They fund PBS science documentaries so they can control the narrative. I don't trust them. Got to be strings attached.

the various Koch foundations have given billions to everything from hospitals to the ballet.

They do give a lot to rightwing organizations and causes, but why is it impossible to accept that their strictly charitable giving is consistent with their libertarian views and for pretty much the same reasons we all give?

And what they have done to the 'art world' - schools and museums.

I don't trust it - just don't. They are trying to get into the HCBU's and control and manage things for a reason.

Now what precisely is that reason?

And what can we black folk do to make sure they are exposed for what they are to those students?

that "Black conservatives" and "Black teadrinkers" tend to be highly educated sellout types.

Yes - our grandparents were staunch Republicans. But I know my grandfather started voting D when LBJ was up. That shift to solid D started in the 70's. There are still some in the solid R category - but lets face it . . . Allen West doesn't share the black elite background. Read the book Our Kind Of People by Lawrence Otis Graham. A family member of mine is quoted in there - and he shows the sharp difference between the African Methodist Church and the Evangelical Baptist Church goers in that book.

When I went to visit Spleman I rejected it as the upper classwoman I was tagged with were snotty and stuck up about two girls I befriended that weekend - one from the Bronx and one from Chicago. It was made very clear what was expected of legacy "ladies" and I was told what Sorority I wouldn't have to pledge. This was NOT my grandmother's S.C. It wasn't how I was raised.

I ended up at Niagara and it was a blessing. There I met the poor white girl from Appalachia, the 22 year old Freshman woman thr had grown up in Apartheid, the kids from 'da Bronx, the children of French Canadian immigrants etc etc. It was a blessing.

However - if the Democratic Party as represented at DU wants to piss on my back and tell me it's raining I'll start voting my economic interests. Leave poor minority folks behind, tell the LGBT community things aren't a big deal, tell women they are behaving hysterically - that's how you create sell outs.

It's what the Republican Party did in the sixtes, they doubled down when they got into bed with the likes of James Dobson and Gary Bauer in the 1980's and now we have one hell of a cultural war being instigated by the evangelical Right and they are gunning for the HBCUs.

It's funny - these two threads I read last night I read - what everyone has done for the black folks. Here's the thing about majority of the HBC's folks I know -

We have a stronger get down and kiss the ass of our ancestors mentality than we do the civil rights warriors.

My affluence as a single woman was directly related to efforts of my great grandfather - a child of Reconstruction who lived his entire life in rural Alabama and never had less than $100K in the bank - and my grandfather that except for his time in Atlanta at a HBC - lived in the same place and died with a net worth of $16 Million dollars.

Know what? They earned that. Without anyone's help and in spite of this rotten vicious country's treatment of them.

So before you throw around sell out - make sure you understand the "Our Kind Of People" subculture. The kind of people who give large sums to these schools and the UNCF because we KNOW that there but for the right womb went I.

Don't ever throw people like Allen West or Herman Cain or even Clarence Thomas in with people like my father (Tuskeegee) or my uncles (H and M respectively). Those aren't their kind of guys. They didn't have to be accepted by white elites because they were the black elites.

and makes them look like such wonderful altruists. $25million is a piddling amount to them. They're STILL assholes. Fuck 'em.

it's like thinking you do good and care because you gave a couple dollars to some poor kid. but opposing public education and other public programs that would help everyone .

Clan has done to the art world though . . . They - I don't know. The Gio (juried artist) hit the roof prior to sending me this link. Are they going after the black Pentecosts and Baptist with this to lull them into the far right Christian fold in 2016. It won't have an impact on this coming election - and I don't think those two groups are even aware of the Koch documentary out now - but is this to gain a foothold among black Christian Social Conservatives?

hidden, being flagged for review and a post calling her out now sitting on the top of the DU home page, I am done.

This cesspool can carry on without me. I am done. And to be honest, have no idea why I've stuck around this long considering that I've hated this place far longer now than I've enjoyed it.

i don't even know where to begin. but post racist right wing shit and get called out on it and they are seen as a victim.

post something that should be obvious about our country concerning race issues and you are the problem.

I big time missed something.

ETA - never mind - I saw it. *smack my head* I'm going spend insomnia nights at Lipstick Alley on a go forward basis.

Wont buy them one vote. I love it.

and the Kochs now have the power to call in certain "favors" in the future...

This is of course the lesson when we don't properly support our own organizations -- They eventually have to whore themselves for a big corporate payday, ala NPR....

with the UNCF taking the money, especially if it came with no strings on disbursement.

Besides, isn't the UNCF just a "bundler" of scholarship moneys?