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Both use controversial tactics to force powerful institutions to toe their line, but does that mean the Greenlining Institute and the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now are two sides of the same coin? Depends on who you ask. Greenlining says on its Web site that “since 1993, the Greenlining Institute has blossomed into a major policy player throughout California and the nation ... garnering over $2.4 trillion dollars in investments into traditionally underserved areas.” Even so, Greenlining has purposely flown beneath the radar of public opinion since its inception. That began to change, however, when the subprime meltdown...

The Berkeley, California-based Greenlining Institute's politically correct approach to philanthropy now threatens to metastasize at the national level. The Wall Street Journal reports today that the shakedown artists at the Greenlining Institute, which played a major role in Wall Street's current problems, is taking its crusade to bring race-consciousness to philanthropy nationwide. Here's the top part of the op-ed: What if the Greenlining Institute held a shakedown and nobody paid up? The Berkeley-based outfit invited representatives from America's top 50 foundations to come to their offices two weeks ago for a chat on the urgent national priority of "diversity in...

  Assault on the mortgage lenders: in the name of racial justice, the Clintonites want the power to decide who gets a home of his own - efforts to impose regulations on banks to make loans even if applicants are not creditworthy Robert Stowe England QUIETLY, behind the scenes, the Clinton Administration is preparing for the biggest regulatory crackdown of recent years. Attorney General Janet Reno is linking up with banking regulators and with HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros to end the supposed epidemic of discrimination against minorities in making home loans. The implications for society at large are ominous. Here,...

Tuesday, September 30, 2008 Bill Clinton Fibbing on Fannie ... Posted by: Matt Lewis at 8:56 AM Bill Clinton has been getting a lot of press lately for trashing his own party’s handling of the mortgage mess. Last Thursday, he told Good Morning America, “I think that the responsibility that the Democrats have may rest more in resisting any efforts by the Republicans in Congress, or by me when I was President, to put some standards and tighten up a little on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.” Unfortunately, he was fibbing. He actually set the “standards” that forced Fannie and...

Link to article is here

When I was young, jobs grown-ups had were doctors, plumbers, lawyers, dentists, stock brokers and so on. I had never heard of "Community Organizer" until this Presidential season. What is this job and how does it connect with important current issues? Today, the Department of the Treasury exerted a conservatorship over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac at the cost of billions to taxpayers. The role of community organizers like ACORN and Barak Obama played in our present financial dislocations may be more direct and pervasive than what first meets the eye. The present subprime financial strains have as its genesis...

...As with so many marginal ideas, this one is coming out of California. A proposed bill there would have required foundations with more than $250 million in assets to report the racial, gender and sexual orientation of their board members, staffs and grantees. The bill's sponsors recently agreed to drop the issue in return for a political payoff of millions of dollars from 10 of the state's biggest charities...

The weekend edition of the Wall Street Journal highlighted the growing menace of groups like California's Greenlining Institute. Greenlining is a left-wing pressure group that threatens adverse public relations campaigns against lenders that refuse to bow to its agenda. The Journal editorial begins: Readers who run a foundation, serve on a board or are thinking of starting such a charitable effort should know about the gauntlet of shakedown artists forming up to demand a piece of the action. As with so many marginal ideas, this one is coming out of California. A proposed bill there would have required foundations with...

On the July 29 edition of "Organization Watch," James Dellinger and Matthew Vadum interview Human Events political editor John Gizzi about the growing menace of groups like California's Greenlining Institute. Greenlining is a left-wing pressure group that threatens adverse public relations campaigns against lenders that refuse to bow to its agenda that demands affirmative action in lending. Gizzi wrote about the group's latest shakedown in the current Foundation Watch. His profile of the Greenlining Institute itself appears in the upcoming Organization Trends (which will be posted on our website by this Friday, August 1). Listen live at 3:05 Eastern at...

Left-wing pressure groups like the Center for Responsible Lending played a role in bringing down Indymac, according to commentator Jerry Bowyer. Around the same time Senator Charles Schumer (D-New York) questioned the financial viability of the California-based bank, an event the Office of Thrift Supervision said gave "the bank a heart attack," the Center for Responsible Lending exacerbated the situation. As Bowyer writes: Indymac has been under attack from the hard left. The Center for Responsible Lending issued an attack on Indymac within a few days of Schumer's letter. CRL is part of a small army of left of center...

DOHA, Qatar (AP) - Al-Jazeera's taboo-smashing newscasts regularly vex politicians in Washington, but not nearly as much as they anger leaders in the Arab world, where the news channel has been banned from operating in 18 countries at one time or another. Now, the network is launching its biggest gamble on its 10th anniversary - an English-language channel with an Arab perspective. Al-Jazeera International plans to hit the airwaves Nov. 15 and hopes to steal viewers from CNN and the BBC. Feisty and sometimes graphic coverage of global carnage is an Al-Jazeera specialty, as is bracing commentary that has shaken...

http://www.dailybulletin.com/Stories/0,1413,203~21481~2713534,00.html Inland Valley Daily Bulletin Article Published: Tuesday, February 15, 2005 - 8:28:22 PM PST 'Save Our License' may face state probe By SARA A. CARTER, STAFF WRITER The Secretary of State's Political Reform Division has ordered Save Our License, a group opposed to driver's licenses for illegal immigrants, to refile all its committee documents and submit all its campaign finance data. Meanwhile, a group representing Latino and church groups across the nation this week filed a formal complaint with the state Fair Political Practices Commission, saying Save Our License willfully violated campaign finance laws. The state order and FPPC...

To set the stage, first a snip from a Sacto Bee article (url at bottom)--snip-The FPPC has not yet acted on the Proposition 54 complaint, which was filed by California Common Cause, the League of Women Voters of California, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Greenlining Institute, Californians for Justice and the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights.---end snipACRC Statement regarding lawsuit (See below thread post for background data) Posted at www.acrc1.org:The American Civil Rights Coalition (ACRC) was established in January 1997 in the District of Columbia as a national not-for-profit organization to promote the principles of equal treatment...