Case closed
Posted on 08/31/2008 11:07:07 AM PDT by NoobRep
Annenberg Challenge a radical enclave? Gimme a break! There is nothing to condemn about Ayers’ leadership over the past 20 years.
August 30, 2008
BY LINDA LENZ
Somewhere in the afterlife, Walter Annenberg must be shaking his head and wondering what in the world is going on in Chicago. First, the Sun-Times and the Tribune gave up precious inches of their dwindling news space to report that the University of Illinois at Chicago was refusing — and then later agreed — to release documents detailing Sen. Barack Obama’s role in a nonprofit education project "started" by William Ayers, a founder in the 1960s of the radical Weatherman group, which embraced violence as an anti-war tactic.
The project in question was the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a pairing of nonprofit organizations and schools funded by the late publishing magnate and mainstream Chicago foundations. Ayers had been one of the authors of Chicago’s proposal to get a slice of Annenberg’s $500 million multi-city school reform grant, and Obama was the project’s first board chairman.
The issue of Obama’s role arose when a blogger for National Review raised questions about his relationship with Ayers, a favorite election-year target of conservatives. The blogger felt quite sure that the pair were much closer than Obama intimated when he said he knew Ayers "from the neighborhood" where both live. The blogger hinted darkly that the pair were really ideological soul mates and that Obama was aligned "with Ayers’s radical views on education issues."
When the appointed hour arrived for release of the documents, reporters, camera operators and bloggers descended on the hapless university library staff to pore over hundreds of files of grant proposals, meeting minutes and reports — a "media frenzy," the Tribune called it.
And what did the muckrakers find? Horrors, Obama had attended meetings and retreats with the author of The Good Preschool Teacher and To Teach: The Journey of a Teacher. He had actually rubbed shoulders — can you believe it? — with a distinguished professor of education who holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in early childhood education and a doctorate in curriculum and instruction. He had probably even shared a cup of coffee, as only a co-conspirator would, with this professor, whose writings describe good schools as places that are "organized around and powered by a set of core values" and "effectively meet students where they are and find ways to nurture and challenge them to learn."
In other words, Obama does, indeed, know Bill Ayers as more than just a guy from the neighborhood. So do a host of civic leaders in Chicago. For example, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge board included Susan Crown of the General Dynamics Corp. family; Patricia Graham, former dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and Arnold Weber, past president of Northwestern University and of the Civic Committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago. Indeed, just about everyone active in Chicago school reform in the early days saw Ayers as a colleague. No one ever accused them of being radical because of their association with Bill Ayers.
Whatever one thinks of Ayers’ actions 40 years ago, there is nothing to condemn, and much to admire, about his leadership and commitment over the past 20 years in making schools better places to teach and learn. And there is nothing to condemn, and much to applaud, in Obama’s close association with those efforts.
Some of the reporters assigned to dig into the Annenberg archives felt a little silly about it all, I’m told. Their editors should too.
Linda Lenz is the founder and publisher of Catalyst Chicago, an education newsmagazine published by Community Renewal Society.
This Obama-affiliated goon tries to gloss over Ayer's record and his radical agenda. Make sure you read Steve Diamond's comments below the article. He's been all over this story from the beginning.
They do protect their own.
Case closed
Hey, Linda Lenz:
What tangible progress resulted from this work? $50MM was spent — what did it accomplish?
Are you sure William Ayers’ radical ideas didn’t permeate into the “curriculum” or “teacher requirements/credentials” as a result of this effort?
What benchmarks did the leaders (Obama and Ayers) of this commission establish? Were they met? Is the Chicago cr*ppy school system any better off for having spent these $50 million?
So, in other words, Obama lied.
Perhaps the editors of the Sun Times should feel “a little silly” about inviting Ms. Lenz to pen an editorial defending a former terrorist without identifying her fully.
Ms. Lenz is associated with the Alliance for Excellent Education on whose board sits Obama education advisor Linda Darling-Hammond. And on Ms. Lenz’ board of directors at the Community Renewal Society is Warren Chapman, one of the founders of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge and a former staff member of the Joyce Foundation on whose board served Barack Obama.
While Ms. Lenz brushes over the self-proclaimed “radical” nature of school reform in Chicago she also ignores the fact that a central goal of the Annenberg Challenge led by Ayers and Obama was to bolster flagging Local School Councils, a new power center in the schools set up in the wake of a teachers strike to watchdog teachers and principals.
And although in a recent talk she gave she lauds the research conducted by the Consortium on Chicago School Research of the University of Chicago, she ignores their studied conclusion that the Annenberg Challenge was a failure. $160,000,000 down the drain and no improvement in student outcomes.
No wonder the Mayor pushed against Ayers and Obama to re-centralize power over the schools, although that was no comfort to the teachers union.
Oh, at least Ms. Lenz gets one thing right: Ayers was indeed not “just some guy in the neighborhood” as Senator Obama attempted to mislead the American people into thinking. Given the failure of the Annenberg Challenge and the authoritarian outlook that a former terrorist brought to the reform effort, no wonder he made the attempt.
Setting aside the fact that Michelle LaVaughn Robinson's colleague [and probable mentor] at Sidley & Austin, one Bernardine Dohrn, revelled in the Manson Family butchery in the Sharon Tate massacre ["Dig It. First they killed those pigs, then they ate dinner in the same room with them, they even shoved a fork into a victim's stomach! Wild"], just the mere fact that Michelle's & Bernardine's husbands were conspiring together to embezzle the Annenberg money to fund "Juneteenth" rather than Algebra is enough to file Mr. Obama Soetoro in the radical kook fringe category.What Lurks in the Ayers-Annenberg Files?August 29, 2008 - by Clarice Feldman...The CAC files show the organization funneled money to activist organizations and did so on ideological grounds, favoring applications that focused on ethnic identity and bilingual education and turning down grant proposals which did not. Thus, CAC funded a Juneteenth effort by the South Shore African Village Collaboration and a peace school but rejected proposals by the Chicago Algebra Project aimed at increasing student achievement and the District 5 Math Science Initiative which was trying to increase the math and science competence of Hispanic youngsters...
Freep-mail me to get on or off my pro-life and Catholic List:
Please ping me to note-worthy Pro-Life or Catholic threads, or other threads of interest.
Whatever one thinks of Ayers’ actions 40 years ago, there is nothing to condemn, and much to admire, about his leadership and commitment over the past 20 years in making schools better places to teach and learn.What about his 911 comments in the NY Slimes?
''I don't regret setting bombs,'' Bill Ayers said. ''I feel we didn't do enough.''
When Bambi was first asked publicly about Ayers (at a debate) he described him as a “professor of English” who “lives in my neighborhood.” Obviously we were to think that he cant possibly know Ayers well if he doesnt even know what subject he teaches (education, not English).
Of course, Bambi was just trying to fake us out, something he attempts regularly. He could not have spent all those years on this Annenberg Project and not know that Ayers is a professor of education.
How many Freepers would serve on a board with a known terrorist?
“I told you it wouldn’t be long before people started saying “yeah so what he hung out with Bill Ayers.”
The leftist, Obama-worshipers don’t care if Obama has been associated with terrorists/communists/racists his entire life. The ones who hopefully will care are the un-decided voters and probably also the PUMA’s and that might be enough to keep this closet marxist away from the White House.
It seems it is starting to unravel a bit for the left again. I only hope it falls apart by election time.
Ayers should have been locked in prison with no hope of parole.
Actually, her editorial provides thinking voters one additional insight into the Chicago political cesspool that nurtured Obama. Failure of the organization run by Obama and the abhorrent people he has associated with are of no importance to some people. Voters must unite to keep their ilk as far as possible from winning.
thanks for the addy
I sent her a question,
What do Obama and Osama have in common?
They both have friends that bombed the pentagon, and they will never be elected President of the United States of America
So they only spent 50 million and had 160 million. I read they spread a lot to politicians BUT can you imagine the offshore accounts that Obama and Ayres must have.
Obama’s life story is just one long meta-narrative, which is continually morphing and being re-written to fit the current agenda. I don’t think that Obama even knows the truth of his own life story.
I’ve been thinking about this because I was talking to my neighbor who lived in Indonesia for thirty years, and whose three children grew up there. She says that it is very concerning that Obama denies that part of his life. She says that it is impossible that he went to school in Indonesia for four years and doesn’t speak the language. She says that he would have been taught some Arabic, as well. Obama says that he can’t speak any other language but English. My neigbor also says that the Muslim schools in Indonesia mostly teach a very radical form of Islam. She says that it is troublesome that Obama denies this part of his life because if it was all so innocent and harmless, why not discuss it in the open?
good one!lol
Lenz’s objectivity is zilch, as the Obama/Ayers connections continue:
* Chicago Catalyst’s largest funder is The Joyce Foundation1, upon whose board Obama served for eight years, beginning in 1994, during which time, in 1995, “Anne Hallett of the Cross City Campaign for Urban School Reform, William Ayers of the University of Illinois at Chicago, and Warren Chapman of the Joyce Foundation” proposed the CAC (Also see Diamond’s Annenberg-Gate).
* Mike Klonsky, who runs Progressives for Obama, is a former member of Lenz’s Catalyst Chicago editorial board, as is John Ayers, Bill Ayers’ brother.
* Thomas G. Ayers, Bill Ayers’ father, was a contributor to the Community Renewal Society, as are: Bettylu Saltzman, whom we learned recently, has been an Obama supporter since at least his run for the Illinois legislature; Obama bundler John Rogers (and Exelon director), through his Ariel Mutual Fund; Sidley Austin, the law firm which employed both Barack and Michelle Obama and Bill Ayers’ wife, Bernadine Dohrn; and Trinity United Church of Christ, Obama’s church until recently tossed under the Obama bus.
(cont.)
Linda A. Lenz’s Chicago media ties run even deeper. She is married to Marshall Froker, the former deputy editor of the Chicago Tribune magazine, whose only political contribution on record was $250 to the Obama campaign donated in May 2008.
Although only in small amounts, Lenz also contributed to Obama’s campaign: $500 in February, $250 in April, and a second $250 as recently as July. FEC records do not show Lenz contributing to any other or previous political candidates.
>>Whatever one thinks of Ayers’ actions 40 years ago, there is nothing to condemn, and much to admire, about his leadership and commitment over the past 20 years in making schools better places to teach and learn. And there is nothing to condemn, and much to applaud, in Obama’s close association with those efforts.<<
And Hitler tamed inflation. Mussolini got the trains to run on time. Pol Pot solved overcrowding. Stalin helped us win WW2 (a lie). I’m sure that the above op-ed could be re-written with different names and say the same thing.
Sidley Austin also does work for Tom Ayers’ company. Speculation is that is why Bernadine Dohrn got hired there as a clerk or whatever.
Obama camp seeking ‘totalitarian’ state?
Ad maker criticizes attempts to shut down information
World Net Daily | August 30, 2008 | Andrea Shea King
Posted on 08/30/2008 7:16:36 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2071570/posts
Three ghosts haunt Barack
Boston Herald | August 31, 2008 | Michael Barone
Posted on 08/31/2008 5:38:03 AM PDT by Presbyterian Reporter
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2071744/posts
Is Khalid al-Mansour the man behind Obama myth?
WorldNetDaily | August 28, 2008 | Jack Cashill
Posted on 08/30/2008 8:18:40 PM PDT by SatinDoll
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-gop/2071608/posts
*Breaking News* FactCheck posts update
to its “Born in the U.S.A.” story on Aug 26th
FactCheck: Born in the U.S.A. | 08/31/08 | Polarik
Posted on 08/31/2008 11:30:50 AM PDT by Polarik
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2071906/posts
Hussein's speeches need to be Freeper with a sign that says,
"TELL US ABOUT YOUR TERRORIST FRIEND".
It's absolutely outrageous that the President of the US could have a 'friend' who has bombed the Pentagon, Capitol Building and NY Police HQ!!
Who would doubt that Ayers would have linked with Bin Laden to wage war against the citizens of the United States. Pravda (Chicago Sun Times) would have dutifully taken transcription from either. Now, Obama, much more than a neighbor to Ayers, but someone who is his understudy, gets cover by Chicago citizens who read the rag (Chicago Sun Times). If George Bush had dinner parties with terrorists (unrepentent) the media would have crapped bricks. But because their political idol is linked to their hip they willfully disgorge themselves of reason and any modicum of patiotism they may have as a residual.
Family ties proved Ayers ‘ point
Chicago Tribune (IL) - May 18, 2008
Author: Ron Grossman, Tribune reporter
EXCERPT
Ayers ‘ father moved in philanthropic circles with Howard Trienens, an attorney with the powerhouse firm of Sidley Austin . The two served together on Northwestern University’s Board of Trustees. Ayers was chairman of that group, then handed the post off to Trienens in 1986.
Trienens headed Sidley Austin when the firm hired Dohrn in 1984. She had never practiced law and had been out of law school for 17 years.
When I asked Trienens if he had hired Dohrn , he replied: “Yes.”
Wasn’t that a bit of nepotism, considering his relationship to her father-in-law? A lot of lawyers would love a first job with such a prestigious firm.
“We often hire friends,” replied Trienens, 84.
EXACTLY!!
The same thing if John McCain was buddies with a terrorist.
The MSM's attempt to 'spike' this story is absolutely OUTRAGEOUS.
You think killing policemen, making bombs, bombing the capitol, and forcibly raping young women is OK? Just a matter of opinion? And maybe it's OK that Ayres now says he didn't do enough bombing and raping?
Explains a lot.
Yup, but those people don't have an explanation for why team uhh-ummmmmmm-umm-uh-bama are trying to silence Stanley Kurtz from discussing his Annenberg Challenge findings on radio appearances.
Exactly! Why hasn't he been shunned?
Instead, Linda Lenz gives us a long list of prominent people who have worked closely with this unrepentant terrorist.
Linda Lenz is the founder and publisher of Catalyst Chicago, an education newsmagazine published by Community Renewal Society.Thank you Al Gore. I love this Internet thingy of yours. You can find the darnedest stuff.
Community Renewal SocietyLinda Lenz is just an old commie like her fellow traveler Bill Ayers.
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