Corporate Integrity Project

NLPC seeks to promote integrity in corporate governance, including honesty and fair play in relationships with shareholders, employees, business partners and customers. In doing so, NLPC places special emphasis on:

* Asserting that the social responsibility of the corporation is to defend and advance the interests of the people who own the company, the shareholders. True responsibility is fidelity to one’s own mission, not someone else’s, or someone else’s political agenda.

* Exposing the seeking of influence on public officials by corporations, which is the inevitable result of high levels of government spending and intervention in the marketplace.

* Combating practices that undermine the free enterprise system, including philanthropic giving to groups hostile to a free economy.

Sorry Starbucks, You’re Stuck With Howard Schultz

Posted on by Peter Flaherty

Now that Howard Schultz supposedly has disengaged himself from Starbucks and is considering a run for the presidency in 2020, the company fears his political pursuits will hurt their bottom line.

Well too bad.

After decades of liberal activism and supporting Democratic candidates like Hillary Clinton, Schultz now says he may run as an independent. Some Democratic Party loyalists have gone ballistic, hurling invectives at Schultz and claiming that he will ensure the re-election of the president by splitting the anti-Trump vote.

Moreover, they are threatening boycotts. Leftist filmmaker Michael Moore urged everyone to avoid Starbucks until Schultz “announces he’s not running.”

And raising the stakes, Democratic Super PAC American Bridge 21st Century – backed by billionaire George Soros – recently targeted Starbucks, casting doubts on Schultz’s leadership. Among the charges: The company paid $46 million in settlements to employees over wage and compensation grievances. “[American Bridge] is clearly trying … Read More ➡

Google, Facebook, Apple Weigh in AGAIN for DACA Amnesty

Posted on by Paul Chesser
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg

It is February 2019, and major corporate CEOs – who are in most cases reluctant to weigh in on controversial political issues lest they repel significant segments of their customer bases – have no hesitation advocating for the amnesty for DACA recipients, or “Dreamers.”

They have been at it since President Trump was elected.

The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, initiated by President Obama’s executive order in 2012, granted protections from deportation and work permits to illegal immigrants who entered the United States as children (including teenagers) and have been here five years. President Trump intended to rescind DACA in 2017 but delayed the decision to await a Congressional fix, which never happened, but now the status of the program remains as the efforts to phase it out are tied up in the courts.

In a letter addressed to the top leaders of both … Read More ➡

Google CEO Sundar Pichai’s Failed Leadership

Posted on by Peter Flaherty

The latest earnings report from Alphabet, Google’s parent company, demonstrates that the company is still a cash cow, but it does nothing to allay fears about the intrusive role “big data” plays in our lives. Nor does it provide respite from serious credibility problems facing the company’s leadership.

For instance, Google CEO Sundar Pichai may have lied to Congress. Pichai testified in December before the House Judiciary Committee, where members grilled him about transparency, data collection, and how Google filters search results. Moreover, several Republican congressmen wanted answers about political and ideological bias.

The plaintive Pichai was unequivocal. “We don’t manually intervene on any particular search result,” he claimed, because of the massive scale of trillions of searches each year. “It is not possible for an individual employee or groups of employees to manipulate our search results.”

However, according to an internal discussion thread leaked by an anonymous company … Read More ➡

Maxine Waters’ ‘Diversity Committee’ May Pressure Banks to Make Bad Loans

Posted on by Carl Horowitz

Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., has a habit of redoubling her efforts when her ideas fail. That’s especially true given that she now chairs the House Financial Services Committee. One of her top priorities is bullying banks into boosting mortgage lending to marginally qualified borrowers based on race or ethnicity. And her main vehicle for that now is a proposed subcommittee on diversity and inclusion. In a prepared statement on January 30, she declared, “I am proud to say that this will be the first Subcommittee of its kind in Congress.” One hopes it will be the last. For if she gets her way, the outcome, taken to its logical conclusion, may be a financial meltdown rivaling the one a decade ago.

Click here to read the rest on Townhall.com.… Read More ➡

Netflix Tries Again to Bully North Carolina on Transgenders

Posted on by Paul Chesser

Long after North Carolina and dozens of businesses and organizations resolved a conflict over a policy to allow so-called “transgenders” (regardless of their genitalia) to use the public/business restroom of their choosing, Netflix is trying to stir up trouble again.

According to Jonas Pate, the creator of a series called “OBX” who Netflix has contracted with for an initial ten episodes, the company doesn’t want his show filmed or produced in the Tar Heel State, because a law that overrode the original “transgender bathroom” law of a couple years ago wasn’t good enough.

Pate, who lives in Wilmington, NC after 25 years in Hollywood, had his hometown in mind for location shooting. “OBX” is shorthand for “Outer Banks,” the barrier islands that stretch nearly the entire coast of North Carolina.

Pate says Netflix asked him to explore sites in South Carolina, including coastal Charleston, for potential filming – but … Read More ➡

Liberal Netflix CEO Reed Hastings Caves to Saudi Arabia

Posted on by Paul Chesser
Netflix CEO Reed Hastings/PHOTO: jdlasica via Creative Commons

What is it about Silicon Valley corporations that make them want to pander to the sensitivities of oppressive dictatorships?

The answer, of course, is earnings, share price and the almighty dollar. But the recent example in which television-streaming service Netflix yanked a program critical of the oppressive Saudi Arabia regime is extreme cowardice, even for the most conflict-averse corporation.

The background: Jamal Khashoggi, a Washington Post contributing journalist and Saudi dissident who was critical of the government’s intolerance of dissent, was murdered and dismembered at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey. International and U.S. intelligence assigned the responsibility for the killing on Saudi Prince Mohammed bin Salman, but the regime has denied his involvement. Many have called for the United States to alter diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia until justice is served in Khashoggi’s death and the nation enacts reforms regarding personal … Read More ➡

Tucker Carlson Shows Corporate America How to Stand Up to Activists

Posted on by Carl Horowitz

There are few sights these days as pitiable as a corporation acceding to the demands of radical activists on the basis of an ostensibly insensitive comment made by one of its officials or employees. As the script normally dictates, the offending individual steps down, while the company profusely apologizes for its insensitivity and vows to redouble its commitment to “diversity.” That’s what makes Fox News Channel’s refusal to fire political talk show host Tucker Carlson in the face of an activist-triggered advertiser boycott so refreshing. By resisting the speech police, the network just might have set an example for other corporations.

Tucker Carlson, now 49, host of Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson Tonight, isn’t one to back down from a controversial issue. Indeed, not backing down is pretty much his main job requirement. His blunt style won him the 8 P.M.-9 P.M., Monday through Friday time slot on Fox … Read More ➡

Auto Workers Official Sentenced for Accepting Bribes from Chrysler Execs

Posted on by Carl Horowitz

Looking back, Nancy Adams Johnson probably doesn’t think the money was worth it. On December 18, Johnson, former chief negotiator for the United Auto Workers with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, was sentenced in Detroit federal court to a year and a day in prison, and ordered to pay restitution and a $10,000 fine, for conspiring with certain UAW and Chrysler officials to receive more than $40,000 in cash payments and gifts in return for dropping certain issues during contract talks a few years ago. Johnson, who had been slapped with a five-count indictment this March, pleaded guilty in July. She is the seventh person to be sentenced in the scandal, which first came to light in July 2017. The actions follow a joint probe by the FBI, the IRS and the U.S. Labor Department’s Office of Labor-Management Standards and Office of Inspector General.

According to prosecutors, Nancy Johnson, now 57, … Read More ➡

Google CEO Stonewalls Congress on Anti-Conservative Bias

Posted on by Paul Chesser
Sundar Pichai/IMAGE: YouTube

Google CEO Sundar Pichai made his long-awaited appearance before the House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday to testify, and receive a grilling, about censorship of political conservatives and a planned search engine for communist China.

As expected, like other heads of fellow technology companies such as Facebook and Twitter, Pichai denied any prejudice in its services or products.

“I lead this company without political bias and work to ensure that our products continue to operate that way,” Pichai said. “To do otherwise would go against our core principles and our business interests. We are a company that provides platforms for diverse perspectives and opinions — and we have no shortage of them among our own employees.”

Google’s best-known and most important service is Internet search, to the degree that the corporate name is now a verb (“Google it”) when referring to researching terms on the Web. Pichai said … Read More ➡

Trump Should Make GM Repay Bailout Costs

Posted on by Peter Flaherty

In response to General Motors’ intention to close American assembly plants and effectively move manufacturing offshore, President Trump should seek repayment of costs associated with the auto bailout. The direct loss to taxpayers when the Treasury sold the last of its GM shares in 2013 was approximately $10 billion.

There is precedent for requiring direct bailout costs to be paid back. In January 2010, President Obama proposed a new fee on the banks that took TARP funds, even though TARP funds were already in the process of being paid back, and with interest. Obama said, “We want out money back. We want our money back, and we are going to get it.”

In 2013, the National Legal and Policy Center asked then-GM CEO Dan Akerson to repay the $10 billion, prompting his widely publicized refusal during a speech at the National Press Club.

The rationale for the bailout was to … Read More ➡