{"id":32813,"date":"2016-08-09T14:39:44","date_gmt":"2016-08-09T18:39:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/?p=32813"},"modified":"2016-08-09T14:39:44","modified_gmt":"2016-08-09T18:39:44","slug":"sinister-rumors-connect-hillary-clinton-with-tree-planting-in-malawi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2016\/08\/09\/sinister-rumors-connect-hillary-clinton-with-tree-planting-in-malawi\/","title":{"rendered":"Sinister rumors connect Hillary Clinton with tree-planting in Malawi"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is impressive. I do not care, at all, for Windows, and tend to have a poor emotional response to the very word \u201cMicroSoft.\u201d I also think that billionaires should be presumed guilty until proven innocent. Yet the work of the Gates Foundation \u2014 the overall effect of it, and the level of personal commitment to it \u2014 makes me think favorably of Bill Gates, as a person.<\/p>\n

Yes, I also think his foundation, in some areas (education \u201creform,\u201d in particular) may be doing more harm than good. But the bottom line is that it\u2019s doing an awful lot of good on a remarkable scale. It\u2019s a well-intentioned and largely effective effort to contribute to human flourishing and to generally make the world a better place.<\/p>\n

So it would be really strange if the only references we ever saw to the Gates Foundation were vaguely sinister assertions that its existence and the work it does were somehow a dark stain on the legacy of Bill and Melinda Gates. That would be weird, misleading, churlish and inaccurate.<\/p>\n

It would be really strange if every mention of the Gates Foundation implied that it was something sinister, or if thousands of voices were hinting that they were going to expose the real truth of what that foundation really does while at the same time never ever mentioning, even in passing, any of its actual programs, efforts, successes or achievements.<\/p>\n

That would be just \u2026 weird<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Now, how many references have you seen to the Clinton Foundation?<\/a> How many times have you seen that name invoked in articles, or heard it uttered by cable newsreaders, or seen it hurled as an accusation on social media?<\/p>\n

And how many of those references have ever bothered mentioning what the Clinton Foundation actually does? Anything at all<\/em> about what it does?<\/p>\n

This is a remarkable thing. Somewhere it was decided, apparently, that promoting girls\u2019 education and sustainable agriculture and access to medicine are all shameful crimes against humanity that the Clintons should be ashamed to be connected with in any way. You know \u2026 (whispers darkly) \u2026 the Clinton Foundation<\/em>. It\u2019s discussed like the legendary \u201cWhitey Tape\u201d \u2014 like something that will one day come to light to expose Hillary\u2019s darkest secrets of scandalously helping poor girls learn to read and of planting trees in Malawi.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s just \u2026 weird<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\"SmallFarmers\"<\/a>
The Clinton Foundation claims these women are farmers, but come on \u2014 we know what farmers look like. Farmers are grizzled Midwestern white men in jeans and John Deere caps, and these women don\u2019t look anything like that. More Clinton lies. (Clinton Foundation photo, click for link to article.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Ah, but it has to do with the fundraising<\/em>. You see, the Clintons have raised money for their charitable work from wealthy people \u2014 from 1 percenters. And not just wealthy people here in America, but from wealthy foreigners<\/em>. They\u2019re laundering the ill-gotten plunder of global plutocrats into schooling and medicine and tree-planting and \u2026<\/p>\n

Is this supposed to offend my conscience? Is this something I should be indignant about?<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a Counterpunch piece based on a Real News Network interview with Michael Hudson titled \u201cIs the Real Scandal the Clinton Foundation?<\/a>\u201d\u00a0(The question mark there is a hint of what you\u2019ll find in the piece. Whenever you see a question mark in a headline, you can read that question as this: \u201cDo we have any evidence to back up what we\u2019re suggesting here?\u201d And the answer is almost always No. If we did, we\u2019d have made a statement, not asked a question.)<\/p>\n

This is a left-wing piece, but it parallels similar speculation promoted on the opposite side via Fox News and talk radio. It never mentions anything the Clinton Foundation does, anything it has done, or anything it plans to do. Nothing at all about the actual work of the foundation.<\/p>\n

They, like, apparently help girls in the developing world and, like, poor farmers or some stuff like that. Whatever. Irrelevant. Hudson isn\u2019t interested in any of that. He\u2019s not interested in what the charity is doing, but he\u2019s very, very interested in insidious speculation\u00a0about\u00a0what it maybe possibly could be imagined to maybe possibly have done.<\/p>\n

This is the strongest case against the Clinton Foundation. And there\u2019s no there there:<\/p>\n

JAY: As far as we know, there\u2019s no direct evidence that she did precisely what you\u2019re saying. And that they actually say \u2013 \u201cGive money to the foundation; I will facilitate such-and-such a contract.\u201d There\u2019s no evidence of that, correct?<\/em><\/p>\n

HUDSON: That\u2019s right. And partly there\u2019s no evidence because her private emails are not subject to [inaud.]. They\u2019re not subject to finding out this. We don\u2019t have any evidence one way or the other. So certainly there is no evidence. There is only the appearance of what looks to me to be an inherent conflict of interest with the foundation.<\/p>\n

JAY: And there\u2019s no direct evidence that any abnormal amount of money has gone to Bill Clinton, in terms of fees and expenses. One can assume he\u2019s well-compensated. But it does have charitable status, it has to file a 990. They are under charitable law regulations, and so far I don\u2019t know of any reporting that says that they have violated the law.<\/em><\/p>\n

HUDSON: You\u2019re right. The advantage of being under charitable law is it\u2019s in a foundation that \u2013 you can look at it in effect as your savings account. And you can treat it \u2013 you can do with a foundation whatever you want.<\/p>\n

Now, if you or I had a quarter billion dollars, what we\u2019d want to do is influence policy. Influence the world. Well, that\u2019s what they want to do. They want to use the foundation to support policies that they want.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Hudson imagines this foundation has some kind of agenda<\/em> \u2014 something it wants to accomplish. He may be on to something. If only there were some way of figuring out what they might be up to<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It would be really strange if every mention of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation implied that it was something sinister and a dark stain on Gates’ legacy. It would be really weird if dozens of voices were hinting that they were going to expose the real truth of what that foundation really does while at the same time never ever mentioning, even in passing, any of its actual programs, efforts, successes or achievements. Can you imagine?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":141,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-class-warfare"],"yoast_head":"\nSinister rumors connect Hillary Clinton with tree-planting in Malawi<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"It would be really strange if every mention of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation implied that it was something sinister and a dark stain on Gates' legacy. It would be really weird if dozens of voices were hinting that they were going to expose the real truth of what that foundation really does while at the same time never ever mentioning, even in passing, any of its actual programs, efforts, successes or achievements. Can you imagine?\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2016\/08\/09\/sinister-rumors-connect-hillary-clinton-with-tree-planting-in-malawi\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Sinister rumors connect Hillary Clinton with tree-planting in Malawi\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It would be really strange if every mention of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation implied that it was something sinister and a dark stain on Gates' legacy. It would be really weird if dozens of voices were hinting that they were going to expose the real truth of what that foundation really does while at the same time never ever mentioning, even in passing, any of its actual programs, efforts, successes or achievements. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark1\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Sinister rumors connect Hillary Clinton with tree-planting in Malawi","description":"It would be really strange if every mention of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation implied that it was something sinister and a dark stain on Gates' legacy. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. 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