Hmmmm...One guess where the The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy allegiances lie...LOL....
The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI) is an extremely influential, pro-business right-wing think tank founded in 1943 by Lewis H. Brown. It promotes the advancement of free enterprise capitalism, and succeeds in placing its people in influential governmental positions. It is the center base for many neo-conservatives.
Table of contents [showhide] 1 History
2 Personnel
3 Alumni
4 Connections
5 Funding
6 Contact Information
7 Publications
7.1 SourceWatch Resources
8 External Links
[edit]History Originally set up as a spokesperson for big business and the promotion of free enterprise, the AEI came to major national prominence in the 1970s under the leadership of William Baroody, Sr., during which time it grew from a group of twelve resident "thinkers" to a well-funded organization with 145 resident scholars, 80 adjunct scholars, and a large supporting staff. This period of growth was largely funded by the Howard Pew Freedom Trust [1] (http://www.mediatransparency.org/recipients/aei.htm).
Ronald Reagan said of the AEI in 1988:
"The American Enterprise Institute stands at the center of a revolution in ideas of which I, too, have been a part. AEI's remarkably distinguished body of work is testimony to the triumph of the think tank. For today the most important American scholarship comes out of our think tanks – and none has been more influential than the American Enterprise Institute." In 1986, the Olin and Smith Richardson foundations withdrew their support from AEI because of substantive disagreement with certain of its policies, causing William Baroody, Jr. to resign in the ensuing financial crisis. Following criticism by conservatives that the AEI was too centrist, it moved its programme further to the right and became more aggressive in pursuing its public policy goals. [2] (http://www.mediatransparency.org/recipients/aei.htm)
More recently, it has emerged as one of the leading architects of the Bush administration's foreign policy. AEI rents office space to the Project for the New American Century, one of the leading voices that pushed the Bush administration's plan for "regime change" through war in Iraq. AEI reps have also aggressively denied that the war has anything to do with oil.
In June 2003, AEI and another right-wing group, the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies, launched a new website NGOWatch.org/NGOwatch.org (http://www.NGOWatch.org) to expose the funding, operations and agendas of international NGOs, and particularly their alleged efforts to constrain US freedom of action in international affairs and influence the behavior of corporations abroad. [3] (http://ipsnews.net/interna.asp?idnews=18733) AEI states that "The extraordinary growth of advocacy NGOs in liberal democracies has the potential to undermine the sovereignty of constitutional democracies, as well as the effectiveness of credible NGOs."[4] (http://www.aei.org/events/eventID.329,filter.foreign/event_detail.asp) Ralph Nader responds with "What they are condemning, with vague, ironic regulatory nostrums proposed against dissenting citizen groups, is democracy itself." [5] (http://www.tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/8107)
