Democratic Underground Latest Greatest Lobby Journals Search Options Help Login
Google

American Enterprise Institute - is there a worse think tank in America?

Printer-friendly format Printer-friendly format
Printer-friendly format Email this thread to a friend
Printer-friendly format Bookmark this thread
This topic is archived.
Home » Discuss » Archives » General Discussion (1/22-2007 thru 12/14/2010) Donate to DU
 
ChairmanAgnostic Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:06 PM
Original message
Poll question: American Enterprise Institute - is there a worse think tank in America?
I happened upon another council, this time on education, and as CSPIN usually does, they include at least one neo-con ultra-conservative, this time from AEI. (Fascist Fridays don't count. They ALWAYS have one after another certified members of the lunatic conservative fringe on Fridays. I cannot recall one moderate or liberal to date)

Just look at their roster, and you realize that this is the biggest collection of windbags, mental deficients, neo-cons and worse. Here are but a few of their inmates:

David Frum
Mike Barone
Newt Gingrich
Fred Kagan
Lawrence Lindsay
Norm Ornstein
Richard Perle
and my favorite,

John Yoo.

It is not that they have been wrong at times. It is not that they have made a few mistakes. Bush/Cheney adopted their economic plans, their war plans, their ecology plans, their education plans, their recommendations on faith based initiatives, financial regulations, environmental regulations, in fact, pretty much every policy decision for the past 8 years has the fingerprints of one or more of these morons from AEI.

If there was a group that showed such consistency, I have yet to see it. Because on every issue, they weren't just wrong, they were dangerously, abysmally, terribly and horribly wrong. On Israel, despite their consistent proclamation of even-handed, but loyal support, they were the biggest cheerleaders of Israel's last horrible mistake - the invasion of Lebanon. Their response? Let's send a million more cluster bombs to Israel, because they ran out. AEI demanded it, and our government responded.

Iraq? Don Rumsfeld tossed steady, careful, experience-based pre and postwar studies which would have required him to send many more troops, and admit to spending much more money than America was willing to do. What did he base his decisions on? AEI friends who willingly supported Rummie in his time of need. AEI, if not the cause, certainly aided and abetted this disaster.

Iran? Sure, Iran is a thorn in people's sides, especially when they have reason to be. We created the Shah, deposed a duly elected democratic leader, destroyed their parliament, and then blamed them when they got tired of the Shah. We ignored moderate leaders requests for help after their revolution, and made things worse by acting like a bull in a China shop since. We now routinely invade their northern regions by proxy, we have two carrier forces (sometimes one, but never less than one) right at the edge of their territorial waters. And in America, AEI continues to beat its drum that they are the bad guys?

Torture? AEI asshole call Yoo their constitutional expert! When every literate or educated person has looked at his work product, it was so pathetic and irrational, that Yoo is lucky to have a job, much less at a university AND at AEI.

AEI assholes are both distancing themselves from Bush at the very time as they try to rewrite history, conveniently glossing over their terrible history over the past 8 years. There is one thing that AEI has in common with Bush. If you ask what decision should be made on a particular issue, taking the exact opposite road from that suggested by AEI or Bush will be far more successful.

Are there any other organizations as bad or worse than AEI?
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
BOSSHOG Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:09 PM
Response to Original message
1. Honorable mention to the Claremont Foundation
West Coast version of the Heritage. Dumbasses parading as scholars.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
arcadian Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:10 PM
Response to Original message
2. Too many to list. They are incestuous.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Greyhound Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:12 PM
Response to Original message
3. I votes too many to list, but heritage was set up as a shelter for Nazis and Nazi sympathizers.
Literally.

Fucking parasite scum.


Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
DinahMoeHum Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:30 PM
Response to Original message
4. Circlejerkers in the golden ghetto that is called the Beltway.
n/t
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
el_bryanto Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:34 PM
Response to Original message
5. That's a tough one
I dislike the Heritage Foundation more; a lot more. But AIE is arguably far more powerful and influential, and there for probably more dangerous.

You might also add the Cato Institute in the mix of right wing think tanks - they are libertarian though.

Bryant
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
KamaAina Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:35 PM
Response to Original message
6. Well, PNAC, but...
...they seem to be a wholly owned subsidiary of AEI, with the same DC address and everything. :eyes:

Dishonorable mention: the Heritage Foundation. :puke:
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Oregone Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:37 PM
Response to Original message
7. Is the AEI as bad as the PNAC or NAMBLA
:)
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Sebastian Doyle Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 11:56 PM
Response to Reply #7
25. AEI and PNAC are basically the same bunch of treasonous Likud war criminals
Their individual memberships in NAMBLA have not been confirmed, however. Only Limbaugh knows for sure whether any of them accompanied him on his vacation to "boys town" in the Bermuda Triangle.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
RaleighNCDUer Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:40 PM
Response to Original message
8. What you must understand is that AEI is not really a think tank.
It is a propaganda mill, nothing more. The neocon positions they support existed in full before AEI was ever organized, and they did nothing to develop the theories - all they did was present a pseudo-intellectual forum for promoting those theories.

A think tank comes up with NEW ideas and NEW theories. There has never been anything new out of AEI.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
SidneyCarton Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:44 PM
Response to Original message
9. Club for Growth, Heritage Foundation, PNAC...
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
EstimatedProphet Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:44 PM
Response to Original message
10. Google Chalcedon Foundation sometime
All these other organizations are amateurs in comparison, including PNAC.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
peacetalksforall Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 02:53 PM
Response to Original message
11. AEI and AIPAC - same people, but please don't forget the Federalist Society - they
are mainly responsible for the take down of our Constitution and Bill of Rights.

Also, I don't think if PNAC as a Think Tank - think of a heirarchy:

.Barons (Domestic and International).
.Baker types - first in contact and their counterparts in other countries - usually ultra wealthy.
.Politicians at the very top - PNAC.
.Politicians, CEO's, Military Brass plus Reverends, and most specially their Media and Think Tankers.
.Specialists with partisan politics - Gonzalez, Ashcroft, Tenet, Mueller and thousands more,.
.Specialsits at a lower level with partisan politics = Franklin, and all the graduates of the Pat Robertson Law School who filled the offices of the Justice Dept and who they want to get in the Federal Judge positions, including non-RObertson graduates.

There are those with the agenda and plans, there are those who take on the task of design and problem solving and public relations, plus all levels of enablers, including assasinators and stunt handlers. They work together, but in a heirarchial way.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
El Supremo Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 03:02 PM
Response to Original message
12. The Independence Institute in Colorado
Libertarian. Totally against public transportation - especially light rail.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
malaise Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 03:06 PM
Response to Original message
13. Didn't they have a seminar yesterday suggesting that
Americans are better off financially than they think.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
supernova Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 03:12 PM
Response to Original message
14. The financial scandal - AEI needs to be the next victim
I would be so gloriously happy if AEI went bankrupt due to financial difficulties. Let's see what these windbags do with no money in their accounts.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
peacetalksforall Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 03:26 PM
Response to Reply #14
18. See my post above - Barons - fund some. However, is is worth considering
that some of the stolen money - Enron, DOD, HUD, stolen identities, Wall Stree kick-back, CEO corporation pay from the savings they get for outsourcing and setting up factories outside the U.S. plus registering outside the U.S. to stay out of courts by not having to follow our laws, privatizing kick-backs, mortgage flips - all of them can be used to fund them. The think tankers are devoted to their role, but I don't think they work for free. They probably get paid by their own - the media - when they appear as a gues expert, but knowing that they are all in the same pool - perhaps the think tankers are paying the memdia off to get their appearances - IF there is any money transferred at all.

Another source for earning the money to pay all the enablers is by selling off our technology secrets and maybe some bombs. Another source is kick back from the banks that are hiding the money they have taken and manipulated.

Think tankers - our enemy within.

Follow the money - if only we could.o
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
supernova Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 03:37 PM
Response to Reply #18
20. I'm talking about the "Institutes" themselves
They would be much more scattered and disorganized if their organizations went away. They'd have much less credibility and power if they couldn't say they were affiliated with an "Institute." That word and all like it give them an air of quasi scholarship and respectability.

Almost all of these places have foundational funds that are for the upkeep of the "Institute". It's time they got hit too.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
ChairmanAgnostic Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 04:04 PM
Response to Reply #20
21. maybe some invested with Madoff? One can only hope.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
peacetalksforall Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 11:51 PM
Response to Reply #21
24. Maybe Madoff was in with Cheney - perhaps Madoff helped our leaders to steal -
Edited on Tue Dec-16-08 11:57 PM by higher class
supposedly, you could only invest with him if invited, what if M invited Lehman types, but not Goldmans Sachs, Citigroup types to use a parallel? What if it wasn't all aboout Madoff? What if he is part of the fall, by design?

Think the reality of the barons who lead Cheney to enact their plan and the twists and turns of a Hollywood script, plus some copy catting from another century regarding schemes to bring down nations - like waterboarding to torture. All borrowed. Plus, borrowing from SF.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Blue_Tires Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 03:18 PM
Response to Original message
15. too many...heritage, cato, and the unofficial, unseen ones
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
NJCher Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 03:18 PM
Response to Original message
16. thanks for the thread
I'll use it to update my propaganda institutes list that I teach students about in the critical thinking parts of my classes.

I have to teach them about this. If I don't, I find their papers and speeches end up with references from these various propaganda sites. Even if the site doesn't directly say "Heritage Foundation," a little tracking down reveals it to be one of their turfgrass sites.



Cher
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Idealism Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 03:25 PM
Response to Original message
17. PNAC/Project For the Republican Future
Thank Bill Kristol for us not having universal health care and slamming the Iraq war down our throats. By his actions, he has killed millions.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Marie26 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 03:31 PM
Response to Original message
19. I don't know, is PNAC still around? nt
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
liam_laddie Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 04:15 PM
Response to Original message
22. Not exactly a think tank but...
The Federalist Society is as dangerous a group as any of the tanks. As is Fox News.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
libodem Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Tue Dec-16-08 05:26 PM
Response to Original message
23. Think Tank
is such a misnomer. They don't think they propagandize to induce the working class to vote against their own interests.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
mrreowwr_kittty Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Dec-17-08 12:00 AM
Response to Original message
26. Does Focus on the Anus...uh I mean...Family count as a think tank?
Because they're pretty rancid.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
DU AdBot (1000+ posts) Click to send private message to this author Click to view 
this author's profile Click to add 
this author to your buddy list Click to add 
this author to your Ignore list Thu Dec 26th 2024, 06:22 PM
Response to Original message
Advertisements [?]
 Top

Home » Discuss » Archives » General Discussion (1/22-2007 thru 12/14/2010) Donate to DU

Powered by DCForum+ Version 1.1 Copyright 1997-2002 DCScripts.com
Software has been extensively modified by the DU administrators


Important Notices: By participating on this discussion board, visitors agree to abide by the rules outlined on our Rules page. Messages posted on the Democratic Underground Discussion Forums are the opinions of the individuals who post them, and do not necessarily represent the opinions of Democratic Underground, LLC.

Home  |  Discussion Forums  |  Journals |  Store  |  Donate

About DU  |  Contact Us  |  Privacy Policy

Got a message for Democratic Underground? Click here to send us a message.

© 2001 - 2011 Democratic Underground, LLC