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Jim Hightower
"No matter how cynical you get, it's almost impossible to keep up." -- Lily Tomlin
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Hightower Lowdown:
Big biz wants to own the information superhighway while We the People bump along the backroads
In the 1970s, Lily Tomlin developed an iconic comic character she named Ernestine--a telephone clerk who took perverse pleasure from hectoring customers. Her character was a perfect portrayal of the arrogance of AT&T, the monopolistic telephone giant of that day. In one skit on on the TV show, Laugh-In, Tomlin had Ernestine delivering a TV pitch for the corporation:
"A gracious hello," she cheerfully began, speaking directly into the camera. "Here at the Phone Company, we handle 84 billion calls a year. So, we realize that every so often, you can't get an operator, or for no apparent reason your phone goes out of order, or perhaps you get charged for a call you didn't make. We don't care!"
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The General Store
There's Nothing in the Middle of the Road but Yellow Stripes and Dead Armadillos
"I make a lot of money these days speaking to corporations, so I'd really prefer not to admit how...
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Thieves in High Places - Hardback
America is at an historic divide between rulers and rulees and the rulees are restless. Hightower...
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Let's Stop Beating Around the Bush
It's time to make politics fun again! With uncommon insight, political fearlessness and laugh-out...
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Have a gander at the whole store here...
STAMPING OUT THE FREE PRESS
At last, Washington officials are doing something about the problem of corporate control of America's media sources. Unfortunately, what they're doing will make the problem worse.
The culprit is the U.S. Postal Service, which is now a corporation rather than a government agency. It is presently changing what it charges for mailing publications, doing so in a way that reverses 215 years of postal policy.
From Jefferson and Madison forward, a bedrock principle of the post office has been to use mailing rates as a means of encouraging a free press. Rates for smaller publications have always been cheaper to help them get started and survive. The idea is to stimulate competition and keep the flow of ideas open.
Now, however, the postal corporation has proposed a rate increase that'll sock smaller periodicals with a hike of up to 30 percent, while letting the largest and richest publishers skate by with a hike of less than 10 percent. Mailing is the highest expense for most small publications, so this skewed rate structure threatens their very existence.
Guess who drafted this new rate scheme. Time Warner, the largest magazine publisher in the country. Small publishers were not consulted, there were no public hearings, and not even Congress was asked about it.
Throughout our history, it's been the sassy, iconoclastic publications outside the conglomerate structure that have often provided the sharpest analysis and most original journalism. America desperately needs them. This is not a left-wing or right-wing issue – it’s a democracy issue.
This is Jim Hightower saying... The perverted rate policy is scheduled to be imposed on July 15 – but there's still time to demand congressional action. Rep. Danny Davis chairs the post office oversight committee in congress. Ask him to stand against Time Warner... and for a free press: 202-225-5051
www.stoppostalratehikes.com