|
|
|
Conventional wisdom says that Democrats and progressives speak for the poor and working class. On the other hand, Republicans and conservatives ostensibly represent wealthy people who use their incomparable resources to secure power and carry out "vast right-wing conspiracies." Once again conservative firebrand David Horowitz explodes liberal mythology with irrefutable facts and figures that prove it is actually progressives who control the richest political machine in history. Horowitz and co-author Jacob Laksin explain that an extensive network of leftwing tax-exempt foundations and advocacy groups form a formidable "new leviathan" that far outstrips conservative groups in both quantity and funding. Although 501(c)3 nonprofits are legally prohibited from supporting particular candidates or parties, they routinely impact voter behavior by running ad campaigns and using the liberal-leaning media to control debate over the issues that drive elections -- health care, immigration, taxes and more. For example, there are 117 activist nonprofit organizations that support open borders or citizen rights for illegal aliens, as compared to only 9 conservative nonprofits that oppose these agendas. The progressive immigration advocacy groups have annual funding that is 22 times greater than that of the conservative groups. A portion of those funds are supplied by taxpayers in the form of federal grants -- a stunning $325.3 million to the progressive groups as compared to only $18,094 to conservative immigration groups. As a result, the progressive groups have seen many of their policies passed into law in the form of federally funded bilingual education, the establishment of "sanctuary cities," driver's licenses and in-state tuition rates for illegals, and outright amnesty for some illegal immigrants. The sad irony is that many of the wealthiest leftwing foundations were founded by conservatives. Oil tycoon and Christian conservative J. Howard Pew founded his charitable trust in 1957 to educate Americans about the "values of the free market" and the "paralyzing effects of government controls." Now Pew's namesake is the largest contributor to the Tides Center, a middleman that directs funds to radical, anti-capitalist leftwing causes. The charitable fortunes of numerous other pro-capitalist conservatives including John D. MacArthur, John D. Rockefeller, and Henry and Edsel Ford have also been hijacked by progressives. Perhaps the book's most disturbing observation is that these leftwing foundations are financially selfsustaining and accountable to no one -- not voters, not supporters, not shareholders, not even their founders -- for the agendas they advance. Though the authors don't offer solutions, they have done a great service in highlighting the problem so that conservatives can counter, if not kill, the "new leviathan." (Crown Forum, 2012, 309 pp., $27) |
Indeed, progressive groups boast $105 billion in assets, a figure 10 times greater than assets held by conservative organizations. (These figures don't even include the massive dollars government unions and universities spend promoting progressive causes.)
