Lee Fang | The Nation

Editors' Note: After a review, we've determined that this blog post overstates the role Blue Line Strategic Communications and its founders, Michael Meehan and David DiMartino, played in Clean Energy Works. A coalition comprised of dozens of NGOs, Clean Energy Works was founded in 2009 to campaign for the passage of climate change legislation. The organization was led by Democratic strategist Paul Tewes and a managing committee comprised of representatives from each of the participating groups, which collectively determined the coalition's priorities and strategies. Clean Energy Works subsequently hired several firms to work on the campaign, including Blue Line, which handled strategic communications. While Blue Line played a role in shaping the campaign's messaging, it neither managed Clean Energy Works nor was it in a position to unilaterally determine strategy, as the post suggests.

The post also leaves the impression that Michael Meehan worked for Clean Energy Works. While Meehan worked for groups that were part of the broader coalition, he did not work directly with Clean Energy Works. That account was handled by his partner David DiMartino. As Fang reported, Meehan was a vice president at Virilion, the digital media company that held a $19 million contract from American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity. Meehan maintains, however, that he never worked directly on the ACCCE account, which preceded his arrangement with Virilion, and had no financial stake in it. Both Meehan and DiMartino, who were not interviewed before publication, contacted The Nation to say that neither of them are registered lobbyists, as the post describes them, but rather communications professionals. They previously worked at BGR Public Relations, part of the BGR Group, which has lobbied on behalf of fossil fuel companies, although both Meehan and DiMartino maintain that they had no role in those efforts.

We stand by the post's contention that Meehan's work for Blue Line and Virilion—while Blue Line was coordinating communications strategy for Clean Energy Works in favor of climate legislation and Virilion was working to block the same bill—created an apparent conflict of interest. What is not supported by the evidence is that this conflict influenced Clean Energy Works' strategic decisions and ultimately contributed to the failure of the bill.  We apologize for the errors.

John Boehner speaks next to Mitch McConnell and other Republican members of Congress. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh).

Next year, even if voters cast millions more votes for Democratic candidates, it's likely John Boehner will continue as Speaker of the House, and Republicans will still have a firm grip to determine policy in the waning years of the Obama presidency. In the last campaign for the House, Republicans maintained a comfortable hold on the lower chamber of Congress even though Democrats won at least 1.1 million more votes. That's because over the last few years, GOP state legislators—with help from corporate backers—radically redrew congressional district lines to disadvantage Democrats in over half a dozen states, making representative democracy impossible until the next census in 2020, essentially. (For more on this, see Sam Wang's "The Great Gerrymander of 2012.")

Chamber of Commerce President Thomas Donohue at a press conference. Major health insurers have given the chamber millions of dollars to campaign against healthcare reform but reported almost none of the transactions. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin.)

The Securities and Exchange Commission took a bold step in considering new rules that would require publicly traded companies to disclose political donations. This is a good idea, because since the Citizens United decision, corporate entities have moved away from disclosed campaign committees, and instead have begun funneling cash into secret campaign funds, mostly 501c nonprofits.

Charles Koch. (AP Photo/Topeka Capital-Journal, Mike Burley.)

Charles Koch, the chief executive of Koch Industries who is worth an estimated $34 billion to $44.6 billion, has a new letter to his employees. Koch and his brother spent more than ever in the last election, financing anti-Obama attack ads, phone banks voter contact efforts and more—but came up short. In his letter, sent to tens of thousands of employees through the Koch Industries’ “Discovery” newsletter, Koch warns that “November’s election results … are part of a trend that, if not reversed, will destroy the American dream.”