In many states, including California, voters can propose and enact laws through the ballot measure process. Both federal tax law and California state campaign finance law permit 501(c)(3)s to proactively initiate ballot measures (including ballot initiatives, constitutional amendments, bond measures, and referenda) by circulating initiative petitions or to react to measures proposed by others, including efforts to support or oppose qualification of an initiative for the ballot, and to support or oppose the passage of a qualified initiative. Additionally, 501(c)(3)s can lobby either the state Legislature or a local legislative body to place a bond measure, ballot measure, or constitutional amendment on the ballot.

501(c)(3)s can support or oppose ballot measures and encourage the public to vote accordingly. Even though 501(c)(3)s cannot support or oppose candidates for public office, 501(c)(3)s can urge voters to support or oppose particular ballot measures because the IRS treats this work as lobbying.

501(c)(3)s must comply with both federal tax law and California state campaign finance laws. We discuss each of these laws separately below, but in general, federal tax law limits the amount of lobbying work the organization can do (including, work on ballot measures), while state campaign finance law requires disclosure of the organization's ballot measure activity. It is important to keep in mind that federal tax law is the body of law that governs the federal tax-exempt status of 501(c)(3) organizations. An activity, such as ballot measure advocacy, can be perfectly permissible under federal tax law, but may also require additional disclosure at the state level.

Federal tax law considers ballot measure work to be a lobbying activity - not electoral activity - because members of the voting public act as legislators when they vote "yes" or "no" on the legislation proposed in ballot measures. Federal tax law allows 501(c)(3)s to engage in lobbying, but limits how much lobbying, including ballot measure activities, a 501(c)(3) can engage in annually.

A 501(c)(3) organization may measure its lobbying under the "insubstantial part test" or the 501(h) expenditure test. Under the 501(h) expenditure test, ballot measure work is considered to be direct lobbying, not grassroots lobbying. Whichever test the 501(c)(3) uses, it should be tracking its lobbying activities and expenses. These lobbying expenses must be reported on the IRS form 990 that most 501(c)(3)s file each year.

State campaign finance law considers ballot measure activity to be potentially reportable campaign activity. State law does not limit how much a 501(c)(3) (or any organization) can spend on ballot measure activities. However, if a 501(c)(3) engages in ballot measure work state law dictates that the organization disclose it's expenditures and, potentially, it's donors. The type of disclosure that the organization is subject to will depend on the kind of activity the organization is engaging in, and the source of funds it is using to fund the activities.

So when they tell you that NOIW is just an educational organization, they're feeding you a line of BS! It simply isn't true. We work closely with our legislators to effect a real change to the system by stopping the fraud & corruption that have brought this system to it's knees and we also use our state-of-the-art media production facilities to do it!

Thanks to the Alliance For Justice for clarifying these very important issues!

POLITICAL ORGANIZATIONS
Some callers have asked us why we are not a political organization. Simply put, a simple answer. Political organizations are about 2 things: Power & Money! They want the power, and they want to get it with your money! We want the laws changed too.

Legislators who condone it!

An Insurance Comissioner who closes his eyes to it!

Attorneys who look the other way while their clients are victimized by it!

It's an epidemic that is totally out of control, and you have your legislators to thank for it. After all, if they stopped pimping and pandering for the big insurance conglomerates in exchange for those big campaign contributions, we wouldn't be in this mess, and you would be getting the medical treatment and receiving the benefits that the law mandates.

But big money has a very loud voice in our state capitals. Spread enough of it around and even the best of intentions will get skewed and turned into something totally unrecognizable. And it doesn't matter what you do for a living...fireman, lawyer, policeman, indian chief...everyone is the target of employers and insurers who just don't want to provide the benefits that they agreed to and are more interested in their financial bottom line!

It is truly unbelievable, the extent that insurers will go to to deny you the benefits to which you are legally entitled. Their attorneys are "Master Manipulators" of the law and they will spend obscene amounts of money to make sure that a dangerous precedent is not set; that of an injured worker actually getting the proper treatment that he or she is entitled to under the law!

Employers and insurers just hate adverse publicity, and it's time to bring these issues to the front burner of America's dinner table converstaion. Radio and television are very valuable media resources and we need take advantage of the impact of the aural and visual messages that these media channels offer.

Very mysteriously you don't hear a word about this most serious of issues from the California Applicant's Attorneys Association or even their subsidiary injured worker group, Voters Injured At Work. And you have to ask yourself why. Why aren't they interested in stopping this unlawful behavior that so adversely affects their members? Before you can fix something, you first have to admit that the problem exists. We can't answer this question, only they can!

Be part of the cure, not part of the problem!

We own and control our own television media voice, "Injured On The Job", seen on Public Access television stations around the nation, and streamed over the internet! We also stream it on our own injured workers channel on "YouTube." We've been doing it for the past 5 years and it's been a very effective tool to get the truth out to America's injured workers.

Those three defenses were commonly referred to and defined as the following:

• Assumption of risk - you took the job knowing what could happen.
• Contributory negligence - your actions or inactions contributed to your injury/disease/death.
• Negligence of a fellow employee - your injuries caused by others' negligence were not the employer's fault.

If an employee were killed on the job, families of the deceased had no means for recourse.

For the sake of brevity, we fast forward to the time where Workers' Compensation is instituted in the United States and the 'no-fault' law is enforced.

This law meant that if an employee were injured on the job, the employee was compensated by the employer, regardless of whether the employer was negligent, and in exchange for this automatic, 'no-fault' compensation, the employee forfeited the right to bring suit for compensatory damages against the employer.

As a note, to be covered under a Workers' Compensation statute, an injury or disease must arise out of and in the course of employment.

In most instances, the Workers' Compensation law provides full and unlimited medical expense benefits for a covered injury or disease.

Disability is paid after an assessment of the level of disability is determined: temporary partial, temporary total, permanent partial or permanent total.

Disability income is typically paid as a percentage of the employee's currently reported wages, typically 66 2/3 percent, and is subject to minimum or maximum dollar amounts.

Other benefits under the policy include rehabilitation and death benefits.

Walmart had a carefully crafted and calculated plan to create a shopper's "feeding frenzy" between 5 and 11 a.m. during it's "blitz" "door-buster" sale. When it offered incredible deals on "hot toys" such as plasma TV's to hungry shoppers, it was really doing nothing more than throwing "blood into shark infested waters".

Just look at the the language Walmart used to create the climate necessary to create this horrific event. For the non-football fans out there, both common usage and the Merriam Webster dictionary define the word "blitz" as a "sudden attack", which can easily describe the rush of shoppers Walmart anticipated and invited yesterday. The fact that such sales are known as "door-buster" sales clearly puts Walmart on notice of the imminent danger they were creating, not just for its own employees, but for shoppers alike. It was only divine intervention that stopped a shopper 8 months pregnant from losing her baby in the same stampede.

Walmart is a smart highly successful consumer retailer - with a horrible record of mistreatment of employees. They fully understand the concept of "mob psychology" that caused this preventable death, but willfully chose to ignore the threat to fill it's cash registers. In our opinion, the police do not need to check the store security "video-tape" to find the party responsible for this homicide. Just check the sign outside the store.

This is no different than when Ford willfully decided not to recall the defective Ford Pinto gas tank in favor of profits over safety. Despite Walmart employee requests to close the store after the tragedy, Walmart allowed all important "shopping" to continue. Shame on Walmart for being so callous. The profits from a single door on a single day would not even register on the Walmart (or Wall Street) radar screen.

Of course, Walmart is protected from a direct lawsuit in this case by the New York State Workers' Compensation Law. Mr. Damour's family will receive a measly $6,000 burial allowance under the law. You can be sure that Walmart's public relations agency has been working overtime to do damage control and minimize any negative publicity due to the death. After all, this is the Christmas season - a time of charity and goodwill!

The days of government "looking the other way" while worker safety is ignored must come to an end. New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo should launch an immediate investigation into whether Walmart's actions (or failures to act) leading to the death of it's own worker are criminal. There is ample legal precedent for such prosecutions. Certainly, even if not criminal, they further highlight Walmart's corporate irresponsibility toward the safety of both workers and consumers. The costs associated with a small Workers' Compensation claim of a dead worker will be fully absorbed in no more than 1 minute of Walmart shopping at the Valley Stream store.

What say you, Mr. Cuomo?

The workers sued Illinois-based Cassens Transport Co., insurance claims adjuster Crawford & Co., and Warren physician Dr. Saul Margules, alleging mail fraud, wire fraud and violations of the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act. It is alleged that the defendants conspired to falsely deny Workers' Compensation claims.

"They further pleaded that Cassens, Crawford, and Dr. Margules, as well as other 'medical whore' doctors, engaged in a pattern of racketeering activity that denied the plaintiff's Workers' Compensation claims," the court wrote. "Specifically, the plaintiffs alleged that Cassens and Crawford deliberately selected and paid unqualified doctors, including Margules, to give false medical opinions that would support the denial of Workers' Compensation benefits, and that defendants ignored other reasonable medical evidence in denying them benefits."

Does this sound familiar?

It is also alleged that the defendants communicated amongst themselves by mail and wire, bringing them under the umbrella of the federal RICO statutes.

Thursday's ruling by the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals does not mean the workers have won their case. It just means the lawsuit can move forward and proceed into the discovery phase of the trial in U.S. District Court in Detroit.

In the conclusion of its 13-page opinion, the appeals court said that it reversed "the dismissal of plaintiffs' RICO claims because their RICO claims are not preempted by state law and because plaintiffs have adequately pleaded a pattern of racketeering activity despite the lack of reliance on the defendants' fraudulent acts and remand to the district court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion."

U.S. District Judge Paul D. Borman dismissed the lawsuit in 2005 and, in a split decision, the 6th Circuit upheld Borman's ruling in 2007. But the U.S. Supreme Court sent the case back to the 6th Circuit earlier this year in light of a ruling the Supreme Court made in a case involving similar legal issues in the area of alleged fraud.

Marshall Lasser, the Southfield attorney representing current or former Cassens employees Paul Brown, William Fanaly and Charles Thomas, said he was stunned and pleased by Thursday's ruling.

NOIW's acclaimed "Injured On The Job" television show held an exclusive telephone interview with Attorney Lasser than can be seen by Clicking Here!

Make sure that you have the RealVideo plugin for your browser. It is quite an interesting in-depth interview conducted by attorney Sam Lasser, Marshall's son, who is a California criminal defense attorney.

Bad Faith deals with the fraud and corruption perpetrated by the disability insurance industry against those who purchased their policies and thought they would be covered in case of a long term disability. These same illegal tactics are used against injured workers in the Workers' Compensation industry as well, hence the reason for the screening as there are so many close parallels that affect us all!

Over 51.2 million people, nearly 1 out of 5 U.S. residents has some level of disability. Over half of our work force, 56% of the population, ages 21 to 64, has some type of disability.

The insurance industry, and specifically the disability insurance industry, is an industry rife with unlawful and unethical practices. The crisis is rooted in the industry's gross overselling of disability policies to younger professionals in the 1970's and 80's. As that population aged and its claims increased dramatically, the insurance companies began casting about for ways-not always legitimate-to cut their losses.

Commonplace in the disability insurance industry, all of these actions are intended to ruin the insured's reputation and cast doubt on their character.

In the last decade, a wave of reductions in benefits spurred by the massive legislative efforts of an industry that is totally out of control, have brought workers and their families to the brink of financial, emotional and psychological collapse. Rather than talk about lowering and limiting workers benefits, we should be trying to raise injured workers' benefits to a living level so that these injured workers and their families can survive and at some point re-enter the workforce as productive workers once again.

We have a crisis in America that threatens to destroy a hundred years of gains by labor to make America a safer workplace. The insurance industry and their mighty checkbook have drastically diluted laws in almost every state that were created to be a safety net for those who are unfortunate enough to be injured at work. Diluted them so that they are not even recognizable anymore! And their money has a very loud voice in state capitols all over the country, where legislators count on political contributions from these big business special interests for their respective campaigns.

As a matter of principle, benefit levels for injured workers should not be subject to the crass commercial arguments of the employers, insurers and their lobbyists. A worker who becomes disabled suffers real serious losses, and should not be asked to subsidize the employer's gross negligence by taking reduced medical and monetary benefits. Employers are trying to place the concept of "fault" back into the Workers' Compensation process thereby eroding the fundamental principles upon which it was established.

Contrary to what insurance industry lobbyists and the Chambers of Commerce want you to think, no one gets rich by receiving Workers' Compensation benefits. A worker always gets less than the wages he is losing from the injury, bearing at least 1/3 of the cost himself, and often more for higher wage earners. He is not compensated for the loss of health insurance, pension benefits or other fringe benefits that go with his job. Consequently, in real dollar value, a worker and his family bear 50% or more of the cost of injury or disease. The employer is protected from paying for the full economic losses and is relieved entirely from compensating the worker for pain and suffering and a loss of life's enjoyment.

Take a look for example, at the fight in California over permanent disability. This is compensation for injured workers who are no longer able to compete in the workplace for their entire lifetime. A union worker who can no longer work at his job that brought home almost $125,000 a year to his family, and they want him to take a paltry $20,000 settlement if he's lucky. So how does he fend for his family now? With a voucher worth maybe 6 or 7 thousand dollars to secure some type of retraining that won't guarantee any type of meaningful employment and doesn't allow for any living allowance during the training. If he's lucky he might find a job that would pay maybe 25 or 30 thousand a year.

Undocumented workers who cross over the border daily to do the jobs that Americans wouldn't even consider doing, and are threatened with deportation should they be injured while performing their jobs. These hard working folks are exploited by their employers on a daily basis. Take for example, the case of Edgar Velasquez who was horribly injured by a chain saw while working for a Rhode Island tree trimming firm, a firm that was not carrying Workers' Compensation insurance to cover it's employees in violation of their state law. His employer called immigration on his employee when faced with having to account for his actions before a Workers' Compensation court.

Workers who are falsely accused of fraud and are retaliated against, have their lives turned upside down after they catch the insurance companies violating their lawful rights, and have the nerve to report it to the proper authorities. But then they get a rude awakening when the District Attorney who they think is going to protect them against some very ruthless and vicious employers and insurers, turns against them on the basis of flawed private investigator reports supplied by the Special Investigation Units of these very same insurers. Little do they know that these District Attorneys are receiving money for fraud investigation from funds supplied by these same insurers in the form of mandatory surcharges on the sale of each insurance policy sold. A conflict of interests you say, you betcha!

There needs to be a common level of accountability to the law that simply does not exist in Workers' Compensation. If an injured worker makes a false statement, even if it's by accident, it's called perjury, a felony. If an insurer and/or their doctors knowingly and willfully make a false statement, it's simply referred to as an opinion and nothing is done about it, despite the horrendous damage that it may cause the injured worker and his family. And if one is lucky enough to force the issue in a court, the employer and his insurer will try to hide behind the doctrine of the "Exclusive Remedy" or in the case of public entities, school districts and joint power authorities, "Governmental Immunity" regardless of whether these crimes are due to gross negligence, malicious intent and in many cases without any probable cause at all.

The combination of high risk of injury and wealth-producing functions means that these workers are compensated at rates which to a degree but not completely reflect the risks they take and benefits that they generate for the national economy. Workers who become disabled still must bear a share of the loss, and shoulder completely the costs for loss of heath insurance for themselves and their families, and their pension benefits. Often even with the meager state benefits, their families can no long afford health insurance.

As has been stated, the present system is not perfect. For example, employers frequently and unreasonably contest claims, many times in bad faith. Court hearings often delay the legal process while the worker's claim languishes. Some employers use this to their advantage. Employers can unilaterally terminate compensation for no justifiable reason, and without making a prima facie case of reasonableness to the court.

Understand the realities of this system. You're dealing with corporate entities that have billion dollar bankbooks and they won't think twice about using those resources against you to save themselves a few bucks. If they do it often enough to enough injured workers, then it really begins to add up. They employ legions of defense attorneys, master manipulators of the law who play it like a finely tuned fiddle.

If we can't bring fairness and equity back to this system, maybe it's time for the Justice Department and the United States Attorney to become involved in the process. Smells like racketeering and enterprise corruption to me.

If you're sick and tired of watching these guys get away with this kind of behavior, then you're just the kind of person we're looking for. No kind of legislation will fix anything until the insurance industry gets the message that they WILL be held accountable for their actions! Stop the fraud and end the legislative corruption that has this system in a stranglehold!