Guest Post From Derek Cressman

A few weeks ago I stumbled on the video above and was so impressed with Derek Cressman, the progressive candidate running against some corrupt Sacramento insiders, one of whom, Leland Yee, is now in prison, that I invited Cressman to introduce himself with a guest post. Instead of a bio bragging out his accomplishments, he got right to the meat of the matter-- cleaning up the systemic corruption that plagues California state government-- and he got very specific... immediately.

AT&T has California by the Calls
-Derek Cressman

Every year at this time, dozens of Democrats serving in the California Assembly head to Pebble Beach for a weekend of golf and schmoozing with the telecommunications giant AT&T and other corporate lobbyists. The Speakers Cup weekend, as it is known, is nominally a fundraiser for the party. But it is also one of the more visible-- and unseemly-- ways in which a major corporation with significant policy interests in the Golden State gets to press the flesh with the men and women who vote on regulating the company’s behavior in the marketplace.

All evidence suggests that, from AT&T’s perspective, it’s money well spent As I told the Los Angeles Times a couple of years ago when I was a government watchdog with Common Cause:

"What these things do is create a sense of gratitude and indebtedness. It's basic human nature: If someone does something nice for you, you want to do something nice for them."

The company has consistently been able to block legislation in this state to remove monthly fees it charges consumers for unlisted phone numbers. To further its desire to deregulate phone service provided over the Internet, it found a champion in State Senator Alex Padilla (disclosure: Padilla is one of my rivals for the Secretary of State’s office) who authored and passed a bill to that effect-- a piece of legislation described by Mark Toney of the Utility Reform Network as “the most anti-consumer bill ever introduced in California."

Just last week, AT&T achieved another of its goals when the state Senate voted down a bill that would have required telecom companies and their manufacturers to install a so-called “kill switch” in all smartphones to block access to the information stored on them if they are lost or stolen.

There’s no mystery about what’s in it for the elected officials: cold campaign cash. Never mind what they raise over the two days of the Pebble Beach event. According to public records, AT&T has given California legislators $2,336,468 in campaign donations since 2006-- making it one of the biggest, if not the single biggest, corporate donor in the state. Senator Padilla has received more than $100,000 from the telecommunications industry as a whole, including $43,395 from AT&T, since he first ran for his Senate seat in 2006.

In California politics, this has become business as usual, which is exactly why it needs to stop right now. Time and again, legislators have betrayed the interests of ordinary consumers-- their own voters-- to give AT&T and its competitors what they want. They may deny a direct quid pro quo-- the legal definition of bribery-- but the pattern of cause and effect could not be clearer.

Voters have known for years that an ugly money sewer runs through Sacramento. Now, with the recent suspension of three state Senators facing criminal proceedings for corruption and perjury, the most egregious problems are being showcased. But the bigger problem is what’s legal, the fact that corporate money is electing corporate legislators who will do their bidding at the expense of the rest of us.

For all these reasons, I’m calling for this year’s Speakers Cup even to be canceled this coming weekend and protesting outside an AT&T store today. I’m running for Secretary of State on a mission to eliminate corporate corruption from our politics, and there could be no more appropriate place to start. The system stands exposed and vulnerable.

Just a few weeks ago, right after Senators Leland Yee, Roderick Wright and Ron Calderon were suspended from their jobs, the Senate leader Darrell Steinberg canceled another golf-and-schmooze event, the so-called Pro Tem Cup which is held every year at Torrey Pines, outside San Diego. If it was clear to Steinberg and the Senate Democrats that such events and unpalatable and abhorrent to voters, then it should be equally clear to the Assembly Speaker John Perez and his Democratic colleagues in the lower house.

For too long, our democracy has been for sale to the highest bidder. It’s time to take it back.