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Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Boom! Lefty news reporters have 'explosive' connections

Left-leaning news reporters linked to Bill Ayers, Dohrn

Also tied to Marxist-founded group seeking government-run Internet

By Aaron Klein WND

Among the individuals who were part of the controversial JournoList e-mail group were activists who served on an editorial board alongside Weather Underground terror group founders William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, WND has learned.

Also, it has emerged that other members of JournoList were activists from a far-left think tank with close ties to a Marxist-founded, George Soros-funded group that petitions for more government control of the Internet.

So far, 107 names have been confirmed as part of the JournoList e-mail group of about 400 reporters and activists. The list shut down last month after group members were caught discussing how to minimize negative publicity about Obama's radical associations, such as the politician's long relationship with his former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

The names include John B. Judis, senior editor at the New Republic and a contributing editor to the American Prospect. Judis started reporting from Washington in 1982, when he became Washington correspondent for In These Times, a Chicago-based socialist journal.

Also a confirmed JournoList member is Frida Berrigan, contributing editor and a member of the editorial board for In These Times.

As of 2009, both Ayers and Dorhn were on the editorial board of In These Times. The duo became household names after it was exposed they maintained a close relationship for years with Obama.

Yesterday, we reported that in little-noticed comments, Judis first publicly exposed in 2008 that news media reporters "threw their support" to Barack Obama, then a presidential candidate.

Meanwhile, researcher Trevor Loudon of the New Zeal has identified eight other members of JournoList who currently or recently worked for the New American Foundation, a left-leaning non-profit public policy institute and think tank with offices in Washington, D.C., and Sacramento, Calif.

The chairman of the New American Foundation Board of directors is Eric Schmidt, chairman and CEO of Google.

Schmidt is a member of President Obama's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.

A New American Foundation fellow is Tim Wu, a professor at Columbia Law School and the chairman of Free Press, a George Soros-funded, Marxist-founded organization with close ties to the White House.

WND previously reported Free Press published a study advocating the development of a "world class" government-run media system in the U.S.

In May, WND reported Free Press Policy Director Ben Scott was named a policy adviser for innovation at the State Department.

Free Press is a well-known advocate of government intervention in the Internet. The founder of Free Press, Robert W. McChesney, is an avowed Marxist who favors the dismantling of capitalism.

McChesney is a professor at the University of Illinois and former editor of the Marxist journal Monthly Review.

In February 2009, McChesney concluded that capitalism should be dismantled.

"In the end, there is no real answer but to remove brick-by-brick the capitalist system itself, rebuilding the entire society on socialist principles,'" wrote McChesney in a column.

The board of Free Press, meanwhile, has included a slew of radicals, such as Obama's former "green jobs" czar" Van Jones, who resigned after his founding of a communist organization was exposed.

Obama's "Internet czar," Susan P. Crawford, spoke at a Free Press May 14, 2009, "Changing Media" summit in Washington, D.C., revealed the book "The Manchurian President".

Crawford's pet project, OneWebNow, lists as "participating organizations" Free Press and the controversial Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now.

Crawford and Kevin Werbach, who co-directed the Obama transition's Federal Communications Commission Review team, are advisory board members at Public Knowledge, a George-Soros-funded public-interest group.

A Public Knowledge advisory board member is Timothy Wu, who is also chairman of the board for Free Press.

Like Public Knowledge, Free Press also has received funds from Soros' Open Society Institute.