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Kate Epstein: kepstein@jd13.law.harvard.edu
This Saturday, April 13, 2013 at Harvard Law School, Cambridge, MA: "Deep Capture: Psychology, Public Relations, Democracy, and Law"
"Deep Capture: Psychology, Public Relations, Democracy, and Law" is an conference Saturday April 13, 2013, at Harvard Law School organized by the Harvard Law School National Lawyers Guild & The Project on Law and Mind Sciences
Public relations firms, working on behalf of both governments and market actors, manage public opinion for their clients through all of those channels, effectively capturing the institutions important to our democracy and tilting the playing field in favor of a more stratified distribution of wealth and power.
Through a series of speakers and discussions, we hope to illuminate some of the phenomena at the heart of "deep capture," from the
psychological tendencies and assumptions that render humans vulnerable to manipulation to the history of public relations in the U.S. and the industry's strategies and tactics. The conference will also highlight some examples of how those processes and actors shape various institutions and policies.
Presenters include:
The conference is organized by the Harvard Law School Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild and The Project on Law and Mind Sciences at Harvard Law School. The National Lawyers Guild seeks to unite the lawyers, law students, legal workers and jailhouse lawyers to function as an effective force in the service of the people, to the end that human rights shall be regarded as more sacred than property interests.
The Project on Law and Mind Sciences at Harvard Law School is devoted to identifying, inventorying, archiving, blogging, and otherwise
promoting research, writing, conferences, and presentations directed toward understanding the implications of social psychology, social cognition, and other mind sciences for law, policymaking, and legal theory.
Website: <https://deepcaptureconference.wordpress.com/>
The National Lawyers Guild (NLG) works to promote human rights and the rights of ecosystems over property interests. It was founded in 1937 as the first national, racially-integrated bar association in the U.S.
(212) 679-5100A transition to public ownership could create millions of new jobs, curb planet-warming emissions, protect public health, and slash shipping costs.
In recent years, the United States' rail system has been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons.
In East Palestine, Ohio, a Norfolk Southern train carrying hazardous materials wrecked, sparking a public health crisis and national outcry. More rail workers have been killed on the job in notoriously unsafe conditions. Train after train has derailed.
Such disasters have come as no surprise to rail workers on the frontlines, who have long warned that the corporate-dominated U.S. system is a threat to public safety, employees, and the climate.
But a new report argues it doesn't have to be that way—and envisions an alternative: a publicly owned rail system that saves money, creates jobs, protects workers and the public, and aids the badly needed transition to a green transportation system.
"The structure of the railroad industry in the United States constitutes a massive and ongoing missed opportunity," wrote Kira McDonald, a fellow at the Climate and Community Institute and the lead author of "From Margins to Growth: The Economic Case for a Public Rail System," an analysis published Tuesday by the Public Rail Now campaign and Railroad Workers United.
"Freight service is in decline, and passenger service lags enormously behind international peers," McDonald continued. "Long-term trends of decreased freight service, decreased market share, and decreased employment have accelerated in recent years, particularly with the advent of precision-scheduled railroading (PSR) across most Class 1 railroads. In many ways, these are predictable consequences of how the industry is structured: as a set of massive, largely underregulated, regional duopolies."
"Public operation predominates among the most successful and intensely used rail systems internationally."
Just a handful of private companies control the majority of the U.S. freight rail network, leaving large swaths of the country with access to just one or two privatized railroads. The heavily concentrated rail industry's model of maintaining "supernormal profits" and delivering for shareholders by slashing investment, McDonald wrote, runs directly counter to public priorities, including expanded passenger service.
Amtrak, the United States' passenger rail corporation, is managed as a for-profit company and "runs passenger service on tracks that are typically owned by the private Class 1 railroads," McDonald observed. While private railroads are by law required to give preferential treatment to Amtrak's passenger trains over freight, "this has rarely been enforced," leading to often terrible performance.
Bringing the U.S. rail system under public ownership, the new report argues, would be transformational, allowing for greater investment in passenger and freight rail and thus helping to shift away from costly and heavily polluting on-road transportation.
The report estimates that under an ambitious reform scenario that entails a publicly owned high-speed passenger rail network and other major developments, the U.S. by 2050 "could save up to $400 billion annually on shipping costs; avert over $190 billion annually in averted public health, environmental, and fiscal costs; create 180,000 new jobs in the railroad sector; and create up to four million other new jobs throughout the economy through indirect economic effects."
Transforming the U.S. rail system is almost certainly a "climate necessity," McDonald argued, noting that "current plans to decarbonize transportation within the U.S., particularly on a timeline consistent with even 2°C of warming, are extremely tenuous, to the point of implausibility."
Massively shifting passenger and freight transport to rail could help the U.S. avoid the "equivalent to 2% of the world's remaining carbon budget to maintain a 50% chance of staying within 1.5°C of warming, as of 2023," McDonald wrote.
While the report does not detail precisely how U.S. railroads should be brought under public ownership, it notes that "a comparative
analysis of railroad institutions and international practices indicate the promise of public ownership, particularly when paired with
integrated public operation."
"Public operation predominates among the most successful and intensely used rail systems internationally," pointing to Switzerland, South Korea, and Germany as examples of countries with rail systems that are largely owned by the public.
Tommy Carden, associate director of the Green Locomotive Project at Warehouse Workers for Justice, said in a statement that the new report "clearly demonstrates that under public ownership, working Americans would benefit enormously."
"Class 1 railroads are hoarding wealth that could be used to invest in and expand the rail industry," said Carden. "We must continue to advocate for the massive amounts of infrastructure that rail electrification will require while also pushing for the adoption of low-emission locomotives built by union workers as we continue to work towards achieving full rail electrification."
Eric Basir, a union steward with the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 308, said he has witnessed firsthand "how private ownership of railroads is responsible for the destruction of our environment and good union jobs."
"It will only worsen," Basir added, "until the people who live in this country have control and accountability powers over the railroads."
"This vital hearing is a crucial step in addressing the alarming rise of hate crimes across our nation, particularly those targeting Muslim, Jewish, and Palestinian Americans."
On the eve of a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearing about "stemming the tide of hate crimes" nationwide, Congresswoman Ilhan Omar on Monday commended the panel's chair, Sen. Dick Durbin, for "hosting this groundbreaking yet overdue" event.
Discrimination against Jews and Muslims has significantly increased in the United States since the Hamas-led October 7 attack on Israel and the U.S.-backed Israeli retaliation on the Gaza Strip, which critics worldwide call genocide. In May, Durbin (D-Ill.) vowed to hold a hearing "in response to the ongoing and persistent rise in antisemitism and other forms of bigotry across the country."
The committee announced last week that it had scheduled a Capitol Hill hearing for 10:00 am Tuesday to "examine how we can better protect Jewish, Arab, and Muslim Americans, and other vulnerable communities from bigoted attacks."
Durbin—who has faced calls from Republican committee members to hold a hearing focused on "the civil rights violations of Jewish students" and "the proliferation of terrorist ideology"—said at the time that "hate crimes are a threat to justice everywhere. Sadly, no community is immune from violent acts of hate. Congress cannot turn a blind eye to it."
"We must stand united against hate in all its forms and reaffirm our commitment to justice, equality, and the protection of all Americans, regardless of their race, faith, or national origin."
Omar (D-Minn.) expressed gratitude for Durbin's broader event, saying Monday that "this vital hearing is a crucial step in addressing the alarming rise of hate crimes across our nation, particularly those targeting Muslim, Jewish, and Palestinian Americans."
"I'm glad this committee hearing will address the rise in hate felt by thousands across the country, I hope this hearing serves as a catalyst for meaningful action," she continued. "We must stand united against hate in all its forms and reaffirm our commitment to justice, equality, and the protection of all Americans, regardless of their race, faith, or national origin."
Omar is an outspoken opponent of Israel's assault on Gaza and U.S. support for it. She fled war in Somalia as a child and is one of only a few Muslim members of Congress—and while in office, she has endured intense racism, sexism, Islamophobia, and death threats. Some of the hate has come from fellow federal lawmakers.
Her praise for the hearing came amid reports that some Republicans and Jewish groups are unhappy with Democrats' witnesses: Arab American Institute executive director Maya Berry and Kenneth Stern, director of the Bard Center for the Study of Hate.
Notably, when Stern was with the American Jewish Committee, he helped craft the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance's (IHRA) Working Definition of Antisemitism. He has since accused right-wing groups of "weaponizing" it in their efforts to conflate criticism of Israeli government policies and practices with anti-Jewish bigotry.
Describing both Berry and Stern as "at odds with Jewish communal leaders," Jewish Insiderreported:
In his opening statement to the committee, obtained by Jewish Insider ahead of Tuesday's hearing, Stern will testify that "advocating for genocide against anyone of course should be robustly condemned; but the mere expression of such ideas (whether intended as such or heard as such) should be countered, not as a matter for discipline."
Stern will also say that it is a good thing that David Duke, the former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, did not face any disciplinary action when he spread Nazi propaganda on Louisiana State University's campus as a student in 1968. "This would have allowed him to claim the status of martyr, and changed the subject to his right to speech as opposed to the content of his hate," Stern will say.
"Berry's written testimony focuses primarily on hate crimes data and reporting, and federal enforcement of hate crimes laws," according to Jewish Insider. The outlet added that the Republican witness Rabbi Mark Goldfeder, director of the National Jewish Advocacy Center, "is set to express support for the IHRA definition."
In response to Jewish Insider editor in chief Josh Kraushaar's social media post sharing the report, Center for International Policy executive vice president Matt Duss said, "Translation: testimony from Ken Stern and Maya Berry, who are both widely respected authorities on these issues, makes it harder to use this hearing as part of the campaign to suppress pro-Palestinian activism."
While this will be the first Senate hearing on hate crimes since last October, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives has held multiple, mostly focusing on campus anti-genocide protests. Critics have argued that the lower chamber's events have pushed university administrators to enable violent law enforcement crackdowns on students demonstrating against Israel's assault on Gaza.
More than 40 former members of Congress said the ETHICS Act is sorely needed because it "addresses pressing issues, especially low levels of trust in Congress and the appearance of insider trading."
A bipartisan group of more than 40 former federal lawmakers on Monday urged the U.S. Senate to vote on proposed legislation that would ban sitting members of Congress from buying or selling stocks and other financial holdings.
"We, the undersigned bipartisan former public officials, many of whom served in Congress, write to urge Senate leadership to bring the amended Ending Trading and Holdings In Congressional Stocks (ETHICS) Act to a floor vote before it is set to sunset at the end of the 118th Congress," the letter's signers wrote in a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).
Signatories include former Sens. Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) and Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) along with Reps. Barbara Comstock (R-Va.), Donna Edwards (D-Md.), Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.), and Leon Panetta (D-Calif.).
"Notably," the ex-lawmakers said, "we propose attaching this crucial legislation to any 'must-pass' package. This legislation merits inclusion in such a package because it addresses pressing issues, especially low levels of trust in Congress and the appearance of insider trading."
The letter continues:
As you are both aware, the discussion of how elected officials trade stocks has been intensifying both inside and outside the Congress for years. In 2022, members of Congress made more than 12,700 individual trades, with dozens of members making above-average gains. A 2022 New York Timesinvestigation reported that a fifth of all lawmakers were trading in companies directly related to their work on a congressional committee.
Critics have long decried existing legislation—including the Ethics in Government Act of 1978 and the Stop Trading Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act of 2012, which require annual financial disclosures by members of Congress—as largely toothless window dressing. Advocates of measures like the ETHICS Act have pushed for more stringent safeguards against self-dealing by members of Congress.
The ETHICS Act—which was introduced in July by Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.), Gary Peters (D-Mich.), and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.)—would ban members of Congress, the president, and vice president from buying and selling securities, commodities, futures, options, trusts, and other holdings. It would also prohibit their spouses and dependent children from divesting covered assets starting in 2027. The bill contains robust enforcement mechanisms and noncompliance penalties.
Calls for a vote on the ETHICS Act mounted after last week's revelation that more than 50 U.S. lawmakers held stocks in companies related to the military-industrial complex—even as those same firms received hundreds of billions of dollars in annual business via congressional legislation.