NBC Blogging

Doesn't anyone else find NBC and its affiliates going "green" incredibly annoying? Stop telling me to buy florescent light bulbs, not only are they dangerous but I hate them with my core being. Also, it turns out NBC is not only doing this green week promotion because they are so altruistic, GE seems to have a lot to gain from it.

NBC Universal is owned by General Electric, which plays a regular role in this column because of how aggressively the company has hitched its profits to its lobbying successes. GE spends more than any other corporation in America on lobbying the federal government — more than $20 million annually over the past three years — and Green Week and Earth Week probably should be disclosed as lobbying efforts.

In many of GE’s businesses, the profit model appears to be: (1) invest in something for which there isn’t much demand; (2) then lobby to mandate or subsidize it.