A Democratic freshman legislator from Wisconsin attended the most recent ALEC gathering in Chicago two weeks ago. Her story gives a great insight into what happens behind those closed doors where the actual legislation is cooked up and served to Republican state legislators across the country. These legislators in turn attempt to run this corporate friendly legislation through the various state legislatures.

One of the most important exchanges takes place between a think tank person and Rep. Taylor:

Taylor: One guy I was talking to, who was from one of these right wing think tanks was saying we need to curb Obama’s reckless power with these administrative regulations, and he wanted a federal constitutional amendment saying Congress has to approve federal regulations. I said, I don’t think most people are going to want to amend the Constitution for that. I don’t think that ignites people. Maybe it does on the far right, but most people don’t really care about that. And he said, “Oh, well, you really don’t need people to do this. You just need control over the legislature and you need money, and we have both.” [italics BFIA’s]

That sentiment was underscored so many times to me, that they don’t want people involved in the political process, or in the policy process. And that seems to be the intent in a lot of ways: You have a think tank in every state and all they do is come up with these very, very regressive policies, you have corporations who are going to benefit so they fund it all, and then you have the legislators as your foot soldiers to carry out the tasks.

Read the interview here: