Re: Professor Punished for Witty Remark
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Tue, Dec 11, 2001 at 05:01:11PM -0800, Eric Cordian wrote:
OK. How about "well-funded?" :)
I count $1,270,000 in grants to the organization since its creation as the
Compared to giants like Brookings? Not well-funded, well-known, big, nor powerful. Few folks even in DC have heard of it. $1M in grants over a period of years is not much by Washington policy group standards.
- -Declan Last year, Brookings had revenues of 29 million. The RAND Corporation had revenues of 157 million. One year, one hundred fifty seven million. Their grants and contracts for last year alone totaled 142.7 million. Sort of adds a new dimension to the idea of being "giant" and "well-funded", doesn't it. ~F. *** The right to be let alone is indeed the beginning of all freedoms. - --William O. Douglas, Associate Justice, US Supreme Court -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: PGPsdk version 1.7.1 (C) 1997-1999 Network Associates, Inc. and its affiliated companies. (Diffie-Helman/DSS-only version) iQA/AwUBPBlGS/g5Tuca7bfvEQJbJACgpwMX2yolpxFpLAImBj0l3QWYZacAn12z BU19/N1jMfShiZEvzFHKJJwY =9qFa -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
Faustine wrote:
Last year, Brookings had revenues of 29 million. The RAND Corporation had revenues of 157 million.
One year, one hundred fifty seven million.
Their grants and contracts for last year alone totaled 142.7 million. Sort of adds a new dimension to the idea of being "giant" and "well-funded", doesn't it.
I think we're kind of missing the point here. ACTA is well-funded for being an annoying little pressure group that tries to increase the heat around people who say things it doesn't approve of. It's silly to compare its budget to Rand or SRI or the NSA. And having spent a million to try and redirect $29 billion in alumni donations makes it a much bigger operation than the usual "Christians for Niceness" or "Mothers Against Baby Exploitation" groups most of us are sick and tired of hearing spew on news programs. -- Eric Michael Cordian 0+ O:.T:.O:. Mathematical Munitions Division "Do What Thou Wilt Shall Be The Whole Of The Law"
On Thu, 13 Dec 2001, Eric Cordian wrote:
I think we're kind of missing the point here. ACTA is well-funded for being an annoying little pressure group that tries to increase the heat around people who say things it doesn't approve of.
It's silly to compare its budget to Rand or SRI or the NSA.
Not when they're playing in the same pool it isn't. -- ____________________________________________________________________ Day by day the Penguins are making me lose my mind. Bumper Sticker The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage@ssz.com www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087 -====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'- --------------------------------------------------------------------
Faustine wrote:
Last year, Brookings had revenues of 29 million. The RAND Corporation had revenues of 157 million.
One year, one hundred fifty seven million.
Cooincidentally, I bumped into *this*, today. Reminded me of the time, in my teens, when I finally discovered exactly how much unions gross a year in "dues", and what they paid for. Put a big hurt on the whole crunchy-granola rosy-colored hippie-glasses power-to-the-people-raht-on thang, that did... Cheers, RAH
http://www.opinionjournal.com/forms/printThis.html?id=95001590
SCENE & HEARD Activist Inc. Professional agitators can't claim to be a "grassroots" movement anymore. BY KIMBERLEY A. STRASSEL Thursday, December 13, 2001 12:01 a.m. It seems every time you read a story about a domestic conflict--whether it's drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, free trade clashes, or tobacco litigation--two adjectives always describe the opponents. On one side are the "grassroots" organizations--disorganized, under-funded, struggling folk willing to live hand-to-mouth in the name of their noble goal. On the other are "powerful" corporate and political interests--fat-cats with loads of money, contacts and discipline, willing to use any tactic to get their way. David-and-Goliath descriptions add the touch of drama, which is no doubt why journalists continue with the "grassroots-powerful" routine. Yet even as they do, the rest of America is cottoning on to the fact that such descriptions are not only outdated--they're completely backward. These days, most "grassroots" groups are far better moneyed, networked and operated than many corporations and political lobbies. And they've become far more ruthless in accomplishing their goals.
<snip...>
ActivistCash.com, unveiled yesterday, is run by the Guest Choice Network, an organization of 30,000 restaurant and tavern operators. The Guest Choice Network has become a front line defense against today's nanny culture. Or, as its first Web site--nannyculture.com--puts it: "Unofficially we include anybody who stands up against the growing fraternity of food cops, health care enforcers, vegetarian activists and meddling bureaucrats who 'know what's best for you.' " The site offers, among other things, information on junk science and food scares.
Now, however, the group has gone further. Over the past year it has used freedom of information laws to get the IRS documents of the country's leading activist groups--more than 100,000 pages of information the activist hope Americans won't see. "What we uncovered is an intricate, organized, well-funded web of what you might call the "'new left,' " says John Doyle, the group's communications director. "It allows a person to finally link the environmental activists with the animal rights activists with the anti-corporate activists, and see that they all operate together in the anti-choice arena."
<Details elided about how most of these organizations have more interlocking boards than a gilded-age Morganized railroad trust, and so on....> -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah@ibuc.com> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
participants (4)
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Eric Cordian -
Faustine -
Jim Choate -
R. A. Hettinga