Reply #1: Can't get onto bbv.com to post this... [View All]

... but here's another wrinkle from Illinois:

We've all become accustomed, unfortunately, to public schools with money troubles having to
turn to contracts with junk food manufacturers. Those contracts, meant to enhance brand name
recognition and brand loyalty in exchange for educational essentials, have been the bane of
many parents for some years now. (That corporations aren't paying their fair share of taxes,
thus putting those schools in dire financial straits, is a story for another time.)


In Decatur, IL, Macon County Clerk Steve Bean thinks the concept would work to solve his
problem, too. Bean is currently floating the idea of sponsorship of voting machines,
because his budget and projected HAVA funds are not substantial enough to buy all the
machines required for every precinct in the county.


The other curious aspect of such sponsorship, in which Bean would like to encourage local
corporations, is that the remaining large corporation in the Decatur area is none other than
Archer-Daniels-Midland, known better around the Midwest as that corporation funding the PBS
Nightly News Hour--and as "price-fixer to the world." Indeed, ADM paid record fines for
price-fixing in the `90s, and several of its top executives have gone to prison for crimes
related to that price-fixing and for embezzlement.


It's the free market at work, folks. (Voice-over) "It's 'Let's Make a Vote,' brought to you
by...?"


Cheers.