Castro, Obama, and CHANGE

[Beetle]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYEiwR2KklM

We are going to be in real deep stuff, if we elect this guy.

[wallis]

Big difference between a war-torn, corrupt island nation and the U.S.

The U.S. backed Castro. It should have kept a leash on its new dog.

One President is not going to be able to turn a nation into something else, be it Obama or McCain. Not without the people wanting to go along with it.

Americans may be getting dumbified every day with their distracting gadgets, but they are a whole lot more educated than the Cuban people were.

FDR tried to turn the U.S. into a quasi-socialist state. Americans backed off.

Nixon tried to turn the U.S. into a quasi-police state. After his resignation, America created laws to protect personal liberty.

Bush sponsored the Patriot Acts. Americans are making sure that they are not abused.

There are more checks and balances in this country to prevent one man, one party, to turn the U.S.

[Backstop]

Pro 2nd Amendment orientation:

SNIP

One President is not going to be able to turn a nation into something else, be it Obama or McCain. Not without the people wanting to go along with it.

SNIP

There are more checks and balances in this country to prevent one man, one party, to turn the U.S.

Disagree.

Recently, we barely dodged a bullet; by one freaking vote.

For example, 2 or 3 chairs on SCOTUS will be available during the next Term.

With a Democratc majority in Congress, you think they'll nominate/approve a Republican pro 2nd Amendment judge?

Nope.

The Obamanator WILL push for more gun control - to include almost complete bans.

Not by any stretch of the imagination do people want that.

Do you honestly think that will stop him?

[Beetle]

I concur with Backstop. I also think that it is not the work of one President to complete. I think that there are people in Hollywood, College Professors, Judges on the Bench, the media, and some elected officials who would help push the socialistic and/or commie agenda.

[samizdat]

I refuse to vote since I think it's n/a. It is probable that 40-50% of the electoral populace are so dumbed down that they desire the "changes" , collusion or convergence or capitulation which obamma promises.

Only a very small percentage of the populace is aware, wary, scared xxxxless and well educated concerning the evils of communism and authoritarian rule. The gramschi crowd did well.

Obamma is being used and was set up. I doubt he will be elected, but even if he is-
he IMHO, would not be president. His grandmother and 2 siblings claim he was born in Kenya. That would make him ineligible. If he confesses- that makes him a felon.

I would like to say something nice about Obama. He is a strong, energetic young man who expresses a desire to help others beyond his wildest ideals. He has worked hard and studied well in his quest to serve others and his ideals.

I do not agree with obama's ideals- he is a lawyer- that's not a plus. I find it astounding that so many people are so glued to him. It's scary.

Hilary broke the news months ago- so I'll just affirm here that he is a candidate for
assasination. I guess the electorate wants a hero. They got Ken and a beat up GI Joe.

With acorn and dead souls, I estimate a .05-3% vote fraud, not counting what could be done in the electoral college.

Obama is a phenomena- here's HOW and WHY


http://www.americanthinker.com/printpage/?...e_strategy.html

[Malsua]

Checking the various haunts this morning, it seems as if the Acorn story cannot be ignored by the MSM. My guess is that ACORN is going under the bus. There have been too many "we registered your 7 year old" or the neighbor's dog for this to be ignored. The deeper they dig, the more fraud that is found. This isn't over yet.

[Aplomb]

That information needs to be seen, sami:

September 28, 2008 Barack Obama and the Strategy of Manufactured Crisis

By James Simpson

America waits with bated breath while Washington struggles to bring the U.S. economy back from the brink of disaster. But many of those same politicians caused the crisis, and if left to their own devices will do so again.

Despite the mass media news blackout, a series of books, talk radio and the blogosphere have managed to expose Barack Obama's connections to his radical mentors -- Weather Underground bombers William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, Communist Party member Frank Marshall Davis and others. David Horowitz and his Discover the Networks.org have also contributed a wealth of information and have noted Obama's radical connections since the beginning.

Yet, no one to my knowledge has yet connected all the dots between Barack Obama and the Radical Left. When seen together, the influences on Obama's life comprise a who's who of the radical leftist movement, and it becomes painfully apparent that not only is Obama a willing participant in that movement, he has spent most of his adult life deeply immersed in it.

But even this doesn't fully describe the extreme nature of this candidate. He can be tied directly to a malevolent overarching strategy that has motivated many, if not all, of the most destructive radical leftist organizations in the United States since the 1960s.

The Cloward-Piven Strategy of Orchestrated Crisis

In an earlier post, I noted the liberal record of unmitigated legislative disasters, the latest of which is now being played out in the financial markets before our eyes. Before the 1994 Republican takeover, Democrats had sixty years of virtually unbroken power in Congress - with substantial majorities most of the time. Can a group of smart people, studying issue after issue for years on end, with virtually unlimited resources at their command, not come up with a single policy that works? Why are they chronically incapable?

Why?

One of two things must be true. Either the Democrats are unfathomable idiots, who ignorantly pursue ever more destructive policies despite decades of contrary evidence, or they understand the consequences of their actions and relentlessly carry on anyway because they somehow benefit.

I submit to you they understand the consequences. For many it is simply a practical matter of eliciting votes from a targeted constituency at taxpayer expense; we lose a little, they gain a lot, and the politician keeps his job. But for others, the goal is more malevolent - the failure is deliberate. Don't laugh. This method not only has its proponents, it has a name: the Cloward-Piven Strategy. It describes their agenda, tactics, and long-term strategy.

The Strategy was first elucidated in the May 2, 1966 issue of The Nation magazine by a pair of radical socialist Columbia University professors, Richard Andrew Cloward and Frances Fox Piven. David Horowitz summarizes it as:

The strategy of forcing political change through orchestrated crisis. The "Cloward-Piven Strategy" seeks to hasten the fall of capitalism by overloading the government bureaucracy with a flood of impossible demands, thus pushing society into crisis and economic collapse.

Cloward and Piven were inspired by radical organizer [and Hillary Clinton mentor] Saul Alinsky:

"Make the enemy live up to their (sic) own book of rules," Alinsky wrote in his 1989 book Rules for Radicals. When pressed to honor every word of every law and statute, every Judeo-Christian moral tenet, and every implicit promise of the liberal social contract, human agencies inevitably fall short. The system's failure to "live up" to its rule book can then be used to discredit it altogether, and to replace the capitalist "rule book" with a socialist one. (Courtesy Discover the Networks.org)

Newsmax rounds out the picture:

Their strategy to create political, financial, and social chaos that would result in revolution blended Alinsky concepts with their more aggressive efforts at bringing about a change in U.S. government. To achieve their revolutionary change, Cloward and Piven sought to use a cadre of aggressive organizers assisted by friendly news media to force a re-distribution of the nation's wealth.

In their Nation article, Cloward and Piven were specific about the kind of "crisis" they were trying to create:

By crisis, we mean a publicly visible disruption in some institutional sphere. Crisis can occur spontaneously (e.g., riots) or as the intended result of tactics of demonstration and protest which either generate institutional disruption or bring unrecognized disruption to public attention.

No matter where the strategy is implemented, it shares the following features:

1. The offensive organizes previously unorganized groups eligible for government benefits but not currently receiving all they can.
2. The offensive seeks to identify new beneficiaries and/or create new benefits.
3. The overarching aim is always to impose new stresses on target systems, with the ultimate goal of forcing their collapse.

Capitalizing on the racial unrest of the 1960s, Cloward and Piven saw the welfare system as their first target. They enlisted radical black activist George Wiley, who created the National Welfare Reform Organization (NWRO) to implement the strategy. Wiley hired militant foot soldiers to storm welfare offices around the country, violently demanding their "rights." According to a City Journal article by Sol Stern, welfare rolls increased from 4.3 million to 10.8 million by the mid-1970s as a result, and in New York City, where the strategy had been particularly successful, "one person was on the welfare rolls... for every two working in the city's private economy."

According to another City Journal article titled "Compassion Gone Mad":

The movement's impact on New York City was jolting: welfare caseloads, already climbing 12 percent a year in the early sixties, rose by 50 percent during Lindsay's first two years; spending doubled... The city had 150,000 welfare cases in 1960; a decade later it had 1.5 million.

The vast expansion of welfare in New York City that came of the NWRO's Cloward-Piven tactics sent the city into bankruptcy in 1975. Rudy Giuliani cited Cloward and Piven by name as being responsible for "an effort at economic sabotage." He also credited Cloward-Piven with changing the cultural attitude toward welfare from that of a temporary expedient to a lifetime entitlement, an attitude which in-and-of-itself has caused perhaps the greatest damage of all.

Cloward and Piven looked at this strategy as a gold mine of opportunity. Within the newly organized groups, each offensive would find an ample pool of foot soldier recruits willing to advance its radical agenda at little or no pay, and expand its base of reliable voters, legal or otherwise. The radicals' threatening tactics also would accrue an intimidating reputation, providing a wealth of opportunities for extorting monetary and other concessions from the target organizations. In the meantime, successful offensives would create an ever increasing drag on society. As they gleefully observed:

Moreover, this kind of mass influence is cumulative because benefits are continuous. Once eligibility for basic food and rent grants is established, the drain on local resources persists indefinitely.

The next time you drive through one of the many blighted neighborhoods in our cities, or read of the astronomical crime, drug addiction, and out-of-wedlock birth rates, or consider the failed schools, strapped police and fire resources of every major city, remember Cloward and Piven's thrill that "...the drain on local resources persists indefinitely."

ACORN, the new tip of the Cloward-Piven spear

In 1970, one of George Wiley's protégés, Wade Rathke -- like Bill Ayers, a member of the radical Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) -- was sent to found the Arkansas Community Organizations for Reform Now. While NWRO had made a good start, it alone couldn't accomplish the Cloward-Piven goals. Rathke's group broadened the offensive to include a wide array of low income "rights." Shortly thereafter they changed "Arkansas" to "Association of" and ACORN went nationwide.

Today ACORN is involved in a wide array of activities, including housing, voting rights, illegal immigration and other issues. According to ACORN's website: "ACORN is the nation's largest grassroots community organization of low-and moderate-income people with over 400,000 member families organized into more than 1,200 neighborhood chapters in 110 cities across the country," It is perhaps the largest radical group in the U.S. and has been cited for widespread criminal activity on many fronts.

Voting

On voting rights, ACORN and its voter mobilization subsidiary, Project Vote, have been involved nationwide in efforts to grant felons the vote and lobbied heavily for the Motor Voter Act of 1993, a law allowing people to register at motor vehicle departments, schools, libraries and other public places. That law had been sought by Cloward and Piven since the early1980s and they were present, standing behind President Clinton at the signing ceremony.

ACORN's voter rights tactics follow the Cloward-Piven Strategy:

• 1. Register as many Democrat voters as possible, legal or otherwise and help them vote, multiple times if possible.
• 2. Overwhelm the system with fraudulent registrations using multiple entries of the same name, names of deceased, random names from the phone book, even contrived names.
• 3. Make the system difficult to police by lobbying for minimal identification standards.

In this effort, ACORN sets up registration sites all over the country and has been frequently cited for turning in fraudulent registrations, as well as destroying republican applications. In the 2004-2006 election cycles alone, ACORN was accused of widespread voter fraud in 12 states. It may have swung the election for one state governor.

ACORN's website brags: "Since 2004, ACORN has helped more than 1.7 million low- and moderate-income and minority citizens apply to register to vote." Project vote boasts 4 million. I wonder how many of them are dead? For the 2008 cycle, ACORN and Project Vote have pulled out all the stops. Given their furious nationwide effort, it is not inconceivable that this presidential race could be decided by fraudulent votes alone.

Barack Obama ran ACORN's Project Votein Chicago and his highly successful voter registration drive was credited with getting the disgraced former Senator Carol Moseley-Braun elected. Newsmax reiterates Cloward and Piven's aspirations for ACORN's voter registration efforts:

By advocating massive, no-holds-barred voter registration campaigns, they [Cloward & Piven] sought a Democratic administration in Washington, D.C. that would re-distribute the nation's wealth and lead to a totalitarian socialist state.

Illegal Immigration

As I have written elsewhere, the Radical Left's offensive to promote illegal immigration is "Cloward-Piven on steroids." ACORN is at the forefront of this movement as well, and was a leading organization among a broad coalition of radical groups, including Soros' Open Society Institute, the Service Employees International Union (ACORN founder Wade Rathke also runs a SEIU chapter), and others, that became the Coalition for Comprehensive Immigration Reform. CCIR fortunately failed to gain passage for the 2007 illegal immigrant amnesty bill, but its goals have not changed.

The burden of illegal immigration on our already overstressed welfare system has been widely documented. Some towns in California have even been taken over by illegal immigrant drug cartels. The disease, crime and overcrowding brought by illegal immigrants places a heavy burden on every segment of society and every level of government, threatening to split this country apart at the seams. In the meantime, radical leftist efforts to grant illegal immigrants citizenship guarantee a huge pool of new democrat voters. With little border control, terrorists can also filter in.

Obama aided ACORN as their lead attorney in a successful suit he brought against the Illinois state government to implement the Motor Voter law there. The law had been resisted by Republican Governor Jim Edgars, who feared the law was an opening to widespread vote fraud.

His fears were warranted as the Motor Voter law has since been cited as a major opportunity for vote fraud, especially for illegal immigrants, even terrorists. According to the Wall Street Journal: "After 9/11, the Justice Department found that eight of the 19 hijackers were registered to vote..."

ACORN's dual offensives on voting and illegal immigration are handy complements. Both swell the voter rolls with reliable democrats while assaulting the country ACORN seeks to destroy with overwhelming new problems.

Mortgage Crisis

And now we have the mortgage crisis, which has sent a shock wave through Wall Street and panicked world financial markets like no other since the stock market crash of 1929. But this is a problem created in Washington long ago. It originated with the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), signed into law in 1977 by President Jimmy Carter. The CRA was Carter's answer to a grassroots activist movement started in Chicago, and forced banks to make loans to low income, high risk customers. PhD economist and former Texas Senator Phil Gramm has called it: "a vast extortion scheme against the nation's banks."

ACORN aggressively sought to expand loans to low income groups using the CRA as a whip. Economist Stan Leibowitz wrote in the New York Post:

In the 1980s, groups such as the activists at ACORN began pushing charges of "redlining"-claims that banks discriminated against minorities in mortgage lending. In 1989, sympathetic members of Congress got the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act amended to force banks to collect racial data on mortgage applicants; this allowed various studies to be ginned up that seemed to validate the original accusation.

In fact, minority mortgage applications were rejected more frequently than other applications-but the overwhelming reason wasn't racial discrimination, but simply that minorities tend to have weaker finances.

ACORN showed its colors again in 1991, by taking over the House Banking Committee room for two days to protest efforts to scale back the CRA. Obama represented ACORN in the Buycks-Roberson v. Citibank Fed. Sav. Bank, 1994 suit against redlining. Most significant of all, ACORN was the driving force behind a 1995 regulatory revision pushed through by the Clinton Administration that greatly expanded the CRA and laid the groundwork for the Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac borne financial crisis we now confront. Barack Obama was the attorney representing ACORN in this effort. With this new authority, ACORN used its subsidiary, ACORN Housing, to promote subprime loans more aggressively.

As a New York Post article describes it:

A 1995 strengthening of the Community Reinvestment Act required banks to find ways to provide mortgages to their poorer communities. It also let community activists intervene at yearly bank reviews, shaking the banks down for large pots of money.


Banks that got poor reviews were punished; some saw their merger plans frustrated; others faced direct legal challenges by the Justice Department.

Flexible lending programs expanded even though they had higher default rates than loans with traditional standards. On the Web, you can still find CRA loans available via ACORN with "100 percent financing . . . no credit scores . . . undocumented income . . . even if you don't report it on your tax returns." Credit counseling is required, of course.

Ironically, an enthusiastic Fannie Mae Foundation report singled out one paragon of nondiscriminatory lending, which worked with community activists and followed "the most flexible underwriting criteria permitted." That lender's $1 billion commitment to low-income loans in 1992 had grown to $80 billion by 1999 and $600 billion by early 2003.

The lender they were speaking of was Countrywide, which specialized in subprime lending and had a working relationship with ACORN.

Investor's Business Daily added:

The revisions also allowed for the first time the securitization of CRA-regulated loans containing subprime mortgages. The changes came as radical "housing rights" groups led by ACORN lobbied for such loans. ACORN at the time was represented by a young public-interest lawyer in Chicago by the name of Barack Obama. (Emphasis, mine.)

Since these loans were to be underwritten by the government sponsored Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the implicit government guarantee of those loans absolved lenders, mortgage bundlers and investors of any concern over the obvious risk. As Bloomberg reported: "It is a classic case of socializing the risk while privatizing the profit."

And if you think Washington policy makers cared about ACORN's negative influence, think again. Before this whole mess came down, a Democrat-sponsored bill on the table would have created an "Affordable Housing Trust Fund," granting ACORN access to approximately $500 million in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac revenues with little or no oversight.

Even now, unbelievably -- on the brink of national disaster -- Democrats have insisted ACORN benefit from bailout negotiations! Senator Lindsay Graham reported last night (9/25/08) in an interview with Greta Van Susteren of On the Record that Democrats want 20 percent of the bailout money to go to ACORN!

This entire fiasco represents perhaps the pinnacle of ACORN's efforts to advance the Cloward-Piven Strategy and is a stark demonstration of the power they wield in Washington.

Enter Barack Obama

In attempting to capture the significance of Barack Obama's Radical Left connections and his relation to the Cloward Piven strategy, I constructed following flow chart. It is by no means complete. There are simply too many radical individuals and organizations to include them all here. But these are perhaps the most significant.




The chart puts Barack Obama at the epicenter of an incestuous stew of American radical leftism. Not only are his connections significant, they practically define who he is. Taken together, they constitute a who's who of the American radical left, and guiding all is the Cloward-Piven strategy.

Conspicuous in their absence are any connections at all with any other group, moderate, or even mildly leftist.They are all radicals, firmly bedded in the anti-American, communist, socialist, radical leftist mesh.

Saul Alinsky

Most people are unaware that Barack Obama received his training in "community organizing" from Saul Alinsky's Industrial Areas Foundation. But he did. In and of itself that marks his heritage and training as that of a radical activist. One really needs go no further. But we have.

Bill Ayers

Obama objects to being associated with SDS bomber Bill Ayers, claiming he is being smeared with "guilt by association." But they worked together at the Woods Fund. The Wall Street Journal added substantially to our knowledge by describing in great detail Obama's work over five years with SDS bomber Bill Ayers on the board of a non-profit, the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, to push a radical agenda on public school children. As Stanley Kurtz states:

"...the issue here isn't guilt by association; it's guilt by participation. As CAC chairman, Mr. Obama was lending moral and financial support to Mr. Ayers and his radical circle. That is a story even if Mr. Ayers had never planted a single bomb 40 years ago."

Also included in the mix is Theresa Heinz Kerry's favorite charity, the Tides Foundation. A partial list of Tides grants tells you all you need to know: ACLU, ACORN, Center for American Progress, Center for Constitutional Rights (a communist front,) CAIR, Earth Justice, Institute for Policy Studies (KGB spy nest), National Lawyers Guild (oldest communist front in U.S.), People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), and practically every other radical group there is. ACORN's Wade Rathke runs a Tides subsidiary, the Tides Center.

Carl Davidson and the New Party

We have heard about Bomber Bill, but we hear little about fellow SDS member Carl Davidson. According to Discover the Networks, Davidson was an early supporter of Barack Obama and a prominent member of Chicago's New Party, a synthesis of CPUSA members, Socialists, ACORN veterans and other radicals. Obama sought and received the New Party's endorsement, and they assisted with his campaign. The New Party also developed a strong relationship with ACORN. As an excellent article on the New Party observes: "Barack Obama knew what he was getting into and remains an ideal New Party candidate."

George Soros

The chart also suggests the reason for George Soros' fervent support of Obama. The President of his Open Society Institute is Aryeh Neier, founder of the radical Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). As mentioned above, three other former SDS members had extensive contact with Obama: Bill Ayers, Carl Davidson and Wade Rathke. Surely Aryeh Neier would have heard from his former colleagues of the promising new politician. More to the point, Neier is firmly committed to supporting the hugely successful radical organization, ACORN, and would be certain back their favored candidate, Barack Obama.

ACORN

Obama has spent a large portion of his professional life working for ACORN or its subsidiaries, representing ACORN as a lawyer on some of its most critical issues, and training ACORN leaders. Stanley Kurtz's excellent National Review article, "Inside Obama's Acorn." also describes Obama's ACORN connection in detail. But I can't improve on Obama's own words:

I've been fighting alongside ACORN on issues you care about my entire career (emphasis added). Even before I was an elected official, when I ran Project Vote voter registration drive in Illinois, ACORN was smack dab in the middle of it, and we appreciate your work. - Barack Obama, Speech to ACORN, November 2007 (Courtesy Newsmax.)

In another excellent article on Obama's ACORN connections, Newsmax asks a nagging question:

It would be telling to know if Obama, during his years at Columbia, had occasion to meet Cloward and study the Cloward-Piven Strategy.

I ask you, is it possible ACORN would train Obama to take leadership positions within ACORN without telling him what he was training for? Is it possible ACORN would put Obama in leadership positions without clueing him into what his purpose was?? Is it possible that this most radical of organizations would put someone in charge of training its trainers, without him knowing what it was he was training them for?

As a community activist for ACORN; as a leadership trainer for ACORN; as a lead organizer for ACORN's Project Vote; as an attorney representing ACORN's successful efforts to impose Motor Voter regulations in Illinois; as ACORN's representative in lobbying for the expansion of high risk housing loans through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that led to the current crisis; as a recipient of their assistance in his political campaigns -- both with money and campaign workers; it is doubtful that he was unaware of ACORN's true goals. It is doubtful he was unaware of the Cloward-Piven Strategy.

Fast-forward to 2005 when an obsequious, servile and scraping Daniel Mudd, CEO of Fannie Mae spoke at the Congressional Black Caucus swearing in ceremony for newly-elected Illinois Senator, Barack Obama. Mudd called, the Congressional Black Caucus "our family" and "the conscience of Fannie Mae."

In 2005, Republicans sought to rein in Fannie and Freddie. Senator John McCain was at the forefront of that effort. But it failed due to an intense lobbying effort put forward by Fannie and Freddie.

In his few years as a U.S. senator, Obama has received campaign contributions of $126,349, from Fannie and Freddie, second only to the $165,400 received by Senator Chris Dodd, who has been getting donations from them since 1988. What makes Obama so special?

His closest advisers are a dirty laundry list of individuals at the heart of the financial crisis: former Fannie Mae CEO Jim Johnson; Former Fannie Mae CEO and former Clinton Budget Director Frank Raines; and billionaire failed Superior Bank of Chicago Board Chair Penny Pritzker.

Johnson had to step down as adviser on Obama's V.P. search after this gem came out:

An Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO) report^[1] from September 2004 found that, during Johnson's tenure as CEO, Fannie Mae had improperly deferred $200 million in expenses. This enabled top executives, including Johnson and his successor, Franklin Raines, to receive substantial bonuses in 1998.^[2] A 2006 OFHEO report^[3] found that Fannie Mae had substantially under-reported Johnson's compensation. Originally reported as $6-7 million, Johnson actually received approximately $21 million.

Obama denies ties to Raines but the Washington Post calls him a member of "Obama's political circle." Raines and Johnson were fined $3 million by the Office of Federal Housing Oversight for their manipulation of Fannie books. The fine is small change however, compared to the $50 million Raines was able to obtain in improper bonuses as a result of juggling the books.

Most significantly, Penny Pritzker, the current Finance Chairperson of Obama's presidential campaign helped develop the complicated investment bundling of subprime securities at the heart of the meltdown. She did so in her position as shareholder and board chair of Superior Bank. The Bank failed in 2001, one of the largest in recent history, wiping out $50 million in uninsured life savings of approximately 1,400 customers. She was named in a RICO class action law suit but doesn't seem to have come out of it too badly.

As a young attorney in the 1990s, Barack Obama represented ACORN in Washington in their successful efforts to expand Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) authority. In addition to making it easier for ACORN groups to force banks into making risky loans, this also paved the way for banks like Superior to package mortgages as investments, and for the Government Sponsored Enterprises Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to underwrite them. These changes created the conditions that ultimately lead to the current financial crisis.

Did they not know this would occur? Were these smart people, led by a Harvard graduate, unaware of the Econ 101 concept of moral hazard that would result from the government making implicit guarantees to underwrite private sector financial risk? They should have known that freeing the high-risk mortgage market of risk, calamity was sure to ensue. I think they did.

Barack Obama, the Cloward-Piven candidate, no matter how he describes himself, has been a radical activist for most of his political career. That activism has been in support of organizations and initiatives that at their heart seek to tear the pillars of this nation asunder in order to replace them with their demented socialist vision. Their influence has spread so far and so wide that despite their blatant culpability in the current financial crisis, they are able to manipulate Capital Hill politicians to cut them into $140 billion of the bailout pie!

God grant those few responsible yet remaining in Washington, DC the strength to prevent this massive fraud from occurring. God grant them the courage to stand up in the face of this Marxist tidal wave.

Jim Simpson is a former White House staff economist and budget analyst. His writings have been published in American Thinker, Washington Times,FrontPage Magazine, DefenseWatch, Soldier of Fortune and others. His blog is Truth and Consequences..

Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/..._strategy.html at October 13, 2008 - 09:27:11 AM EDT

[American Patriot]

I agree with Wallis, in part. One MAN can't change things... without the people going along.

However, I ALSO agree completely with Backstop on this.

Here's why.

America is a divided country in politics and there are very partisan components on both sides. I don't have a problem with America have two diverse and opposite thinking groups - and in fact there is a third, less-well known group in the middle. There's not as many of them... or IS THERE?

In reality the President of the United States has some very strong powers to change thinking and doing in this country. Don't believe that? Look at how the Right changed while Clinton was in office, becoming more and more against ideas of "change" (Obama's main theme right now!).

Look how the Left has become more and more hateful while Bush was in office - in fact, I even heard a Liberal caller calling into a Conservative talk show host this morning screaming about he HATED Bush... then went on to say how he was pissed off over the images of Bill Ayers standing on the US Flag, and Ayers is connected to Obama.

Funny how even the Left doesn't like Obama all that much now. And the fact is, they are right, they shouldn't like him.

Obama is a Socialist. There is NO question about that. If you think there is a question, then you really need to do some more research!

Obama has displayed flags in his office of Che Guevara.>Obama IS an associate of a Chicago based group called the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and in 1996 received endorsements from them as a state senator. DSA describes itself as the largest socialist organization in the United States and the principal U.S. affiliate of the Socialist International. The Socialist International (SI) has what is called "consultative status" with the United Nations. In other words, it works hand-in-glove with the world body.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIlIpOkRh2A that video shows Obama campaigning for open socialist Bernie Sanders of Vermont.

(http://www.newswithviews.com/Kincaid/cliff208.htm)


Here's a quote, directly from a speech given at a Communist Party reception:

http://www.politicalaffairs.net/arti...iew/5047/1/32/

When these sources are explored, I think scholars of the future will be struck by, for example, the response in Honolulu when tens of thousands of workers went on strike when labor and CP leaders were convicted of Smith Act violations in 1953 – a response totally unlike the response on the mainland. Of course 98% of these workers were of Asian-Pacific ancestry, which suggests that scholars have also been derelict in analyzing why these workers were less anti-communist than their Euro-American counterparts. In any case, deploring these convictions in Hawaii was an African-American poet and journalist by the name of Frank Marshall Davis, who was certainly in the orbit of the CP – if not a member – and who was born in Kansas and spent a good deal of his adult life in Chicago, before decamping to Honolulu in 1948 at the suggestion of his good friend Paul Robeson. Eventually, he befriended another family – a Euro-American family – that had migrated to Honolulu from Kansas and a young woman from this family eventually had a child with a young student from Kenya East Africa who goes by the name of Barack Obama, who retracing the steps of Davis eventually decamped to Chicago. In his best selling memoir ‘Dreams of my Father’, the author speaks warmly of an older black poet, he identifies simply as "Frank" as being a decisive influence in helping him to find his present identity as an African-American, a people who have been the least anticommunist and the most left-leaning of any constituency in this nation – though you would never know it from reading so-called left journals of opinion. At some point in the future, a teacher will add to her syllabus Barack’s memoir and instruct her students to read it alongside Frank Marshall Davis’ equally affecting memoir, "Living the Blues" and when that day comes, I’m sure a future student will not only examine critically the Frankenstein monsters that US imperialism created in order to subdue Communist parties but will also be moved to come to this historic and wonderful archive in order to gain insight on what has befallen this complex and intriguing planet on which we reside.

More connections to Davis: http://antiprotester.blogspot.com/20...communist.html

Connections to Marxism:
http://newzeal.blogspot.com/2008/08/...leninists.html
http://progressivesforobama.blogspot.com/

In the United States of America, for those of you completely unfamiliar with our Constitution, we have a little set of Amendments called "The Bill of Rights". Regardless of your "take" or "interpretation" on them or why you might think they are there - the first ten were added during the ratification of the Constitution at the request of multiple states to PROTECT individual rights - NOT to protect the Government, but the RIGHTS of individual people.

The First Amendment gives freedom of speech, allowing the Press to be able to print the truth (although they rarely do this) but still, the press, and the PEOPLE are allowed to voice their opinions. This amendment allows us to attend church where ever we want, without Government interference. It gives us Freedom of Religions (NOT contrary to some peoples' beliefs, freedom FROM religion).

The Second Amendment gives us one thing and one thing only, the Right to KEEP and BEAR Arms - to be used when the need arises to defend ourselves against a tyrannical government. All of the Founding Fathers agreed upon one thing, if they agreed on nothing else. Governments tend to become too big, too powerful and too tyrannical over time.

Obama is severely against Guns, wants GUN control...

• Obama voted to ban hundreds of rifles and shotguns commonly used for hunting and sport shooting
  Illinois Senate, SB 1195, 3/13/03
• Obama endorsed a ban on all handguns
  Independent Voters of Illinois/Independent Precinct Organization general candidate questionnaire, 9/9/96
  Politico, 03/31/08.
• Obama voted to allow the prosecution of people who use a firearm for self-defense in their homes
  Illinois Senate, S.B. 2165, vote 20, 3/25/04
• Obama supported increasing taxes on firearms and ammunition by 500 percent
  Chicago Defender, 12/13/99
• Obama voted to ban almost all rifle ammunition commonly used for hunting and sport shooting
  United States Senate, S. 397, vote 217, 7/29/05
• Obama opposes Right-to-Carry laws
  Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, 4/2/08, Chicago Tribune, 9/15/04

So - you see, regardless of what Obama or any other President TRIES to do, he won't be allowed to do so. Americans aren't going to stand for taking more rights.

I sure as hell won't and neither will a lot of others.

A President has something called "Executive Orders". They are "law of the land" for a period of time, and usually expire, but the President can certainly declare martial law, or give money to some cause or country. The President can even enter into treaties with foreign countries, with Congress' approval - but even so, being buddy buddy with foreign dictators is not out of the question for Mr. Obama.

He's even said he'd meet with Imanutjob of Iran.

I'm SURE that Hugo Chavez is looking forward to meeting him.

That middle group I mentioned before - the Moderates on both sides of the fence will be voting too. I'm in that group, contrary to what many of you might think you know about me and I expect the main push to be for McCain-Palin.

So... in my view, not only is Obama a Socialist, yes indeed he will push this country even further to the left than Hillary Clinton would have, and she's someone I sorely do not ever want to see in the Office of President.

This is about ethics, this is about the heart and soul of human beings. It's about CONTROL of this country.

Right now, the Left has a lock on control in Congress. God help us all if they have the Presidency as well, and if not God, then Mr. Smith, Mr. Wesson, Mr. Remmington, Mr. Ruger and several other famous names WILL.

[Aplomb]

I voted "yep".

[Aplomb]

Rick said:

So - you see, regardless of what Obama or any other President TRIES to do, he won't be allowed to do so. Americans aren't going to stand for taking more rights.

I sure as hell won't and neither will a lot of others.

You'd have to show me that. I'm NOT seeing it.

[Toad]

I always equate the Nation to an aircraft carrier. It doesn't turn on a dime. Even with the power of the Presidency, there's only so much you can do in a 4 year time period. You can change it's heading to some degree, but not nearly as much as any President ever think's he'll be able to. Every President runs into resistance, even from their own party at times.

[Aplomb]

I consider it dangerous to think like many are thinking, including you, Rick, specifically that this isn't going to be so bad. For Pete's sake, is everybody blind here? Why do you think all of your parents have said that this is a new world and that the world is going to hell in a handbasket? Because once they have taken an inch it goes to a mile. And when they take an inch it isn't stopped, it hasn't been for years. And once they take that inch, it's gone, baby, gone. Turn that word inch into the word right. Think about just to keep it simple: the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Start with the youngest American the preborn infant and go right on through the age of the eldest and ask if they have all of their rights. No sir they DON'T! I'll tell you what is going to happen when more rights are taken away... we will all sit around moaning and bitching and some will say that they are not going to let more rights be taken away. I've had it!

[Aplomb]

Here's how this crap starts. A parent of one of the children, according to some reports I read, suggested this field trip. The parent isn't told, "oh, you're so sweet, your support for the teacher is wonderful, thank you; but as far as a field trip policy goes, those are done strictly for educational purposes. Two parents keep their children out of that teaching and refuse to condone a gay wedding so they remain at school in another 1st grade class. That is what happens to a child who is being disciplined, by the way, paying the consequences for some wrong doing by not being allowed to go. In addition, not participating draws negative peer pressure type attention to the children who didn't go, by students in the whole school, not just teasing 1st graders. I submit that the children who were opted out by their parents have the right to have a decent education in a safe environment. They will have to go somewhere else to get that now. And what about the effect witnessing the wedding had on the other children? Yeah, yeah, I know, they will be more tolerant of diversity.

Look, here's how it is. Conservatives teach their children traditional values and liberals teach everyone they can that those values are wrong and need to be changed. In the process, they are chipping away at your rights a little at a time. Of course, if Obama wins, he isn't going to get into office and blatantly announce that he is going to ban guns. Our own children will willingly remove them from us one day because we don't want to stand up together and do something to stop this for a number of reasons including needing to be at work to put food on the table rather than sitting in a jail cell. For all the criticism about McCain not putting forth a fierce stance in the campaign, how are most of us any different? Just words, just speeches. What could two families do, for example, in this situation? Keep their children from the field trip of liberal homosexual indoctrination. Did it help? Did it matter? Liberal educational win: 18 kids go, 2 stay. Do the math.

http://michellemalkin.com/2008/10/13...s-gay-wedding/

In the same week that the No on 8 campaign launched an ad that labeled as “lies” claims that same-sex marriage would be taught in schools to young children, a first grade class took a school-sponsored trip to a gay wedding. Eighteen first graders traveled to San Francisco City Hall Friday for the wedding of their teacher and her lesbian partner, The San Francisco Chronicle reported. The school sponsored the trip for the students, ages 5 and 6, taking them away from their studies for the same-sex wedding. According to the Yes on 8 campaign, the public school field trip demonstrates that the California Supreme Court’s decision to legalize same-sex marriage has real consequences.


“Taking children out of school for a same-sex wedding is not customary education. This is promoting same-sex marriage and indoctrinating young kids,” said Yes on 8—ProtectMarriage.com Campaign Co-Manager Frank Schubert. “I doubt the school has ever taken kids on a field trip to a traditional wedding,” Schubert said.


When asked by the Yes on 8 campaign, The San Francisco Chronicle reporter said she did not know if the school had ever sponsored a field trip for students to a traditional wedding. Telling the Chronicle that the field trip was “a teachable moment,” the school’s principal believes it is perfectly appropriate for first graders to attend a same-sex wedding.



Officials in other school districts disagree.


“Prop. 8 protects our children from being taught in public schools that ’same-sex marriage’ is the same as traditional marriage,” said Santa Ana Unified School District board member Rosemarie “Rosie” Avila. “We should not accept a court decision that results in public schools teaching our kids that gay marriage is okay. That is an issue for parents to discuss with their children according to their own values and beliefs. It shouldn’t be forced on us against our will,” Avila added.


The lesbian teacher’s wedding was officiated by San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom. Newsom is featured in a Yes on 8 television ad, released last week, in which he arrogantly declares of same-sex marriage: “The door’s wide open now. It’s gonna happen, whether you like it or not.”
The Yes on 8 campaign’s ads explain that if the voters do not overturn the California Supreme Court’s same-sex marriage ruling, teachers will be required to teach young children that there is no difference between gay marriage and traditional marriage. “It’s totally unreasonable that a first grade field trip would be to a same-sex wedding,” said Chip White, Press Secretary for Yes on 8. “This is overt indoctrination of children who are too young to understand it.” The field trip underscores the Yes on 8 campaign’s message that unless Prop. 8 passes, children will be taught about same-sex marriage in public schools. “Not only can it happen, it has already happened,” White said.



http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...politics&tsp=1


A group of San Francisco first-graders took an unusual field trip to City Hall on Friday to toss rose petals on their just-married lesbian teacher - putting the public school children at the center of a fierce election battle over the fate of same-sex marriage.


The 18 Creative Arts Charter School students took a Muni bus and walked a block at noon to toss rose petals and blow bubbles on their just-married teacher Erin Carder and her wife Kerri McCoy, giggling and squealing as they mobbed their teacher with hugs.


Mayor Gavin Newsom, a friend of a friend, officiated.
A parent came up with the idea for the field trip - a surprise for the teacher on her wedding day.


"She's such a dedicated teacher," said the school's interim director Liz Jaroslow.


But there was a question of justifying the field trip academically. Jaroflow decided she could.


"It really is what we call a teachable moment," Jaroflow said, noting the historic significance of same-sex marriage and related civil rights issues. "I think I'm well within the parameters."


Nonetheless, the excursion offers Proposition 8 proponents fresh ammunition for their efforts to outlaw gay marriage in California, offering a real-life incident that echoes their recent television and radio ads.


"It's just utterly unreasonable that a public school field trip would be to a same-sex wedding," said Chip White, press secretary for the Yes on 8 campaign. "This is overt indoctrination of children who are too young to have an understanding of its purpose."


The trip illustrates the message promoted by the campaign in recent days, namely that unless Prop. 8 passes on Nov. 4, children will learn about same-sex marriage in school.


"It shows that not only can it happen, but it has already happened," White said.


California Education Code permits school districts to offer comprehensive sex education, but if they do, they have to "teach respect for marriage and committed relationships."


Parents can excuse their child from all or part of the instruction.


On Friday, McCoy and Carder, both in white, held hands on Newsom's office balcony overlooking the rotunda and recited their vows.


"With this ring, I thee wed!" Carder said, shouting the last word for emphasis.


After traditional photos, the two walked out City Hall's main doors where the students were lined up down the steps with bags of pink rose petals and bottles of bubbles hanging from their necks. McCoy, a conferences services coordinator, was in on the surprise and beamed as the children swarmed around Carder.


The two said they have participated in the campaign against Proposition 8 and planned to travel around San Francisco on Friday afternoon in a motorized trolley car with "Just Married" and "Vote No on 8" banners.


The two met on a dance floor two years ago.


"This is one girl I can honestly say deserves happiness, and it came in the form of Kerri," said Carder's friend Dani Starelli.


Creative Arts administrators and parents acknowledged that the field trip might be controversial, but they didn't see the big deal. Same-sex marriage is legal, they noted.


"How many days in school are they going to remember?" asked parent Marc Lipsett. "This is a day they'll definitely remember."


Carder's students said they were happy to see their new teacher married.


"She's a really nice teacher. She's the best," said 6-year-old Chava Novogrodsky-Godt, wearing a "No on 8" button on her shirt. "I want her to have a good wedding."


Chava's mothers said they are getting married in two weeks.


The students' parents are planning to make a video with the children describing what marriage is to them.


Marriage, 6-year-old Nolan Alexander said Friday, is "people falling in love."


It means, he added, "You stay with someone the rest of your life."


As is the case with all field trips, parents had to give their permission and could choose to opt out of the trip. Two families did. Those children spent the duration of the 90-minute field trip back at school with another first-grade class, the interim director said.


"As far as I'm concerned, it's not controversial for me," Jaroflow said. "It's certainly an issue I would be willing to put my job on the line for."


E-mail Jill Tucker at jtucker@sfchronicle.com.
This article appeared on page A - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle

[Aplomb]

http://www.nypost.com/seven/10132008...ers_133420.htm

OBAMA'S HOT AYERS


Posted: 4:09 am
October 13, 2008


Barack Obama blasted John McCain last week for focusing on the Democratic nominee's links to shady char acters instead of the economy.


Actually, McCain's said plenty about the economy. But Obama clearly would rather talk about anything but his past.


Obama first became defensive when McCain running mate Sarah Palin accused him of "palling around with terrorists" - a reference to his ties to Bill Ayers, who co-founded the radical Weather Underground and bombed the Pentagon, the Capitol and NYPD headquarters.


Obama's main answer? All of that happened when he was eight years old.


That's lame, for sure.


But Ayers' distant past isn't the only reason to distrust him. He has a present, as well - and Obama is a part of it.


The two of them have worked hard to radicalize Chicago's public schools.


Ayers' work funding radical "education" groups in Chicago came just in the last 12 years. And he teamed up directly with Obama on that.


As The Wall Street Journal has reported, Ayers and Obama worked for the Chicago Annenberg Challenge. "CAC translated Mr. Ayers' radicalism into practice," notes the Journal. "It required schools to affiliate with 'external partners' " for their funding.


"Proposals from groups focused on math/science achievement were turned down.



Instead, CAC disbursed money through various far-left community organizers," such as ACORN.


Ayers seemed to envision schools as "sites of resistance" and for teaching kids to oppose "oppression," with a focus on America's evil and racist past - and an eye toward "social transformation."


This is the swamp in which Obama operated: The Journal notes that Obama was chairman of the CAC board, which handled fiscal matters.


All told, Ayers and Obama won more than $150 million to ladle out.


McCain, to be sure, has never accused Obama of sharing Ayers' terrorist views.


He's merely questioned the Democrat's judgment in having worked with Ayers - and having launched his political career from the ex-terrorist's living room.


It's a fair point.


Incredibly, an Obama aide suggested that the senator didn't know about Ayers' terror past - which is a little disquieting, if true.


But he had to know what Ayers was up to with his school efforts - because Obama himself was helping him.


Bad judgment?


What an understatement.

[Aplomb]

Realizing that you guys are men, and I being a woman, have an opinion that is looked upon with less value, I give you a good and witty man who has a great ability to articulate facts and wager a prediction that should be given some serious thought:

At a McCain rally in Wisconsin, a fellow in the crowd announced he was mad as hell and got a standing ovation. What was he mad about"? Obama, Pelosi and "the socialists taking over our country." McCain listened politely and then pledged to get back to Washington to reach across the aisle to work on some gargantuan bipartisan cure-all. Not the answer that chap wanted to hear, I'll wager.If the more frightening polls are correct, America is about to elect the most left-wing government in history: an Obama Oval Office, a Pelosi House of Representatives, a filibuster-proof Senate … and a year or two down the road maybe three new Supreme Court justices. It would be a transformational administration that would start building (in Michelle Obama's words) "the world as it should be." That big empty hole in the heart of the Obama logo will not stay blank for long.

Mark Steyn http://www.ocregister.com/articles/o...191555-big-don

[American Patriot]

I consider it dangerous to think like many are thinking, including you, Rick, specifically that this isn't going to be so bad. For Pete's sake, is everybody blind here? Why do you think all of your parents have said that this is a new world and that the world is going to hell in a handbasket? Because once they have taken an inch it goes to a mile. And when they take an inch it isn't stopped, it hasn't been for years. And once they take that inch, it's gone, baby, gone. Turn that word inch into the word right. Think about just to keep it simple: the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Start with the youngest American the preborn infant and go right on through the age of the eldest and ask if they have all of their rights. No sir they DON'T! I'll tell you what is going to happen when more rights are taken away... we will all sit around moaning and bitching and some will say that they are not going to let more rights be taken away. I've had it!

Well, Ms. Aplomb, you're incorrect. I never said it "won't be so bad". NEVER said that.

Go back up just below your post and read what I wrote. Obama is a SOCIALIST. He can't change the course of this country, as Toad stated, on a dime.

He certainly can, and already HAS misdirected people, and this country though - and the current BS on the television about ACORN is a clear and present danger to us and this country.

However, I will say this... he will NOT be allowed to make this country in to a Socialist society. Period. Americans in general won't stand for it.

He might try and he might succeed in some efforts, but it won't happen.

I WILL say this too, it WILL be bad if he is president, he plans to ban guns, take away the rights of the media through the "Fairness Doctrine" which is really the UNFAIRNESS LEFTIST DOCTRINE....

so, I suggest you go back and read my stuff along with what you wrote. It seems you and I are actually in the same position on this and somehow you're thinking I'm taking the opposite position, when Iam not.

[Aplomb]

Well, no Rick, I don't think you and I are taking opposite positions. I just think that you make it sound like Americans are going to stand up and not let our rights be taken away and I don't understand what the point of empty words like that is. This is what I'm taking issue with:

So - you see, regardless of what Obama or any other President TRIES to do, he won't be allowed to do so. Americans aren't going to stand for taking more rights.

I sure as hell won't and neither will a lot of others.

All I'm saying is yes, we certainly are going to sit back and let it happen, just as we have been. I'm annoyed with people saying socialism isn't coming, it's already begun. You say, I don't know why, like to pacify or calm people, that we won't let our rights be taken away. But with nobody actually having any power to do anything, I think I'd rather have you pointing out examples of when we did stand up. But how can you when it isn't true.

There's something else I want to say about this. It truly is beyond weird this entrancement that people have listening to Obama. Honestly, that bit in the Bible about the beast and the people worshipping him sure doesn't seem like such a far stretch of the imagination any more. I'm not saying that it is Obama, just that now there is evidence that such a major large-scale cult following thing could happen.

[American Patriot]

Realizing that you guys are men, and I being a woman, have an opinion that is looked upon with less value,

Umm... Aplomb, I'll put this as delicately as I possibly can...

What the F*** are you talking about?

That is the most disingenuous thing I have ever heard you say in the 35 or something years I've known you...

Good grief.

What in the hell makes you think that "because you're a woman" men look down on your opinion.

Sheesh.

[American Patriot]

Well, no Rick, I don't think you and I are taking opposite positions. I just think that you make it sound like Americans are going to stand up and not let our rights be taken away and I don't understand what the point of empty words like that is. This is what I'm taking issue with: All I'm saying is yes, we certainly are going to sit back and let it happen, just as we have been. I'm annoyed with people saying socialism isn't coming, it's already begun. You say, I don't know why, like to pacify or calm people, that we won't let our rights be taken away. But with nobody actually having any power to do anything, I think I'd rather have you pointing out examples of when we did stand up. But how can you when it isn't true.

There's something else I want to say about this. It truly is beyond weird this entrancement that people have listening to Obama. Honestly, that bit in the Bible about the beast and the people worshipping him sure doesn't seem like such a far stretch of the imagination any more. I'm not saying that it is Obama, just that now there is evidence that such a major large-scale cult following thing could happen.

No T - we won't let it happen.

Sorry, I'm not like "everyone else" and "they" and "Them" and you of all the people here know that to be true. Sorry editing to finish.

I have NEVER in my life took much stock in things like Biblical Prophecy....

But I'm reconsidering for reasons you cited above. LOL

[Backstop]

Realizing that you guys are men, and I being a woman, have an opinion that is looked upon with less value...

I disagree.

I enjoy your posts - they're well thought out, and interesting.

Quit with that defeatist attitude.



Now, back to the kitchen with you!



Sorry...I just couldn't resist.