74 Barack H. Obama: The Unauthorized Biographyconference of the New England Branch of the Women’s International League for Peace and
Freedom, October 23, 1971)
Bundy was determined to ram through the Ford Foundation counterinsurgency strategy,
whatever the cost to New York City and its people: as one student of these events observes,
‘McGeorge Bundy was not a man given to self-doubt. (He once cut off discussion at a foundation
meeting by announcing to a group of program officers: “Look, I’m settled about this. Let’s not talk
about it any more. I may be wrong, but I’m not in doubt.”) And if he had second thoughts about the
path down which he was taking the foundation, he did not express them at the time. Indeed, his
speeches and writings in that period showed a confident determination to continue working with
black militants.’ (“McGeorge Bundy: How the Establishment’s Man Tackled America’s Problem
with Race,” Tamar Jacoby)^17
GONZALEZ: FORD FOUNDATION “REVERSE RACISM” AMONG LATINOS
Bundy started by revamping the grant priorities inside the Ford Foundation to focus on black
oppression, as well as the parallel problems of other ethnic minorities. It is important to note that
racial oppression was never defined by the Ford Foundation in broad-based economic terms, such as
the need for modern housing, new urban mass transit, top-flight medical care, high-tech jobs with
union wages, a quality college education for all ghetto youth, and other reforms which would have
necessitated a domestic Marshall Plan costing hundreds of billions of dollars. This was something
which the oligarchs had no intention of paying for. Rather, the Ford Foundation claimed that the
oppression of the black community was a matter of white racist attitudes, as reflected in institutional
arrangements which prevented black self-determination, community control, and self-esteem. In
this case, the oligarchs could claim that white blue-collar workers were the real culprits, since they
were the ones who came into the most intensive daily contact with oppressed blacks. “Bundy
reallocated Ford’s resources from education to minority rights, which in 1960 had accounted for 2.5
percent of Ford’s giving but by 1970 would soar to 40 percent.” The same methods were also
applied to Hispanics and Latinos in programs that were the precursors of the lunatic provocateur
propaganda of groups like Atzlan, which makes the absurd demand that many American states be
restored to Mexico. The only purpose of such raving delirium is to provide grist for the right-wing
xenophobic radio talk show hosts and other ideologues, who can use this transparent posturing as
“proof” in the minds of their gullible listeners of a nefarious Mexican plot to subvert the United
States.
Under Bundy’s leadership, Ford created a host of new advocacy groups, such as the Mexican-
American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (a prime mover behind bilingual education) and
the Native American Rights Fund, that still wreak havoc on public policy today. Ford’s support
for a radical Hispanic youth group in San Antonio led even liberal congressman Henry B.
Gonzalez to charge that Ford had fostered the “emergence of reverse racism in Texas.” (Heather
Mac Donald)
Congressman Gonzalez, a real fighter who later pioneered in the effort to impeach George Bush
the elder,
complained that the Ford Foundation had promoted racism among his people, Mexican-
Americans. He related how the Ford Foundation made a grant of $630,000 to the Southwest
Council for LaRaza. He said: The Ford Foundation wanted to create new leadership, and in fact
the new leaders it has created daily proclaim that existing leadership is no good ... ... the
president of MAYO, ... likes to threaten to ‘kill’ what he terms ‘gringos’ if all else fails ... ... I