It's a beautiful Sunday morning, and America is inactive great. After a week of honest and hard work, you're going out of town to relax from the hustle and enjoy your fresh shiny Chevrolet. You're on a wide highway, and the air falling through a somewhat opened window inactive smells like morning rain.
But the road is inactive wet, and then you slip. The car pulls off the road and hits the tree at 40 miles an hour. The rigid frame of the car without the crushing zones does not absorb the force of impact. The steering column mounted on a thin metallic dashboard breaks and pierces your chest through.
Under the facade of car ads, a shining symbol of American freedom, there was a gruesome reality. 50,000 people died on American roads all year. Rigid steering columns, a minimum crash zone, sharp and thin metallic dashboards, no head restraints and safety belts made the journey fatally dangerous.
What Ralph Nader did
For this facade, he decided to look into a young lawyer, Ralph Nader. Digging through court papers and university investigation funded by Ford, Chrysler and the Pentagon, Nader discovered that the car bosses knew well how dangerous their products were. Doctors and scientists have repeatedly recommended equipping cars with elements that would make them safer, but manufacturers have been reluctant to do so, fearing cost increases and harm to the appearance of cars.
In 1965, Nader published the results of his investigation in the book Unsafe at Any Speed, focusing in peculiar on the Chevy Corvair production of General Motors, the giant liable at the time for almost half of the sales of cars in the US.
The book has angered citizens. In response, the legislature conducted a series of hearings on vehicle safety standards. They revealed that General Motors had hired a private investigator to discredit Ralph Nader. GM's CEO publically apologized for this Nader, which was a major event – it is hard to imagine Elon Musk admitting his mistake and apologizing to a citizen criticizing Tesla today.
The expanding force led to Congress' adoption of the Road Safety Act, introducing fresh safety standards for car manufacturers. Nader became a hero. Between 1965 and 1979, the mortality rate in automobile accidents in the United States declined. about 40%.
In the following years, Nader played a key function in improving standards in access to drinking water, protecting the environment, the rights of air passengers, the right to information and safety at work. It led to the creation of the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), which allowed dangerous toys, flammable fabrics and dangerous household appliances to be withdrawn from trade or improved.
Nader became 1 of the most trusted people in America and inspired many civic movements and consumer protection organisations. He has hosted the most popular programs Publicist and entertainment. Newsweek introduced him on Cover as a knight in shining armor.
Consumer protection is non-American
As we can imagine, his activism did not appeal to anyone.
"Perhaps the most effective antagonist of the American business is Ralph Nader, who, mostly thanks to the media, became a legend of his time and an idol of millions of Americans" – a fragment Powell Memorandum, a 1971 paper that became 1 of the foundations of conservative counter-revolution, by future United States ultimate Court justice Lewis Powell.
Powell joined the ultimate Court in 1972 after a long career of 1 of the top corporate lawyers in the country, especially known for his cooperation with tobacco giant Philip Morris. He was considered a jury of average and progressive social issues. He was 1 of the judges who confirmed the constitutional right to abortion on Roe vs. Wade and helped save the affirmative action on the Regents of the University of California vs. Bakke.
In economical matters, he was a strong corporate advocate. Even as Philip Morris' lawyer, he was profoundly active in the disinformation run strategy, which was to discredit technological investigation showing that smoking causes cancer. Part of this strategy was astroturfing, or backing supposedly grassroots civilian organizations, which were designed to rise doubts about the investigation that active smoking and cancer. specified studies existed and were unambiguous – smoking caused fatal diseases.
Ralph Nader's work was very disturbing to Powell. Thanks to Nader, many corporations were forced to make changes beneficial to consumers, which Powell perceived as an attack on the fundamental right to be entrepreneurial in America. He expressed his outrage in a confidential memorandum written for the American Chamber of Commerce, in which he outlined a strategy for the gradual takeover of power by friendly conservative corporations.
"Political power is essential. specified power must be firmly strengthened, and, erstwhile necessary, it must be aggressively used," Powell notes already at the beginning and then identifies areas whose acquisition is crucial for business. It regrets that young people, especially academics, are hostile to capitalism, and that nearly half of the students surveyed support the socialisation of basic industries, and that as 1 of the most crucial areas in which business should spread its influence, Powell lists the university:
"Social discipline departments usually have members who are not in favour of the entrepreneurship system. They are frequently attractive and charismatic; they are inspiring as teachers and have a immense influence on their colleagues and the academic world. The home should consider setting up staff for highly qualified researchers in social sciences who believe in the system. It should be made up of respective people who are widely respected. technological staff should measure textbooks for social sciences, especially economics, political discipline and sociology."
And the media:
"National tv stations should be under constant supervision. This applies not only to alleged education programs but besides to regular “news analysis”, which frequently contain the most insidious kind of criticism of the entrepreneurship system. Whether this criticism is due to hostility or economical ignorance, the consequence is simply a gradual erosion of trust in business.
Information stands – in airports, drugstores and another places – are filled with books and brochures promoting everything, from revolution to free love. There are barely any attractive, well-written books and brochures on our side.’
And the judiciary:
"In our constitutional system, especially with the Activist ultimate Court, the judiciary can be the most crucial instrument of social, economical and political change. The home needs highly competent lawyers. In circumstantial situations, the Chamber should be entitled to affect its lawyers as advisers in the ultimate Court.”
Business representatives read in the alleged Powell Memo. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the largest pro-business lobbyist organization in the country, distributed thousands of copies among prominent business figures, politics and media. In 1973, she besides held meetings focused on the memorandum, including Gerald Ford (who was about to take over as president) and CBS and ABC tv station presidents. The gathering in Dallas besides featured young tv maker Roger Ailes – the later founder of Fox News. Ailes argued that corporations – as advertisers – should usage their influence on tv stations and interfere in the content transmitted by broadcasters.
In the Nixon era, Powell's memorandum was an equivalent Project 2025which point by point is realized present by the Trump administration. Like the contemporary uber-conservative authors of the Project, Powell presented a profoundly ideological program to establish and strengthen right-wing power.
Reagan started, Elon Musk will finish
After taking over the presidency, Ronald Reagan began to retreat many regulations won by Nader and the consumer movement. "Many Americans feel oppressed by a government that has become besides big, besides bureaucratic, besides wasteful, besides small caring for people and their problems. I have frozen the regulations and set up a task force under the direction of Vice president Bush to review the rules in order to get free of them as much as possible," he stated in speech the state of the economy.
A fewer decades later Elon Musk announced on platform X the garbage of the Consumer Protection Office. respective members of the Muska squad came to the agency and gained access to its office and computer systems, and the agency's website, through which consumers could submit applications, ceased to operate.
The Consumer Financial Protection Office (CFPB) was set up following a global financial collapse in 2008 to defend consumers from unscrupulous financial institutions. Over the years, it has reinforced collateral for mortgages, credit cards, tiny loans and another financial instruments.
Throughout its lifetime, FPB, a comparatively tiny agency from annual financing At $800 million, she returned over $21 billion to the citizens' pocket and implemented regulations to defend consumers from predatory financial institutions.
Republicans and the financial manufacture have long fought with the FPB, accusing the office of exceeding their powers and unsuccessfully attempting to close them through lawsuits.
"CFPB is another left-wing arm of bureaucracy that uses its power against certain industries and people not liked by the alleged elites" – stated late in the White home Regulation.
In early 2025, Elon Musk announced the improvement of a "X Money", a digital payment strategy that is to transform X into a superapplication integrating multiple services within a single platform. specified an application is, for example, the Chinese WeChat, utilized by about 90% of Chinese net users, due to the fact that it is essential to them for everyday life. The Muska initiative has akin ambitions and would be regulated by the FPB as the agency is liable for overseeing digital portfolios and payment systems to defend consumers from fraud. And yes, RIP CFPB.
Godfather Think Tanks
In 1978, the U.S. ultimate Court settled the First National Bank of Boston vs. Bellotti case. With a relation of 5 votes to 4 judges, they found that American corporations have the right to freedom of speech, and backing election campaigns is nothing but enforcement of that law. The author of the opinion, to which the majority of the jury's composition was favored, was Lewis Powell. Since the transportation of this judgment, billionaires' money could already legally influence elections in America (for now only state; national law The time came later).
If you remember that the Occupy Wall Street movement demanded that money cease to influence politics, that was the point. present we know that Elon Musk spent over a 4th of a billion dollars to support Donald Trump's campaign. He most likely doesn't regret it.
Powell's memorandum played a key function in the improvement of conservative think tanks, whose precedence became deregulation and caring for the interests (including impunity) of corporations. The Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute shaped Reagan's conservative revolution, The Cato Institute promotes economical libertarianism, and The Manhattan Institute influences urban politics and the fight against crime.
The celebrated Federalist Society took on the judiciary. It is from his guts that ideologically formed candidates come to advanced justice positions. Six of the 9 ultimate Court judges present have ties to the Federalist Society. In July 2024, by just six votes to 3 SNs, he completely relieved the president of his criminal liability for his actions in the performance of his office.
