According to a new report, at least 200 American colleges and universities illegally withheld information on approximately $13 billion in undisclosed contributions from foreign regimes.
It's striking that a tiny country like Bermuda could be ranked fifth in the world on this list. Is this because tax laws encourage rich people to park their money in Bermuda, making that country the "source" of any donations or bequests they may make? Is there some other legitimate explanation for Bermuda's high position? Or is it being used to launder money from other, iffier places? Enquiring minds want to know . . . .
Dear Free Press, please see the email sent to all CUNY personnel. CUNY Chancellor mentioned in the email responded firmly and unambiguously to atrocious attack of HAMAS - quite differently from leaders of elite colleges. This is the reaction of FIle and Rank Action of CUNY that is (see at the end how they announce themselves) - a militant group!!! Maybe you can add this to your collection of things taking place at campuses around the country.
"MARCH ON THE CHANCELLOR!
Felix Matos-Rodriguez and CUNY administration are:
• Creating an atmosphere of McCarthyite repression for those opposed to Israeli settler colonialism, apartheid and the ongoing genocide in Gaza
• Overseeing a system of racist austerity at CUNY
On October 11th, in response to the Hamas attacks in Israel, CUNY Chancellor Felix Matos-Rodriguez released a shocking statement with not a single mention of Palestine nor the 75 years of racist Israeli apartheid that is the context for what happened on October 7th. In the intervening month, the CUNY administration has been criminally silent as more than 11,000 Gazans, including more than 4,000 children, have been murdered by U.S.-supplied Israeli bombs and missiles. He has remained silent as CUNY students and faculty have been attacked by Zionists, doxxed, and even threatened with a firearm by a New York City councilwoman.
These attacks on pro-Palestinian, anti-Zionist students, faculty and staff are occurring against a backdrop of the unrelenting impoverishment of thousands of part-time faculty, who teach the majority of classes at CUNY and yet work without any job protection, hired from one semester to the next. The racist austerity that diminishes and degrades CUNY students’ education also continues apace, as budget cuts mean fewer classes with larger enrollment caps, a lack of vital student services, and crumbling infrastructure. For these crimes alone, we must step up and demand change at CUNY! Combine it with the campaign of fear and intimidation leveled at pro-Palestinian students, faculty and staff and we have no choice. Our voices must be heard!
Join us on Sunday, November 19th, at 12:00 at the Pelham Metro North station. We will march to the Chancellor’s home in Pelham, NY and demand a retraction of his October 11th statement and an end to adjunct poverty and racist austerity at CUNY!
Rank and File Action (RAFA) is a volunteer- run group of militant rank & file activists at CUNY challenging the culture of austerity in higher education and demanding a more democratic fighting union."
College students are the new Hitler Youth groups. They have turned in the brown shirts for Palestinian flags. But look at the protesting mobs. Do they look like White Supremacists?
I just read your piece in Tablet re DEI programs. I completely agree but also would like to see the FP go further. I was first attracted to your writings by the article “The Miseducation of American Elites” several years ago much of which directly related to the DEI issue. There was a follow up later on how those ideas carry over to university and beyond. Current events prove the point. But this thinking starts earlier at the secondary school level as the first article shows. Re Independent schools one only needs a quick look at the NAIS (National Association of Independent Schools) website to see that the pervasiveness of these programs. The ideas of diversity equity and inclusion seem so positive to the average person who sees the words but the practice is an entirely different animal. I have seen how it has led the great school I attended many years ago down a whole new road. I would love to see the FP do further reporting on DEI in the secondary school arena and how that has impacted ideological diversity at that educational level. Is what we see on the university campuses an extension, in part, of what has been indoctrinated at a lower level? I think middle eastern money is not so much a concern as high school indoctrination followed up by an ideological monoculture created under the guise of avoiding the harm of challenging ideas.
Makes me wonder about the original ESMC (ethnic studies model curriculum) that was set up by SFSU graduate students to push through California legislature to make it official, and how upset they were that it had to be revised several times to the point they took it and relabeled it LES (liberated ethnic studies) which is very anti-semitic and cast Israel as the "bad guy" oppressing Palestinians . . . I am sure it was funded by some of this money.
Vietnam war protests in campuses are frequently being used as comparisons to current campus tumult. But student movements from 1965-1970 had a focused “enemy” on campuses upon which anti war protests focused: ROTC, military recruiting and Dow chemical for production of napalm. Administrations were far less complicit than they are today perhaps because of what this article suggests, donor purchasing power.
Part of the problem today is there is no campus “enemy” as there was during Vietnam, only each other. Timing adds a layer of the now general intolerance of each other, excessive woke and emotional responses and political and social hyper polarization.
With college administrations taking sides they lose any liberal arts credibility while stoking unrest.
Why do we need private universities? The state university systems are totally able to educate the children of the state residents with state revenues or taxes. Why does the federal government try to dictate how states carry out these duties. Even admission and degree requirements? .These are things should be decided by senior faculty members, in the same way and for the same reason that a preacher should write his own sermons. The federal government should simply stay out of this and should revoke all tax exempt status for private or so-called private universities. The feds should not fund research except at federal labs like Los Alamos, where the results will be publicly owned and secure from software and data pirates.
I really have issues with the framing of this question.
Quatar is buying the world. The /state/ of Quatar (excluding the personal assets of its impossibly wealthy royals) is the 10th biggest landowner of the UK. The policy of Quatar is to set a foothold in as many places it can, because they are a tiny extremely rich country that wants to matter and has the money to matter.
Your private universities system is founded on a for profit model: therefore it needs money from donors and it will take money more or less from anywhere (note the position of China in the graph).
To expect that donors (aside from maybe alumni) should only have culturally neutral goals is pretty naive. Do you believe that American billionaires and corporations that give money to American universities do not push their personal political agendas in education?
The only protection from falling into abuses is to have strict transparency -- which clearly is not required by law if funding can remain undisclosed -- in both the provenance of every funding and the employment of the money given. Public awareness of this is the only way in which the public interest can be upheld... but it is hard to get this from private entities.
Attempting to blame the "rage" onto external influences is a nice way of avoiding to look at how the entirety of anti-Western pseudo-anti-colonialist-anti-imperialist ideology developed in the very middle of the western culture over several decades. Just like Nazism, this is simply a product of our culture, with which we should begin to grapple.
Islamism just uses it, because it can: it is easy to disguise as the oppressed, mixing past and present and nebulous events in distant places.
Last, just a not for the people who edited the funding graph. ENGLAND?? England is not a country, kids. It was not called that even when you did your own revolution, and now it is called the UK. Please.
While turnabout would be fair play - as the Pol Pot Progressives have done to classical liberals, libertarians and conservatives - incidentally I find it curious why you would subscribe to Bari when Pol Pot Progressives drove her from NYTs - anyhow - I would prefer banishment to North Korea where you can bask in the utopia of Pol Pit Progressive implementation
What I want to know is who is organizing and paying for these protests on campuses and in the cities. It costs money to bring 100,000 people to DC or to shut down the Grand Central Station. Time and funds are needed to supply Palestinian flags, signs, and other antisemitic paraphernalia. You can't order them from Amazon for an overnight delivery. These month long protests must be organized by an entity which appears to be well-positioned to take advantage of this crisis. They got people out on the street protesting even as the pogrom in Israel was unfolding.
It's striking that a tiny country like Bermuda could be ranked fifth in the world on this list. Is this because tax laws encourage rich people to park their money in Bermuda, making that country the "source" of any donations or bequests they may make? Is there some other legitimate explanation for Bermuda's high position? Or is it being used to launder money from other, iffier places? Enquiring minds want to know . . . .
Great questions
Dear Free Press, please see the email sent to all CUNY personnel. CUNY Chancellor mentioned in the email responded firmly and unambiguously to atrocious attack of HAMAS - quite differently from leaders of elite colleges. This is the reaction of FIle and Rank Action of CUNY that is (see at the end how they announce themselves) - a militant group!!! Maybe you can add this to your collection of things taking place at campuses around the country.
"MARCH ON THE CHANCELLOR!
Felix Matos-Rodriguez and CUNY administration are:
• Vilifying pro-Palestinian students, faculty and staff & silencing Palestinian voices.
• Creating an atmosphere of McCarthyite repression for those opposed to Israeli settler colonialism, apartheid and the ongoing genocide in Gaza
• Overseeing a system of racist austerity at CUNY
On October 11th, in response to the Hamas attacks in Israel, CUNY Chancellor Felix Matos-Rodriguez released a shocking statement with not a single mention of Palestine nor the 75 years of racist Israeli apartheid that is the context for what happened on October 7th. In the intervening month, the CUNY administration has been criminally silent as more than 11,000 Gazans, including more than 4,000 children, have been murdered by U.S.-supplied Israeli bombs and missiles. He has remained silent as CUNY students and faculty have been attacked by Zionists, doxxed, and even threatened with a firearm by a New York City councilwoman.
These attacks on pro-Palestinian, anti-Zionist students, faculty and staff are occurring against a backdrop of the unrelenting impoverishment of thousands of part-time faculty, who teach the majority of classes at CUNY and yet work without any job protection, hired from one semester to the next. The racist austerity that diminishes and degrades CUNY students’ education also continues apace, as budget cuts mean fewer classes with larger enrollment caps, a lack of vital student services, and crumbling infrastructure. For these crimes alone, we must step up and demand change at CUNY! Combine it with the campaign of fear and intimidation leveled at pro-Palestinian students, faculty and staff and we have no choice. Our voices must be heard!
Join us on Sunday, November 19th, at 12:00 at the Pelham Metro North station. We will march to the Chancellor’s home in Pelham, NY and demand a retraction of his October 11th statement and an end to adjunct poverty and racist austerity at CUNY!
Rank and File Action (RAFA) is a volunteer- run group of militant rank & file activists at CUNY challenging the culture of austerity in higher education and demanding a more democratic fighting union."
Tatiana Malyuta
College students are the new Hitler Youth groups. They have turned in the brown shirts for Palestinian flags. But look at the protesting mobs. Do they look like White Supremacists?
First Saturday then Sunday.
Bari, please answer me this:
Why can’t the chanting illiteratti understand that if, allah forbid, the IDF fails, the next slogan is “From the Hudson to the Pacific.”
Bari,
I just read your piece in Tablet re DEI programs. I completely agree but also would like to see the FP go further. I was first attracted to your writings by the article “The Miseducation of American Elites” several years ago much of which directly related to the DEI issue. There was a follow up later on how those ideas carry over to university and beyond. Current events prove the point. But this thinking starts earlier at the secondary school level as the first article shows. Re Independent schools one only needs a quick look at the NAIS (National Association of Independent Schools) website to see that the pervasiveness of these programs. The ideas of diversity equity and inclusion seem so positive to the average person who sees the words but the practice is an entirely different animal. I have seen how it has led the great school I attended many years ago down a whole new road. I would love to see the FP do further reporting on DEI in the secondary school arena and how that has impacted ideological diversity at that educational level. Is what we see on the university campuses an extension, in part, of what has been indoctrinated at a lower level? I think middle eastern money is not so much a concern as high school indoctrination followed up by an ideological monoculture created under the guise of avoiding the harm of challenging ideas.
Makes me wonder about the original ESMC (ethnic studies model curriculum) that was set up by SFSU graduate students to push through California legislature to make it official, and how upset they were that it had to be revised several times to the point they took it and relabeled it LES (liberated ethnic studies) which is very anti-semitic and cast Israel as the "bad guy" oppressing Palestinians . . . I am sure it was funded by some of this money.
No truer words ever spoken: "Follow the Money"..
Vietnam war protests in campuses are frequently being used as comparisons to current campus tumult. But student movements from 1965-1970 had a focused “enemy” on campuses upon which anti war protests focused: ROTC, military recruiting and Dow chemical for production of napalm. Administrations were far less complicit than they are today perhaps because of what this article suggests, donor purchasing power.
Part of the problem today is there is no campus “enemy” as there was during Vietnam, only each other. Timing adds a layer of the now general intolerance of each other, excessive woke and emotional responses and political and social hyper polarization.
With college administrations taking sides they lose any liberal arts credibility while stoking unrest.
Why do we need private universities? The state university systems are totally able to educate the children of the state residents with state revenues or taxes. Why does the federal government try to dictate how states carry out these duties. Even admission and degree requirements? .These are things should be decided by senior faculty members, in the same way and for the same reason that a preacher should write his own sermons. The federal government should simply stay out of this and should revoke all tax exempt status for private or so-called private universities. The feds should not fund research except at federal labs like Los Alamos, where the results will be publicly owned and secure from software and data pirates.
How educated to you have to be to refuse to see what is right before your eyes?
I really have issues with the framing of this question.
Quatar is buying the world. The /state/ of Quatar (excluding the personal assets of its impossibly wealthy royals) is the 10th biggest landowner of the UK. The policy of Quatar is to set a foothold in as many places it can, because they are a tiny extremely rich country that wants to matter and has the money to matter.
Your private universities system is founded on a for profit model: therefore it needs money from donors and it will take money more or less from anywhere (note the position of China in the graph).
To expect that donors (aside from maybe alumni) should only have culturally neutral goals is pretty naive. Do you believe that American billionaires and corporations that give money to American universities do not push their personal political agendas in education?
The only protection from falling into abuses is to have strict transparency -- which clearly is not required by law if funding can remain undisclosed -- in both the provenance of every funding and the employment of the money given. Public awareness of this is the only way in which the public interest can be upheld... but it is hard to get this from private entities.
Attempting to blame the "rage" onto external influences is a nice way of avoiding to look at how the entirety of anti-Western pseudo-anti-colonialist-anti-imperialist ideology developed in the very middle of the western culture over several decades. Just like Nazism, this is simply a product of our culture, with which we should begin to grapple.
Islamism just uses it, because it can: it is easy to disguise as the oppressed, mixing past and present and nebulous events in distant places.
Last, just a not for the people who edited the funding graph. ENGLAND?? England is not a country, kids. It was not called that even when you did your own revolution, and now it is called the UK. Please.
While turnabout would be fair play - as the Pol Pot Progressives have done to classical liberals, libertarians and conservatives - incidentally I find it curious why you would subscribe to Bari when Pol Pot Progressives drove her from NYTs - anyhow - I would prefer banishment to North Korea where you can bask in the utopia of Pol Pit Progressive implementation
What I want to know is who is organizing and paying for these protests on campuses and in the cities. It costs money to bring 100,000 people to DC or to shut down the Grand Central Station. Time and funds are needed to supply Palestinian flags, signs, and other antisemitic paraphernalia. You can't order them from Amazon for an overnight delivery. These month long protests must be organized by an entity which appears to be well-positioned to take advantage of this crisis. They got people out on the street protesting even as the pogrom in Israel was unfolding.
Can you publish a list of the 200 schools? My grandson will want to avoid applying to them. He is a superb student.
I am with you BW. These are not gifts. It is shameful