It’s widely known that the Foundation for Economic Education experienced a golden decade under the presidency of Lawrence “Larry” Reed, a true hero of the liberty movement.
This prosperous time finally came after many years of FEE floundering and diminishing. With Larry’s leadership, many difficult decisions were made, and the organization was granted new life.
During his tenure, the organization was reenergized, created many successful new projects, including ones that I was involved with and worked on, and although it wasn’t perfect, FEE regained its position as one of the leading liberty organizations.
Alas, we still haven’t found a way to control the passage of time, and a few years ago, Larry retired. There’s no tragedy or comedy there, but simply goes to show that the right person for the job can do amazing things.
And with Larry’s retirement, the search for a new president began.
LITHUANIA ENTERS THE CHAT
The man who became FEE’s next president was a Lithuanian academic, a tall, elegant man who bore a strong sense of the old-world aristocrat. I’m sure his credentials as an economist are unimpeachable, and undoubtedly, he, his family, and his countrymen suffered tremendously under the evils of communism.
But was he the right person for the job?
From all accounts, he was ushered in by Wayne Olsen, FEE’s chairman, with little oversight or understanding of what the organization needed. Maybe it was an urgency dictated by the vacancy of the president’s chair, or maybe there were other reasons for this selection.
And indeed, over the course of this short presidency, there was a lot of friction with the staff. Many key, dedicated people were driven out simply because of not getting along with El Presidente. People I know, whose work was tremendous, and who understood the organization’s challenges, and who were architects of much of FEE’s success over the preceding years, were cut off at the knees and put in situations where there was no choice but to leave.
Efforts were made to get the chairman and the board to intervene, to course-correct, but to no avail.
I personally met this president on a few occasions, and although he was always cordial and friendly to me, I can confirm that there was a true misalignment. In one example, I tried to make the case for a series of foundational videos that would really help in every aspect of FEE’s mission. His response was dismissive, that other organizations had made such videos, and he wouldn’t know how to ask donors to fund the project. I was honestly flabbergasted at such a reply.
And I know it wasn’t just me from the constant bitter chatter in the company Slack channel and on video conference calls. Being the dysfunctional organization that it is, these complaints were largely ignored or even worse, the “leadership” didn’t know how to deal with it.
Indeed, last October, suddenly, there was an announcement. The president had been fired, and the hunt was on for a new one.
FROM EASTERN EUROPE TO SOUTH AMERICA
Brazil, in fact. Yes, after a search of several months, the “leadership” landed on a fellow from way down south.
Because the good ol’ US of A just doesn’t have any good liberty-minded people, I guess…
[Lest I be accused of xenophobia, let me remind you, dear reader, that your humble author is a naturalized citizen of the US, an thus an immigrant himself.]
The people in charge made it clear that this time, they were going to find the right person for the job, that they were going to take their time, and we were updated that they had a lot of interest in the position, and many qualified candidates had applied.
In fact, they circulated a short questionnaire among the staff so they could get their say as to what to look for in the next president.
My answer was pretty obvious: someone very media savvy, who understood its power, especially in storytelling, and who had a sense of what video production entailed.
To my surprise, in a subsequent all-staff meeting, it was announced that this was the most popular answer! I was genuinely elated, and felt that FEE was going to be okay, that things were going to turn around, and that I had a future there…
A couple of months ago, late February I think, the new president was revealed. He was a friendly-seeming fellow, on the younger side, pretty accomplished in his native land of Brazil in running some liberty organizations.
But it started off oddly. In the all-staff video conference where he was introduced, Wayne Olsen made a crack about him “not being particularly strong in storytelling.” It was delivered as a joke, but to this day, I’m pretty sure it was serious.
What a stunning start.
And it went downhill from there.
Due to the US’s idiotic immigration system, this new president wouldn’t actually be able to enter the country and take up his post for several months until his visa situation could be resolved.
You’d think all the panic over the vacant president’s chair, including concern from donors, might push them in a different direction, like choosing someone who could immediately jump in. I’d go as far as to say it’s a very strange choice, and I have some thoughts on this below.
The tragicomedy didn’t stop there.
Again, given how urgent filling the position was to ease donors’ minds, Wayne insisted on the new president filming a video introducing himself to be sent out to all the moneyed supporters.
Now, having just written, directed and edited a video for one of FEE’s speakers, which everyone thought was fantastic, and which I directed remotely from Utah, one might think an organization would go, “We really liked that video you made. Could you help make this video of the new president? The stakes are high and we want to instill confidence.”
Or something along those lines.
But nooooo…
The new “media-savvy” president films himself on some old, crummy phone, his back up against a dirty, stained wall, with no script, really poorly lit and with even worse audio.
The three or so different takes, all wildly different from each other since it was off-the-cuff, were then sent to me to edit into something good. For those who know, the files were very compressed, making doing any meaningful post work on them extremely difficult.
I spent a week on this edit, taking out the dirty wall and putting in a different background, cutting in b-roll, cleaning up the dialogue, using every tool I have at my disposal to make something… passable.
Again, this is the first introduction of the new president to the people who keep FEE alive. It’s an important video.
We could have easily done this right at very little cost. (Penny-wise, pound-foolish: I spent a full week trying to make silk out of this poor sow’s ear…)
The final insult was when they decided not to send the video out, and no one even bothered to tell me.
To the layperson, this may all sound incredibly petty. But I promise you, as someone who’s been creating film and video for many, many years, who has crafted award-winning work, and who struggled thanklessly to bring an elevated level of craft to FEE, it’s not petty.
A short bit later, this new president told everyone on the next all-staff video conference that he wanted to hear about what was working at FEE and what wasn’t. I gladly wrote him an email detailing the issues I saw with creativity at the organization, which I shared with my team to keep them in the know and maybe even inspire them to make themselves heard, and got a short cordial reply from the new president.
Soon thereafter, I was shown the exit.
SO WHAT’S THE DEAL?
A friend mentioned to me that it was bizarre that FEE would bring on another president who isn’t American, with all the issues over cultural understanding that it brings.
I couldn’t agree more, and was thinking much the same thing. After all, this particular pursuit of liberty does have deep roots in this country.
So here’s some conjecture on my part:
It’s become quite clear that the person running FEE is not the president. Do with that what you will.
Therefore, who better to keep under the thumb of the chairman and the board than a foreigner, here on a limited visa, without a proper knowledge of American workplace laws? Such a person will undoubtedly be more obedient than some liberty-obsessed gringo, and far more likely to bend to threats of being fired, kicked out of the country, etc.
And I’m also going to guess that they got a Brazilian for a lot cheaper than an American. (Libertarians’ obsession with “open borders” and all…)
I’d wish this new president luck if I thought it would help. But the deck is already stacked against him, and until there’s a full-on regime change at FEE, the search for a new president will likely start again very, very soon.
If the organization is still standing that is.