HuffPo Whitewashes Hillary Supporter Biography

December 11th, 2007 9:07 AM

A Huffington Post blog, "Hillary As An Agent of Change," authored by Derek Shearer was posted yesterday to reassure the "progressives" that Hillary Clinton is really one of their own. Despite the common view among the left that Hillary is a status quo type, Shearer lets us know that she is really quite liberal as you can see in these excerpts:

... Hillary would be a strong leader who manages change in the public interest-at home and abroad--in the manner of FDR or Harry Truman. She is, in fact, the true heir to the New Deal tradition of the Democratic Party, but for a new era.

...As for change at home, her commitment to progressive values should never be held in doubt. Since she was a student at Wellesley protesting the Vietnam War and then as an activist law student at Yale when I first met her, she has been a progressive...

...Hillary is a hard-headed, reality-based, practical progressive -- and it is no accident that the Radical Right opposes her and has tried to bring her down. They know that she will not fold under pressure of attack, and that she cannot be bought off by special interests...

... If Hillary is elected President, and if as is likely a solidly Democratic Congress is elected, she will have helped to change the political atmosphere of the country, to create hope for the possibility of progressive change -- and she will be in a position to lead that change. It will be an historic moment of great consequence to the nation, and I have no doubt that she will be equal to the task...

...History sometimes provides opportunities for nations and for leaders -- but the outcome is not predetermined. I have spent forty years in progressive movements and democratic governments, first as a student activist then as an official in state and local government, and later as a federal official and US diplomat. I would not stake my reputation on supporting just another politician. I know Hillary, I trust her and I am certain that she is one person who will be the leader that our time demands...

Shearer certainly is quite an expert on leftwing credentials but you wouldn't know it by reading his whitewashed biography in the Huffington Post. To read it you would think that Derek Shearer is merely some mainstream establishment type:

Ambassador Derek Shearer is currently Chevalier Professor of Diplomacy and World Affairs at Occidental College in Los Angeles. He also serves as Director of Global Affairs, handling the college’s international relations and directing the expansion of its international affairs programs.

Derek Shearer served in the Clinton administration as an economics official in the Commerce Department, and then as Ambassador to Finland (1994-97). Among his many accomplishments were the creation of the administration’s coordinated strategy to the Nordic-Baltic region and the hosting of the Clinton-Yeltsin summit in Helsinki. After diplomatic service, Ambassador Shearer was a fellow at the Economic Strategy Institute and then at the Woodrow Wilson Scholars Center in Washington, DC. He also was a visiting Woodrow Wilson fellow and ambassador-in-residence at a number of colleges. He served as a foreign policy advisor to Vice President Gore during the 2000 Presidential campaign.

Ambassador Shearer’s articles on foreign affairs and public policy have appeared in the New York Times, the International Herald Tribune, the Wall Street Journal, and many weekly and monthly publications. He has authored numerous scholarly and policy articles in books and journals---and has lectured at leading universities in Europe, Asia, and Australia, including speaking tours for the US government in China, Japan, Greece, Australia, and the Baltic States—and taught at the University of Maryland, Tufts, and UCLA, as well as at Occidental. He has been the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, an US-Japan Leadership Fellowship, and a Swedish Bicentennial Fellowship, among other honors—and he is listed in Who’s Who in the World, Who’s Who in America, and other such publications. He is also a senior fellow at the Center for Public Diplomacy located at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School.

Ambassador Shearer has also taught courses in business and entrepreneurship, served on the boards of media and food companies, and as an international advisor to Ziff Brothers Investment Co, and other firms. He serves on the board of the nonprofit relief group Operation USA, and is a member of the Pacific Council on International Policy. He currently resides in Pacific Palisades, CA. with his wife Sue Toigo and two dogs.

Conveniently left out of this whitewashed biography is any hint of Shearer's background in far left politics including his own 1980 book, "Economic Democracy: The Challenge of the 1980's," in which he describes how to hide his socialist objective:

Socialism has a bad name in America and no amount of wishful thinking is going to change that... the words, economic democracy are an adequate replacement.

According to Dr. Samuel Blumenfeld in his September19, 2000 article in WorldNetDaily, "The Gramscian commie in the White House," Shearer and other socialists were highly influenced by the writings of Italian Communist, Antonio Gramsci:

Shearer and so many other Marxists realized that the only way to impose Marxist socialism on America was by way of the strategy outlined by Antonio Gramsci (pronounced "gram-shee"), the Italian communist, who had much time to think about such things while imprisoned for many years in Italy. His "Prison Notebooks" were widely read and studied by communists in the West. Gramsci analyzed Western culture and concluded that the only way that communists could finally impose their totalitarian will over the West was by first taking over its educational, cultural and religious institutions. This would require years of stealthful infiltration.

Also missing from Ambassador Shearer's biography is any mention of how he created and ran in the 1970's a socialist platform for Tom Hayden in Santa Monica, California called "Campaign For Economic Democracy." And speaking of Santa Monica, Shearer's part in the infamous "Peoples Republic of Santa Monica" is also missing from his biography. In 1979, Shearer's wife, Ruth Goldway, was elected mayor of that city and with the help of her husband whom she appointed to the City Commission along with other leftists, they proceeded to cripple Santa Monica's economy with their socialist policies. Shearer now seems reluctant to mention his prominent role in the establishment of the Peoples Republic of Santa Monica. Instead he prefers to hide his background behind a highly selective whitewashed biography which emphasizes "Ambassador Shearer."