Posted on 08/18/2008 11:04:24 AM PDT by mojito
The National Review's Stanley Kurtz has been denied access to important documents relating to the Chicago Annenburg Challenge.
Obama was Chair of this organization from 1995 to 1999 and received the appointment with Ayers' help. Ayers was the founder of this organization and played a substantial role in its operations.
Kurtz was initially granted permission to view documents relating to the operations of the Annenberg Challenge, which are house that the library of the University of Illinois at Chicago.
However, at the last moment library officials intervened to block access to the documents.
The complete story is available at the link.
Please contact the president of the University of Illinois system, B. Joseph White and ask him to take immediate steps to insure the safety of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge records, to release the identity of the Collection’s donor, and above all to swiftly make the Collection available to Mr. Kurtz, and to the public at large.
His email address is: PresidentWhite@uillinois.edu
His address and phone:
414 Administrative Office Building, MC-760 1737 W. Polk St. Chicago, IL 606l2
Phone: 312-413-9097
Rush is pounding this.
The Obama cover up is in full swing.
It’s about time someone noticed the Annenberg Challenge..Chicago
Have you heard of Annenberg Challenge? The Chicago version of aiding schools in Chicago. It may not be listed on Obama’s resume but it should be. He had a high position in Annenberg Challenge for about three years along with Tom Ayers, and sons Bill and John(?) I think Bill’s bro named John.
11 posted on Wednesday, August 13, 2008 9:28:00 PM by BARLF
Is it a publicly funded university?
If so, then FOIA is your friend.
Here is a copy of an email I sent if anyone would like to copy it (and hopefully at least make a few modifications to it so that President White will see that writers are not just sending a canned request):
B. Joseph White
President, University of Illinois
Dear Sir:
This e-mail is written in response to “Chicago Annenberg Challenge Shutdown?,” a column by Stanley Kurtz. Mr Kurtz has a reputation for balanced, well-reasoned writing. It seems highly unlikely that he is over-reacting to the actions of representatives of the Richard J. Daley Library of the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Surely you agree that no publicly-funded institution such as yours should deny the public access to the information and records requested by Mr Kurtz, and surely you understand why Mr Kurtz would be suspicious about what has occurred.
Please take immediate public steps to insure the safety of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge records, to release the identity of the collection’s donor, and above all to swiftly make the collection available to Stanley Kurtz, and to the public at large.
Thank you very much for your time and attention to this request.
Barack was essentially an employee of Bill Ayers for eight years, starting in 1995, the year the Chicago Annenberg Challenge was created to raise funds to help reform the Chicago public schools. One of the architects of the Challenge was none other than Professor Bill Ayers. Ayers co-wrote the initial grant proposal and proudly lists himself on his own website as the co-founder of the Challenge.
And who did William Ayers, co-creator of the Challenge, help select as the new director of the board for this program? Why, Barack Obama, of course. Obama was the first Chairman of the Board of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge.
Obama served on the board for eight years until the Challenge ended in 2003. Bill Ayers was intimately involved in the Challenge over this same time period, raising and spending at least $110 million in an effort to bolster a “radical” (Ayers’ word) reform program in the Chicago Public Schools from 1994 to 2001.
http://www.theobamafile.com/ObamaIllinois.htm
“Dear President White,
Today I read an article in the National Review Online that detailed attempts by the journalist Stanley Kurtz to review documents relating to the operations of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge which are archived at the library of the University of Illinois at Chicago.
The story is here.[link provided]
After being given permission to view these documents, Mr. Kurtz was subsequently denied an opportunity to view them for reasons that remain opaque.
I write to ask you to reconsider this decision. Surely the University does not wish to deny the public important information regarding the career of a man who aspires to occupy the Presidency.
Sincerely,
etc.,
Bump
If Kurtz relies on the FOIA, is there even a remote chance of a response before the election?
Bill Ayers was a radical 60's activist who was one of the founders of the domestic terrorist Weatherman group. The Weatherman, or the Weathermen, and later the Weatherman Underground Organization, was a violent leftist group who engaged in riots and bombings in the name of "Peace". They bombed the U.S. Capitol building, the Pentagon, and buildings associated with the military, law enforcement, etc.
Thanks! I will do it, here is a reminder of the kind of friends Hussein surrounds himself with:
http://mystical-politics.blogspot.com/2008/02/bill-ayers-and-bernardine-dohrn.html
He went underground in 1970, after his girlfriend, Diana Oughton, and two other people were killed when bombs they were making exploded in a Greenwich Village town house. With him in the Weather Underground was Bernardine Dohrn, who was put on the F.B.I.’s 10 Most Wanted List. J. Edgar Hoover called her ‘’the most dangerous woman in America’’ and ‘’la Pasionara of the Lunatic Left.’’ Mr. Ayers and Ms. Dohrn later married.
In his book Mr. Ayers describes the Weathermen descending into a ‘’whirlpool of violence.’’
‘’Everything was absolutely ideal on the day I bombed the Pentagon,’’ he writes. But then comes a disclaimer: ‘’Even though I didn’t actually bomb the Pentagon — we bombed it, in the sense that Weathermen organized it and claimed it.’’
So, would Mr. Ayers do it all again, he is asked? ‘’I don’t want to discount the possibility,’’ he said.
With his friends and associates, past and present?
Got a sneakin’ suspicion that these papers will wind up in the same black hole as the Obamessiah’s college thesis and Illinois State Senate records. All purely by accident, of course.
In the volumnious documents contained in dozens and dozens of boxes it can be expected that there will be correspondence and meeting minutes, etc. which involve both Obama and Ayers (unless these docs have already been sanitized).
There are likely to be chatty notes of a “Dear Bill” and “Dear Barack” nature, and/or meeting notes that document just how many times Obama and Ayers were in the same room together discussing this $100 million project, etc.
It is difficult to imagine that these docs will fail to shred the lie that Obama told, that Ayers is simply “a guy who lives in my neighborhood” when in reality the two of them worked closely together over quite a few years.
Calling Sandy Burglar, calling Sandy Burglar —
major archival sanitation project needed immediately!!
Your socks and underwear will not be sufficient this time — better bring in your document shredding machine.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=15197&R=13AE0E
Farrakhan lives in Hyde Park neighborhood?
“Just another guy from my neighborhood” Obama
Hence, the tagline....
I would think that interested taxpayers would give a respectful but firm call to the number provided.
Ward Churchill was involved with the Weather Underground.
http://marathonpundit.blogspot.com/2008/05/weather-undergrounds-smash-monogamy.html
BTTT
Bump
Annenberg Records in Grave Danger [Stanley Kurtz]
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=MzRiNmM1OGU4ZmFlM2YzOTJmNjYzYWI3MzdmN2U3NGQ=
Earlier today, I appeared on the Jerry Agar radio show, in Chicago, talking about my efforts to gain access to the Chicago Annenberg Challenge records. After my appearance, a spokesman for the University of Illinois at Chicago phoned Agar, read a statement, and was interviewed. Agar did a fantastic job of drawing this fellow out, and what emerged alarms me profoundly. Although the statement read by this spokesman for UIC claimed that the university was aggressively pursuing an agreement for legal possession of the documents, under questioning, this university spokesman clearly raised the possibility that no such agreement would be signed and that the entire Chicago Annenberg Challenge records would be returned to the donor, who he refused to name. You can listen to the interview here.
I will have more shortly.
08/19 01:09 PM
Later, Kurtz includes the transcript of the radio interview:
Below you will find a transcript of the radio interview Chicago talk radio host Jerry Agar conducted with a University of Illinois at Chicago spokesman regarding the Chicago Annenberg Challenge records. Although done quickly, this transcript should be at least 95% accurate, and is probably more so, but if in doubt, listen to the audio interview in my earlier post. Here is the transcript:
Prepared Statement by Bill Burton of UIC library:
“The university library supports the teaching, research and service missions of the university by acquiring, organizing, preserving and providing access to information. The library is open to the public and dedicated to free inquiry. The university has not received ownership rights to the Chicago Annenberg Challenge Collection. The university is aggressively pursuing an agreement with the donor. And as soon as an agreement is finalized, the collection will be made accessible to the public.
Question and Answers:
Q: Who’s the donor?
A: I’m not sure I’m at liberty to release that information.
Q: Is the donor Bill Ayers?
A: Not to my knowledge.
Q: Why is this a problem? If they give the material to a library, why would they hold up after giving permission. Your library gave permission to Stanley Kurtz to look at this material. Why was he suddenly shut down?
A: We were only made aware that there was not a formal ownership agreement as recently as he was so informed.
Q: How long can that take?
A: As I said we are aggressively pursuing an agreement with the donor.
Q: Stanley Kurtz I believe points out in his column he finds it hard to believe you would get 132 boxes of material without that agreement being put in place ahead of time?
A: I can’t help what he find hard to believe. But in fact there is no ownership agreement.
Q: Can this be done before the election?
A: I’m sorry.
Q: Can this be done before the election?
A: It can be done very quickly once we have an agreement.
Q: Can the agreement be done before the election?
A: Excuse me, and if it can’t be done we’ll simply return the materials to the owner.
Q: Do you understand that it looks you guys are trying to help someone hide this information from the media?
A: That’s not the case as I just told you.
Q: Thanks for your call.
08/19 01:50 PM
My question: Why should there be any problem obtaining this ownership agreement?
Especially since the owner donated the materials with the expectation that they would be available for public review?
If indeed it was just an oversight, it could be resolved in a day: Just come in, sign the standard agreement, and presto, no more problem.
And why wasn't an ownership agreement part of the transfer of the materials into the library's possession?
And now, of all times, it seems that the owner is having second thoughts about making this material public?
Or is this just a canard thrown up by the University?
And of course, if this was a McCain scandal the press would be hounding him 24/7 about this. But since it's Barry the Golden Boy, no journalist has asked him to comment on this situation, and what his campaign should do to resolve it.
Here’s the brand new update from Kurtz- my question is what can we do to do to get this thread more action? :)
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ODhhOTg2YTE3MDBhODJjNmI4YmY5NDY5MWRmYTc5Y2M=
Endangered Documents Act [Stanley Kurtz]
There are new developments in my quest to gain access to the Chicago Annenberg Challenge records, to prevent them from being returned to their original donor, and to preserve them from tampering. (For background, see my piece, “Chicago Annenberg Challenge Shutdown?”) The Associate Press has reported on the story. Over at JustOneMinute, Tom Maguire makes note of the fact that the AP story fails to mention the contradiction between Obama’s Annenberg connection and his claim that Ayers was just “a guy who lives in my neighborhood.” I find it odd that the reporter interviewed a spokesman for UIC, yet neither asked me to comment, nor even mentioned my name. It’s hard not to suspect that the AP is trying to give the impression of due diligence, while nonetheless attempting to control the story-line in a way that minimizes damage to Obama.
Although I linked to it yesterday, I would strongly urge interested readers to consider Steve Diamond’s important post, “ ‘Annenberg-Gate’ — It’s not the crime, it’s the cover up.” If Diamond’s legal analysis is correct (and I’ve been hearing a similar analysis from others), then UIC’s claim that it cannot show me the collection because it lacks a deed of gift is merely a “flimsy manufactured excuse.” That’s because, according to Diamond, the mere act of giving the documents to the library suffices to transfer ownership. If Diamond’s analysis is correct, then the donor’s demand to purge the collection of “personnel information that could include names...” is most disturbing. First, because it could serve as a tactic to force delay in making the collection accessible. Second, because it would appear to require that someone move through the collection to blank out names that could be of central importance to what I hope to discover. Again, if Diamond is right, there is really no basis for making any modifications to the documents at all, and no basis for yesterday’s claim by a university spokesman that, in the absence of a signed deed of gift, the entire collection might be returned to its original owner.
Diamond also delicately raises the possibility that there may be direct or indirect links between the donor of the Chicago Annenberg Collection records and individuals connected to the Obama campaign. This is an important reason why we need to know the name of the donor.
So I remain unsatisfied with mainstream media reporting on this issue, and continue to be extremely concerned for the safety and fate of the documents. We need more public pressure, and better reporting. I plan to say more down the road about Obama’s role at Annenberg, even without access to the records at UIC. I also plan to say more about the detailed finding aid now in my possession, and about the contents of the single file folder I was permitted to examine.
Let me make one broad point today. Notice that the critical evaluation of Woods Fund grant programs I discuss in “Senator Stealth,” my piece in the current issue of National Review, occurred in 1995. That was the same year the Chicago Annenberg Challenge began, with Obama as board chairman, and the same year Obama launched his first campaign for State Senate, at a political coming out party at the home of Ayers and Dohrn, among other venues. In 1995, in other words, Obama moved to increase his influence over two local foundations, each of which would disburse money to his radical political-organizer friends, and even to his future campaign ground troops. This alone raises many interesting and important questions, some of which I pursue in “Senator Stealth.” But I note that, if names were to be purged from the Chicago Annenberg Collection records, it could inhibit my ability to follow critical leads on this, and other, aspects of this story.
If you would like to keep up the pressure on UIC to protect these documents, to release the name of the donor, and to make this material accessible to me and to the public, you can email University of Illinois President B. Joseph White here. Phone numbers for President White’s two offices are (312) 413-9097 and (217) 333-3070. Snail mail addresses for the offices can be found here.
08/20 12:15 PM
As to your question: Go ahead and post the Kurtz update to the forum, and link to this thread in the comments is the best I can suggest.
The Mods removed this thread from “Activism” yesterday for reasons that are not clear to me.
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