A Scream In The Wilderness: George Soros Part 5

RADICALIZING AMERICA, ONE STATE AT A TIME: “PLAN” AND THE SECRETARY OF STATE PROJECT

In August 2005, when the Democracy Alliance was just getting off the ground, George Soros's Open Society Institute helped establish yet another new organization—the Progressive Legislative Action Network, or PLAN. Furnishing state legislatures with prewritten “model” legislation reflecting leftist agendas, this group was part and parcel of Soros's methodical campaign to shift American politics and public attitudes toward the left—by gaining a foothold inside the corridors of power on a state-by-state basis.311

Then, in July 2006, Democracy Alliance partner Michael Kieschnick collaborated with Becky Bond (who also had affiliations with Working Assets and the New Organizing Institute) and James Rucker (who co-founded Color of Changeand formerly served as director of grassroots mobilization for MoveOn.org Political Action and Moveon.org Civic Action) to launch a major new initiative called the Secretary of State Project (SoSP). This “527 committee” was devoted to helping Democrats win secretary-of-state elections in crucial “swing” states—i.e., states where the margin of victory in the 2004 presidential election had been 120,000 votes or less.312 One of the principal duties of the secretary of state is to serve as the chief election officer who certifies candidates as well as election results in his or her state.313The holder of this office, then, can potentially play a key role in determining the winner of a close election. Numerous Democracy Alliance partners became funders of SoSP. Soros was one of them. In 2008, for instance, he personallygave $10,000 to the Project.314

SOROS HELPS CREATE TWO NEW PRO-DEMOCRAT GROUPS

Just two months after the Democratic Party had won control of both houses of Congress in the November 2006 elections, George Soros and then-SEIU president Andrew Stern created Working For Us (WFU), a pro-Democrat PAC. This group does not, however, look favorably upon Democratic centrists. Rather, it aims “to elect lawmakers who support a progressive political agenda.” Originally proposed by Stern as a way to prevent moderate Democrats from gaining too much influence over the party, WFU publishes the names of what it calls the “Top Offenders” among congressional Democrats who fail to support such leftist priorities as “living wage” legislation, the proliferation of public-sector labor unions, and the provision of government-funded healthcare for all Americans. Targeting congressional Democrats whose “voting records are more conservative than their districts,” WFU warns that “no bad vote will be overlooked or unpunished.”315

In an effort to promote large-scale income redistribution by means of tax hikes for higher earners, WFU advocates policies that would narrow the economic gulf between the rich and poor. The group's executive director is Steven Rosenthal, a longtime Democrat operative with close ties to the Clinton administration and a co-founder of Soros'sAmerica Coming Together. According to Rosenthal, WFU “will encourage Democrats to act like Democrats—and if they don't—they better get out of the way.”316

In November 2007, Soros joined fellow Democracy Alliance members Rob McKay and Anna Burger, as well as John Podesta of the Center for American Progress, to help form the Fund for America (FFA), a “527 committee” designed to work on what Roll Call characterized as “media buys and voter outreach in the run-up to the 2008 elections.” The leading early donors to FFA were Soros ($3.5 million), the SEIU ($2.5 million), Hollywood producer Stephen Bing ($2.5 million), and hedge fund executive Donald Sussman ($1 million). But when FFA failed to meet its overall fundraising goals by early 2008, DA donors cut off their contributions and the group was disbanded in June. Among the organizations it had bankrolled before shutting its doors were America Votes, Americans United for Change, ACORN, and the Center for American Progress Action Fund.317

Meanwhile, Soros's regard for President Bush remained as low as ever. “Indeed,” wrote Soros in 2006, “the Bush administration has been able to improve on the techniques used by the Nazi and Communist propaganda machines by drawing on the innovations of the advertising and marketing industries.”318 Soros would elaborate on this theme at the January 2007 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where he told reporters: “America needs to ... go through a certain de-Nazification process.”319

SOROS AND OBAMA: QUIET PARTNERSHIP AND SHARED AGENDAS

While George Soros was busy bankrolling his battalion of established activist groups and launching a few new ones of his own, he quite naturally looked toward the upcoming presidential election of 2008 with great anticipation, eagerly awaiting the day when George W. Bush would finally leave office. The question was, who would replace him? In recent years, all indications had been that Soros favored Hillary Clinton above most, if not all, other potential Democratic candidates for President. But now there was a new face on the scene—a young, charismatic U.S. senator from Illinois named Barack Obama—who seemed not only to share virtually all of Soros's values and agendas, but also appeared to be a highly skilled politician who stood a good chance of getting elected to the nation's highest office.

In December of 2006, Soros, who had previously hosted a fundraiser for Obama during the latter's 2004 Senate campaign, met with Obama in Soros's New York office. Just a few weeks later—on January 16, 2007—Obama announced that he would form a presidential exploratory committee and was contemplating a run for the White House. Within hours, Soros sent the senator a contribution of $2,100, the maximum amount allowable under campaign-finance laws. Later that week, the New York Daily News reported that Soros would support Obama rather than Hillary Clinton for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination, though Soros pledged to back the New York senator were she to emerge as the nominee.320 But it was clear that Soros considered Obama to be the more electable candidate of the two. Most importantly, Obama's economic and political prescriptions for America were wholly accordant with those of Soros.

For an in-depth look at the shared agendas of Soros and Obama, click here.

SOROS PURSUES A NEW 'ECONOMIC PARADIGM"

In January 2009, Anatole Kaletsky—a Times of London economics writer who opposed the “noninterventionist model of capitalism” and favored deficit spending and “stimulus packages” as bulwarks against economic depression—discussed with George Soros “the unique opportunity to reshape economics in the wake of the financial crisis.” Eight months later, Soros assembled 25 economists, financiers, and journalists in Bedford, New York to brainstorm the idea. This “Bedford Summit” resulted in a “unanimous agreement that our economic paradigm must change,” and a “recognition of the importance of empowering the young generation of economists to rethink” the field of economics. Toward that end, the Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET) was created as a nonprofit foundation in October 2009; its initial funding came from a $50 million pledge by Soros's Open Society Institute.

SOROS AND THE ARAB SPRING

The so-called “Arab Spring,” which began in late 2010, was a momentous series of popular uprisings that swept—in rapid succession and with varying degrees of intensity and effect—through a host of countries in the Middle East and North Africa: Tunisia, Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Yemen, Libya, Morocco, Jordan, Bahrain, Iraq, Syria, and Iran. By February 2011, Tunisian president Ben Ali had stepped down after 22 years in power, and Egyptian president Hosni Mubarek had abdicated after 30 years. For the most part, the Western media—and the American left in particular—promoted the notion that the events in the Arab world were organic eruptions of rebellion launched spontaneously by oppressed populations who would no longer tolerate political tyranny and economic deprivation, and who longed to quench their own thirst for freedom and democracy.

Over time, it would become apparent that however strong the popular support for the Arab uprisings may have been, the hidden hand of an Islamist movement was also at work in fomenting and sustaining the revolts. This reality was driven home dramatically in the political events that took place where regimes had fallen. In post-Mubarak Egypt, this meant the rising influence of the Muslim Brotherhood—the ideological forebear of both Hamas and al Qaeda, and the spearhead of a movement aiming to establish a worldwide Islamic caliphate (or kingdom) ruled by strict Islamic Law (Sharia). And in Tunisia, the first free elections of the post-Saleh era resulted in the triumph of the al-Nahda party, an Islamist movement which had opposed, sometimes violently, the existing regime. In short, the Arab Spring evolved into a Muslim Winter.

Notwithstanding these developments, Soros in late 2011 said: "A lot of positive things are happening. I see Africa together with the Arab Spring as areas of progress. The Arab Spring was a revolutionary development."

SOROS SEEKS TO UNSEAT REP. ALLEN WEST (FLORIDA)

In July 2012, it was reported that Soros was among a group of donors who had already pledged their financial support for "Dump West," a Democratic Super-PAC that planned to raise at least $5 million for the purpose of defeating conservative black Republican Allen West's bid for reelection to the House of Representatives. A key player in"Dump West" was national Democratic operative Charles Halloran, a former aide to President Bill Clinton. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi asked lobbyist Larry Smith (a former U.S. congressman) to help line up initial funding for the Super-PAC.

SOROS GIVES MONEY TO HELP NAACP FIGHT VOTER ID LAWS

In March 2013, Soros pledged to give, through his Open Society Foundations, $1 million to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. This was the largest grant that organization had received from a named donor in recent decades. The purpose of the grant was to help the NAACP fight challenges to the Voting Rights Act and oppose the implementation of Voter ID laws. In a statement, Soros said: “We need bold and courageous civil rights strategies if we are to achieve racial equality in this country.”

SUPPORTING HILLARY CLINTON

In October 2013, Soros signed on to co-chair the national finance council of Ready For Hillary, a political action committee established nine months earlier to lead a nationwide grassroots movement encouraging Hillary Clinton to run for U.S. President in 2016. “George Soros is delighted to join more than one million Americans in supporting Ready For Hillary,” said Soros’s political director, Michael Vachon. “His support for Ready For Hillary is an extension of his long-held belief in the power of grassroots organizing.”

SUPPORTING BILL DE BLASIO
In August 2013 Soros endorsed Bill de Blasio for Mayor of New York City, and he contributed the legal limit of $4,950 to de Blasio's campaign. Soros also gave financial support to Talking Transition, a two-week project launched in early November 2013—immediately after de Blasio's election victory—to "help shape" the latter's "transition" to City Hall. Soros’ relationship with the mayor-elect actually dated back to 2011, when the billionaire had given $400,000 to de Blasio’s Coalition for Accountability in Political Spending.

NOTES:

3 George Soros, The Alchemy of Finance (1994 edition), p. 362
4 George Soros, Underwriting Democracy, p. 3
5 http://www.newswithviews.com/Kincaid/cliff367.htm; http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/george-soross-evangelicals
6 “The Billionaire Who Built on Chaos – George Soros (The Independent: June 3, 1993)
7 http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,602163,00.html

8 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4635465

9 Faisal Islam, “Rich Man, Wise Man” (Observer: March 10, 2002)

10 Anthony Gottlieb, “Who Wants To Be A Billionaire?” (The New York Times: March 3, 2002)

A Scream In The Wilderness

George Soros Part 5

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