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Astroturf Telecom Groups Exposed

New from the media reform team at Common Cause:

Back in March, Common Cause released its first "Wolves in Sheep's Clothing" report, detailing the activities of nine groups masquerading as think tanks and public interest organizations, but controlled by telephone and cable companies. Since then, we've gotten the dirt on five more.

For example, Hands off the Internet sounds like activists wanting to protect the Internet. Actually, it's a telecommunications industry-backed organization that was spending $20,000 a day on television commercials aimed at eliminating long-standing net neutrality protections so that telephone and cable companies can maximize profit and minimize competition on the Internet.

These groups have managed to convince some members of Congress (with, just possibly, a nudge and a wink) that they enjoy public support. The Common Cause website allows people to go on the record and tell their Senators they oppose the telecom reform bill, which is, to quote CC, is "riddled with giveaways to the phone and cable companies."

See the new report here.

Posted by Julian Brookes on 08/10/06 at 10:32 AM | E-mail | Print

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