The Conservative Money Matrix Is Funding Schiavo's Parents

by Chris Bowers, Tue Mar 22, 2005 at 08:50:29 AM EST

The Conservative Message Machine Money Matrix, famously identified by Rob Stein and David Brock, is the source of almost all funding behind the wingnut Schiavo push. A two-week old article from Jon Eisberg identifies how the Philanthropy Roundtable is involved with the case, among other familiar faces of uber-rich conservative donor fame: Schindler lawyer Pat Anderson "was paid directly" by the anti-abortion Life Legal Defense Foundation, which "has already spent over $300,000 on this case," according to the foundation's Web site. Much of the support for Life Legal Defense Foundation, in turn, comes from the Alliance Defense Fund, an anti-gay rights group which collected more than $15 million in private donations in 2002 and admits to having spent money on the Schiavo case "in the six figures," according to a recent article in the Palm Beach Post. Mediatransparency.org states that between 1994 and 2002, the Alliance Defense Fund received $142,000 from Philanthropy Roundtable members that include the Lynde & Harry Bradley Foundation and the Richard and Helen DeVos Foundation.

Wesley Smith and Rita Marker also work for organizations that get funding from Roundtable members. Smith is a paid senior fellow with the Discovery Institute, a Seattle-based think tank that advocates the teaching of creationist "intelligent design" theory in public schools. Between 1993 and 1997, the Discovery Institute received $175,000 from the Bradley Foundation. Marker is executive director of the International Task Force on Euthanasia, which lobbies against physician-assisted suicide. In 2001, Marker's organization received $110,390 from the Randolph Foundation, an affiliate of the Smith Richardson family.

Roundtable members also played a role in financing the Bush v. Schiavo litigation.

The Family Research Council, which uses its annual $10 million budget to lobby for prayer in public schools and against gay marriage, filed an amicus curiae brief in Bush v. Schiavo supporting Gov. Bush, at the same time its former president, attorney Kenneth Connor, was representing the governor in that litigation. Between 1992 and 2000, the council received $215,000 from the Bradley Foundation.

Another amicus brief backing Bush was filed by a coalition of disability rights organizations that included the National Organization on Disability and the World Institute on Disability. The former received $810,000 between 1991 and 2002 from the Scaife Family Foundations, the Richard and Helen DeVos Foundation, and the JM Foundation; the latter received $20,000 in 1997 from the JM Foundation.

These connections may be just the tip of the iceberg. I'm no Woodward or Bernstein. I got this information using only the most rudimentary Google skills. I imagine that a thorough search by a seasoned investigator would yield quite a bit more.

Pardon my language, but these fuckers seem to be everywhere, funding every wingnut crusade imaginable. This is why Republicans in congress had to take the wildly unpopular stance of intervening, overstepping their bounds, and damaging the Constitution. They had to become involved: all of the top donors and architects of their propaganda apparatus demanded it.

The real leaders of the Republican Party are not named DeLay, Bush, Hastert or Frist. They are named Scaife, Olin, Koch, McKenna, Bradley, Richardson, Smith and Coors. The public puppets simply had no choice but to dance when the real powers that be told them to do so. The Republican base had been funding this for years and they were not about to let it go by without at least a very public debacle in return for their investment.

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Chris, does Frist dance to his tune or theirs?

There's certainly more than enough money in the Frist family portfolio to suggest the Frist family can dance to any tune it chooses. While I have no doubt that Frist will play ball to keep important theo-cons happy along the way to the nomination, do you think Frist is more driven by what the Frist family wants, or what the theo-cons want?

by afs 2005-03-22 09:05AM | 0 recs

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Christian Right power...

Let's look at the Schiavo case for the precedent it really is:

The Christian Right has literally pushed Congress into passing a law that specifies statutory protection for A SINGLE INDIVIDUAL...no equal protection for anybody else -- hell, the law offers NO protection of ANY KIND for anybody not named Terri Schiavo...If this is so "extraordinary" a case, how come that baby was allowed to die in Texas because of a bill W himself signed? ... Why didn't that little boy get his own law? ...

Legislative power is supposed to result in GENERAL rulemaking that applies equally. Ironically, though we're being told this is about "protecting life", all this decision effectively does is DE-value the life of anybody NOT named Terri Schiavo -- in the eyes of the law, at least...If counting votes by hand "dilutes" the rights of others (the Republican Bush v Gore argument), how can singling out ONE person for special protection not do the same?...

Given W's penchant for sidestepping the law when he doesn't like its output -- giving himself the power to declare anybody an "enemy combatant", for example -- I'm waiting to see him call out the national guard to re-insert the tubes...

Also, what if TS was a devout atheist? ... Not likely the CR would be going to this effort, imo... and that's fine, I suppose... But the scary thing is that with Congress rolling over, this seems to prove that the CR can apparently pick and choose who ends up with protection under the law...Does this mean Christians will now individually (by name) receive preferential treatment?... What about a poor Muslim baby without that kind of political pull?

Hank

by HKingsley 2005-03-22 09:08AM | 0 recs

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Time for a Name Change

I think I'm going to change my name to Terri Shiavo.

by kaleidescope 2005-03-23 11:38AM | 0 recs

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Another Example - God in Cupertino Pub Schools

The current New Yorker has an excellent piece on the teacher in the Cupertino, CA public schools who was allegedly threatened because he promoted the Declaration of Independence. Cue the right wing media organizing a national crusade to demonize the school, the principal, and liberals.

In reality, this teacher had repeatedly inserted religion into lesson plans and the item in question was an excerpt from the Declaration that emphasized God. The teacher had been warned prior to this on several occaisions, and was a self-identified evangelical. And by the way, the Declaration was always on display in the school lobby.

The efficiency of the right wing machine in using this is notable.

by Andmoreagain 2005-03-22 09:10AM | 0 recs

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these fuckers

Its not new that there are wealthy people who think they can use their money to co-opt of the institutions of freedom -- the press, elections, religious leaders, even scientists.

What is new here is that the leaders of the country aren't willing or able to stand up to these fuckers -- a more polite, though less accurate term, might be hard-right, big-money special interests. Indeed, its no surprise that the craven leadership of this country won't stand up for the public interest; they don't believe in it. Whats amazing here is how much they wont' even stand up for their own special interests in this case.

They are letting wingnuts destroy their own agenda and make them look patently ridiculous in the process.

May Terry Shiavo's soul find the peace she so richly deserves.

by desmoulins 2005-03-22 11:59AM | 0 recs

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That's Letting DeLay and Crew off the Hook

All this says is that anyone can be a bought-and-paid for, politically-owned hack. That's too easy to let DeLay get away with his part in this crap.

On the other hand, this is the same bunch that went on a ten-year manhunt after Clinton. Read "The Hunting of the President" - Scaife alone has had his knickers in a bunch about Clinton since 1991.

by Political Junkie 2005-03-22 12:13PM | 0 recs

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Conservatives Coming Out Against This

The action being taken by a few cultish neo-conservatives is not conservative at all. In fact, political conservatives are starting to object to what is happening.

DeLay and the cynical political operatives paying for the Schiavo Congressional Circus are deconstructing the boundries that define what is conservative, among all else they are tearing apart.

This item on AP wire -

"Not all conservatives are happy with the decision by Congress and President Bush to intervene in the Terri Schiavo case. Some leaders said Tuesday the new law allowing a federal court review of the case is an example of the big government they have always opposed.

'To simply say that the 'culture of life,' or whatever you call it means that we don't have to pay attention to the principles of federalism or separation of powers is certainly not a conservative viewpoint,' said former Rep. Bob Barr, R-Ga.

Allan Lichtman, who chairs the history department at American University in Washington, said the intervention of Congress and Bush to try to overturn the decision by Schiavo's husband not to prolong her life is the antithesis of several conservative principles.

'It contradicts a lot of what those behind it say they believe: the sanctity of the family, the sacred bond between husband and wife, the ability of all of us to make private decisions without the hand of government intervening, deference to states and localities as opposed to the centralized government,' said Lichtman."

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20050322/D890AGOG1.html

by Patricia Taylor 2005-03-22 02:11PM | 0 recs

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Pulling the Plug on Pandering (we hope)

Pulling the Plug on Pandering

George W. Bush is neither a neurologist nor a medical ethicist. What on earth is he doing in this case?

For your information, while he was governor of Texas, George W. Bush signed the Advanced Directives Act in 1999, which gives hospitals the right to remove life support in cases where there is no possibility of revival, when the family cannot pay, no matter what the family's wishes are in the matter.

From Molly Ivins <http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/21564>

by MS 2005-03-22 07:53PM | 0 recs