Posted on 10/01/2008 10:55:32 AM PDT by NoobRep
An exchange of letters in late 1994 (links below) between Vartan Gregorian, the President of Brown University, Adele Simmons, President of the MacArthur Foundation, and Bill Ayers, the founder of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, demonstrate that Ayers played a direct personal role in the recruitment of members of the Challenge's board of directors.
The Board was chaired by Barack Obama.
The Obama campaign recently issued a statement stating that Bill Ayers had "nothing to do with Obama's recruitment to the Board." The campaign contends that the only people involved in the appointment of Obama were Deborah Leff, then president of the Chicago based Joyce Foundation, and Patricia Graham, President of the Chicago based Spencer Foundation. Graham is a noted education historian and professor at Harvard.
The Campaign's conclusion appears to be based on a statement issued by Leff a few days ago, fourteen years after the letters were written, where she stated:
“While working with Adele Simmons and Patricia Graham to identify a highly qualified person to chair the education reform organization the Annenberg Challenge, I recommended Barack Obama to serve as Chair. After meeting with Obama to review his qualifications, Patricia Graham asked Obama to become a candidate for the position.”
Of course, it is not clear from this statement that Ayers was not also involved as the letters demonstrate. In addition, a letter from Leff to Vartan Gregorian indicates that she viewed Ayers as in charge of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge.
http://globallabor.blogspot.com/
Obama is a liar when he claims he met Ayers in 1995.
Ayers and Obama were at school in New York at the same time in 1982/83.
Obama was at Columbia, Ayers was at Bank Street College.
Well, New York is a big city you might say....
....Bank Street College is 371 yards down the street from Columbia.
Both lived off Campus, (possibly together?), they had mutual acquaintances, and must have moved in the same political, social circles.
As an aside, did you notice the only agenda specific that Obama mentioned in the debate last week when asked about what effect the finance meltdown would have on his program was that he was still keen on "expanding Early Childhood Education"..
That seems like an odd priority when there are so many dire needs in this current crisis until you consider this..
Guess what Bill Ayers' degrees are in?
Early Childhood Education..
On November 29, 1994, Simmons replied to Gregorian and copied her letter to Bill Ayers. She told Gregorian that:
“Bill Ayers, Debby Leff, Pat Graham, Anne Hallett, and I had breakfast on November 22, and reviewed the issues raised in your letter....We are constituting a governing board that will be diverse and bi-partisan and will include civic leaders who have a long-standing interest in the public schools as well as the people who are actually working in the schools. We expect this group to include no more that [sic] eight people, and we should be able to send you a list of several of the names by early next week. It is this group that will be accountable for the implementation of the project, for raising the matching funds, and for overseeing the evaluation.”
On December 1, 1994, Ayers and Anne Hallett (who co-chaired the CSRC with Ayers) wrote to Gregorian. They wrote:
“Thank you for your letter of November 18, 1994. We are continuing to build a broad base of consensus and support for the main thrust of the proposal....We have given careful thought to the issues raised in your letter. We are working with Adele Simmons, Deborah Leff, and Pat Graham on issues of management and governance to ensure that Chicago's Annenberg Challenge initiative is successful. We offer the following responses:....Board of Directors. A five-to-seven person Board of Directors of highly respected Chicagoans is being assembled. Pat Graham, president of the Spencer Foundation, has agreed to serve and is willing to work with the Board. The duties of the Board will be to approve grants, to help raising matching funds, and to hire the executive director....The Board and the Collaborative will reflect the racial and ethnic diversity of Chicago.”
Thus, it is clear from the contemporaneous written record of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, that Bill Ayers, who conceived and led the organization, submission and implementation of the CAC’s grant application, also played an active and direct role in the recruitment and formation of the CAC’s board of directors.
Nothing there but “indications”.
“to identify a highly qualified person to chair the education reform organization the Annenberg Challenge”
Here we go again... What “High Qualifications” in education did Barrack Obama have. Or was he just there to rubber stamp the money grants for whatever or whoever he was told.
Follow the money, $160 million went down the rabbit hole. Nice way to pay off your friends.
Now why would Deborah Leff who has headed up the gun violence section of the Joyce Foundation recomend a young “pro gun” Obama to head up a new foundation?
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