A Southern Poverty Law Center two-fer

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Talk about liberal elites getting wealthy off the backs of the very underclass they claim to represent. First is from the Center for Immigration Studies:
Immigration and the SPLC: How the Southern Poverty Law Center Invented a Smear, Served La Raza, Manipulated the Press, and Duped its Donors
This report examines the efforts by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) to smear the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) and, by extension, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) and NumbersUSA.

With no serious analysis, the SPLC in late 2007 unilaterally labeled FAIR a �hate group.� That poisonous designation became the centerpiece of a �Stop the Hate� campaign launched by the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), also known as La Raza, to call on Congress and the media to exclude FAIR from the national debate on immigration.

The campaign gathered strength as newspapers across the country reported that FAIR had been �designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.� While the news stories generally included FAIR�s denial of the charge, thereby providing a semblance of balance, the designation�s taint lingered. The SPLC, presenting itself as a non-partisan, public-interest watchdog, never acknowledged � and no reporter ever disclosed � that the center was an active ally of the NCLR in the campaign.

The evidence presented here demonstrates that the SPLC became a propaganda arm of the NCLR. The SPLC�s decision to smear FAIR was the work of a kangaroo court, one convened to reach a pre-determined verdict by inventing or distorting evidence. The �Stop the Hate� campaign would more accurately be labeled as a campaign to �Stop the Debate.�

As this report notes, FAIR, CIS, and NumbersUSA have raised questions about the social, economic, and fiscal costs of the �comprehensive immigration reform� sought by La Raza and such allies as the National Immigration Forum and America�s Voice. Rather than engage in a debate, La Raza and its allies have waged a campaign to have the other side shunned by the press, civil society, and elected officials. It is an effort to destroy the reputations of its targets. It also seeks to intimidate and coerce others into silence. It undermines basic principles of civil society and democratic discussion.

We examine the SPLC�s work in the campaign against the background of the law center�s history, acknowledging that the SPLC has done admirable work in attacking the Ku Klux Klan and in representing immigrant workers who have been exploited by employers.

But we also review two decades of work by investigative reporters that has exposed SPLC hate-mongering and deception of the donors on whom it depends. Indeed, the SPLC�s hometown paper, the Montgomery Advertiser, was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for its nine-day expos� of the SPLC and its founder, Morris Dees, in 1994. The current attack on FAIR is consistent with the duplicity documented by that series and by other journalists who have investigated the SPLC.

Finally, we examine the SPLC attack on John Tanton, the Michigan environmental activist who founded FAIR in 1979. We document repeated distortion and exaggeration and show that many of Tanton�s concerns about immigration, though cited by the SPLC as proof of bigotry and intolerance, also have been raised by respected scholars and journalists.

But we also discuss how Tanton has undermined the movement by adhering to a big-tent philosophy that embraces some figures who do not play a constructive role in the immigration debate.

In a civil society, proven racists, bigots, and hate mongers deserve rejection. This report shows that the SPLC, while claiming to hold high the banner of tolerance, failed to observe basic standards of responsible judgment, honest reporting, and simple human decency. It preferred to engage in character assassination.

The SPLC is entitled to its opinion. But it cannot pose as a non-partisan watchdog when it fabricates and distorts evidence to delegitimize one side of the immigration debate while it is actually working as an ally of the opposing side. Claiming to act in the name of tolerance, the SPLC has tried to destroy it.

Tom Barry, director of the TransBorder Project at the liberal Center for International Policy in Washington, DC, noted that the SPLC�s �hate group� designation of FAIR �provided highly explosive ammunition for the character assassination campaign.�

Barry, who supports �comprehensive� reform, offered this assessment of the �Stop the Hate� campaign: �Trying to stick a label of �extremist� on institutes that have massive memberships, good relations with the media, and good standing on the Hill is a measure of how desperate and isolated the pro-immigration forces that have embraced this strategy really are.�
Much more at the site -- this is a well written and detailed report. Next up is this post from the Petrelis Files:
Southern 'Poverty' Law Center's Cayman Island's Bank Account
As if an unquestionable and unblemished deity was handing down tablets of absolute truth, many gay bloggers and community leaders including Dan Savage wholly embraced the release earlier this week of a new list on 18 of the menacing antigay groups stirring up trouble from the Southern Poverty Law Center.

No doubt, the groups fingered by the SPLC don't like us and contribute greatly to our political setbacks, but it's not big news to me that the groups have been corralled on to an SPLC list - one of obvious extremist enemies. The gays have more to worry about with the very mainstream Democratic Party and its affiliated gay front group, the Human Rights Campaign. Let's look beyond the scary report and peek at larger SPLC issues.

The SPLC's new 2009 IRS 990 filing shows they have a bank account in the Cayman Islands. Now, stop for a good long minute and ask yourself what the hell is a supposed poverty-fighting Alabama-based tax exempt organization doing with such an account. Then ponder this: how much money is in it.

Unfortunately, the IRS does not require SPLC or any tax exempt charity with an account in a foreign country to disclose additional details, such as the amount, and the SPLC's current 990 filing merely notes the existence of an account in a foreign country. The center's site reveals neither the existence of the off-shore account nor the total it contains.

Assets for the organization are listed at $190 million, a nice chunk of change in these economic hard times. When was the last time this group, with almost $190 million in assets, did a damn worthwhile thing about, um, poverty?

The latest 990 additionally shows founder and chief trial counsel Morris Dees had his salary raised to $350,000, and his CEO, Richard Cohen, is close behind at $345,000.

The tax filing also shows Dees traveled by air charter, and that his spouse, artist and businesswoman Susan Starr, accompanies her husband on the business trips.
A lot more at this second article -- lots of links to check the facts. What is interesting is that they have some photos of the Dees house courtesy of the Montgomery Advertiser who published a photo shoot back in May 2010:
dees_01.jpg

dees_02.jpg

dees_03.jpg
Not too shabby for someone dedicated to public service and to the care and management of the institutionalized "poor".

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This page contains a single entry by DaveH published on December 4, 2010 10:23 PM.

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