1. Where do you draw the line? What limits should be placed on corporate lobbying under shell grassroots organizations? Does your attitude toward “shell” lobbying groups vary with the extent to which you agree with the causes they are promoting?
2. What, if any, public policy recommendations would you make?

“Save Our Species Alliance,” “Americans for Job Security,” and “Citizens for Asbestos Reform”—the names of these organizations would lead one to believe they are composed of individual people who have organized at the grassroots level to solve a problem about which they feel deeply. However, according to a 2007 Public Citizen report, these organizations “are bankrolled by large corporations, industry trade associations, or ultra-wealthy individuals who have little in common with the regular Americans they are pretending to represent.” The purpose of the “Save Our Species Alliance” was to make land management more industry friendly by gutting the Endangered Species Act. “Americans for Job Security” advocated for repeal of the estate tax in order to protect inherited wealth, and the “Citizens for Asbestos Reform” bases its operations in the offices of the American Insurance Association.