September 22, 2015
The most recent link update at the end
of the post is October 14, 2015.
On Sunday, September 20th
hundreds of supporters of public schools rallied in Los Angeles to protest corporate education reformer Eli Broad as
he opened his new museum. The Broad is a museum designed to show to the world Eli Broad’s “trophy
acquisitions from the contemporary art market,
tigers’ heads bagged from a notoriously wild and lawless economic jungle.”
The protestors were not at The Broad to
protest the crass commercialization of art, however. They took the opportunity to
protest their outrage at what Broad would like to do to
the public schools of Los Angeles. Eli Broad and corporate education reform
backers plan to spend $490 million in an attempt to
turn over half of Los Angeles’ public schools to charters in the next eight years.
In the museum were
seven hundred invited guests…celebrities,
artists, art collectors and arts professional. Topping the list was former
President Bill Clinton. The
Los Angeles Times report on the gala event had a
reveling off the cuff comment by Bill Clinton.
Of his friendship with the Broads, Clinton turned to them
and asked, “What year did you come and sit in the living room with me?” Edye
Broad noted that Clinton daughter Chelsea, now an active figure in the Clinton
Foundation and the Clinton Global Initiative, had been a baby at the time and
that Hillary Rodham Clinton, a
Democratic presidential candidate and former secretary of State, had been Eli’s
lawyer. After settling on 1983, Clinton said, “I looked up one day and Eli was
in my living room, and my life has never been the same.” (Boldface added)
This
confirms that Eli Broad’s relationship with the Clintons has existed for over
thirty years. Bill Clinton was the governor
of Arkansas
at the time, and Eli Broad was of the owner of
the retirement savings company SunAmerica.
At
the beginning of his “Courage in the Classroom”
bus tour in 2010,
Arne Duncan gave a speech at the Clinton Presidential Library and the University
of Arkansas Clinton School of Public Service. The U. S. Department of
Education report on Duncan’s speech said,
Both as governor of Arkansas and as president, Bill Clinton
was an early and active voice in the education reform movement. While in the
White House, he pioneered a financial aid program that made the federal
government, instead of private banks, the direct lender to college students.
This year, Congress expanded the direct lending program, fully eliminating
wasteful subsidies to banks and recouping billions of dollars in savings to
send millions more needy students to college and invest in our nation’s
community college system.
President Clinton
also spurred states toward rigorous standards in elementary and secondary
education and better assessments of student learning. And in the last year,
under the leadership of governors and state education chiefs along with
incentives from the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act (ARRA), the movement
toward higher standards has advanced considerably, with 36 states and the
District of Columbia—and counting—signing on to a common set of college- and
career-ready standards that they developed together. ARRA is providing $350
million to develop a set of 21st century assessments that will better measure
students’ readiness for college and careers, and the Department plans to award
that money to groups of states in the coming weeks.
President Clinton
also passed a school-to-work law, recognizing one of the ultimate goals of
education—to prepare students for careers that are rewarding to themselves and
to society. The Obama administration’s education agenda continues this emphasis
on preparation for the workplace, and the Department of Education has proposed
regulations to ensure that career-focused college programs are providing
training that leads to gainful employment for their graduates.
So, in many aspects
of its education agenda, the Obama administration is building on programs and
policies for students that began in the Clinton administration nearly two
decades ago. (And, coincidentally, President Clinton’s education secretary,
Dick Riley, also marked the back-to-school season with a bus tour.)
From this soil the Eli Broad corporate
education reform agenda grew.
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
The above post is an update of the article
“Eli Broad and the Clintons” published on June 28, 2015 which traced the
evolution of the relationship of Eli Broad and the Clintons.
Eli Broad and the Clintons
By Ken Derstine
June 28, 2015
The Broads and the Clintons at the pre-ball dinner
hosted by Eli Broad at the Inauguration of Barack Obama on January 20, 2009. Click here to view more
pictures from the event.
For
some people, sleep seems incidental. If you’re one of them, I envy you. Bill
Clinton, who I have known since he was governor of Arkansas, sticks out in my
mind as someone who does exceptionally well with very little rest.
While
he was president, he invited me to stay at the White House. It had been a long
day and I was tired, so I went to bed a bit early. At 11:30 PM, I woke up to a
knock on the door. The president’s usher poked his head in and informed me the
president was in the solarium and wanted to chat. There wasn’t much I could say
except, “Sure.”
President
Clinton came in, sat down, and began talking about everything–the Russian
election, the Taiwan Strait, Israel, and why Kentucky was the best of the Final
Four in that spring’s college basketball playoffs. We ended up going to bed not
long before dawn.
During his presidency, Bill
Clinton started the controversial practice of inviting political supporters to spend the night
in the Lincoln Bedroom of the White House. Nearly 1000
White House guests gave more than $10 million in the 1990’s towards his reelection campaign and later to Hillary
Clinton’s 2008 Presidential bid. One of the contributors was Eli Broad who gave more than $162,500. From January 1, 1995 to December 31, 1996 Broad
gave $100,000 and listed his corporate affiliation as Truman Arnold Companies. Truman Arnold Companies is a $2.2 billion Texarkana,
Texas petroleum marketing company. Clinton’s assistant District attorney, Webster
Hubbell, who was convicted on corruption charges in 1994, was on the payroll of Truman Arnold and Sun
America, Inc., “a California financial services company controlled
by Eli Broad, a close Clinton friend who, like Rapoport and Arnold,
stayed overnight at the White House.”
Eli
Broad started accumulating his riches from a real estate company that he began
with his wife’s cousin on borrowed money in 1957. Riding the crest of the
expanding real estate market after World War II, particularly with the growth
of suburbs around urban areas, Broad began building his millions, later to be
billions, when he acquired Sun Life Insurance Company of America in 1971. In
1999, he sold SunAmerica to the American International Group (AIG) for $18
billion. For those who see accumulating wealth as the measure of a man, Broad
became an icon fulfilling the American Dream’s Horatio Alger myth of the
self-made man becoming incomprehensibly rich.
Fortunately
for Eli Broad, his myth could remain intact during the real estate and financial market
crashes in 2008 because his affiliation with his real estate business and
financial company was years in his past. He stepped down as CEO of Kaufman
& Broad in 1974 and CEO of SunAmerica in 2000. AIG was given $182 billion
in taxpayer funds in 2008 to prevent the company, and the financial system,
from collapsing during the financial market collapse brought on by the real
estate market collapse.
In
2000, Broad and his wife Edythe created the “philanthropy” The Broad
Foundations. The “philanthropy” became a means for the Broads to bring their
Horatio Alger myth to the arts and to
education, having no background in either, and, along with other major “philanthropists”
like the Gates Foundation and the Walton Foundation, he begin the
reshaping of public education in the United States to fit a neoliberal agenda in the
interests of the financial oligarchy the 1% is trying to form in the United
States.
Bill
Clinton’s all night White House meeting with Eli Broad, occurred
as Clinton, under the guise of a progressive agenda, was advancing a neoliberal agenda during and
after his presidency. Though he claims many of the reactionary laws during his
Presidency were due to Republican intransigence, the Democrats controlled
both legislative bodies during Clinton’s first term when most
of these reactionary laws were passed. He continued with the policies of the
Reagan years that were a counter-reform undermining the gains of Roosevelt’s
New Deal and the Civil Rights movement of the ‘60’s. Corporate and financial
interests had given these concessions because of fears that labor unrest in the
30’s and urban unrest in the 60’s would lead to a political movement that
threatened the interests of the 1%. The repeal of the Glass-Steagall
Act of 1932 benefited Clinton’s many White House guests and others in
the 1% and have led to historic levels of wealth for the 1% even as it has impoverished
the 99%. Clinton’s Violent
Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 led to an expansion of
Reagan’s “War on Drugs” which creation a prison population that is the largest
per capita in the world and an expansion of the death penalty for the
low-income population. His Personal
Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, known as “welfare
reform”, was to lead to an explosion of homelessness and low-income or
no-income families falling into a poverty not seen since the Great Depression.
The North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) opened up corporations to
low-wage workers in the developing world and gutted manufacturing in the United
States. It is under these conditions that Eli Broad launched his
“philanthropies”, including the Broad Superintendents Academy in 2000, to train
and insert superintendents in school districts all around the United States who
would advance a privatization of public schools agenda. Based on the right-wing economic theories
of economist Milton Friedman corporate education reform began a fascistic agenda designed
to reshape public schools financially and ideologically for the one percent.
Playing
a central role in promoting Clinton’s neoliberal agenda was the Democratic
Leadership Council. Formed in 1985 after the defeat of Walter Mondale and the
reelection of Ronald Reagan, it became the think tank for many of the rightwing
neoliberal policies promoted by Clinton. Clinton was
head of the DLC in 1990 until he became President in 1992. A key player shepherding
the neoliberal agenda during the Clinton Presidency and after was Bruce Reed
who became head of the Democratic Leadership Council in 2001.
“Mr.
Reed was policy director when Mr. Clinton, then the governor of Arkansas, was
chairman of the Democratic Leadership Council. Mr. Reed also served as deputy
chairman of policy for the 1992 Clinton-Gore campaign, then worked in the White
House for all of the Clinton administration.
As
head of the Domestic Policy Council, he had a leading role in overhauling
welfare in 1996 and in developing initiatives on education, crime, health,
tobacco and more. In 2006, back at the Democratic Leadership Council, Mr. Reed
and Rahm Emanuel, now the White House chief of staff but then a congressman and
Mr. Reed’s friend from their years in the Clinton administration, wrote a book
called “The Plan: Big Ideas for America.” It was intended as a platform for the
Democrats’ takeover of Congress that year.”
Files in the National Archives show that Reed was heavily involved in developing the
Clinton neoliberal education agenda. Files from 1997 – 2000 in 133 folders in 9
boxes “includes material pertaining to national standards and
testing; the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) and the 1999 efforts
to reauthorize the act; 100,000 teachers and class size; charter schools and
vouchers; education events and forums; social promotion; Goals 2000; Helping
Outstanding Pupils Educationally (HOPE) Scholarships; Pell Grants; the
Education Flexibility Partnership Act of 1999 (Ed-flex); education funding and
budgets; and various school and teacher issues.”
In the final months of
the Clinton administration, another controversy erupted over favoritism for wealthy supporters of the Clinton’s
neoliberal agenda. Hillary Clinton played an active role in efforts to give tax
breaks to private foundations and wealthy charity donors at the same time as
donations were being solicited for Bill Clinton’s presidential library. Bruce
Reed, who was Clinton’s chief domestic policy advisor at the time, dismissed
the controversy saying, Clinton "wanted to give a break to
working people for putting a few more dollars in the plate at the church. Not
for any other far-fetched reason." Months before proposing the tax breaks,
Clinton White House officials had proposed holding a September, 1999 conference
to celebrate “philanthropy heroes” who had donated large gifts. The list
included
“Microsoft's Bill Gates and his wife, Dell computer founder Michael Dell and
investors George Soros and Eli Broad”.
In July of 2005 Hillary
Clinton was appointed by the Democratic Leadership Council to define the
party’s agenda for the upcoming 2006 and 2008 elections. Reed assured an interviewer on NPR that she was on board with the neoliberal agenda but her appointment
had nothing to do with a political run for President in 2008.
Despite his endorsement
of Hillary Clinton in the 2008 election, Eli Broad was thrilled with the
election of Barack Obama. The 2009/2010 Annual Report of the Broad Foundation (page 5) says,
“The election
of President Barack Obama and his appointment of Arne Duncan, former CEO of
Chicago Public Schools, as the U.S. secretary of education, marked the pinnacle
of hope for our work in education reform. In many ways, we feel the stars have
finally aligned.
With an agenda that echoes
our decade of investments—charter schools, performance pay for teachers,
accountability, expanded learning time and national standards—the Obama
administration is poised to cultivate and bring to fruition the seeds we and
other reformers have planted.”
Arne Duncan had been on the board
of the Broad Foundation until he became Secretary of Education (2009/2010 Broad Report page 25) and, according to this Report brought
five Broad Residents and alumni with him to the Department of Education. Also
on the board (2009/2010 Broad Report page 25)
the Broad Foundation is Larry Summers who
served as top economic advisor in the Clinton and Obama administrations after
being Chief Economist for the World Bank from 1991–1993. At this time the World
Bank was in the midst of playing a leading role in developing a neoliberal education agenda in Chile that began under the Pinochet
dictatorship. Among the many former officials in the Clinton administration joining Obama’s administration was Bruce Reed who became Vice President Biden’s chief
of staff. On March 22, 2010 he also was appointed executive director of President Obama’s bipartisan commission
to reduce the national debt.
On November 13,, 2013,
Bruce Reed left as Biden’s chief of staff to
become the first President of The Broad Foundation. The website Inside Philanthropy said this appointment made him “one of the powerful
people in education philanthropy.” In an interview in the Los Angeles Times on March 13, 2014, about his agenda
with the Broad Foundation, Reed gave the standard boilerplate of corporate
education reform. This is someone who has never taught a day in his life at any grade level nor
had any background in pedagogy or education.
After announcing her run for
President on April 12, 2015, Hillary Clinton met with the leadership of the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association in June. She sought to distance herself
from her support of No Child Left Behind when she was a Senator in 2001. While
she was an early critic of standardized testing, her position seems to shift by
which way the political winds are blowing. Given her history with the Broad
Foundation, can there be any illusions that she will continue the neoliberal
attack on public education? It has been reported that 181 Clinton Foundation donors lobbied the State Department when she was
Secretary of State. The two top donors were leaders in corporate education
reform: The Microsoft/Gates Foundation ($26,000,000) and the Walmart/Walton
Family Foundation ($10,500,00).
Nor can the union leaders be trusted to represent the interests of their
members. Randi Weingarten in particular has a history with the Broad Foundation
going back to 2002. This collaboration has continued ever since.
“Teacher unions
have always been a formidable voice in public education. We decided at the
onset of our work to invest in smart, progressive labor leaders like Randi
Weingarten, head of the United Federation of Teachers in New York City for more
than a decade and now president of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT).
We partnered with Weingarten to fund two union-run charter schools in Brooklyn
and to fund New York City’s first incentive-based compensation program for
schools, as well as the AFT’s Innovation Fund. We had previously helped advance
pay for performance programs in Denver and Houston, but we were particularly
encouraged to see New York City embrace the plan.”
In 2010 she collaborated with the Gates Foundation to develop a teacher evaluation system
based on standardized tests, testifying before Congress three times in support
of the effort. A recent study noted the increasing convergence of the goals of Bill Gates and Eli
Broad. Randi Weingarten has been collaborating with both. For several years, she has been a leader in the Clinton Global Initiative conferences that bring together
corporate and union leaders to foster collaboration in promoting a neoliberal
agenda nationally and internationally.
Unless the 99% gets its act
together and launches a serious political challenge to the two-party system
with a party with a program that represents the interests of the 99%, the November
2016 election will once again be a choice between the lesser of two evils. The
problem is the evil just keeps getting worse.
Also see:
Diane Ravitch's Blog - July 11, 2015
Read the comments.
Huffington Post - July 17, 2015
Esquire - July 16, 2015
Why Bill Clinton's Apology and Barack Obama's Prison Drive-By, Token
Clemencies Are Cynical Election Year Posturing
Black Agenda Report - July 17, 2015
Black Agenda Report - July 17, 2015
Democracy Now! - July 17, 2015
Real Learning CT - July 20, 2015
Daily Beast - August 4, 2015
Curmudgucation - August 20, 2015
Fred Klonsky's blog - September 21, 2015
At the opening of the Broad Museum, Bill Clinton confirmed the Clinton's
close relationship with Eli Broad.
The NEA May Be About to Endorse Hillary Clinton Without Input From Majority
of Members
Gadflyonthewallblog – September 21, 2015
Gadflyonthewallblog – September 21, 2015
The American Enterpirse Institute -
September 21, 2015
The American Enterpirse
Institute's Frederick Hess with the neocon view of Obama's
education legacy.
Defend Public Education!- April 22, 2015
Analysis of Randi Weingarten's appearance before an audience at the
American Enterprise Institute on June 18, 2014.
LA
Plan to Crush Public Education
Curmudgucation - September 22, 2015
K-12 News Network’s The Wire – September
24, 2015
Eli
Broad, the Billionaire at war with democracy, the want-to-be Emperor of
Southern California
Crazy Normal – The Classroom Exposé – September 25, 2015
Crazy Normal – The Classroom Exposé – September 25, 2015
Some
teachers resisting union endorsement of Hillary Rodham Clinton for president
Los Angeles Times – October 1, 2015
Los Angeles Times – October 1, 2015
This LA Times article cites the website Defend Public Education! as one of the sources of the
discontent with Hillary Clinton, but it distorts what is stated in the above
article. A previous LA Times article (quoted in the Update above) says Eli
Broad visited the Clintons in 1983, but this new article does not include the information that Bill Clinton said that
Hillary Clinton was Eli Broad's lawyer at the time as the previous article did. This relationship
indicates a much deeper connection between Eli Broad and the Clintons than
previously disclosed. Is this why this LA Times article, while mentioning this
website, does not provide the link to this article?
The Movement Lives in Ferguson: Teach for America, Black Leadership, and Disaster Capitalism
Orchestrated Pulse - October 9, 2015
#BlackLivesMatter: Chat Partners with Hillary
Black Agenda Report - October 14, 2015
The Movement Lives in Ferguson: Teach for America, Black Leadership, and Disaster Capitalism
Orchestrated Pulse - October 9, 2015
#BlackLivesMatter: Chat Partners with Hillary
Black Agenda Report - October 14, 2015
Thanx for full information. Keep it up.
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