Stanley Kurtz, writing for National Review Online, has written a detailed and well researched article on the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, the education foundation led by Obama and William Ayers in the late 1990s. It should be required reading. Mr. Kurtz had to overcome denials and challenges for his right to see the documents of the Foundation (after receiving permission, he was denied permission, etc.) and this article is part of his findings.
He attempts to make clear the connection between Rev. Wright, Ayers, and Obama as well as to study exactly what kind of education reform the Chicago Annenberg Challenge was funding.
In short:
- Winter 1996 - Coalition for Improved Education in [Chicago's] South Shore (CIESS) receives $200,000 grant from Chicago Annenberg Challenge. The group teaches Afrocentric "rites of passage...designed to provide African American youth with the cultural information and values they would need to counter the potentially detrimental effects of a Eurocentrically oriented society." It asserts that American socialization has "proven to be dysfunctional and genocidal to the African American community."
- One of the presentors at a CIESS conference was Jacob Carruthers. Carruthers wrote a book entitled Intellectual Warfare in which he takes as his mission the need to "dismantle the European intellectual campaign to commit historicide against African peoples."
- According to Chicago Annenberg Challenge records, Carruthers's training session was a huge hit. It "received rave reviews, and has prepared the way for the curriculum readiness survey...". These teacher training workshops were funded by the Chicago Annenberg Challenge.
- Carruthers and other prominent thinkers from his Association for the Study of Classical African Civilizations spoke often at Trinity United Church of Christ, Wright's church where Obama was a member.
- Asa Hilliard was another Afrocentric speaker funded by Annenberg; Hilliard had accepted an appointment to Wright's new elementary school where Wright said, "We need to educate our children to the reality of white supremacy." Wright's own educational philosophy, then, is "mirrored at the Annengberg-funded SSAVC, which sought out Hilliard's and Carruthers's counsel to construct its curriculum.
- Bill Ayers worked with Obama to fund these groups. Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dorn have book coming out next year entitled Race Course Against White Supremacy.
- In 1995, the same year "Obama assumed control of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, he publicly rejected 'the unrealistic politics of integrationist assimilation'"
- If Obama read the Annenberg proposals of SSAVC he could not be ignorant of what they were about.
- In 1995 all funding decisions fell to Obama and the board; he would have read the proposals. He voted to keep funding these endeavors.
So what's the point of all this? Why even bring it up? Because this is the man who half of the country wants to put in charge of education reform. Is this the kind of education reform we want? Is this what's best for American children? Radical education of ANY kind? Of course that's not what's in his platform! But what kind of judgment does this man display here?
2 comments:
While I was growing up I use to hear the "old folks" talk about Chicago politics. That was during the days when Richard J. Daley was mayor. I also heard some guy say, while talking about about a politician, "He's acting like he's from Chicago."
But what the hell am I talking about, I live in Louisiana, the land of Huey P. Long and Edwin Edwards, and ...
Chicago has a rich history of dirty politics and they do it very well, as does many other places in the country.
As I was reading this blog the word Chicago just stood out and I started remembering what I had heard about Chicago politics.
Then I started thinking about ACORN, you know, the organization that Obama has never had any ties to. The one he never represented in court, the one he never gave money to, the one he as never no never had any ties to, regardless of the evidence. Yes the same ACORN that is registering homeless people, 18 year olds, the Dallas Cowboys,...
and in some cases up to 72 times, and handing out money and cigarettes, and telling the new registrated voter who to vote for...
Yes that same ACORN.
Then I started thinking about an old phrase that descibed Chicago politics. "Vote Early, Vote Often."
(A politician, one from CHICAGO, ACORN, Vote Early, Vote Often. Any connection?)
The following is from a Google search.
The cynical phrases "Vote early -- and often" and "Vote early -- and vote often" are variously attributed to three different Chicagoans: Al Capone, the famous gangster; Richard J. Daley, mayor from 1955 to 1976; and William Hale Thompson, mayor from 1915-1923 and 1931-1935. All three were notorious for their corruption and their manipulation of the democratic process. It is most likely that Thompson invented the phrase, and Capone and Daley later repeated it.
I would have to read the entire article, but I would offer the idea that many, many african americans believe that they want to present more of their history and culture "afrocentric" to their children so they can feel connected in this country - so there is just something other than "slavery" connected to them in this country. Bill Cosby does it with his children's cartoon "Bill" that Alex watches, the guys from Outkast do it too in some cartoon that shows, and so forth. I think you can take it as something to fear if you choose to - but I also think there is clearly another way to view it and just possibly the motivation behind it was not evil, but a good thing. But that's just me.
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