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John Henry Stanford was the most charismatic asshole you could ever hope to meet. His megalomania, fueled by the powerful forces that exploited him for corporate gain, made him as intriguing as he was disgusting. Stanford himself said he was apolitical. He was also amoral and raceless, with roots in no community and allegiance to none. He was the consummate whore.

But Stanford remains relevant. Remember, he was courted by corporations and both the Republican and Democratic parties, and the Seattle School District is still withering under the carnage Stanford left in his wake.

I wrote most of the articles below during Stanford’s reign of terror in Seattle. Some are somewhat amateurish, and many of them are a bit wordy. After all, I was new to politics and political writing at the time. Hopefully, I’ve improved a bit since then. :)

I moved these articles from my old education reform site to this site in July, 2004. They disappeared from the Internet for a while, apparently due to some technical problem. So I gave the entire site a facelift and put the articles back online in November 2011.

The Atlanta Years
• Atlanta: Stanford’s Last Pit Stop
• J$: Attorney at Law?

Classic Stanford
• John Stanford at a Glance
• To Whom do Our Schools Belong?
• Public Schools Rescue or Coup?
• J$ Discovers Math
• J$, Literary Agent
• J$ conquers Bantam Books
• Letter to the Editor
• J$’s Report Card

Articles from Jan. 1998
• J$: Real Estate Agent?
• J$: Employment Agency?
• False Alarm!
• J$: Big Business’ Little Darling
• J$: Affirmative Action, Inc.
• Creative Perks for a Creative Jerk
• J$: Personal Baggage Allowance

John Stanford’s free media ride hit a few bumps when two of Seattle’s leading media whores took a few belated potshots at him. Read Geov Parrish’s “A Man in a Uniform” (The StrangerJanuary 22-28, 1998) and Nina Shapiro’s “In Stanford We Trust” (The Seattle Weekly, February 28, 1998). Seattle Times columnist Terry McDermott wasnt’t as lucky; he lost his job over his January 11 parody of Stanford’s backmail attempt.

March (and cheerlead), March (and cheerlead)...
• Geobopological Survey celebrates March by riding herd on the Seattle Post-Intelligencer’s Stanford Chronicles, BIGGER than life and truer than you might imagine! (No longer online)
• Take a trip into The Stanford Zone in The Taxi! (No longer online)
• Read my report on Stanford’s last stand — U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Riley’s Sad State of American Education address and bad principals’ convention. (No longer online)

April-May-June-July
• Stanford wore me out! I simply couldn’t keep up with his 18-hour work days and his sensational blackmail attempt. (Seattle Times columnist Terry McDermott loses his job over his January 11 parody of that pathetic stunt.) I couldn’t keep up with Stanford when he entered Virginia Mason Hospital with leukemia, nor when he escaped and strolled down Broadway Avenue in the middle of the night. (Fortunatley, the Seattle Times made up for my lapse with two separate accounts.)

Read the Stranger-Than-Life Story of John Stanford’s Post-Midnight Flight!

August 1998
• Well, I have enough energy to report that Stanford bought a concert grand piano on a whim, even though he can’t play and the Stanford Book Fund could have used a little help. Hollywood is rumored to be knocking on Stanford’s door. Thirty Seattle principals recorded a song in his honor, apparently forgetting to invite the other seventy. I even managed to get one more detailed report online: Is there a connection between John Stanford’s missing vision statement and the rumor that someone bribed Bantam not to publish his book? Read Vanishing Visions & Anonymous Bribes and judge for yourself!

Finally, bid adieu to the children’s general with the question Does John Stanford deserve sympathy? and Remembering Stanford in the Sunday Funnies.

The John Stanford saga continues to unravel. A report published by the Seattle Post-Intellgencer revealed that he wasn’ even evaluating princpals. The sensational article The Olchefske Files offers a tantalizing glimpse of Stanford’s fiscal crimes.

I also received correspondence from a man who was investigating Stanford in connection with a much earlier scandal. he believes that General Stanford was helping Federal Express bilk the U.S. Army out of mllions of dollars. It’s no wonder the Seattle Chamber of Commerce thought so highly of John Henry Stanford.