VOTERS, DON'T BELIEVE CLAIMS FOR PROP. 64.

Byline: Jamie Court

BIG corporations are constantly trying to blow up big government. So when big business claims that government regulation and prosecution are the panacea for policing industries, the public should watch out.

This is precisely the argument made by the big corporations spending $13 million on Proposition 64. Proposition 64 limits enforcement of laws protecting the public health, environment and consumers by ending lawsuits brought by citizens and public interest groups to end illegal practices before they claim a victim. Government prosecutors would have sole authority for proactively enforcing laws relating to unfair competition. Citizens could only sue after they lost money or property, not over matters such as contamination of the water supply, poisoning of the air, false advertising or privacy violations.

Forget for a second that California Attorney General Bill Lockyer calls Proposition 64 ``a weapon of mass destruction'' because he acknowledges that underfunded, overburdened government prosecutors cannot do the job alone. Never mind that nonprofit groups like the American Lung Association, Sierra Club, and California Nurses Association - which oppose Proposition 64 because it would cripple their ability to protect the public - are hardly ``shakedown artists.'' Or that protecting the air, the water and the public health are as valuable as protecting lost money and property.

Aren't the big funders of Proposition 64 - including the likes of Phillip Morris, Farmers Insurance, Microsoft, Pacific Telesis, Exxon and Bank of America - from the very same industries that use their vast resources to foil government at every turn?

Microsoft, which has contributed $150,000 to Proposition 64, lobbied Congress to cut the budget of the antitrust division of the Justice Department at the same time the department was prosecuting its case against the company.

Insurers, led by $100,000 Proposition 64 donor Farmers, challenged the right of the California attorney general to prosecute overcharges under insurance reform Proposition 103 in the case of The People v. Farmers Exchange. The industry has donated $780,000 to Proposition 64.

Big tobacco sued California's attorney general arguing the Proposition 99 media campaign - which promoted a reduction in the use of tobacco products - violated cigarette makers' First Amendment rights.

Cell-phone carriers recently filed suit to invalidate regulations dubbed ``The Cell Phone Bill of Rights,'' issued by the California Public Utility Commission. Banks, credit-card and finance companies that have given $931,300 to Proposition 64 sued through their trade association to stop implementation of last year's landmark California financial privacy law, after agreeing in the Legislature to not oppose its passage. The law says banks and financial institutions have to ask your permission before selling your private information to other companies. A judge tossed out the banks' claims, but if Proposition 64 passes, the public won't be able to enforce those privacy provisions.

The same big industries behind Proposition 64 are also the biggest advocates for corporate tax loopholes that take money away from law enforcement. Of course they are also the first to object to new tax increases that would adequately fund government prosecutors and regulators.

The greatest irony, though, is that after decades of condemning red tape and government waste, the Fortune 500 backers of Proposition 64 claim they believe government does any job more efficiently than the private sector. The Center for Environmental Health used the law under attack by Proposition 64 to force the removal of tobacco billboards advertising within 1,000 feet of schools and playgrounds. Consumers Union made one of the nation's largest dairies warn consumers of the dangers of raw milk. Communities for a Better Environment forced the nation's biggest oil companies to clean up groundwater contamination at more than 1,000 California gas stations. None of these cases would have gone forward if Proposition 64 were in effect.

Voters should not believe the claims - paid for by tobacco makers, oil companies and banks - that government can do a better a job, unless they are prepared for dirtier air, contaminated water and even less privacy.