"Offended" 911 Ads Funded By Kerry's Wife

[pechuna]

Shouldn't we all have been able to figure this out?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1091579/posts

[c1986goose]

The Heinz Endowments have teamed up with a secretive left-wing group



By Tom Randall
Sunday, December 14, 2003


CHICAGO - Pittsburgh is home to a new liberal funding organization that lists its priorities as the local environment, land use and "sustainability." However, its affiliations raise questions about its real purpose.
Known as the Tides Center for Pennsylvania, formerly the Tides Center for Western Pennsylvania, it is a creation of the Tides Foundation and Center, headquartered in San Francisco, and two Pennsylvania-based foundations -- the Vira Heinz Endowment and the Howard Heinz Endowment-- chaired by Teresa Heinz Kerry, heir to the Heinz food company fortune and wife of Democrat presidential contender Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts.

What makes the pairing with Tides troubling is that organization's secretive funneling of cash from private foundations -- such as Heinz, the Pew Charitable Trusts and many others -- to extreme left-wing activist groups whose interests include exclusion of humans from both public and private lands, anti-war protests, opposition to free trade, banning of firearms, abolition of the death penalty, unlimited abortion rights, gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender advocacy, as well as and environmental extremism.

How it's done

Tides works like this: When a high-profile donor wants to give money to a group with an extreme agenda but doesn't want its fingerprints on the donation, it simply gives the money to The Tides Foundation in the form of a "donor- advised donation." Tides then passes that money on to the desired recipient, masking the real source of the cash. As anti-war activist Drummond Pike (who set up the Tides Foundation in 1976 for the express purpose of keeping donors' identities unknown) told the Chronicle of Philanthropy, a publication for the nonprofit world, "Anonymity is very important to most of the people we work with."

And, the amount of "hidden money" handled by the Tides Foundation is considerable. Since its founding, the relatively little-known foundation has made over $300 million in grants. In 2002 it amassed assets of $139 million and had an income of $59.3 million. Between 1995 and 2001, $4.3 million of that money came from the Howard Heinz Endowment. In 2002, it and the Vira Heinz Endowment blessed The Tides Center, a San Francisco spin-off of the Tides Foundation, with another $190,000 while the two endowments gave $1.6 million to the new Tides Center for Western Pennsylvania.

If all this movement of money between the Tides Foundation, Tides Center, two Heinz Endowments and Pittsburgh's new Tides Center for Western Pennsylvania has you shaking your head, let's talk about your money. You, the taxpayer.

Public underwriting

Nearly $8 million in taxpayer money flowed into the Tides Center in the form of federal grants made by eight different agencies between 1997 and 2001. They include the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Energy. Does this mean your tax dollars also are going to fund the Tides Center for Western Pennsylvania, a creation of the Howard Heinz Endowment, which in 2001 was worth a breathtaking $788.6 million in 2001? With the Tides Center for a partner, we will likely never know.

What we do know is that, with Tides as a partner, the Heinz Endowments now keep interesting company.

Friends of Heinz

The Tides Center also manages the Youth Gender Project whose goal is to "empower and support transgender, gender-variant, intersexed and gender-questioning youth and young adults." I freely admit, not all of these terms are in my spell-checker.

Grant recipients also include the Iraq Peace Fund that has so far granted $489,000 to 27 groups to promote anti-war marches and their coverage by the news media, as well as the mission of one of those groups, MoveOn.org, whose purpose is to defeat George W. Bush.

While groups such as these and dozens of others organized and/or financed by the Tides Foundation and Center are relatively recent in their origin and transient in their nature, many are more established and pervasive in their influence.

The Ruckus Society, which received over $200,000 in Tides money between 1999 and 2002, was begun in 1995 to train activists in violent protest against biotechnology, globalization and the World Bank. It incited property destruction in the Seattle riots of 1999 and Washington, D.C., the following year. However, Ruckus director John Sellers didn't see the wanton destruction of property as being violent at all. He told Mother Jones magazine, " I make a distinction between violence and destruction of property. Violence to me is against living things. But inanimate objects? I think you can be destructive, you can use vandalism strategically. It may be violence under the law but I just don't think it's violence."

The Natural Resources Defense Council, another Tides project, destroyed many apple farmers in Washington state with its phony Alar pesticide scare. It "leaked" a false report that Alar, used by the state's apple growers there, caused cancer, particularly in children. Even movie stars signed onto the hoax, testifying before Congress about Alar's dangers. Sales of apples plummeted before the hoax could be debunked.

Finally, the American Medical Association concluded, "The Alar scare of three years ago shows what can happen when science is taken out of context or the risks of a product are blown out of proportion." Unfortunately, that conclusion came too late to save the livelihoods of many growers.

Unfortunately, too, it came too late to prevent NRDC from cashing in to the tune of $700,000 from a book on the bogus scare.

But that seems to be what Tides and its dozens of its related organizations are about: money, a flagrant disregard for the truth, and even disdain for the law.

Those capitalistic old American entrepreneurs Howard and Vira must be spinning in their graves.

Tom Randall is a senior partner with the consulting firm Winningreen LLC. A longer version of this commentary was published by Capital Research Center and is available at www.capitalresearch.org

[bulldglit]

Shouldn't we all have been able to figure this out?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1091579/posts

Even the biased article from freerepubli did not say that Mrs. Kerry's group paid for anything that these people have said. In fact, her group has supported the victims of 9-11. Hooray for her.

[c1986goose]

In the ebb and flow of special interest groups, Peaceful Tomorrows is a child of the Tides Center which, in turn, is a spin-off of the Tides Foundation. As explained in one analysis, “The Tides Foundation and its off-spring, the Tides Center, effectively ‘launder’ donor dollars when they give to other nonprofits...” Tides is "...the epicenter of a large financial operation that collects and disperses millions of dollars to left-wing activist groups...." In 2001, the Tides Foundation and the Pennsylvania-based Heinz private foundations launched the Tides Center of Western Pennsylvania.

The Heinz foundations consist of the Howard Heinz Endowment and the Vera I. Heinz Endowment. Teresa Heinz Kerry is Chairperson of the Howard Heinz Endowment and a director of the Vera I. Heinz Endowment. Collectively, the Heinz Endowments, under Teresa’s stewardship, have donated in excess of $5 million to the Tides’ operations. Who says that Senator Kerry is special interest averse!

The Tides Foundation is the brainchild of 1970’s anti-war activist Drummond Pike. Somehow, he overcame his capitalist phobias to create a spider web of non-profit and for-profit entities which approach the $100 million per year mark. The allure of the Tides’ non-profits is their ability to opaquely funnel money from private donors to activist causes.

Private foundations, such as the Heinz endowments, must publicly report their donations. Both the Tides Foundation and the Tides Center are 501 (c)(3) non-profit corporations considered by the I.R.S. to be public charities. As such, they are not required to disclose their donors.

Therefore, the millions of dollars that Tides receives from Heinz, Pew Charitable Trusts, Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation and others is, in turn, redistributed to organizations like The Ruckus Society, Greenpeace, Peaceful Tomorrows and others. Thus, using Tides as an intermediary, there is no direct reporting connection between the private foundations and the activist groups they support. And you thought Swiss banking was secretive.

[larry]

EVERYBODY in the political arena has an agenda.. and most political activity that pretends to be unbiased is usually just the opposite. Those that suggest otherwise have no credibility.


Every week I sit down with my teens and we talk about current events. Part of the conversation is about who said what and why they said it (pardon the poor grammer).

In the end they must make their own life decisions...but it's my job to help them understand that every news article is more about opinion than fact. Our job is to decern and glean that (which we feel is) unbiased information based upon the facts we can discover.

While "loud is right" may be the rule of the day for the left or the right, I try to share with my teens that they must be prepared to participate in the process..which means they MUST think for themselves.

[advantage2000]

Are you telling me that the republican machine has no funding issues? How about the Bush empire itself?

Halliburton
Texas Rangers
NRA
Tobacco
Shell

[larry]

Are you telling me that the republican machine has no funding issues? How about the Bush empire itself?

Halliburton
Texas Rangers
NRA
Tobacco
Shell


?? r u addressing me or goose?

while I can;t speak for goose, I will say that I believe his/(her?) point is that the ads in question are being paid for by the wife of mr kerry..indirectly through a non-profit organization....


which of course is the near perfect example of my post.


but dems certainly dont have that cornered.

[larry]

Are you telling me that the republican machine has no funding issues? How about the Bush empire itself?

Halliburton
Texas Rangers
NRA
Tobacco
Shell


with your question in mind...can you share with us the relationship with the companies you listed and 503c companies that are currently running anti-republican ads?

That info would be greatly appreciated advantage2000

[advantage2000]

with your question in mind...can you share with us the relationship with the companies you listed and 503c companies that are currently running anti-republican ads?

That info would be greatly appreciated advantage2000

Spare me the passive-aggressive act...

My point is... both parties in this country get their funding/power from places they would rather NOT.

HOWEVER, the thing about the Heinz funding is that it doesn't HURT anyone... the Republican funding sources I mentioned are pretty much EVIL, or have illegal acts attached to them.

[larry]

Spare me the passive-aggressive act...

My point is... both parties in this country get their funding/power from places they would rather NOT.

HOWEVER, the thing about the Heinz funding is that it doesn't HURT anyone... the Republican funding sources I mentioned are pretty much EVIL, or have illegal acts attached to them.


It's a real question advantage based upon your response.


Your assertion that the organizations you listed are evil is laughable. If you can't conceive that projects funded by the heinz organization are not see as "evil" by conservatives you are clearly close minded. I cant tell you how to feel about any of my posts but as a "free will centrist" I can tell you that it is easy to spot those who are intolerant on both sides.


I wasn't trying to bait you with my earlier question...I was looking for you to back up what you said with facts hoping that you had some insight that would be valuable to me and others. That doesnt appear to be the case.

[tncorgi]

Rush Limbaugh, like the RNC, Wall Street Journal and New York Post, has taken to attacking family members of 9/11 victims for criticizing President Bush for using 9/11 images in his campaign ads. In a radio program this week, Limbaugh said the families were being funded by Teresa Heinz Kerry and berated two family members after playing audio clips of them criticizing Bush: "These people are poisoned. They have literally been poisoned by their hate. They have been poisoned by their rage. It is unbelievable, the depths to which they will sink," Limbaugh said, without identifying the two women.

In an op-ed, Allan P. Duncan does a good job of exposing the conservative conspiracy theory about the 9/11 families. First, Duncan says, the two women Rush attacked but didn't identify were Kristen Breitweiser and Monica Gabrielle, "both members of the Family Steering Committee for the 9-11 Commission, and not members of the group Limbaugh claims received funding from Teresa Heinz Kerry. That group, according to news reports that began hitting the wires on March 6th was September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows."

And, it appears Limbaugh and other conservative critics aren't even right about the supposed ties between Peaceful Tomorrows and Heinz Kerry. Duncan excerpts a statement from the 9/11 group that says: "September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows has never received funding from the Howard Heinz Endowment, the Vira I. Heinz Endowment, Teresa Heinz Kerry or John Kerry. Peaceful Tomorrows has no connection with the Heinz or Kerry families through Tides Foundation, the Tides Center or any other entity. Peaceful Tomorrows has been a not-for-profit project of the Tides Center since July of 2002. As our fiscal sponsor, the Tides Center provides administrative and financial services that allow the staff and membership of Peaceful Tomorrows to focus on work related to our mission. We raise money for our own work and we pay Tides Center 9 percent of those funds in exchange for vital services such as invoice payment, tax services, and insurance."

(And, to add to Duncan's argument, here's a link to a response from the Tides Foundation after inaccuracies about its connection to Heinz Kerry and Peaceful Tomorrows were repeated in the New York Post and the Wall Street Journal. This is classic: "Tides Foundation, which has made four grants to Peaceful Tomorrows in 2002 and 2003 for a combined total of $34,665, has not received 'millions of dollars controlled by Teresa Heinz Kerry.' The Heinz Endowments have granted Tides Foundation a total of $230,000 dispensed between 1994 and 1998. These grants were to support a pollution prevention initiative and other environmentally friendly practices by industries in Western Pennsylvania.")

Duncan says: "So, it appears as though the above articles and Rush Limbaugh's statements on his show were wrong all along. Not only were Kristen Breitweiser and Monica Gabrielle slandered on the air, but September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows was also libeled in the press. So much for objective reporting and vetting facts."

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room//index.html