Greetings Dedicated Supporters,
Ben Cohen & Jerry Greenfield, co-founders of Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream, will address the audience of Free & Equal’s United We Stand Festival at UCLA on May 10th, 2014, via video.
Ben and Jerry are known for their activism for social change. In the area of environmental justice, they support mandatory GMO labeling, and all Ben & Jerry’s products will be 100% non-GMO by the end of this year. They also support getting Big Money out of politics.
Ben’s Stamp Stampede and the company’s Get the Dough Out of Politics campaigns are akin to Free & Equal’s educational platform to awaken “We the People” to restore the integrity of the electoral process, as well as to elect honest, independent leaders.
The United We Stand Festival at UCLA is the kick-off for a University Bus Tour across America, combining music and education to awaken the nation. It will inspire both adults and young people to take part in making our world a better place. By electing principled leaders who are not swayed by special interests, we can restore a world of peace, liberty, harmony, justice, ecology, and prosperity for all.
Musical headliners at UCLA include Playing for Change, Public Enemy (Rock n Roll Hall of Famers), members of Wu-Tang Clan, Immortal Technique, The Siren, Cynic, Rooftop Revolutionaries, and more.
Speakers include Larry King (media legend), Marianne Williamson (New York Times bestselling author & independent congressional candidate [CA-33]), David Bronner (CEO of Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps), Sean Stone (son of Oliver Stone, host of Buzzsaw), Dr. Jill Stein, Gov. Gary Johnson, Amber Lyon (Emmy winning journalist/whistleblower), Ben Swann (Emmy winning journalist), Abby Martin (host of Breaking the Set on RT America), Diane Goldstein (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition), Pamela Donnelly (Amazon Bestselling Author and Education Reform Advocate), and many more.
Tickets are on sale now at UCLA Central Ticket Office and Ticketmaster.com.
Let’s make a difference together!
With warmest regards,
The Free & Equal Elections Foundation
I’m cutting out processed sugars for a few weeks, but they do have good ice cream.
Yes, Ben & Jerry are idiots, but fortunately, that does not prevent them from making delicious ice cream! And as for boycotts, as a libertarian, if I tried to boycott every company owned by someone whose political views are anathema to me, I would have to live like a caveman!
I may not agree with Ben & Jerry, but your reaction has prompted me to go out & buy some Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. I’ll be sure to tell you what flavor(s) I got & how delicious it is.
I’ll go ahead and call for a boycott of Ben & Jerry’s, Inc.’s ice cream products here and now. I believe that promoting a constitutional amendment to gut the First Amendment is an extreme attack on “democracy” (their word) that warrants an across-the-board boycott. I will never eat another Ben & Jerry’s product until they renounce their attack on the First Amendment. (And I admit to consuming more than my share of ice cream products.) Ben & Jerry’s is good ice cream–but not good enough to warrant paying to undermine the Bill of Rights to consume it.
Boycott!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hrT3oaV0zM
These guys are without question the biggest hypocrites in the “money in politics” debate. Just click on their link above and it sends you to an official Ben & Jerry’s corporation webpage that promotes efforts the corporation’s “get the dough out of politics” POLITICAL CAMPAIGN. They explicitly promote AMENDING THE CONSTITUTION to limit “corporations” from free-speech rights. Their CORPORATE ad for this must have cost, say, a few thousand dollars (AT MINIMUM) to put up. And then there is the problem of Ben and Jerry being avowed Democrats and being able–AS RICH INDIVIDUALS–to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund Democratic political speech while they claim a goal of eliminating the right of Ben & Jerry’s, Inc. (AS A CORPORATION) from doing so. EVEN AS THEY — USE THE CORPORATE FORM TO FUND A POLITICAL MOVEMENT!
If their proposed amendment(s) succeed, the richest Americans (like themselves) will have “unlimited” (a word they love to throw around) free-speech rights while poorer people can never pool their resources to counteract them. (It is lost on most leftists that the corporate form is a business model for the little guy, and that corporations allow the poor to pool resources and compete against the rich).
It is also lost on the corporation haters that BEN & JERRY’S, INC. is actually quite rare in that it is one of the few Fortune 500 corporations that wastes any money at all on political campaigns. I remember spending a few hours researching corporate political donations in 2012. The Fortune 100 spent EXACTLY ZERO DOLLARS on politics at that time. In actuality, only a few major corporations are “politically active” at all. (There is “Hobby Lobby”; there is Koch Industries, and there is Ben & Jerry’s.) The major 100 corporations SPEND NOTHING ON POLITICS!)
The whole ‘get corporations out of politics’ movement is a scam. It is promoted by haters of business, who would like to see a world in which government imposes vast regulations and taxation on American business and where business has no right even to draft a letter to the editor in its defense.
Also from F&E
Dedicated supporter,
Chuck D, frontman for legendary hip-hop group Public Enemy, appeared on Breaking the Set with Abby Martin on RT to discuss Free & Equal’s United We Stand Festival at UCLA on May 10th, where Public Enemy is a headlining performer and Abby Martin is a speaker.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hrT3oaV0zM
RT has a global reach of over 630 million people, or over 25% of all cable subscribers worldwide.
Chuck D discussed Public Enemy’s message; how hip-hop transformed from conscious, political messaging into escapist messaging, which he contends is CoIntelPro (FBI’s Counter Intelligence Programs that split the Black Panther Party) at a whole new level, using corporate pop culture to divide our communities and feed the prison industrial complex; how he thinks corporations are really “cor-plantations”; why he thinks MTV is really “eMpTy-V”; and why movements like United We Stand are so important for the future of our civilization.
For decades, Public Enemy has raised the global consciousness, breaking down barriers and revealing hidden forces, like the two-party system, that divide the human family. While corporations bought up the music industry, with a focus on profit and superficial entertainment, Public Enemy stayed true to their positive message, and in 2013 Public Enemy was inducted in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Chuck D and Professor Griff of Public Enemy will be speaking their minds at the United We Stand Festival about issues that affect all of us.
Abby Martin is a strong, independent journalist, who is helping to shift collective consciousness in a positive direction, speaking truth to power to create a more peaceful and just world. She fully embodies what it means to be an honest journalist. Free & Equal is working to restore the 4th estate by bringing attention to Martin and the many other independent media figures participating at our festival.
The United We Stand Festival at UCLA is the kick-off for a University Bus Tour across America, combining music and education to awaken the nation. Inspiring the young and the old to help elect principled leaders who are not swayed by special interests, we can restore a world of peace, liberty, harmony, justice, ecology, prosperity, and happiness for all.
In addition to Public Enemy, musical headliners at UCLA include Playing for Change, members of Wu-Tang Clan, Immortal Technique, The Siren, Cynic, Tatiana Moroz, Rooftop Revolutionaries, A-Alikes, Luminaries, Jon Goodhue, Sounds of Solidarity, and more.
Speakers include Larry King (media legend), Ben & Jerry (Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream), Marianne Williamson (New York Times bestselling author & independent congressional candidate [CA-33]), David Bronner (CEO of Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps), and Sean Stone (son of Oliver Stone, host of Buzzsaw).
Other notable figures include Dr. Jill Stein, Gov. Gary Johnson, Amber Lyon (Emmy-winning journalist/whistleblower), Ben Swann (Emmy-winning journalist), Diane Goldstein (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition), Pamela Donnelly (Amazon Bestselling Author and Education Reform Advocate), and many more. For a full list of performers and speakers, click here.
Tickets are on sale now at UCLA Central Ticket Office and Ticketmaster.com.
Stand united with us on May 10th!
Warmest regards,
The Free & Equal Team
I would imagine the value of propaganda that they have paid for is more likely in the millions of dollars, and not just 50K.
There are lots of disingenuous people out there. Perhaps their money does not corrupt politics because they are promoting good causes and we better accept them and change our ways, even if they have to get the government to force us to do so because we are too stupid to make our own decisions and they know better than we do, so just drink the Kool-Aid and shut up.
I never buy their products. Probably not much of a protest, as they seem to have done pretty well (those damn capitalists!!!) without me.
Please pass the Paul Newman salad dressing….
What is the cutoff point as to money in politics for Ben & Jerry? Combined they have donated over $50k to Democratic candidates and causes in recent years.
We had a young man come out to our meeting last night to talk to us about the Festival. He said there are so many muscial acts and speakers who want to be there that they’ll have to have 2 stages, I think so that they won’t lose any time setting up between acts. There are 10,000 seats in Pauley Pavilion. That happens to be the round figure put out about Ron Paul’s appearance at UCLA in 2012, although he was in a different venue on campus. And, I confirmed that I’ll get a press pass! Also, I’m told I’ll be personally introduced to Marianne Williamson and perhaps she’ll grant me the opportunity for an interview! Perhaps I can interview Jill Stein for IPR as well.