What have you done for middle class?

I (and I assume everyone in the 6th Congressional District) got a very attractive four color, oversized card in the mail with the cheerful headline “Illinois Seniors — Stand Up and Thank Congressman Peter Roskam.” It was produced by an organization that calls itself RetireSafe. Since I had never heard of RetireSafe I decided to check out what it was and why they were endorsing him.

Lo and behold, RetireSafe is an organization invented by The DCI Group, a Washington PR/Lobbying Agency that caters to the Republican Party and receives funding from health care consultants. Their forte is creating faux grass-roots networks that claim to have widespread public support. They were endorsing him because he (or the GOP) paid them.

In addition, DCI has an enviable record of opposing AARP on health issues: They successfully lobbied to kill the regulations that could have prevented the collapse of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae during the housing crisis. They have also championed causes that portray global warming as a myth. The principles of DCI earned their spurs as grass-roots activists with their efforts to block anti-smoking regulations by lobbying for the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company.

RetireSafe is in good company since DCI has a client list that includes such consumer-friendly, civic-minded, helpful-to-the little-guy organizations like Goldman Sachs ($5.55 billion in bailout money), U.S. Bancorp ($6.6 billion bailout) and the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America. With such high minded philanthropic bedfellows I’m not quite sure that RetireSafe’s endorsement is such a good thing.

Apparently Roskam does. Maybe we should “Stand Up” for Peter Roskam, not to thank him but to look him in eye and ask, “What have you and done for the middle class lately and why do you accept the endorsement of such a questionable outfit?”

Jim Gustafson

Wheaton