In a recently released Harris Poll survey, 21% of American adults believe the sun revolves around the earth. I am not making this up.

By comparison, less than 15% of the population believes tobacco companies, oil companies, HMOs and health insurance companies, phone companies, and pharmaceutical and drug companies are “generally honest and trustworthy:”

These are remarkable numbers. It is very hard to get this degree of agreement about anything.

The Harris results are not an aberration. The results have not varied considerably over the past five years — although overall trust levels actually declined from the already very low threshold in 2003. Also, they are in line with an array of polling data showing deep concern about concentrated corporate power.

An amazing 84% told Harris that big companies have too much power in Washington; by contrast, only 47% percent said that labour unions have too much power in Washington. These results have proven durable. Every year since 1994, the year Republicans took control of Congress, at least 80% of the public has ranked big companies as having too much power in Washington.

The new poll also asked about support for measures to control corporations. These results are eye-opening as well, though perhaps not in the expected way. When polls present specific regulatory proposals for consideration, U.S. public support is typically strong and often overwhelming — even when arguments against government action are presented. For example:

· After hearing arguments for and against, 76% favour granting the FDA regulatory authority over tobacco.

· After hearing arguments for and against, 75% favour legislation that would significantly increase energy efficiency, including auto fuel efficiency standards and the use of renewable energy.

· Eighty-five percent favour country-of-origin labelling for meat, seafood, produce and grocery products, and 75% favour a legislative mandate requiring it be done.

· Some 71% say it is important that drugs remain under close review by the FDA and drug companies after they have been placed on the market.

· Harris found that those who think there is too little government regulation in the area of environmental protection outpaced those who think there is too much by a more than 2-to-1 margin.

What the Harris findings on attitudes to regulation show is that the business campaign against regulation as an abstract concept has been very successful.

It highlights the need for all of us -consumer, environmental, labour and other corporate accountability advocates - to defend the concept of regulation. At the same time, there's a need to connect rampant corporate abuses with the deregulation and non-regulatory failures of the last three decades. One needs look no farther than the "sub-prime mortgage crisis" as a top-flight example.

There’s little doubt that the general public attitude toward regulation significantly affects the willingness of politicians to take on corporate power.

The poll also goes far in explaining two things:

First, if one out of five Americans think the earth revolves around the sun, something is terribly wrong with education in the country. Of course, we also have a serious presidential candidate who states flatly that he does not believe in evolution and that Earth is but 8,000 years old, so what does that say about American education?

Second, it explains why the populist messages of candidates such as Edwards, Obama and even Huckleberry Huckabee strike a resonant chord with voters this primary season.

_______

