Van Jones Resignation‎ as Special Advisor for Green Jobs

[Guest Dixie Chik]

Here is a story you will not see in the leftist media

 

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2009/09/06/phil-kerpen-van-jones-resign/

 

Phil Kerpen

- FOXNews.com

 

- September 06, 2009

How Van Jones Happened and What We Need to Do Next

 

Now that Jones has resigned, we need to follow through with two critical

policy victories. First, stop cap-and-trade, which could send these

groups trillions, and second repeal the unspent portion of the stimulus

bill, which stands to give them billions.

 

The Van Jones affair could be an important turning point in the Obama

administration if we use it as a window to understand the structure of

the left and to stop the huge power-grab now taking place in the name of

green jobs. It's also one of the most significant things I've ever had

the honor of being involved in. Here's how, from my perspective, it

happened and what it means.

 

I was an unlikely Van Jones expert. It started July 9, when "FOX &

Friends" asked me if I'd come on the show the morning of July 10 to

explain what "green jobs" are. It meant an early morning the next day,

but I was glad to do it, because exposing the green jobs scam is

critical to fight cap-and-trade, my top legislative priority for the

year. The producer asked me if I knew anything about green jobs "czar"

Van Jones. I didn't but said I would find out.

 

I e-mailed a friend who follows the green groups and he said he thought

Jones was socialist. -- I doubt he had any idea how deep it went. A

couple Web searches later, I couldn't believe what I found in an article

from the alternative San Francisco newspaper the East Bay Express. The

man was a self-professed communist, with ties to ACORN and a radical

Maoist group called STORM. His real name was Anthony, with "Van" made

up in college because he thought everyone cool has a one-syllable name.

 

There was so much material there, but what really stood out is what I

used the next day on F&F: the "green jobs" concept was merely a new face

on the old ideology of central economic planning and control, an

alternative and a threat to free market capitalism.

 

As soon as I got back to the office, I e-mailed the East Bay Express

article to one of Glenn Beck's producer, saying: "Please share with

Glenn this article about green jobs czar Van Jones, a self-described

communist who was radicalized in jail. Confirms "watermelon"

hypothesis." (I was referring to an explanation we had offered on his

show of the cap-and-trade bill as a "watermelon," green on the outside

but Communist red to the core.)

 

The rest is history. I spent the next two weeks researching everything

I could find about Jones and the Apollo Alliance (much of which is still

to be published, including a forthcoming paper from the Capital Research

Center next month), the national umbrella organization for coordinating

between the environmentalists, the labor unions, and the social justice

street organizers that Jones has served as a board member and a primary

national spokesman for. Beck had me on his show to explain Apollo on

July 28, and several more times thereafter, while he began pounding

away.

 

Two days later, the stakes got higher when another Jones-founded

organization, Color of Change, called for a boycott of the Beck show.

Amazingly, many in the mainstream media would report the fiction that

Beck's coverage of Jones was retaliation for the boycott, even though

coverage of Jones started first. Given the chronology, if there is any

connection we should consider whether the boycott was retaliation for

the coverage.

 

The mainstream media completely ignored the controversy, but the

Internet kicked into high gear, with so many people doing great work

that it was hard to keep track of. This week, when Gateway Pundit the

broke story that Van Jones actually blamed George Bush for the 9/11

terrorist attacks, some of the mainstream media (but only some) finally

began paying attention. Rep. Mike Pence stepped up and called for his

resignation. And early today Jones made his exit.

 

Now Van Jones has left the administration, but we can't afford to stop

thinking about him and what he represents. Clearly, he was far less

cautious than many of the left-wing radical currently influencing the

direction of policy in this country. Less cautious but not

ideologically distinct.

 

The agenda laid out in Van Jones's book, "The Green Collar Economy,"

which we now know is an attempt to achieve radical ends, is squarely

within the mainstream of the political left and the Democratic Party.

He urged adoption of a carbon cap-and-trade program, renewable

electricity mandates�including Al Gore's outlandish and

impossible goal of eliminating fossil fuel use by 2018, large taxpayer-

funded green jobs programs, a so-called smart grid for electricity, more

mass-transit subsidies, higher fuel efficiency standards for

automobiles, federal funding for organic farms, a ban on new coal

plants, expanded ethanol mandates, and even a spirited, multiple page

pitch for a cash-for-clunkers program�he called it "Hoopties for

Hybrids."

 

Even if Apollo is properly tainted by the Van Jones scandal, it's only

the tip of the iceberg, as this chart shows. In fact most of the action

has already moved to the Center for American Progress, the hyper-

politicized think tank that's advancing most of the left's agenda,

especially the push for green jobs and all of the policies from Van

Jones's book.

 

As I explained previously on the FOX Forum, the push for "green jobs"

has everything to do with funding the far-left political activities that

Van Jones so adamantly believed in. Green jobs are not economic jobs

but political jobs, designed to funnel vast sums of taxpayer money to

left-wing labor unions, environmental groups, and social justice

community organizers.

 

Now that Jones has resigned, we need to follow through with two critical

policy victories. First, stop cap-and-trade, which could send these

Green groups trillions, and second repeal the unspent portion of the

stimulus bill, which stands to give them billions. The Van Jones affair

is, as President Obama likes to say, a "teachable moment," and we need

to put not just him but the whole corrupt "green jobs" concept outside

the bounds of the political mainstream.

 

Mr. Kerpen is director of policy for Americans for Prosperity. He can be

contacted through Phil Kerpen.com. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.

His free two-minute Podcast is available daily.

[Guest Truthseeker]

Get the story straight. Jones resigned from his position as Special Advisor after a campaign against him had been launched on 9 July 2009 by Americans for Prosperity,a political pressure group backed by energy businesses. The campaign, heavily covered by Fox News,notably Glenn Beck, produced three main points from Van Jones's past which he was forced to defend: a remark in February 2009 in which he called Congress Republicans "**inappropriate material**"; a 2004 signature on a "911 truth" petition, the views of which Van Jones then disowned; and a leftwing past including membership of a socialist group and support for Mumia Abu-Jamal.

 

After what Jones described as a "vicious smear campaign", he resigned, saying that he could not "in good conscience ask my colleagues to expend precious time and energy defending or explaining my past. We need all hands on deck, fighting for the future"