Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
Big business loves big government and the Tea Party’s effort to reduce the size and scope of government threatens the revenue streams of some of the biggest companies in the country.
The possibility of losing access and money is a major reason for the coordinated attacks against the Tea Party by establishment Republicans and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, as well as the new effort created by former establishment Republican Steve LaTourette from Ohio.
LaTourette created an elaborate infrastructure including a nonprofit and lobbying firm to profit from special interests including labor unions and big businesses that want to end the Tea Party’s uprising.
In a previous post, I described the hypocrisy of LaTourette’s advocacy effort.
Of course, the fight for the soul of the Republican Party is a major media story and a recent New York Times article, “Tangled Role in G.O.P. War Over Tea Party,” exposed LaTourette’s network of organizations to defend the status quo.
While LaTourette claims his fight against the Tea Party is philosophical, I believe his motivation is based on generating a big source of income as my quote in the story states:
“This is not about some high-minded political ideas,” said Tom Borelli, a senior fellow at Freedom Works. “This is a sophisticated get-rich-quick scheme.”
My belief about his real motivation to fight the Tea Party was bolstered by a National Journal story, “Guess Who’s Funding the Republican Civil War,” that revealed labor unions were funding LaTourette’s Defending Main Street PAC.
The Republican Main Street Partnership has emerged as an outspoken, deep-pocketed player in pro-business GOP plans to beat back tea-party challengers next year. But the group’s new super PAC has an unexpected source for its seed money: labor unions.
The super PAC, called Defending Main Street, has not yet submitted a major donor disclosure to the Federal Election Commission. But documents filed by other groups show that two labor organizations, the International Union of Operating Engineers and the Laborers’ International Union of North America, directed a combined $400,000 to the Republican group in September and October.
Main Street says it has raised roughly $2 million total between its super PAC and an affiliated nonprofit group so far—and that means labor has supplied at least 20 percent of those funds.
The Tea Party has collected a powerful array of enemies that are extremely worried about losing control of the inside Washington, D.C. power structure. LaTourette is merely a political opportunist looking to profit from keeping big government big.
