De-Imagining America
By Matthew Vadum
A little-known consortium of radical groups, public-funded universities and the federal government is quietly seeking to transform the arts and other academic disciplines into vehicles of left-wing extremism and indoctrination. The initiative, called “Imagining America,” embraces the philosophy of Communist historian Howard Zinn, famous for manipulating historical fact to fit Marxist paradigms of human “progress” and to plant the seeds of radicalism in unsuspecting youth.
Imagining America is headquartered at taxpayer-funded Syracuse University in upstate New York and was virtually unknown until Glenn Beck threw some light on it in a broadcast. Beck described Imagining America and another group that calls itself “The U.S. Department of Arts and Culture” as an “effort to rewrite our history and catalyze a new culture for America.” This “department” isn’t actually part of the U.S. government but describes itself as “the nation’s newest people-powered department, founded on the truth that art and culture are our most powerful and under-tapped resources for social change.”
Active in both groups are “the people that will be teaching and influencing your children” through “art and music and film and history books,” Beck said.
America’s neo-communist radicals figured out a long time ago how to have their cake and eat it, too. U.S. taxpayers have been funding subversive left-wing groups like the now-defunct Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) and Saul Alinsky’s Industrial Areas Foundation since the Johnson administration. They advance their objectives, erode civil society, and send you the bill.
Such is also the case with Imagining America, which occupies a cushy niche at the intersection of taxpayer-funded universities, government agencies and wealthy far-left non-profit organizations.
Imagining America grew out of executive action. President Bill Clinton created the White House Millennium Council by Executive Order 13072 on Feb. 2, 1998. One of the council’s tasks was to “[p]roduce informational and resource materials to educate the American people concerning our Nation’s past and to inspire thought concerning the future[.]” The veritable cultural warfare council was headed by then-First Lady Hillary Clinton.
