatory force, even though they have not demonstrated violence (yet) of any kind by merely making unused land useful to their unaddressed needs?

Libertarianism, as expressed by those like you, had many of the same problems that the current system encapsulates. It fails to address these problems in a practical, realistic or desirable way that benefits everyone. Instead those who already have, would simply have MORE. Those who have not, would have LESS.

http://www.infoshop.org/AnarchistFAQSectionB3

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

I, likewise, agree with Peristaltor that evil is a meaningless term without a universally applicable definition beyond my personal preferences

Of course. However, there is one. And people do know what it is, even if they don't want to admit it. Sure, there are people who try to expand the definition beyond what it really is, but that's a different problem, and doesn't imply that there isn't a universal definition at all.

You claim there would be no "initiation of force"

No, I claim that a system with only people who adhere to the principle of no initiation of force will produce a better outcome than any system that tries to enforce a morality from the outside.

So what, practically, would exist to prevent a corporation from driving off the indigenous inhabitants of a resource-rich space that the company wants to develop but the people insist must not happen?

Such a corporation would not exist, that's the point. Since it would require the people in the corporation to initiate force, and they don't believe in initiating force, your scenario is a logical contradiction and thus can't occur.

Or send in missionaries to "educate/convert them" and hope they are abandon their traditional ways and will be more compliant?

They might try to do this, but so what if they do? As long as there's no force involved, I don't see a problem with that tactic.

What happens when destitute people who for, whatever reason, cannot seem to succeed in the artificial cuthroat competitive labor market

Well, you're assuming the artificial cuthroat competitive labor market, which isn't a good assumption.

set up libertarian socialist enclaves on unused lands, ignoring whoever claims to own that "private property" and grow food and such?

If someone owns the land, then they are trespassing, and the same thing would happen then as it does now. They'd be kicked off the land, and yes, this would be retaliatory force. Or they could try to reach an arrangement with the owner, since he's not using the land.

You're just showing why anarchy will never work in the real world with any group larger than maybe a few hundred people.

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

And they're under your bed right now!

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

Corporatism is not libertarian philosophy. . . .

Cool your jets, Sunshine. I was referring to a specific quote from the book regarding libertarian philosophy, not conflating the two.

Also, liberals/socialists have been running the schools for a lot longer. . . .

That's what Mr. Powell claimed, as well. At one point in our history, it may even have been true; but forty years of purging can change a school.

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

From people. People who work. As in, " In 2005, more than half of nonunionized private-sector workers said they wanted a union in their workplace, up from around 30 percent in 1984." You know, from the OP. You read it, right?

Yes, I did. This demand does not materialize because, while they may want to see a union in their workplace, they themselves do not want to unionize. The demand is misread.

The graphed comparison with Canada, with a similar population distribution, shows that now you're just making stuff up.

Canada is not the United States.

Often, yes. Brock also happens to document what he says.

Good for him. My point stands.

And again, I don't think noting why our country has apparently shifted from its former path is in any way conspiratorial.

What if this is our default path, and the 1940s-1960 were the outlier?

Or are you just bitter that I I included quotes that called out the Libertarian philosophy as bollocks?

I don't see where you've done this.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

. . . they themselves do not want to cannot unionize.

FTFY.

Canada is not the United States.

Duh. The two countries are, however, quite similar, similar enough that noting their divergences (and why they might diverge) proves instructive.

What if this is our default path, and the 1940s-1960 were the outlier?

(See comment on Canada.)

I don't see where you've done this.

From the OP: "The libertarian vision of a night-watchman state gently policing an unfettered free market is a philosophical conceit, not a description of reality."

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

FTFY.

No, they can. The law is very clear on this matter, that unionization is encouraged by the government and employers are not allowed to opt out. And without a national right to work situation combined with the NLRA forcing union represnetation on people who are not in the union but in a unionized workplace, the rest of us who don't want anything to do with it are left with no recourse.

Duh. The two countries are, however, quite similar, similar enough that noting their divergences (and why they might diverge) proves instructive.

They're not really that similar. We border each other, but our relationship with the government is different, our independence values are different, etc.

From the OP: "The libertarian vision of a night-watchman state gently policing an unfettered free market is a philosophical conceit, not a description of reality."

Right. I've not seen this "conceit," nor has this really happened to prove in either direction.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

No, they can.

No, they can't, not in all states. The book was very clear about a provision in the Taft-Hartley Act, "the famous 14(b) provision," "where unions were barred from making union membership a condition of employment in a firm or industry."

I live in one such state. I also work in a union shop, and can say from experience that I do not need to give dues, by state law. If I so opt, I can refuse union representation, and an equal amount can be donated directly from my paycheck to a charity of my choosing. While that might seem like a moot point, if enough workers did so the union would be effectively de-funded.

Over time, the authors also noted a shift in development with factories getting built in union neutral states and neglected in pro-union states. Think of Detroit's neglect and the rise of auto assembly in the Southern states. Furthermore, the authors note "the rise of much more aggressive employer tactics to block union organizing."

Between 1960 and 1980, there was a fourfold increase in charges of unfair labor practices, a threefold rise in charges of unlawful termination, and a fivefold increase in workers awarded back pay or granted reinstatement orders. These stunning figures suggest that employers increasingly saw such practices as simply costs of doing business, and far preferable to successful unionization. Moreover, the shift in climate was almost certainly greater than the massive rise in violations suggested, since they took place at a time when employers (backed by the new industry of union-avoidance consultants) were deploying increasingly sophisticated techniques to punish organizers without appearing to violate the law.

(Hacker & Pierson, ibid., p. 128.)

[vehemencet-t.livejournal.com]

Do you know how annoying it is to have someone cry you are being conspiratorial when you say people actually get together to try to make things go their way, even to the detriment of everybody else? Its as if you completely missed human history, which is that happening over and over again, and think things just spontaneously happen this way without any planning (sometimes, gasp, in secret) ot effort.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

Yes. Yes I do. ;-)

It's like I stepped in something nasty and can't scrape it off my shoe.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

WAAYYYY OFF TOPIC...


We more seldom hear of his companion in that climb, Tenzing Norgay, a sherpa that accompanied Hillary all the way to the top of the world.

Do others find that true, it's always spoken of here as Hillary and Tenzing... Of course, only Hillary got his mug on a bank note, but I'm guessing in the 60s it was only Hillary here too.

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

Where is this more enlightened place? 'Cause I can assure you that reading that book was the first I heard of Norgay, and Sir Ed is practically royalty in mountain climbin' land around here.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

Australia... I'm not sure if it's generational and only started in the 90s. I've always known of Hillary, he's a folk hero here (he's a kiwi, and we all know any kiwi who does anything good is actually an Australian :P). It was in my teens that I first read about the story from a historical perspective and Tenzing was in that. It's common enough knowledge that there were comedy sketches in the 90s that used him in jokes as Hillary's sidekick. That could be where the knowledge comes from though :P

But yeah, I haven't heard of Hillary referred to on his own in over a decade, unless it's talking about him. Even then, they'll say something like "Hillary, who along with Sherpa Tenzing, was the first person to summit Everest". There's still all kinds of colonialist colouring to that history, but Tenzing is visible at least. I've heard and seen several programmes that are actually about or include using Tenzing as a narrative for colonialism. One this year was actually about all the other sherpas, followed by a programme about the sherpa people themselves.

We have a good public broadcaster :P

[peristaltor.livejournal.com]

It sounds like your ABC beats the living crap out of our ABC in terms of quality. And our NBC, our CBS, our FOX, our CNN. . . .

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

The ABC is closer to PBS than ABC, it's not commercial.

I used to be quite Libertarian in my youth, the ABC is one of the things that brought me 'round from that. I saw how important it was to society to have mass media that was uninfluenced by commercial interests.