Joe Miller, Sarah Palin’s choice candidate for one of Alaska’s Senate seats, does not believe in climate change. That didn’t bother Alaska voters: this week, Miller bested Sen. Lisa Murkowski in the state’s Republican primary. If that weren’t worrisome enough, it also emerged that the fossil fuel industry spent eight times more than environmental groups on lobbying in 2009, the year the House passed the climate change bill. It’s been a bad year already for environmental causes, and as the November election edges closer, progressives might want to start working overtime to regain momentum on climate and energy issues.

The themes of “Big Government” and “taxes” are effective messaging tools for corporate “think tank” groups promoting outsourcing to benefit their own interests.

Shockingly, our legislators WANT to hear from us, and lobbying is very easy if you’re an average concerned citizen. Here’s how I lobbied Congress about food policy, and why you should too.

Net neutrality is rightly seen by many as a battle between little consumers and big telecommunications companies like Comcast and AT&T. At its heart, it’s a fight about whether your phone and cable company can decide what you can consume on the Internet or at what price, or whether the company that provides you Internet service should act simple as a “dumb pipe,” bringing you whatever content you request.

But the net neutrality fight isn’t entirely a fight between David the consumer and Goliath the cable or phone company. A lot of very large, very powerful corporations have a big business interest in seeing net neutrality and the free and open Internet protected – companies on the other end of those pipes like Google, Amazon, EBay and others.

The big phone and cable companies are pulling out all the stops in their campaign against network neutrality, the set of principles which keep the Internet free from corporate gatekeeping and censorship. Part of that campaign involves enlisting members of Congress to echo their talking points, and right now, telecom lobbyists are hitting Capitol Hill hard, putting maximum pressure on members of Congress in both parties to sign letters to the FCC.

ColorOfChange.org is reaching out to every member of the Congressional Black Caucus today to warn them about a letter that is being circulated by Rep. Gene Green. We’re worried that some CBC members will sign the Green letter without fully understanding what’s at stake, and we want to make clear how important this issue is to the ColorOfChange.org community and to African-Americans in general, and why our members see it as a 21st century civil rights issue.

Below is the letter we sent to CBC offices this morning.

Blue Dog Caucus founder and former Oklahoma Congressman Bill Brewster’s firm Capitol Hill Consulting Group was hired to lobby lawmakers by Transocean, owner of the failed Deepwater Horizon drilling rig.

Last night, Senate Republicans proved beyond any doubt that when it comes to the economy, they stand with Wall Street and against everybody else. Joined by lone Democrat Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE), Republicans successfully filibustered the procedural technicality of opening debate on Wall Street reform. It’s an unmistakable ploy to kill the bill and collect campaign cash from bigwig bankers. The coming weeks won’t be pretty.

By Sarah Laskow, Media Consortium blogger

On Monday, climate activists, nonprofit leaders, and governmental officials will gather in Cochabamba, Bolivia, to look for new ideas to address climate change. The conference, organized by leading social organizations like 350.0rg, “will advocate the right to “live well,” as opposed to the economic principle of uninterrupted growth,” as Inter Press Service explains. In the absence of real leadership from the world’s governments, the conferees at Cochabamba are looking for solutions “committed to the rights of people and environment.”

A fat survey arrived in the mailboxes of a purported 2 million seniors who have been put on a mailing list that caters to elderly right wingers. The ‘Christian Seniors Association’ is raising funds for what it says is the purpose of lobbying against President Obama and AARP for their ‘socialist’ agenda.

by Zach Carter, Media Consortium blogger

Congress returns from its April recess this week with financial reform at the top of its to-do list. With millions of Americans still bearing the brunt of the worst recession in 80 years, Congress needs to start protecting our economy from Wall Street excess, and repair the shredded social safety net that has allowed the Great Recession to exact a devastating human cost.

Big banks are an economic parasite