Studying the Lessons of Steven J. Frogue

Studying the Lessons of Steven J. Frogue: 

Profile: The teacher and Saddleback trustee does not retreat from controversy that his views generate 

 (LA Times, Nov. 25, 1996) 

By Michael Granberry  

Studying the Lessons of Steven J. Frogue : Profile: The teacher and Saddleback trustee does not retreat from controversy that his views generate (LA Times, Nov. 25, 1996)

Link to

Studying the Lessons of Steven J. Frogue : Profile: The teacher and Saddleback trustee does not retreat from controversy that his views generate (LA Times, Nov. 25, 1996; Michael Granberry)

Excerpt:

     Frogue has been accused of denying the Holocaust, according to a former board member and several former students who say his comments about Jews and those who died at the hands of the Nazis cross over a line of ethics, propriety and recorded fact…. 

     “I believe Lee Harvey Oswald worked for the ADL,” Frogue said in a half-whisper during a recent interview on the Foothill High campus. 

     Asked to repeat his assertion, Frogue said, “That’s right. . . . I believe the ADL was behind it.”

See also Froomkin's OC Reg article about Frogue

Adventures in Advertising: The real purpose behind gay-baiting at Saddleback College

By R. SCOTT MOXLEY

Orange County Weekly,

November 15, 1996

Adventures in Advertising: The real purpose behind gay-baiting at Saddleback College

By R. SCOTT MOXLEY

      LOCAL POLITICAL observers are calling it the "most scurrilous and vile" campaign ad of the season, and it wasn't the deft handiwork of U.S. Congressman Bob Dornan, Orange County's most infamous negative campaigner. No, the ad—which critics say was designed to tap anti-gay sentiment—was sent by a college-faculty association on behalf of a slate of three conservative candidates and one Democrat vying for seats on the governing board of the Saddleback College District [since renamed the "South Orange County Community College District"]. Three of the candidates supported by the controversial ad-including the Democrat-won.

        According to the four-page mailer, same-sex marriage advocates are plotting to "TAKE CONTROL of your tax dollars and your community colleges." The ad-sent to thousands of South County Republicans during the election's final three weeks-rails against domestic-partner health benefits and discussions of gay and lesbian lifestyles in college classes or seminars.

        "Don't be misled by ultraliberal political groups. Keep Saddleback independent," read the red, white and black mailer. "Reject tax-paid health insurance for same-sex 'partners.' Vote to protect [their emphasis] the integrity of Saddleback Colleges."

        But while same-sex marriage, domestic-partner benefits and gay-related curriculum are certainly inflammatory wedge issues, they had nothing to do with the nonpartisan race for trustee slots at Saddleback, the state's sixth-largest community college district with 33,000 students and an annual budget of more than $70 million.

        "Personally, I am open to the idea of domestic-partner benefits," said Lee Rhodes, one of those blasted in the anti-gay mailer. "But it just isn't on the radar screen of pressing issues we face."

        The nasty rhetoric obscured the real struggle: which group of trustees is likely to be more generous with teachers at the district's two community colleges, Saddleback in Mission Viejo and Irvine Valley in Irvine.

        The anti-gay mailer was paid for by Taxpayers for Responsible Education, a political-action committee (PAC) established by the Saddleback Community College District Faculty Association. The "taxpayers" are mostly Saddleback Community College faculty eager to elect a board that will cut a better deal with teachers when their contract comes up for renegotiation this year.

        Michael Channing, the association's treasurer and a Saddleback College English professor, said that he was unaware of the ad's content before it was mailed. "I really don't want to be associated with this," he said.

        Channing declined to answer further questions and referred inquiries to Sherry MillerWhite, president of the association. She could not be reached for comment. The faculty-controlled PAC reported spending $44,000 through Oct. 19 on behalf of ultraright-wing incumbents Steven Frogue, John Williams, Democrat Dorothy Fortune and Don Davis. Only Davis lost.

        "The ad was manufactured lies and misinformation," said David Lang, a CPA who ran on a slate with Rhodes, Dianne Brooks and Suzanne Moraes. The ad targeted the slate for defeat; only Lang survived. "It's disgusting and shameful that they would involve the gay community in this [election], but it shows the lengths they will go to control the colleges."

        But the most interesting beneficiary of the mailer was Fortune, who was a presidential delegate for Bill Clinton at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

        "I had nothing to do with writing it, mailing it or paying for it," Fortune said after the election. When reminded that her picture and biography appeared in the ad, she said, "I'm sorry, but I was not in the loop at all."

        Members of the Laguna Beach Democratic Club, to which Fortune belonged, were outraged by the ad and voted to strip their endorsement from her campaign in the final weeks. The club issued a statement decrying any candidate who attempted "to kindle fear and hatred in voters as a technique to garner support."

        "Fortune may not have mailed it or paid for it, but she certainly was open to her campaign benefiting from it," said Anne Cox, club president. "I spoke with her at length after the ad came out and explained how betrayed people felt about its tone and message. But she made it clear her goal was to win the election-obviously at any cost."

        Rhodes, the incumbent trustee and fellow Democrat whom Fortune defeated, called the brochure "despicable" and, along with Lang, charged that someone forged their slate's campaign brochures by inserting a statement that they were actively pushing for domestic partner benefits at the colleges.

        "That flier appealed to the worst in human nature by trying to incite certain elements in our community that are susceptible to hatemongering and hysteria," said Rhodes, a retired biology professor associated with Saddleback College for 28 years as a teacher and trustee. "The piece could not have been further from the real education issues at stake. It was just an underhanded smoke screen."

Sherry Miller-White: the end justifies the means, evidently

     The faculty union's flier—distributed to tens of thousands of Republican households—is widely credited with securing Williams, Fortune, and Frogue's '96 election victories. At the time, union consultant Pam Zanelli—later, the chief district PR person—recommended exploitation of the "domestic partners" issue, even though (a) the opposing trustee slate did not run on this issue, (b) CTA, which provided the chapter with campaign funds, officially favors domestic partner benefits, and (c) domestic partner benefits are properly a union, not a trustee, initiative. The flier contained figures concerning the cost of domestic partner benefits that bore no relation to reality. None of the beneficiaries of the flier—including long-time Democrat Dorothy Fortune—ever disowned it.

     Union president Sherry Miller-White's decision to use the Zanelli-inspired flier naturally produced an outpouring of outrage from faculty. In response, the leadership began its campaign of simultaneously defending its action and blaming Zanelli for it. According to the post-election union newsletter, "The Faculty Association was forced to compete in the past campaign because life as we know it was under threat...[T]he Faculty Association, in desperation, turned the campaign over to a professional firm. All the information and literature of the PIE group was turned over to the professionals who developed the campaign...[T]he professionals said that many Democratic and Republican races across the nation were debating [the domestic partners issue] and that the public should not be kept in the dark about the full PIE agenda...." Also in the newsletter, Miller-White writes: "During the election, we were all in a fight for our existence as we know it. With all of this at risk, it became my responsibility as president to do the best I could [to] prevent this from happening...The unfortunate recent campaign war was necessitated solely by those opposing or threatening our contract. Even though the job as President of the faculty association is extremely difficult and requires a lot of self sacrifice, knowing that our immediate future is secure makes it all worth while."

Typical FA newsletter of the time

     During a forum in January of '97, Sherry Miller-White explicitly acknowledged having approved the flier, even though it was, she said, "too homophobic for me." Nevertheless, she explained, the use of such tactics was necessary to protect "life as we know it." She refused to apologize for her decision, thus providing members no reason to suppose that she would not use such tactics again. Indeed, during the trustee race of '98, Miller-White and her cronies helped secure the victories of two anti-teachers union candidates, using a flier that argued, absurdly, that the two would help stop the El Toro airport.

Willing to say or do anything to protect "life as we know it"

ARCHIVES: the infamous "SAME-SEX" flier & how we got to this sorry state

WHENCE THE HOMOPHOBIC FLIER?

The Old Guard's Sharon MacMillan

By 1996, a small group of unscrupulous faculty—including the shamelessly ambitious and incorrigibly conniving chemistry instructor Raghu Mathur—controlled the faculty union (the "Faculty Association"). So unscrupulous were they that they campaigned for their right-wing candidates—including Holocaust denier Steven Frogue (see Register article, April '95)—using the utterly phony "same-sex" benefits issue. 

The union was forced to use the flier, said then-union Prez Sherry after the election, in order to protect "life as we know it."

The union got these people elected; for their trouble, the unionists would get board support for continued high faculty salaries for senior faculty. Junior faculty were not similarly benfitted. Some scores were settled, too.

And so, in December of 1996, the era of the conservative "Board Majority" began. The Old Guard got what they wanted—for the time being. But their "victory" was the beginning of a painful and precipitous decline for the two colleges and the district. The BM concentrated its efforts on dismantling the machinery of "shared governance" (a concept that emerged from the historic "AB1725" legislation of the late 80s). Phoney accreditation reports were written, Old Guard schemers (Runyan, Mathur, Woodward, et al.) became administrators, and the Old Guard's long-time foes sought cover.

LAUGHING STOCK

Soon, the district was the laughing stock of the state community college system. SOCCCD was placed on the state chancellor's "fiscal watch" list—Williams blamed this on the OC bankruptcy, despite other OC district's avoiding that particular fate—and its colleges were given accreditation warnings, owing largely to sustained board "micromanagement"/lawlessness and administrative instability. To make matters worse, the Citizens Commission on Higher Education used SOCCCD to illustrate the need to eliminate locally elected boards of trustees.

Meanwhile, Mathur and the Board attracted tremendous negative media attention, thanks to their absurd and offensive actions and policies, as when Mathur banned signs and graphics from faculty windows and doors at IVC, or when Frogue planned a "Warren Commission" seminar, complete with assorted anti-Semites and conspiracy nuts.

Most faculty were horrified by what their union was doing, and thus many sought reform. For a very long time, reform efforts were successfully thwarted by such Old Guard tactics as refusing to provide copies of the union's bylaws, barring reform faculty from meetings, and proclaiming Old Guard-busting union elections to be null and void! In the course of these struggles, troubling irregularities re the union's bank accounts came to light. They were never fully explained.

Ultimately, the CTA entered the picture and, after years of struggle (CTA wasn't really much help), the Old Guard's stranglehold on the union was broken.

REFORM TOO LATE

But, by then, the union had managed to elect two more right-wing trustees. These two—Wagner and Padberg—campaigned, with union money, on the phony "stop the airport" issue (college trustees had no say in this issue). "Wagberg" were associated with "Education Alliance," a Christian Right organization run by the author of the infamous union-busting proposition of 1998. Without doubt, Wagberg moved the board to the right and even further away from the spirit of "shared governance." (In recent years, it appears that Padberg has drifted toward relative reasonableness, leaving Wagner and Fuentes—Fuegner—to anchor the board in abject right-wing evil.)

So, by late 1999, though the Old Guard was out, and reformers controlled their union, the Old Guard's chief legacy—an utterly anti-faculty board—was firmly in place.

THE FINAL PIECE

But matters got worse. When Frogue resigned in the summer of 2000—thereby providing the Board Majority with an opportunity to hand pick his replacement—notorious arch-conserrvative and Chair of the County GOP Tom Fuentes joined the board. Again, this was done with the help of the Old Guard, some of whom came to speak in favor of Fuentes at board meetings.

Natually, as an incumbent, Fuentes sailed to election victory in 2000.

At about that time, Raghu Mathur, who had already suffered two massive votes of "no confidence" at IVC, was chosen by the board as the district's new Chancellor.

Thus it was that, thanks to the union Old Guard—Mathur and his crew of disgruntled misfits and money-grubbers—the district came to be overseen by an anti-faculty, anti-intellectual, and anti-union board—and led by an unprincipled Chancellor who will say and do anything to keep his "bosses" happy. —CW [RB]

Click on graphic to enlarge

From The conservative board majority

TO CONCERNED UNIONISTS: FROGUE DEFENDS HIMSELF AGAINST THE CHARGE THAT HE IS A HOLOCAUST DENIER

Frogue defends himself against charges (10/6/96)

By the election campaign of 1996, it was clear to all that Trustee Frogue was very conservative (he twice ran against Cox in primaries) and that he had a history of making disturbing remarks. Nevertheless, the Faculty Association (the union) supported him to the hilt.

Some faculty who were union members insisted that Frogue explain himself. The following apologia by Frogue was distributed at a special FA meeting arranged to allay concerns. Even though the students who had reported Frogue's worrisome remarks were unassociated and represented many different years, Frogue seems to suggest--or no?--that their testimony reflect a conspiracy by a Lone Schemer, namely, Harriet Walther (who, naturally, is Jewish).

The Holocaust was one of the greatest tragedies in human history. It represents the outermost limits in man's bestiality towards fellow human beings. It should be continually studied, and held up as a prime example of the consequence of hate. We must never forget the sufferings and deaths of so many millions of innocents.

An April 4, 1994, article in the "Orange County Register" quoted four students saying things that I had supposedly said in my classes two years before. The quotes were absolutely and totally false. I never could or never would have said such cruel, vicious and untruthful things. If I had said anything even remotely akin to such sentiments, there would and should have been a storm of protest. There was none because the events described in the "Register" article never occurred. The manner in which the reporter tried to put words into my mouth, and into the mouths of three colleagues leave little doubt in my mind as to how he elicited such comments from these young women. My students, fellow teachers, parents, administrators, friends and neighbors, know that this article was a smear. I gave a full explanation of this article to my fellow trustees of the Saddleback Community College District at our April public meeting. I was invited to appear before the Orange County Human Relations Commission, at my request, and recounted all details of the event and provided the record to them. I forwarded all records of the event and provided the record to them. I forwarded all records of the event to both the Southern California and national headquarters of Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR). They sent a representative to meet with me in Tustin, and I provided him with full details.

My being assigned to the on campus suspension program at Foothill High School had nothing to do with this controversy. A social science teacher with high quality classroom control skills was required to strengthen a very much needed program at our school. I did an excellent job in that position, but appealed the decision under our teachers contract because I wanted to teach history the next year. While I appreciated their confidence in my ability to strengthen this suspension program, however, I still wanted to teach history.

Because of the article's obvious misrepresentation, it caused little or no concern at our school or within our educational community. One parent request for information about the controversy came the following year (after the article) and was fully answered. Not a single parent ever contacted me directly. I am prepared to answer any and all questions about the matter from any quarter.

That a single trustee [he’s referring to then-Trustee Walther] of the Saddleback Community College District would, for political purposes, attempt to use that untruthful and discredited article is absolutely in keeping with my experience with that person for four years. The board has caught her in numerous lies and deceptions over the entire period. That she should be engaging in such "McCarthy" tactics is perfectly in keeping with her character and past actions. Her relationships with me and other trustees were exacerbated by an official investigation leading to a letter of reprimand by the Fair Political Practices Commission regarding this trustee for her conflict of interest.

While I don't pretend to fathom all this person's motivation, it does appear that her being passed over for President of the Board of Trustees and having been caught by the Fair Political Practices Commission has served to engender in her a grudge against all other Trustees.

If you wish to pursue this matter further, you can contact Don Zimbalist at Saddleback College through the Liberal Arts Division.

Steven J. Frogue, 10-6-96

The California Fair Political Practices Commission did send a "Case Closure Memorandum" to Trustee Harriett Walther concerning the charge that she had violated "conflict of interest" provisions. (5/3/95)

As I recall, the CFPPC judged that Walther was technically in violation. (I have lost track of the whole document.) But their memorandum ends with a paragraph that makes clear that her violation was merely technical (see below).

The faculty union--on behalf of Frogue, Williams, Fortune and Davis--secured this document and quoted from it selectively and deceptively in fliers and ads (see) during the 1996 trustees' campaign.

What follows is the key section of the "Disposition sheet" that the union conveniently failed to reveal in "exposing" the existence of the CFPPC document:

However, we have determined that prosecution for this violation is not warranted based on several mitigating factors which include: 1) the vote to approve the ACCT contract was unanimous and apparently would have been approved without Ms. Walther's vote; 2) it appears that Ms. Walther did not believe that she had a conflict of interest with regard to the ACCT contract, and had she known, it appears she would have abstained from the decision; 3) as a telephone research consultant, she did not stand to gain any commission or bonus as a result of the contract; 4) all other members of the SCCD involved in the ACCT contract were informed by Ms. Walther that she had been employed by ACCT, and 5) Ms. Walther has no prior enforcement history with the Commission.

Note: among those who voted for the ACCT contract: Frogue and Williams.


SEVERAL UNASSOCIATED FORMER STUDENTS OF FROGUE SIGNED AFFIDAVITS ACCORDING TO WHICH, IN THE CLASSROOM, MR. FROGUE DID ENGAGE IN HOLOCAUST DENIAL AND DID MAKE RACIALLY OFFENSIVE REMARKS. WHAT FOLLOWS ARE SOME REMARKS BY FORMER STUDENTS REPORTED IN LOCAL PAPERS:

“He decided that the Holocaust was made up...He basically said that the Jews made it up to make people feel sorry for them, because he decided that it was impossible for so many people to have been killed in such a short amount of time...He said that it was more like 60 people that got killed, rather than 6 million...I would raise my hand and tell him, ‘That’s wrong,’ and he would just really get mad at me and send me out of the class.”

--Emily Hoffman, one of Frogue’s students, quoted in the 1995 Register piece

“He said [the Holocaust] never happened.”

--Leah Killen, one of Frogue’s students, quoted in the Register piece

“He said some really racist things that really really hurt a lot of his Asian students...There was this one time, I forget what he was talking about, but he called us ‘yellow people’...He always characterized ethnicity by color, and it really bothered me. Maybe he was trying to be funny, but it didn’t work.”

--Wendy Hayashi, one of Frogue’s students, quoted in the Register piece)

“Five percent of all Jewish people are bad, but 95 percent are just as good as the rest of us.”

--From student Stacey Marcus’ notes of one of Frogue’s lectures. (From the 1995 Register piece).

"He said you can always tell a Jew by their nose and that they are always rude," Danielle Brown, 19, said. "I couldn't believe he was a teacher. When I got to Irvine Valley and saw that he was the board president, I was disgusted."

--From the OC Register, 9/16/97

"He also said the Holocaust did not exist," [Danielle] Brown told the board...Brown, who attends the Mormon church, also told the board that Frogue made derogatory comments about Mormons as well.

--From the LA Times, 9/16/97

Pam Bustamante, 24, who works as a World Wide Web designer, told The Times on Tuesday that she was a student of Frogue's in 1989, before graduating from Foothill High in 1990. Bustamante, who is Jewish, said she complained to school authorities when Frogue refused to mention the Holocaust during a lengthy discussion of World War II.

"I remember him going into great detail about Japanese internment camps, but when I asked him to discuss the Holocaust, he refused, which upset me a great deal,” Bustamante said. "I lost 48 relatives in the Holocaust, so I found his attitude extremely disturbing."

--From the LA Times, 9/17/97

1996: Ollie North visits Saddleback College

North’s Saddleback Appearance Draws Warm Reception
By MICHAEL GRANBERRY

SEP. 21, 1996

     After two standing ovations, numerous autographs, dozens of flashbulbs popping in his face and countless displays of spontaneous applause Friday, former Marine Lt. Col. Oliver North was ready to field his first question.
     The young man approached the microphone in the brightly lit Saddleback College gym and wanted to know about a recent newspaper series. Was what he had read in the San Jose Mercury News really true, the man asked:
     Did a connection exist between the Nicaraguan Contras whom North once supported and drug dealers in South-Central Los Angeles, who allegedly helped fund the Contras with proceeds from the sale of crack cocaine?
     For the first time all day, North appeared momentarily flustered. Coy and cool from the moment he set foot on campus and embraced by virtually every adoring fan who extended a hand or hug, he suddenly sounded irked.
     Calling it “a frivolous, crazy question,” North, 52, told the man: “I want to be very specific. I do not know, nor have I ever known, anyone who would tolerate drugs coming into this country. . . .
     “Where were these accusers in 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990 . . . when Congress conducted one of its longest inquisitions in history” into allegations that North masterminded a plan to finance the Contra rebels in Nicaragua by selling weapons to the Iranian government.
     “Where were they then?” he demanded. “Can you tell me that?”
     North’s response was punctuated with more thunderous applause from the highly partisan crowd that packed one entire side of the Saddleback Gauchos basketball arena and included a who’s who of Orange County’s Republicans.
     Based on the mood of the crowd, it was hard to believe that advance word of North’s appearance had sparked any controversy at all, as, in fact, it had.
     Articles in the student newspaper had questioned the validity of inviting onto campus such an icon of the far right, and both pro- and anti-North protests had been promised all week long.
North was convicted of aiding in the obstruction of Congress, accepting illegal gratuities and destroying documents. The courts overturned his convictions on appeal in 1990.
     Friday’s protests failed to materialize, with only one 60-year-old man from Dana Point holding up a sign that read “California Is Clinton Country” and jockeying for position with a handful of dark-suited students from the Young Americans for Freedom. The latter group wore “YAF” on their lapels and carried such banners as “United We Stand, Liberal We Fall” and “Ollie Never Went Whitewater Rafting.”
     Aurnie Sutliffe, who appeared to be the lone Democrat anywhere in the vicinity, was outside the gym arguing to anyone who would listen that a Clinton supporter ought to be given equal time--even in Orange County, where recent polls show Clinton running neck-and-neck with challenger Bob Dole. “At a college of higher education, both sides ought to be given the opportunity to present their views,” said Sutliffe, who seemed genuinely surprised upon being greeted warmly by a smiling North, who spotted the pro-Clinton sign en route to the gym and walked over to pump Sutliffe’s hand and thank him for coming.
     Moments later, North said he agreed with Sutliffe—that college campuses ought to be forums of every political view, even if it meant having to listen to the likes of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan.
     “And furthermore,” North told a reporter, “I’d be disappointed if there weren’t a few protesters.”
     Before his speech, North met briefly with the press, which wanted to know his reaction to the newspaper series that only last month dredged up the Iran-Contra scandal, although this time with a radically different twist.
     North said he had welcomed onto his radio show--"The fastest-growing talk show in the United States!"--Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles), only to tell her she owed him an apology for “making ridiculous allegations” on the floor of the U.S. House.
     “I think the whole story is absolute garbage,” North said of the allegations. “It’s an effort to distract the American people from the Clinton administration’s appalling record of dealing with drugs. It is typical of the most liberal elements of our political spectrum to find somebody else to blame for everything.”
     An ex-Marine who rose to fame as a key player in the Iran-Contra arms deal, North was invited to Saddleback College by Assemblyman Bill Morrow (R-Oceanside), who introduced North and the subject of his speech, “Is the U.S. Constitution Still Relevant?”
     It is relevant, said North, who wore his boyish, gap-toothed grin most of the day and whose answers occasionally provoked murmurs of surprise among the crowd, though in no way chilling their enthusiasm. After being serenaded by a drill team that wore glittery American flags as tight-fitting vests, and getting to meet the great-great-grandson of Francis Scott Key, North took aim at the street curfews imposed on teenagers by some cities. Hitler, he said, was a big fan of such curfews.
     He decried almost all attempts at censorship, denounced an unannounced police search of a black woman’s apartment in a public-housing complex and even defended the right of Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf of the Denver Nuggets basketball team not to stand during the national anthem.  

     “But,” he thundered, flashing his trademark smile, “I also defend the right of the Denver Nuggets owner to fire that guy . . . which I believe he should have done—with enthusiasm!”