Posted on 06/30/2011 12:59:16 PM PDT by HorowitzianConservative
The phenomenon of leftist billionaires funding anti-capitalist activism seems on the surface to be a contradiction. How could those who should understand the way individual freedom and initiative creates wealth with the power to do good seek the destruction of the system that produces this wealth? The answer is a complex one, although for those who inherited wealth, rather than making their own fortune, guilt clearly plays a role. This seems to be the case with billionaire former sports mogul George Gund III. He used to own the San Jose Sharks and Cleveland Cavaliers. Today he’s the co-founder of two foundations which provide hundreds of thousands of dollars to dozens of radical causes.
In a rare public interview, Gund has commented on his admiration for those who led lives that challenged the established cultural order, like Zen artists. This affinity for the “outsider” has driven Gund to bankroll the films and activism of Iara Lee, his Korean-Brazilian wife 27 years his junior. Since 2003, Lee has globe-hopped throughout the Middle East, filming sequences for a documentary she and Gund released this spring as “Cultures of Resistance.” Last year she rose to prominence after releasing footage she shot on the Mavi Marmara during a clash between jihadist IHH activists and Israeli commandos during the “flotilla” confrontation.
In spite of their supposed sympathy for outsiders, the couple chooses to focus most of their activist money against the most tolerant Middle Eastern state. Israel is their primary target. The couple is completely indifferent to the reality that the rights of gays, women and religious minorities are protected more diligently in this supposedly “apartheid” state than in Hamas-controlled Gaza.
(Excerpt) Read more at frontpagemag.com ...
How many times did I hear a voice at the end of some PBS program credit “The George Gund Foundation” for its “generous support” of whatever left-wing pap was being spewed.
Of course, that would have been at least 15 years ago, before I stopped watching PBS. And broadcast/cable television in general.
Well, I'll certainly keep that in mind the next time I walk down the cereal aisle...
I disagree on the guesswork about their motives. As with most of the wealthiest Americans, they put their loyalties where they expect to receive the most help with retaining/increasing their wealth (oil, trade, etc.) and with preventing potential domestic competition in the USA. They support social pathologies while rejecting the socially healthy, because their families are rife with pathologies and proud of them. See their inclinations in actual policies (written and unwritten/practiced) of most corporate/government/academic offices.
We see the opportunity in the weakness of default of being prepared to provide better leadership at every level of business, government and academia.
Yes, it’s kind of a shame. I don’t know if I should stop eating corn flakes now. Maybe just motivation to get the generic brand instead.
His Grandfather developed and sold SANKA to Kellogg's for a substantial equity position. His son was a big time banker running Ohio's largest bank for decades and holding a major equity position in Cleveland Trust, now Key.
Gordon, on the other hand has never done anything except be a sincere asshole jet setter.
The teddy bear magnate?
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