Secular Saints of the Corporate State

 From the charter for the Finance Authority of Maine

 The above statement is found in the charter for the Finance Authority of Maine. It is a most astounding statement because it constitutes a legislative decree about the character of certain individuals and associations which practically ordains them into sainthood. By legislative decree, individuals and associations which privately benefit through the activities of the Finance Authority of Maine are motivated by only the purest of motives to serve the "public benefit" - whatever that may be, and whenever the powers that be, want it to be it.  Any private benefits that confer upon themselves, as a public-private relationship, is a pure chance of circumstance.

Which type of government defines human character by legislative decree? Not that created by the founders of the United States Constitution.

The Federalist Papers recorded the thought process which became the United States Constitution. Publius first examined the full range of human character- from the best to the worst - and after considering all, designed a system of checks and balances. This contrasts with Marxism which projected a state which would "wither away", a condition which can only occur after the state has transformed human character into a homogeneity, tolerating no conflicts of interest.

The philosophy stated in the charter for Finance Authority of Maine deems that any benefit going to private individuals, as a result of the activities of the FAME corporation, is incidental to the public benefit. The intent of that statement is further clarified in the charter for the SEGF. (signed into law by Angus King)  There we are told in the section titled "conflicts of Interest" that Title 17, section 3104 does not apply to representatives of the SEGF.

Title 17, section 3104 is a general law which states:

3104. Conflicts of interest; purchases by the State
No trustee, superintendent, treasurer or other person holding a place of trust in any state office or public institution of the State shall be pecuniarily interested directly or indirectly in any contracts made in behalf of the State or of the institution in which he holds such place of trust, and any contract made in violation hereof is void. This section shall not apply to purchases of the State by the Governor under authority of Title 1, section 814. [1975, c. 771, §164 (AMD).]

The Maine state constitution, Article IV, Part Third, Section 14, states that all corporations, however formed, are subject to general Law.

General law, Title 17, section 3104, states that government employees cannot financially benefit from contracts made on behalf of the state.

The charter of the SEGF ( known since 2014  as the Maine Venture Fund) exempts the SEGF from being subject to general law, Title 17, section 3104.

Not only is the SEGF unconstitutional in the fact that it was chartered by special act of legislation to serve the purposes of the state, a violation of Article IV, Part Third Section 14, of the Maine Constitution, prohibiting the Legislature from chartering corporations for any purpose other than municipal purposes, but it also violates Article IV, Part Third Section 14 a second time when it unconstitutionally releases the SEGF from being subject to a general law, in my humble layman's opinion.

In was repeated many times by the board presiding at the Juice Conference I attended in 2009, that 10% of the capitalization of the SEGF comes from the Maine state taxpayer, invested in a "rollover fund" which functions like a nonprofit, continually reinvesting in the fund, never realizing a profit.

The SEGF promotes itself as creating jobs paying higher than two-thirds of the jobs in this state. That is but one instance of how an artificially created upper crust of the Maine economy is being subsidized by the general Maine taxpayer since central management of our economy by public-private relationships was instituted under Governor Longley in the 1970's.

The other night I listened to Paul Ryan explain to Greta Van Susteran why Harry Reid has not been required by the Senate to submit a budget for three years, in violation of the United States Constitution. The reason is that the Constitution does not provide for a penalty for not doing so. The culture in Augusta operates under a similar set of principals but what Augusta has done in transforming our constitutional system of government is even worse than not submitting a budget. It has replaced the American free enterprise system with a centrally managed economy, which since its inception has statistically made the rich richer and the poor poorer

The Maine statistics complement a report released last month by the Congressional Budget Office showing that real, after-tax income grew by 275 percent from 1979 to 2007 for the top 1 percent of the population with the highest income. By comparison, the six out of 10 residents in the middle of the scale saw real income rise by under 40 percent during the period. Portland Press Herald , November 16, 2011

The 2014 Portland Press Herald article by Jessica Hall describes a report done by Investment Consulting Associates, or ICA, of Massachusetts.

(The investigation) found that the Pine Tree Development Zone program’s costs exceed its benefits. Specifically, it said the PTDZ delivered total direct benefits to the state of $358 million in 2012, in terms of people employed and salaries and total sales in the state. The program, however, had $457 million in total direct costs related to lost taxes, administrative costs, overhead and other expenses.
…. According to the ICA report, the total value of corporate incentives was divided by the total number of newly created jobs, which provides a “rate per created job” or information on what governments “paid” for one new job.
Maine awarded total incentives worth $159,000 per created job for the period from 2010 through 2013, the report found. Portland Press Herald. Pine Tree Zones tax breaks costing state more than they deliver by Jessica Hall April 14 2014

That is why we need a  movement to bring a higher public profile to contenders for Olympia Snowe's seat such as Andrew Ian Dodge. like Charlie Summers, Dodge will vote to repeal Obama Tax but unlike Summers, and Angus King, Dodge is not inbred into the Augusta culture. As Secretary of State, Summers could have demanded that the vast network of corporate instrumentalities of the state be subject to the same general laws to which corporations in the private sector are subject, but by virtue of the fact that state corporations are not listed at the Bureau Of Corporations, that is not the case. Summers went along with the existing status quo Augusta culture which routinely overrides the Maine State Constitution with statutory laws, transforming Maine's constitutional system of government into something else. Maine needs Senators from outside the Augusta system, with the guts to challenge the current operational paradigm.

Additional Resources

UTube of  Henry Lamb speaking on the Green Religion and Agenda Twenty One, arguably, the do-coded meaning of the formulaic "public benefit" served by the SEGF (Maine Venture Fund).

I was introduced to the SEGF, in 2009, when I attended the Juice Conference. As I watched the semi-finalists, it was clear that all knew and conformed to the template. Required is service to the green agenda, to satisfy "public benefit", and a statement that one's exit strategy is to sell the business, to satisfy the profit motive of private high growth investors  Brevity is so overvalued in this culture that one is told that the measure of a good business plan is that it can be explained in the time it takes to ride a five minute elevator to the top. If a plan cannot be explained with such brevity, it is designated as a bad plan, not deserving of further consideration.

Agenda Twenty One describes how the "public purpose" justifies high growth investors to "incidentally make a profit" via redistribution of wealth by the state.

There will be a talk on Agenda Twenty One given by Rosa Kouri Monday, August 13 at 6:30pm at The Baptist Church, Waldoboro (71 Grace Ave)