The U.S. Chamber of Commerce appears in the following stories in today's news:

Sen. Sherrod Brown targeted by U.S. Chamber, outside conservative groups

In early July, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce launched ads criticizing the liberal senator for alleged anti-business votes. When that run ended, a nonprofit group affiliated with GOP operative Karl Rove hit Brown with a new slate of ads. Those were immediately followed by another set of chamber ads denouncing Brown as a “career politician.”

N.Y. Attorney General Expands Inquiry Into Political Nonprofits

New York State Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman has sent letters seeking tax and other financial records from close to two dozen registered “social welfare” groups, escalating his office’s inquiry into politicking by nonprofit organizations, according to The New York Times.

The Times reported in June that the attorney general was examining the financing of politically active nonprofit entities, focusing on a case involving the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

John McCain and Chamber of Commerce Strike a Blow Against American Cybersecurity

Despite the warnings of generals, intelligence officers, corporate cyber security experts, and academic experts that America is dangerously vulnerable to attack in cyberspace, John McCain and the right wing Chamber of Commerce succeeded in blocking Senate action to improve our ability to defend America against cyber attack. They said they believed that the bill would create onerous federal regulation. Any objective observer would quickly see that there was no such regulation in the bill, but rather a set of industry created, voluntary standards. Even that was too much for the ideologues who believe that private sector companies are better off without any government assistance and can defend themselves from sophisticated cyber attack, despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary. For a man who campaigned for president on the slogan "Nation First" it was a stunning display of placing partisan and ideological interests ahead of the national security interest.

Richard A. Clarke, former advisor to the President on cyber security

Lies, Damnable Lies and Statistics

The Chamber of Commerce, as we all know, loves mass immigration. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce spends millions of dollars each year lobbying for more and more. Their release got me thinking about Benjamin Disraeli’s famous quip about lie, damnable lies and statistics. Everything the Chamber claims is true, except that it is deliberately misleading. They accomplish this deception by what they leave out.

Regulators Draw Flak Meant for Corporate Perps

When a mobster or street criminal declares “I was framed” and expresses disdain for police and prosecutors, we dismiss it as part of their sociopathic tendencies. Yet when corporate transgressors do essentially the same thing by criticizing government regulators, they are taken much more seriously. All too often, business perps succeed in portraying themselves as the victims.

No discussion of regulation would be complete without mentioning the problem that many of the rules are too weak to begin with. The individual most responsible for this during the Obama Administration—Cass Sunstein—recently announced that he will be leaving the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs to return to academia. An indication of the damage inflicted by Sunstein can be gauged by the fact that both the Business Roundtable and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce bemoaned his departure. Hopefully, Sunstein’s successor will make it harder for corporate malefactors to ply their trade.

Some Laws Favor Labor Unions

A new study from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce finds that, when it comes to “threatening or disruptive behavior,” union members have far more rights—or, at least, far more license—than their fellow Americans. The Chamber's study, “Sabotage, Stalking, and Stealth Exemptions: Special State Laws for Labor Unions,” examines little known state laws that favor organized labor, even to the point of exempting union members from laws prohibiting “conduct that would otherwise be considered criminal activity.”