Long story short: tell President Biden to show less "flexibility" with Republicans on his infrastructure package, tell your cable provider to stop carrying the Fox News (sic) Channel, tell big corporations to stop funding police foundations, tell Disney to stop using facial recognition software, tell big airline corporations to refund folks who didn't use their tickets in a pandemic, and tell the American Dental Association to stop donating to Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ). I've provided President Biden's phone number below for the first alert, and email/petition links for the others. Good hunting!
Yesterday we learned that President Biden seemed amenable to passing infrastructure/jobs legislation more like Republicans would like. Was he waffling? Was he doing pro forma meetings with Republicans? Was he playing them in yet another game of 19-dimensional chess? The answer doesn't matter. Here's what matters: we call President Biden, at 202.456.1111, and tell him do not pander to Republicans on his signature infrastructure/jobs legislation. This way, we change the story from "what's President Biden going to do?" to what we're going to do. And if enough of us communicate our will to our President, he'll hear it, if for no other reason that some staffer in the White House is going to be sick of all these phone calls. (And if you tell him you want the corporate tax rate to go higher -- say, to 55%, where it was in the '50s -- well, what's the harm in that?)
Consumers United for Fairness helps you tell your cable corporation to stop carrying Fox News. I've said it many times: even if you're not watching Fox News, you're still paying for it, and even if you make the cable company come out and block Fox News, you're still paying for it, and they'll never change their ways until we take away their money, particularly that pile of passive money they get from every cable TV subscriber in America. Seriously, $2 a month per account adds up -- and starving the beast of that $2 a month per account will also add up. Yeah, we finally cut the cord last year, but not everyone will do that, particularly if they like their HGTV and their ESPN and their Comedy Central. We've got the power, so let's use it. (And if anyone bellows TEH FREE SPEECHEZ!!!! at you over this, kindly direct them to the "$2 a month per account" phrase above.)
Sum of Us helps you tell big corporations like Starbucks, Target, and Coca-Cola to stop funding police foundations. Why? Isn't that, like, civic duty or something? Except that police foundations usually get the military weapons and surveillance tech for police departments, which they use to attack protestors and single out folks of color. So it's the opposite of civic duty, actually. And these corporations are trying to appear "woke"! Why, it's enough to make you suspicious of corporate PR! But we've got the Big Stick of Bad PR ourselves, plus the power to stop patronizing these establishments, which even in our monopolistic era ain't as hard as they'd like you to think. So let's do that.
Fight for the Future helps you tell Disney to stop using facial recognition software at their theme parks. Yeah, they say they've started "testing" that software at their Magic Kingdoms, but how much more testing do we need to do? We already know that facial recognition software not only intrudes on our privacy but can't tell Black folks apart any better than your Tea Party uncle can, plus it creates another pile of data most corporations have already proven they can't (or won't!) secure, so hackers can steal it. So it's evil and it's useless -- and useless in a way that makes it more evil. Surely Disney World has more to offer the world than that! And the Big Stick of Bad PR may help them remember that, so let's wield it.
Penn PIRG helps you tell big airline corporations to refund good Americans for all those plane tickets they cancelled in 2020. Too many Americans got vouchers, not refunds, and those vouchers have expiration dates, but the pandemic's still going on, so why should they be punished for continuing to make the right choice? Too often, in this sick, immoral, and decadent civilization, we punish people for doing the right thing and reward them for doing the wrong thing; how about we stop doing that in this instance? If it seems like it might not make that much of a difference to our posterity, rest assured that every time we reward the righteous and punish evil, we make a difference to our posterity. I've seen it happen enough times to know it's worth doing, but every day we must make an example of our good works -- and our good hearts! -- to others. It sure is better than cynicism, I tell you what.
Finally, the Juggernaut Project helps you tell the American Dental Association to stop donating to Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ). They donate to him, I presume, because he's a dentist! Not just any dentist, either, but a member of the Arizona Dental Association's Hall of Fame! No, really, I'm not kidding. Sadly, Rep. Gosar has made a name for himself for other reasons -- for being one of the ringleaders of the Congressional effort to overturn the 2020 Presidential election (including the attempted coup of January 6!), and for making nice with white supremacists at the America First PAC meeting the next month. Dentistry Hall of Fame or no, this is one character you don't want soiling your good name -- a fact six of his nine siblings have taken to heart by endorsing his opponent in his 2018 and 2020 House races! If they can do it, surely the ADA can, too.
UPDATE. I am sorry to say the White House phone number is not working today; try the White House's contact link instead.
ANOTHER UPDATE. I wish I'd remembered that Fox News actually charges around $2/month in carrier fees to the big cable corporations, not 75¢/month, as it was many years ago; I've corrected the error above.
Comments