How woke can capitalism get?

I'm guessing, not very. Others are more optimistic

Author

Brad Johnson
February 01, 2022

PRESENTED BY FIVE GREEN SQUARES WORTH MILLIONS OF DOLLARS

Republicans are embracing the fossil-fuel divestment movement, and by “embracing” I mean “reflecting it back through a mirror darkly.” The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is churning out legislation for GOP-run states that divests government holdings in any bank that has any limits on working with fossil-fuel companies. Banks have to submit pledges that they will do business with every fossil-fuel company or be put on a blacklist.

This legislation is so wild that even Smokey Joe Barton, the radical Texan climate denier who apologized to BP during the Deepwater Horizon disaster, wrote a column opposing the Texas version of the bill.

As Sarah Bowman reports in the Indianapolis Star, ALEC’s “woke capitalism” bill has reached Indiana in the form of House bill 1224. It’s headed to the House floor next week.

Langston Hughes, 1925

BUILD BACK BETTER UPDATE: “I think he's gettable. I think we will get him. I think this is going to happen,” said Gina “Wile E. Coyote” Raimondo of Joe “Roadrunner” Manchin.

The League of Conservation Voters and the Democratic climate-coalition group Climate Power held a press call yesterday where Problem (Solvers) Caucus members Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) and Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.) joined Progressive Caucus deputy chair Katie Porter (D-Calif.) and New Democrat chair Suzan DelBene (D-Wash.) to call for passage of some kind of BBB-inspired legislation that “centers climate action.”

Funny thing: Gottheimer and Spanberger are the corporate Democrats who successfully killed Build Back Better’s momentum last year. It’s great seeing House Democrats united, though it would have been nice if they had been doing that when it counted. So it looks like the plan is to work with Acme Corporation, I mean No Labels, to see if some good climate stuff can pass, maybe by throwing in enough polluter subsidies and corporate tax breaks, and removing enough environmental and social justice provisions to appease the billionaires.

To that end, Climate Power is launching “clean energy jobs” television ads as part of one more push for the Build Back Better climate agenda before Biden’s March 1 State of the Union address, with allied groups like LCV, EDF, and NRDC joining in what will be at least a $3 million ad buy this month.

But being a senator who stops Build Back Better pays better than any clean-energy job can.

Manchin “set a personal fundraising record for a non-election year in 2021,” raising more than $4.8 million, much of it from Trump-backing Republican billionaires: Ken Langone, Richard LeFrak, David Fischer, and John Cushman III all chipped in for Manchin. Manchin received nearly $300,000 from corporations and corporate executives after blocking Build Back Better.

And Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) pulled in $1.5 million in the last three months of 2021, with contributions from Langone and GOP oil billionaire Harlan Crow, as well as Fox Corporation, The Carlyle Group, Gilead Sciences, Microsoft, Cigna and the American Petroleum Institute.

So I guess we’ll see!

Students at Brown University are organizing against the expansion of the Koch-backed Political Theory Project. Drew Hudson is the new digital director at Climate Hawks Vote. Wordle went corporate. Applications are open for the 10-week Aspen Tech Policy Hub Climate Cohort in San Francisco this summer. Bolts, a new outlet covering local government, is launching soon. High school curricula, Powered by Amazon. Sharon Block, the climate hawk running OIRA, is leaving.

Oh, and Senate Budget Committee is considering the nominations of Shalanda Young and Nani Coloretti as I hit publish:

Hearings on the Hill:

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