When one foundation has amassed over $30 billion, it has the financial power to shape the policies of government to its liking, says Diane Ravitch, a research professor at New York University, for the Washington Post. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation [1]has more than $30 billion, and when Warren Buffet’s gift of another $30 billion is added to the Gates
fund, the Gates Foundation will have the power to direct global policy on almost any issue of its choosing. Educator Anthony Cody published a guest column on his Education Week Teacher blog [2] that describes how the Gates Foundation intervenes in agricultural and environmental issues around the world, often in ways that support corporate profits rather than the public interest (Education Week is in part funded by the Gates Foundation). I have never believed that the Gates Foundation [3]or the Gates family puts profits above the public interest. I work on the assumption that anyone who has more riches than they can ever spend in their lifetime or in 100 lifetimes is not motivated by greed. It makes no sense. I believe that Bill and Melinda Gates want to establish a legacy as people who left the world a better place. But I think their efforts to “reform” education [4]are woefully mistaken…