The Manipulator may be conscious of their manipulation, or unconscious and blind to their willful use of deceit.
“The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. …We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. . .In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons…who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.” Edward L. Bernays, Propaganda
Americans for a Conservative Direction (ACD) was established in April 2013 by founders of the pro-Democrat organization FWD.us, most notably Facebook Chairman Mark Zuckerberg, to persuade skeptical conservative and republican voters to support “comprehensive immigration reform.” ADC is a sister group to the Council for American Job Growth, also formed by FWD.us to advocate for immigration reform, but to the liberal left.
From its inception, ACD has stood firmly behind Senate bill 744 – the “Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Reform Modernization Act scam sponsored by the so-called “bipartisan” gang of eight which would expedite a path to citizenship for illegals from Mexico and make certain that the “birthright citizenship,” often exploited by illegals, is never touched.
To make it more palatable to conservatives, ACD’s added five Rinos to their board of directors – Haley Barbour, former governor of Mississippi; Sally Bradshaw, chief of staff to former Florida governor Jeb Bush; Joel Kaplan, deputy chief of staff to George W. Bush; Dan Senor, chief advisor to Paul Ryan in 2012; and Rob Jesmer, executive director of the Republican Senatorial Committee from 2008-2012.
Their parent organization, FWD.us was also founded in April 2013, drawing their name from Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign slogan – Forward.” FWD is a pro-Democrat organization founded by thirteen tech-industry leaders for no other reason than to shove amnesty down the throats of American taxpayers.
Though FWD describes its 13 cofounders as “bipartisan,” their political allegiances tilts far left. In addition to Mark Zuckerberg, the organization’s co-founders include:
- Accel Partners executive Jim Breyer, a financial supporter of Obama’s 2008 campaign;
- SV Angel special advisor Ron Conway, who supported the campaigns of Tammy Baldwin, Dianne Feinstein, Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reed, and Elizabeth Warren;
- Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers general partner John Doerr, whose political contributions have gone mostly to Democrats such as Hillary Clinton, James Clyburn, Chris Dodd, Dick Durbin, Tom Harkin and Obama;
- Microsoft chairman Bill Gates, who never met a Socialist cause he didn’t like;
- FWD.us founder and president Joe Green, who worked for John Kerry’s 2004 presidential campaign;
- Linkedln co-founder Reid Hoffman, whose political donations have gone exclusively to Democrats like Joe Kennedy III, Bob Kerry, Obama, and Tom Udall, as well as leftwing organizations like ActBlue, Priorities USA Action and Democratic Party organs in 9 states;
- Dropbox founder Drew Houston, who exclusively supports exclusively Democratic candidates, including Obama and Democratic Party organs in more than 10 states; and
- Founders Fund managing partner Sean Parker, who likewise has contributed exclusively to Democratic candidates, like Obama and Harry Reid, as well as Democratic Party organs in at least a dozen states.
The four remaining FWD founders have little to no history of political partisanship in either direction. These include Dropbox vice presidents Aditya Agarwal and Ruchi Sanghvi; Benchmark general partner Matt Cohler; and The Social+Capital Partnership founder, Chamath Palihapitiya.
FWD’s leading financial contributors include Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Facebook vice president Chris Cox, PayPal co-founder Max Levchin, Yahoo president/CEO Marissa Mayer (a major Obama acolyte), and Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt, a staunch Obama supporter and board chairman of the New American Foundation. Other top donors include corporate leaders from Airbnb, AVOS, Cisco, Code.org, Domo, Formation 8, Groupon, Instagram, Jawbone, Khosla Ventures, Netflix, One Kings Lane, Path, SpaceX, Union Square Ventures, Y Combinator, Yammer, and Zynga.
“Manipulative people prey on our sensibilities, emotional sensitivity, and especially, our conscientiousness. And sometimes they speak and act with such conviction, that we begin to believe them. We can even start feeling responsible in some way for what we perceive to be their pain.” Dr George Simon
