Quotes:
Jobs, Jobs and Cars - NYTimes.com
- A big report in The Times last Sunday laid out the facts. Although Apple is now America's biggest U.S. corporation as measured by market value, it employs only 43,000 people in the United States, a tenth as many as General Motors employed when it was the largest American firm.
- And Chinese manufacturing isn't the only conspicuous example of these advantages in the modern world. Germany remains a highly successful exporter even with workers who cost, on average, $44 an hour — much more than the average cost of American workers. And this success has a lot to do with the support its small and medium-sized companies — the famed Mittelstand — provide to each other via shared suppliers and the maintenance of a skilled work force.
- He got his facts wrong, but he did, unintentionally, manage to highlight an important philosophical difference between the parties. One side believes that economies succeed solely thanks to heroic entrepreneurs; the other has nothing against entrepreneurs, but believes that entrepreneurs need a supportive environment, and that sometimes government has to help create or sustain that supportive environment.
- And the view that it takes more than business heroes is the one that fits the facts.
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Common Cause Uncloaked the Kochs, raising the veil of secrecy around Charles and David Koch, billionaire brothers who, while amassing one of America's largest fortunes, built and fund a vast political network that actively undermines the public interest in a cleaner environment, health care reform, energy independence and climate change. Common Cause helped convene national media and 1,500 peaceful activists outside of a Koch secretive political strategy session near Palm Springs, Calif., and continues to highlight the brothers as poster children for the dangers of self-interested corporate money in our democracy. 
Common Cause Maryland played a lead role in helping to pass legislation requiring corporations and unions that spend $10,000 or more to elect or defeat a candidate or ballot initiative to report that spending. The same bill also contained a first-in-the-nation provision requiring corporations and unions to let their shareholder or members know about their spending. Both provisions are models for other states seeking to mitigate the influence of corporate money in elections in the wake of the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision. (At left, Common Cause Maryland Executive Director Susan Wichmann--top row, middle--stands with Gov. Martin O'Malley and lawmakers at the bill signing ceremony.)
In Colorado and California, Common Cause joined coalition partners to pass measures calling for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution stating that corporations are not people. In Boulder, Colorado, a ballot measure passed with 74 percent of the vote. In Los Angeles, the city council passed a similar resolution. 
Seeking to increase participation and engage new audiences, Common Cause expanded outreach efforts to target younger generations whose voices are integral to national debates. As a sponsor of Power Shift, the nation's largest grassroots training weekend, Common Cause engaged nearly 10,000 activists on issues like the connections between environmental policy and the corrupting influence of money in politics. Common Cause brought its message through educational workshops, group and individual engagement, and in a direct action at the Washington, D.C. headquarters of BP, where details about climate change and corporate political spending created a powerful platform for protest. Common Cause is committed to reaching out to younger people across the country, and through the support of individual donors, we hired our first national youth outreach coordinator. 
