Caveat: By now we should all be used to the idea that lines cross, criss cross, and cross over again any time one attempts to trace a direct pathway between Barack Obama and anyone else. If you have tried to do this, you thoroughly understand the complexity — and frustration — of the task.
In this particular instance, the starting point had nothing to do with the destination. This article began as RBO continued to poke around in that declassified, highly-redacted August 1976 FBI report on the Weather Underground. It was completely unexpected that we would arrive where we did.
In his September 3, 2008, Obama File article about William McNary (left), Trevor Loudon writes that McNary is president of USAction, a MoveOn.org entity.
In 2007, USAction merged with True Majority, another MoveOn-style organization founded by Ben Cohen, to form True Majority Action (web), a netroots organization with an email list containing hundreds of thousands of names.
It should come as no surprise to learn that USAction Fund for a True Majority supported Barack Obama’s presidential campaign — to the tune of $64,766.75. Without a doubt, those “hundreds of thousands of names” on True Majority’s email list also came in handy.
Both Loudon (here) and RBO (here and here) have written about USAction’s vice president, Heather Booth (right), a former SDSer and the founder of Midwest Academy.
There is a third member of USAction, its executive director, Jeffrey D. Blum (left), who has not previously been mentioned.
For starters, in 2008, Jeff Blum, now of Takoma Park, Maryland, and an executive at USAction, personally contributed $800 to Obama for America.
Listed as Jeffrey D. Blum, beginning in 2001, he made a number of contributions to loyal Obama supporter, Rep. Janice D. Schakowsky (D-Ill.) (right).
Just in case you did not know, Jan Schakowsky has the distinction of being married to Robert Creamer, the former director of Citizen Action of Illinois (ICA), the state’s largest consumer advocacy organization. Creamer was a “political force in his own right, having consulted Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley and Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich in past political campaigns, among others,” John Ruberry at Marathon Pundit adds.
Creamer also has a connection to Heather Booth’s Midwest Academy. The Undue Influence website shows Creamer as having served circa 1999-2000 as a member of MA’s board of directors.
In 2005 Creamer was “sentenced to five months in prison after pleading guilty to bank fraud and withholding taxes while heading” ICA.
Illinois Issues, July/August 1997, reported:
Robert Creamer abruptly ended his tenure with Citizen Action of Illinois, a consumer organization that lobbies in Springfield on such issues as utility deregulation and campaign finance reform. The resignation came early last month amid a federal investigation into the group’s financial affairs. Creamer had headed the group for more than two decades. In a prepared statement he cited an inability to serve as an effective spokesman and leader. According to the Chicago Tribune, Creamer met with federal agents about a $1 million overdraft in an organization account.
A decade later, Creamer was Obama’s choice to head his GOTV training organ, Camp Obama.
The selection of Creamer for this job was no accident. A May 1, 1999, Campaigns and Elections article about the growing influence of soft money employed in “interest group- and party-centered campaigns” stated:
Local party activities that are funded by soft money can make a difference as well. In one Illinois race, the most important non-candidate activity, besides party soft money, was the “17th District Victory Fund.” The fund was considered a Democratic Party committee and was designed to help U.S. Rep. Lane Evans (D) and state and local Democrats win re-election.
With a budget of roughly $300,000 and 18 full-time volunteers (with no salaries but expenses paid), this “campaign school” group mattered. The Victory Fund was financed by DNC soft money, labor unions, and other interested groups and individual contributions. Some of these contributors had “maxed out” on direct contributions to the Evans campaign.
The training and setup were provided by Strategic Consulting Group, a Chicago-based consulting firm co-run by Bob Creamer, Citizen Action of Illinois activist and husband of Democratic congressional candidate (now congresswoman) Jan Schakowsky. The group’s volunteers focused on phone calling and door-to-door canvassing to reach tens of thousands of voters, culminating in a GOTV effort on election day.
Challenger Mark Baker (R) attacked this group repeatedly, calling it “Lane’s imported labor” and “political mercenaries.” The group was technically separate from the Evans campaign, but the Democratic incumbent defended it repeatedly by comparing it to the “Freedom Riders” of the 1960s, noting that its goal was to register and get people to vote.
An October 3, 2008, Investor’s Business Daily editorial said of Obama’s “campaign school,” Camp Obama:
Dirty street fighting is at the heart of Obama’s organizing. While he stands above the fray, his minions at ACORN are threatening, intimidating, confronting and even committing voter fraud. [...]
Obama needs more agitators, so he’s set up these camps to train them.
ACORN has the minority communities covered, while the camps are churning out mostly coed organizers. The Chicago program has already trained some 2,000 agitators to go back to their college campuses and reproduce more Obama clones.
Ah, yes, “campaign camp” the “Chicago Way.”
ICA becomes U.S. Action
At U.S. Action’s founding convention in November 1999, speakers included Reps. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) and Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.).
The National Legal and Policy Center’s Organized Labor Accountability Project, “Union Corruption Update” dated January 17, 2000, reported:
Both [Schakowsky and Baldwin] were Citizen Action members who were allegedly “nurtured” into candidates by Citizen Action. Attendees at the founding also included two militant unions: Service Employees Int’l Union and Am. Fed’n of State, County & Mun. Employees (AFSCME), as well as other prominent leftist organizations such as the U.S. Student Association, Midwest Academy and Progressive Action Network. U.S. Action’s statewide groups claim 700,000 members, more than 100 full-time staff and combined annual budgets of $15 million to $20 million.
The corruption issue, you ask? The “Update” reported that the “once powerful, far-left Citizen Action virtually committed suicide in 1996 when it became a key player in the Teamsters’ money-laundering scandal,” taking “two ‘donations’ of $475,000 and $150,000 and routed $110,000 and $100,000, respectively,” back to Union President Ron Carey’s reelection campaign.
The Update continues:
Many of the old guard still strongly defend Citizen Action. But even U.S. Action Executive Director Jeff Blum insisted that the new group would be more democratic and accountable. Blum was Citizen Action’s transportation lobbyist; he is also currently head of Maryland Citizen Action, and before that he headed Pennsylvania Citizen Action, which he founded in 1979. Blum said there would be no more of the old budget sleight-of-hand. “I won’t do it,” Blum said. “We’re trying to make this an organization characterized by learning lessons.”
William McNary of Citizen Action of Illinois said U.S. Action must avoid Citizen Action’s mistake of becoming a conduit for unions and trial lawyers’ money and messages. He said of Citizen Action: “Instead of having a partnership with the people who gave us money, we were looked at as employees.”
A year earlier, in December 1997, Illinois Public Action1 had reorganized and changed its name to Citizen Action of Illinois (ICA).
Again, this links to Schakowsky and Creamer. Tom Roeser wrote on his blog July 12, 2007:
He had a multiple group of organizations that received money, the best known being the “Illinois Public Action Council” a left-wing group on which his wife, Jan Schakowsky, was a board member while the manipulating was going on. She was already in Congress when he pleaded guilty; she was not charged.
Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) announced in its January/February 1998 issue of New Ground that ICA had been reconfigured. It’s board members would serve double duty, with the additional duty of Policy Council. Familiar names of DSA members Alice Palmer and Quentin Young are listed on the boards.
New Ground also reported “ICA appears to be on sound financial footing after its troubles last year which resulted in the resignation of long-time director and founder Bob Creamer.”
What was the source for this financial “sound” footing? Unions!!
Major contributors include UNITE, SEIU, ATU, the Illinois State Council of Carpenters, as well as individuals such as Cook County Clerk David Orr.
Schakowsky’s and Obama’s connections with Citizen Action, and its successor, USAction, are unsurprising, as they are often found in similar — as well as each other’s — political company. Both have shared some of the same backers along the way — DSA, the New Party, AFSCME, SEIU, etc. Here (left), in August 2004, we have a report of USAction President McNary, Rep. Schakowsky, and then-Illinois State Sen. Obama all on the same podium at an Illinois Action event, with Schakowsky introducing keynote speaker Obama.
Profile: Jeff Blum
Jeffrey D. Blum’s speaker’s profile at 21stCenturyDems.org is impressive. As a community activist, Blum’s puts Obama’s resume to shame:
- Founder and co-chair of Health Care for America Now (See below.).
- Executive Committee member, America Votes.
- Advisor to Progress Now.
- Former steering committee member, Americans United to Protect Social Security.
- Previously: founded and directed Pennsylvania Citizen Action; worked for the Peoples’ Coalition for Peace and Justice, Massachusetts Fair Share, People for the American Way (where he co-coordinated the campaign to establish AmeriCorps), Surface Transportation Policy Project, Chesapeake Bay Foundation and Citizens Fund; was Transportation Policy Director for Citizen Action; served as President of Maryland Citizen Action, founder and member of the Advisory Board (with Heather Booth)2 of the Jewish Fund for Justice and as a member of the board of Citizens for Tax Justice.
- Ran for Pennsylvania State Senate 1990.
- Northeast Pennsylvania Regional Director of the Clinton/Gore Campaign in 1992.
- BSN, Boston University; attended the University of Chicago and the University of Warwick, England.
Blum, as head of USAction, is no slouch at GOTV, either. The Hill wrote February 1, 2005, that Blum rerported that USAction “by its own estimates mobilized 20,000 volunteers to register and turn out low-income minority voters.”3
Do all roads lead to ACORN? Health Care for America Now
As stated in his speaker’s profile, Jeffrey Blum is founder and co-chair of Health Care for America Now. Watch the brief July 8, 2008, launch announcement here:
And — Surprise! — it’s a brand-spanking new lobby comprised of some of our “favorite” Obama backers, formed just in time for the Obama administration’s health care plan. HCAN, established as recently as July 2008, is an unprecedented coalition led by:
ACORN, AFSCME, Americans United for Change, Campaign for America’s Future, Center for American Progress Action Fund, Center for Community Change, MoveOn.org, National Education Association, National Women’s Law Center, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, SEIU, United Food and Commercial Workers, and USAction.
As of July 7, 2008, Steering Committee members included:
Richard Kirsch (Health Care for America Now), Maude Hurd (ACORN), Gerald McEntee (AFSCME), Caren Benjamin (Americans United for Change), Roger Hickey (Campaign for America’s Future), Elizabeth Edwards (Center for American Progress Action Fund), Eli Pariser (MoveOn.org), Reg Weaver (National Education Association), Marcia Greenberger (National Women’s Law Center), Cecile Richards (Planned Parenthood), Anna Burger (SEIU), Joseph Hansen (United Food and Commercial Workers), Jeff Blum (USAction), David T. Tayloe, Jr., MD FAAP (American Academy of Pediatrics), and David White (small business owner).
Recall William McNary’s words that USAction “must avoid Citizen Action’s mistake of becoming a conduit for unions and trial lawyers’ money and messages”? What do you think the chances of that NOT happening will be?
Blum, SDS, WUO?
So now we come full circle to where RBO’s search started, the name responsible for this whole article — Jeffrey David Blum.
Is this the same person? Does the connection with USAction vice president Heather Booth2 — who has her own SDS and WUO connections — link to this Jeff Blum? Can there be more than one Jeffrey Blum from Maryland of approximately the same age? Keep in mind, Blum states in his speaker’s profile that he attended the University of Chicago. Another coincidence?
Let RBO know what you think. We DO want to be sure. Can this be just a coincidence?
The August 1976 declassified FBI report on members and activities of the Weather Underground (WUO) to date provides a profile of Jeffrey David Blum of Baltimore, Maryland, who, as of September 1969, was considered by the FBI as one of the activists of the Chicago Regional, Weatherman Faction of SDS (Students for a Democratic Society).
Blum’s name is found on the Chicago Police Department, Statistical Section of the Records Division, list dated October 17, 1969, of those who had been arrested during WUO’s “Days of Rage” riots in Chicago, October 8-11, 1969.
The previous year Blum was issued a passport on May 2, 1968 in Chicago, where he listed his proposed travel for a number of countries to include England, France, West Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Yugoslavia, Italy, Hungary, Romania, Austria, Czechoslovakia, and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Blum stated he planned to travel to these countries via Trans Globe Airways about June 14, 1968.
Although the FBI’s report does not specifically state it, it is most likely Blum was one of those who accompanied WUO leader Bernardine Dohrn to Europe during the summer of 1968.
In 1973, Kirkpatrick Sale wrote (p405) in SDS: The Rise And Development Of The Students For A Democratic Society that after the Democratic National Convention in 1968, Jeff Blum, Gerry Long, Bernardine Dohrn, John Jacobs, Bob Tomashevsky, and Peter Clapp shared an apartment in Chicago. This clearly puts Dohrn and Blum together.
Dohrn wrote in the October 2006 issue of the Marxist journal, the Monthly Review:
We took delegations of youth to meet with the Vietnamese in Budapest, Montreal, and Havana. We met with New Left activists across Europe at an international new left conference in Ljubljana, stopping in Prague, Frankfurt, Stockholm, and Paris—seeking common ground and finding inspiration.
An article RBO came across at Knology.net adds:
Following the Democratic National Convention, approximately twenty-eight Americans including nine individuals who had participated in the Chicago demonstrations traveled to Budapest, Hungary for a conference (Bernardine Dohrn who had departed for a month-long trip to various countries earlier also attended this conference.) They met for five days with five Vietcong and North Vietnamese representatives.
This information is confirmed by the August 1976 FBI report, which cites from a September 21, 1968, Washington Post article, that reported on the “trip of 28 American war foes who traveled to Hungary to meet with representatives of North Vietnam and the National Liberation Front to discuss strategy on U.S. campuses.” The article stated that nine of the above-mentioned 28 individuals took part in demonstrations at the Democratic National Convention. Blum’s name is not specified as having taken part in the DNC demonstrations.
The WUO’s last open meeting prior to their submergence into underground status was the Flint, Michigan War Council, held December 27-31, 1969. During this meeting the WUO decided to go underground and engage in guerrilla warfare against the U.S. government. Jeffrey Blum was known to have attended this meeting.
Additionally, the records of the Flint, Michigan, Police Department show that a vehicle registered to Jeffrey Blum was at this meeting. Although several others were, Blum’s vehicle was not stopped and searched by the police.
Update: What’s Robert Creamer up to these days? Well, YouTuber opchedexio has the answer.
Note 1 — It should surprise no one that Obama’s White House chief-of-staff-to-be, Rahm Emanuel, “began his public career with the consumer rights organization Illinois Public Action.”
Note 2 –Not only are Jeff Blum and Heather Booth both advisory board members of the Jewish Fund for Justice, their names appear numerous times together on boards, as revealed in a Google search. Booth’s name also appears on the 21stCenturyDems.org website as having been a trainer.
Note 3 — As an aside, it is also possible that USAction could come in for some of the same voter registration fraud blame as ACORN — about a “million voter-registration mailings sent across the country this year.” And, yes, of course, there are problems.
Our citizens may be deceived for awhile, and have been deceived; but as long as the presses can be protected, we may trust to them for light.--Thomas Jefferson.
++
i say the sooner we give them what they want.. they wont want it anymore.. hence, the sooner we can get this world straightened out.. because as soon as they realize their dreams only work on paper, the better..
bur then again, the definition of insanity is repeating
the same behavior and expecting different results..
==
All I can say is “WOW!” I don’t know how you do it or keep all these people straight. I would need a flow chart.
As for Blum, as the saying goes “there are no coincidences.”
Have you ever considered sending all this to the FBI or to Fitzgerald? Surely, our country has not gotten to the point where everything is swept under the rug just for political expediency.
Thank you once again for some more hard hitting research!
[...] via You be the judge. Coincidence or not? « RBO [...]
You are totally on the right track – I’ve been tracking the ‘groups” in my area for a few years now – and this is what i find – they start up groups the same way rip-off stock-boiler-rooms open and close, a new group today, another one tomorrow – they cross-pollinate, endorse each other, all collect money and call themselves a ‘growing coalition of such and such’ – in reality there are only a few people behind them – they use the citizen ‘grassroots’ label as a cloak to hide their true intentions, it gives them Sacred Cow status, how dare you question the CITIZENS! They recruit innocent well-meaning people as ‘members’ and use them as cover. the ‘members’ have no real say in how things are done and have no idea they are working with and for new age con-men.
The ones I have been tracking are more related to the “environment’ – but there’s been cross over into all kinds of other groups.
One good resource is activistcash.com/ (I haven’t noticed that they have added ACORN, they are focused more the food and beverage activists, but you’ll be amazed at what you find… HUGE money changing hands, complete with everything Crichton describes in State of Fear; PR firms, graphics shops, everything they need to accomplish their agenda.
Part of the problem is the complexity of EXPLAINING this complicated trail of groups, names and relationships, the commenter above is right, you need a flow chart, you need a war room, with big flow charts on all the walls.
BRAVO! Fabulous research! Yes, I’m ready for a war room flowchart…hear, hear!
Yes! A flowchart!
Tides Foundation & Tides Center
…Tides Foundation and its recent offshoot, the Tides Center, creating a new model for grantmaking — one that strains the boundaries of U.S. tax law in the pursuit of its leftist, activist goals.
Set up in 1976 by California activist Drummond Pike, Tides does two things better than any other foundation or charity in the U.S. today: it routinely obscures the sources of its tax-exempt millions, and makes it difficult (if not impossible) to discern how the funds are actually being used…
…Where the Money Comes From
The Tides Foundation is quickly becoming the 800-pound gorilla of radical activist funding, and this couldn’t happen without a nine-figure balance sheet. Just about every big name in the world of public grantmaking lists Tides as a major recipient. Anyone who has heard the closing moments of a National Public Radio news broadcast is familiar with these names. In 1999 alone, Tides took in an astounding $42.9 million. It gave out $31.1 million in grants that year, and applied the rest to a balance sheet whose bottom line is over $120 million. Since 1996, one foundation alone (the Pew Charitable Trusts) has poured over $40 million into Tides. And at least 17 others have made grants to Tides in excess of $100,000.
The Tides Center: A Legal Spin-Off
While Tides makes its name by facilitating large pass-through grants to outside groups, many of Tides’ grantees are essentially activist startups. Part of Tides’ overall plan is to provide day-to-day assistance to the younger groups that it “incubates.” This can translate into program expertise, human resources and benefits management, assistance with facilities leasing, and even help with public relations and media. Tides typically charges groups 8 percent of their gross income for these services.
Until recently, these administrative functions were provided to grantees by the Tides Foundation itself. But in order to limit exposure to any lawsuits that might be filed against its many affiliated groups (many injured parties have considered suing environmental groups in recent years), a new and legally separate entity was born. In 1996 the Tides Center was spun off, insulating the Foundation’s purse and permanently separating Tides’ grantmaking and administrative functions….
You mentioned Ben Cohen… ?
…This practice of “incubation” allows Tides to provide traditional foundations with a unique service. If an existing funder wants to pour money into a specific agenda for which no activist group exists, Tides will start one from scratch. At least 30 of the Tides Center’s current “projects” were created out of thin air in response to the needs of one foundation or another….
…Fenton Communications, itself a touchstone for radical political campaigns, made use of the Tides Center to set up its Environmental Media Services (EMS) in 1994 (it has also since emerged from under Tides’ protection and formally set up shop in Fenton’s offices). The fact that Tides originally ran EMS’ day-to-day operations provided PR spinmeister David Fenton with “plausible deniability” — a ready-made alibi against charges that this supposedly “nonpartisan” media outfit was just a shill for his paying clients. Now, of course, we all know that it is just that.
Similar stories can be told about SeaWeb, the Environmental Working Group, the National Environmental Trust (formerly known as the Environmental Information Center) and the Center for a Sustainable Economy, each of which received millions while under the Tides umbrella. Besides having been “incubated” in this fashion, the other principal commonality among these organizations is a client relationship with Fenton Communications.
The depth and financial implications of the Tides/Fenton connection is truly impressive, if not surprising. After all, long-time Fenton partner and recently-departed Environmental Media Services chief Arlie Schardt has sat on the board of the Tides Center/Tides Foundation complex since the very beginning. At present, the Fenton Communications client list includes at least 36 Tides grantees, as well as 10 big-money foundations that use Tides as a pass-through funding vehicle just about every year. In some cases, the Tides Foundation has been used to funnel money from one Fenton client to another.
Even taking into account the peculiar relationship between Tides and its in-house “projects,” Tides only spends about 40% of its money on these organizations. The rest goes to other left-leaning grantees, many of which have managers or board members that are connected to Tides in other ways….
…Thumbing Their Noses At America
Among the most unbelievable “projects” of the Tides Center is something called the Institute for Global Communications (www.igc.org). IGC is a clearinghouse for Leftist propagandists of all stripes, including living-wage advocates, anti-war protesters, slave-reparations hucksters, and a wide variety of extreme environmentalists. In February 2002 Orange County Register columnist Steven Greenhut called it “a network of the loony left” that “has to be seen to be believed… One alert posted in an IGC member conference calls for financial support for the Earth Liberation Front… Another message warns readers against cooperating with the FBI.”…
…In order to keep the gravy train running, Tides has demonstrated remarkable ingenuity in coming up with unusual funding streams in addition to its mainstays in traditional philanthropy. Consider the following:
When Ben & Jerry’s announced that profits from its popular “Rainforest Crunch” ice cream flavor were earmarked for save-the-earth charities, the mass media swooned. What they didn’t tell you was that 20% of the cut went directly to the Tides Foundation.…
There’s more in their piece on the Ruckus Society… …Ruckus itself has no problem getting paid, reaping six-figure grant awards from the likes of Ted Turner and the “caring capitalists” at Ben & Jerry’s. When the multinational corporation Unilever bought the ice cream maker in 2000, it agreed to continue Ben & Jerry’s bizarre flavor of philanthropy for the foreseeable future. The Turner foundation has also contributed heavily to Ruckus, including over $150,000 in grants made via The Ecology Center, Inc., a Montana group where Ruckus’ first slate of officers met in the mid-1990s.
Ruckus’s primary contributions to the activist agenda are its “action camps”: weeklong boot camps for leftist protesters, usually held a few weeks prior to a major organized demonstration. A few hundred young Ruckus recruits typically attend each camp, where they are trained in the finer points of “police confrontation strategies,” “street blockades,” “urban climbing & rappelling,” “using the media to your advantage,” and “learning to lock your head to something” (among other things)….
There’s one more tidbit I am looking for. It’s not my intent to be spamming you with info – it’s just that you have touched on something – something very very serious…
Tip of the iceberg…
Environmental Media Services – Also known as a “project” of the Tides Center
…Afraid to eat dairy products from cows that have been treated with hormones to produce extra milk? Scared that the hormone, which the FDA calls “entirely safe,” will make its way into your body and cause cancer or other irreparable damage? Beginning with a huge press conference in 1998, EMS pushed that very message relentlessly for over two years. And they did it on behalf of Ben & Jerry’s, a paying Fenton client. Why would Ben & Jerry’s care? Because their ice cream is made with hormone-free milk, and David Fenton calculated that a little health hysteria would drive customers to their “alternative” product quite nicely.
It’s called “black marketing,” and Environmental Media Services has become the principal reason Fenton Communications is so good at it. EMS lends an air of legitimacy to what might otherwise be dismissed (and rightly so) as fear-mongering from the lunatic fringe. In addition to pre-packaged “story ideas” for the mass media, EMS provides commentaries, briefing papers, and even a stable of experts, all carefully calculated to win points for paying clients. These “experts,” though, are also part of the ruse. Over 70% of them earn their paychecks from current or past Fenton clients, all of which have a financial stake in seeing to it that the scare tactics prevail. It’s a clever deception perpetrated on journalists who generally don’t consider do-gooder environmentalists to be capable of such blatant and duplicitous “spin.”
The first rule of this game is that it’s strictly pay-for-play. For a price, you too can promote your product by maligning the competition with junk-science smear tactics. To Fenton Communications, you’ll be a “client”; down the hall at EMS, though, you’ll join the ranks of its “project partners.” And nobody will be the wiser….
Like I said, activistcash focuses on food and beverage industry activists – but the pattern is exactly what you are describing, interrelated disposable ‘groups’ formed with a specific purpose, funded by millions in big Foundation Grant money and Soros money.
You’ve touched on it, and by all accounts, ACORN is even bigger, definitely more connected to all the legislators. Once you learn the ‘keywords’ like ‘project’ you’ll be amazed what you find, the place that processes your donation is a ‘project’ of such and such… in the case of Project Vote, wasn’t it, they found they shared a house/office… “Citizens Services/Consulting” is Project Vote’s accountants. Coincidentally, they also keep the books for ACORN. Lest we forget, it was recently uncovered that the Obama campaign paid $832,598 to Citizens Services, Inc.)
And again, note that according to their Forms 990 ACORN and Project Vote (and Citizens Services) once again share the same address…