Disinformation, a Tool of the Left

"Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy. Look for ways to increase insecurity, anxiety and uncertainty.” Saul Alinsky, Rules for Radicals.

In the Alinsky way of Chicago politics the art of disinformation has been very sharply honed. In the absence of being able to run on his record Obama and his Alinskyite strategists will be running their 2012 campaign. You will not hear Obama or his minions proclaiming the wonders of Obama’s accomplishments as there are none. Instead you will be given a steady stream of disinformation to sway the voters for Obama.

Disinformation is a tactic where and organization or person are blind-sided by seemingly irrelevant arguments that they are then forced to address. This tactic was developed by the communists at the turn of the twentieth century and honed into a science at the Frankfurt School to demonize the capitalist and free-market economic system.

Two recent examples of how the left is using disinformation to reelect Barack Obama are illustrated by Harry Reid and Joe Soptic.

Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) has been claiming for almost two weeks that Mitt Romney has not paid any taxes for 10 years. He makes this claim based on information he received from an unnamed former Bain Capital investor. Of course he has no evidence to support this claim yet he stands, almost on a daily basis, on the floor of the Senate and tosses this accusation around with total impunity.

According to Politifact Reid has said Romney paid no taxes for 10 years. It was no slip of the tongue. He repeated the claim on at least two more occasions, at one point saying that “the word is out” when in fact it was only Reid who put that “word” out.

Reid has produced no evidence to back up his claim other than attribution to a shadowy anonymous source. Romney has denied the claim, and tax experts back him up, saying that the nature of Romney’s investments in Bain make it highly unlikely he would have been able to avoid paying taxes altogether — especially for 10 years.

Reid has made an extreme claim with nothing solid to back it up just as Alinsky advises in his Rules for Radicals playbook.

Anyone with an ounce of brains knows that the IRS would have been all over Romney like a wet blanket had he paid no taxes. It matters not that Reid has no evidence for his claim the disinformation is out there and the damage is done. Yes, Romney can refute this claim, but it will take energy away from his campaign and Reid can tell any lies he wants from the floor of the Senate without the fear of being called to the bar of justice for liable — as a serving senator he is immune from the laws of liable.

On the other hand Reid has been linked to disgraced fundraiser Jack Abramoff, participated in nepotism-related scandals which are frowned upon everywhere west of the Kennedy compound, and even pushed for a taxpayer-funded “green” high-speed rail system which would directly financially benefit his cronies and him while providing a “vital” rail link between Las Vegas and that heart of West Coast travel and tourism: Victorville, California.

The second, and most recent, example is the claim of Joe Soptic. The Obama supporting Super PAC Priorities USA yesterday introduced us to Joe Soptic who claims Mitt Romney killed his wife. According to CNN this claim is a bold face lie.

Soptic claims in the Super Pac ad that Mitt Romney and Bain Capital bought GST Steel at some point. Romney left day to day operations of Bain in 1999. Thereafter, Bain offered Joe Soptic a buy out and he refused. Eventually the steel plant went out of business and Joe went on the unemployment line. That happened in 2001 — two years after Romney left.

In 2002 or 2003, Mrs. Soptic injured her rotator cuff and left her job. She lost her insurance. In 2006, she was diagnosed with cancer and died a few days later. It is a terrible tragedy that Mitt Romney had nothing to do with.

It seems Mr. Soptic chose poorly on the buy-out offer, lost his job, and would prefer to blame Mitt Romney than anyone else. Priorities USA has set a new standard — Mitt Romney killed a woman, despite being removed from both time of death and decision making. This is disinformation, Alinsky style, at its pinnacle.

There was a time, not too long ago, that governments and the groups of elites that controlled them did not find it necessary to conscript themselves into wars of disinformation.

Propaganda was relatively straightforward. The lies were much simpler. The control of information flow was easily directed. Rules were enforced with the threat of property confiscation and execution for anyone who strayed from the rigid socio-political structure. Those who had theological, metaphysical or scientific information outside of the conventional and scripted collective world view were tortured and slaughtered. The elites kept the information to themselves, and removed its remnants from mainstream recognition, sometimes for centuries before it was rediscovered.

With the advent of anti-feudalism, and most importantly the success of the American Revolution, elitists were no longer able to dominate information with the edge of a blade or the barrel of a gun. The establishment of Republics, with their philosophy of open government and rule by the people, compelled aristocratic minorities to plot more subtle ways of obstructing the truth and thus maintaining their hold over the world without exposing themselves to retribution from the masses. Thus, the complex art of disinformation was born.

The technique, the “magic” of the lie, was refined and perfected. The mechanics of the human mind and the human soul became an endless obsession for the establishment.

The goal was malicious, but socially radical; instead of expending the impossible energy needed to dictate the very form and existence of the truth, they would allow it to drift, obscured in a fog of contrived data. They would wrap the truth in a Gordian Knot of misdirection and fabrication so elaborate that they felt certain the majority of people would surrender, giving up long before they ever finished unraveling the deceit. The goal was not to destroy the truth, but to hide it in plain sight.

In modern times, and with carefully engineered methods, this goal has for the most part been accomplished. However, these methods also have inherent weaknesses. Lies are fragile. They require constant attentiveness to keep them alive. The exposure of a single truth can rip through an ocean of lies, evaporating it instantly.

Today most historians consider Edward Bernays the father of modern disinformation. He believed this manipulation was necessary in society, which he regarded as irrational and dangerous as a result of the 'herd instinct'. One of Bernays' favorite techniques for manipulating public opinion was the indirect use of "third party authorities" to plead his clients' causes. "If you can influence the leaders, either with or without their conscious cooperation, you automatically influence the group which they sway", he said. In order to promote sales of bacon, for example, he conducted a survey of physicians and reported their recommendation that people eat heavy breakfasts. He sent the results of the survey to 5,000 physicians, along with publicity touting bacon and eggs as a heavy breakfast. It was Bernays who was retained by Woodrow Wilson to shape American public opinion to favor entry into World War I. His books and treatises were widely read by those who wanted to shape public opinion and one of his disciples was Joseph Goebbels, Adolph Hitler’s minister of propaganda.

The mainstream media, once tasked with the job of investigating government corruption and keeping elitists and masterminds in line, has now become nothing more than a public relations firm for corrupt officials and their globalist handlers. The days of the legitimate “investigative reporter” are long gone (if they ever existed at all), and journalism itself has deteriorated into a rancid pool of so called “TV Editorialists” who treat their own baseless opinions as supported fact.

The elitist co-opting of news has been going on in one form or another since the invention of the printing press. However, the first methods of media disinformation truly came to fruition under the supervision of newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst, a supported of Franklin Roosevelt and big government who believed the truth was “subjective” and open to his personal interpretation.

Some of the main tactics used by the mainstream media to mislead the masses are as follows:

Lie Big, Retract Quietly: Mainstream media sources (especially newspapers) are notorious for reporting flagrantly dishonest and unsupported news stories on the front page, then quietly retracting those stories on the very back page when they are caught. In this case, the point is to railroad the lie into the collective consciousness. Once the lie is finally exposed, it is already too late, and a large portion of the population will not notice or care when the truth comes out.

Unconfirmed or Controlled Sources As Fact: Cable news venues often cite information from “unnamed” sources, government sources that have an obvious bias or agenda, or “expert” sources without providing an alternative “expert” view. The information provided by these sources is usually backed by nothing more than blind faith.

Calculated Omission: Otherwise known as “cherry picking” data. One simple piece of information or root item of truth can derail an entire disinformation news story, so instead of trying to gloss over it, they simply pretend as if it doesn’t exist. When the fact is omitted, the lie can appear entirely rational. This tactic is also used extensively when disinformation agents and crooked journalists engage in open debate.

Distraction and the Manufacture of Relevance: Sometimes the truth wells up into the public awareness regardless of what the media does to bury it. When this occurs their only recourse is to attempt to change the public’s focus and thereby distract them from the truth they were so close to grasping. The media accomplishes this by “over-reporting” on a subject that has nothing to do with the more important issues at hand. Ironically, the media can take an unimportant story, and by reporting on it ad nauseum, cause many Americans to assume that because the media won’t shut-up about it, it must be important!

Dishonest Debate Tactics: Sometimes, men who actually are concerned with the average American’s pursuit of honesty and legitimate fact-driven information break through and appear on TV. However, rarely are they allowed to share their views or insights without having to fight through a wall of carefully crafted deceit and propaganda. Because the media know they will lose credibility if they do not allow guests with opposing viewpoints every once in a while, they set up and choreograph specialized TV. debates in highly restrictive environments which put the guest on the defensive, and make it difficult for them to clearly convey their ideas or facts. Sometimes this is called “Fair and Balanced.”

TV pundits are often trained in what are commonly called “Alinsky Tactics.” Saul Alinsky was a moral relativist, and champion of the lie as a tool for the “greater good”; essentially, a modern day Machiavelli. His “Rules for Radicals” were supposedly meant for grassroots activists who opposed the establishment and emphasized the use of any means necessary to defeat one’s political opposition. But is it truly possible to defeat an establishment built on lies, by use of even more elaborate lies, and by sacrificing one’s ethics? In reality, his strategies are the perfect format for corrupt institutions and governments to dissuade dissent from the masses. Today, Alinsky’s rules are used more often by the establishment than by its opposition.

Alinsky’s Strategy: Win At Any Cost, Even If You Have To Lie

Alinsky’s tactics have been adopted by governments and disinformation specialists across the world, but they are most visible in TV debate. While Alinsky sermonized about the need for confrontation in society, his debate tactics are actually designed to circumvent real and honest confrontation of opposing ideas with slippery tricks and diversions. Alinsky’s tactics as professed in his Rules for Radicals, and their modern usage, can be summarized as follows:

1) Power is not only what you have, but what the enemy thinks you have.

We see this tactic in many forms. For example, projecting your own movement as mainstream, and your opponent’s as fringe along with. convincing your opponent that his fight is a futile one. Your opposition may act differently, or even hesitate to act at all, based on their perception of your power. How often have we heard this line: “The government knows what is best for the people and there is nothing the people can do now.” This is a projection of exaggerated invincibility designed to elicit apathy from the masses.

2) Never go outside the experience of your people, and whenever possible, go outside of the experience of the enemy.

Don’t get drawn into a debate about a subject you do not know as well as or better than your opposition. If possible, draw them into such a situation instead. Go off on tangents. Look for ways to increase insecurity, anxiety and uncertainty in your opposition. This is commonly used against unwitting interviewees on cable news shows whose positions are set up to be skewered. The target is blind-sided by seemingly irrelevant arguments that they are then forced to address. In television and radio, this also serves to waste broadcast time to prevent the target from expressing his own position.

3) Whenever possible, go outside the expertise of the enemy.

Look for ways to increase insecurity, anxiety and uncertainty. This happens all the time. Watch how many organizations under attack are blind-sided by seemingly irrelevant arguments that they are then forced to address. This what happened to the Catholic Church over the contraception issue promoted by Sandra Fluke and NOW.

4) Make the enemy live up to their own book of rules.

The objective is to target the opponent’s credibility and reputation by accusations of hypocrisy. If the tactician can catch his opponent in even the smallest misstep, it creates an opening for further attacks, and distracts away from the broader moral question.

5) Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.

“Ron Paul is a crackpot.” “Gold bugs are crazy.” “Constitutionalists are fringe extremists.” Baseless ridicule is almost impossible to counter because it is meant to be irrational. It infuriates the opposition, which then reacts to your advantage. It also works as a pressure point to force the enemy into concessions. In essence attack the person with ad hominems not his position.

6) A good tactic is one that your people enjoy.

The popularization of the term “Teabaggers” is a classic example; it caught on by itself because people seem to think it’s clever, and enjoy saying it. Keeping your talking points simple and fun helps your side stay motivated, and helps your tactics spread autonomously, without instruction or encouragement.

7) A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag.

Don’t become old news. If you keep your tactics fresh, it’s easier to keep your people active. Not all disinformation agents are paid. The “useful idiots” have to be motivated by other means. Mainstream disinformation often changes gear from one method to the next and then back again. The term “Useful Idiots” was coined by Lenin to describe journalists like John Reed who would promote his Communist ideology in the capitalistic west.

8) Keep the pressure on with different tactics and actions, and utilize all events of the period for your purpose.

Keep trying new things to keep the opposition off balance. As the opposition masters one approach, hit them from the flank with something new. Never give the target a chance to rest, regroup, recover or re-strategize. Take advantage of current events and twist their implications to support your position. Never let a good crisis go to waste.

9) The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.

This goes hand in hand with Rule No. 1. Perception is reality. Allow your opposition to expend all of its energy in expectation of an insurmountable scenario. The dire possibilities can easily poison the mind and result in demoralization.

10) The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition.

The objective of this pressure is to force the opposition to react and make the mistakes that are necessary for the ultimate success of the campaign.

11) If you push a negative hard and deep enough, it will break through into its counterside - every positive has its negative.

As grassroots activism tools, Alinsky tactics have historically been used (for example, by labor movements or covert operations specialists) to force the opposition to react with violence against activists, which leads to popular sympathy for the activists’ cause. Today, false (or co-opted) grassroots movements and revolutions use this technique in debate as well as in planned street actions and rebellions (look at Egypt. Libya, and Syria for a recent example).

12) The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative.

Never let the enemy score points because you’re caught without a solution to the problem. Today, this is often used offensively against legitimate activists, such as the opponents of the Federal Reserve. Complain that your opponent is merely “pointing out the problems.” Demand that they offer not just “a solution”, but THE solution. Obviously, no one person has “the” solution. When he fails to produce the miracle you requested, dismiss his entire argument and all the facts he has presented as pointless.

13) Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it and polarize it.

Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. The target’s supporters will expose themselves. Go after individual people, not organizations or institutions. People hurt faster than institutions. This what Harry Reid has done with the issue of Romney’s taxes and Joe Soptic with his wife’s cancer. They are attempting to make Romney out to being a “bad” person

The next time you view an MSM debate, watch the pundits carefully, you will likely see many if not all of the strategies above used on some unsuspecting individual attempting to tell the truth.

The most recent and more powerful means of spreading disinformation is the Internet. Internet trolls, also known as “paid posters” or “paid bloggers,” are increasingly and openly being employed by private corporations as well governments, often for marketing purposes and for “public relations” (Obama is notorious for this practice). Internet “trolling” is indeed a fast growing industry.

Trolls use a wide variety of strategies, some of which are unique to the internet, here are just a few:

Make outrageous comments designed to distract or frustrate: An Alinsky tactic used to make people emotional, although less effective because of the impersonal nature of the Web. This tactic is best illustrated by web sites like Media Matters, Move On.Org, and the Daily Koss. These sites are notorious for posting lies and half-truths in true Alinsky fashion.

Pose as a supporter of the truth, and then make comments that discredit the movement: We have seen on our many forums. Trolls pose as supporters of a conservative movement, then post long, incoherent diatribes so as to appear either racist or insane. The key to this tactic is to make references to common conservative arguments while at the same time babbling nonsense, so as to make those otherwise valid arguments seem ludicrous by association. In extreme cases, these “Trojan Horse Trolls” have been known to make posts which incite violence — a technique obviously intended to solidify the false assertions of the think tank propagandists like the Southern Poverty Law Center, which purports that Constitutionalists should be feared as potential domestic terrorists and racists wanting a return to slavery because they believe in the 10^th Amendment.

Dominate Discussions: Trolls often interject themselves into productive Web discussions in order to throw them off course and frustrate the people involved. They also use this tactic by calling into conservative talk radio shows and purporting themselves to be like-minded and then putting forth racists comments to portray conservative thinking people in such a manner.

Prewritten Responses: Many trolls are supplied with a list or database with pre-planned talking points designed as generalized and deceptive responses to honest arguments. When they post, their words feel strangely plastic and well-rehearsed.

False Association: This works hand in hand with item No. 2, by invoking the stereotypes established by the “Trojan Horse Troll.” For example: calling those against the Federal Reserve or ObamaCare “conspiracy theorists” or “lunatics”; deliberately associating anti-globalist movements with racists and homegrown terrorists, because of the inherent negative connotations; and using false associations to provoke biases and dissuade people from examining the evidence objectively.

False Moderation: Pretending to be the “voice of reason” in an argument with obvious and defined sides in an attempt to move people away from what is clearly true into a “grey area” where the truth becomes “relative.”

Straw Man Arguments: A very common technique. The troll will accuse his opposition of subscribing to a certain point of view, even if he does not, and then attacks that point of view. Or, the troll will put words in the mouth of his opposition, and then rebut those specific words.

Sometimes, these strategies are used by average people with serious personality issues. However, if you see someone using these tactics often, or using many of them at the same time, you may be dealing with a paid internet troll.

The best way to disarm disinformation agents is to know their methods inside and out. This gives us the ability to point out exactly what they are doing in detail the moment they try to do it. Immediately exposing a disinformation tactic as it is being used is highly destructive to the person utilizing it. It makes them look foolish, dishonest and weak for even making the attempt. Internet trolls most especially do not know how to handle their methods being deconstructed right in front of their eyes and usually fold and run from debate when it occurs. The only weapon hey have is to scream louder and attack their opposition on a personal and vulgar manner. It you doubt me just look at the vulgar natures of those commenting on these blogs.

The truth is precious. It is sad that there are so many in our society who have lost respect for it; people who have traded in their conscience and their soul for temporary financial comfort or power while sacrificing the stability and balance of the rest of the country in the process.

The human psyche breathes on the air of truth. Without it, humanity cannot survive. Without it, the species will collapse, starving from lack of intellectual and emotional sustenance.

Disinformation does not only threaten our insight into the workings of our world; it makes us vulnerable to fear, misunderstanding, and doubt: all things that lead to destruction. It can drive good people to commit terrible atrocities against others, or even against themselves. Without a concerted and organized effort to diffuse mass-produced lies, the future will look bleak indeed.

Is Barack Obama The Manchurian Candidate?

"Whoever claims the right to redistribute the wealth produced by others is claiming the right to treat human beings as chattel." — Ayn Rand

The 1962 film The Manchurian Candidate is a 1962 American Cold War political thriller film starring Frank Sinatra, Laurence Harvey, Janet Leigh and Angela Lansbury. The picture was directed by John Frankenheimer from an adaptation by George Axelrod of Richard Condon's 1959 novel.

The central concept of the film is that the son of a prominent, right-wing political family has been brainwashed as an unwitting assassin for an international Communist conspiracy. The Manchurian Candidate was nationally released on Wednesday, October 24, 1962, at the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis. The plot is as follows:

During the Korean War, the Soviets capture an American platoon and take them to Manchuria in Communist China. After the war, the soldiers return to the United States, and Staff Sergeant Raymond Shaw (Laurence Harvey) is credited with saving their lives in combat. Upon the recommendation of the platoon's commander, Captain Bennett Marco (Frank Sinatra), Shaw is awarded the Medal of Honor for his supposed actions. In addition, when asked to describe him, Marco and the other soldiers automatically respond, "Raymond Shaw is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I've ever known in my life." Deep down, however, they know that Shaw is a cold, sad, unsociable loner, Marco describing him as "not hard to like. He's impossible to like!".

Marco — who has since been promoted to Major — suffers from a recurring nightmare in which a hypnotized Shaw kills two fellow soldiers before the assembled military brass of communist nations, during a practical demonstration of a brainwashing technique. Marco wants to investigate, but receives no support from Army Intelligence as he has no proof. However, Marco learns that another soldier from the platoon, Allen Melvin (James Edwards), has had the same nightmare. When Melvin and Marco separately identify some of the men in the dream as leading figures in communist governments, Army Intelligence agrees to help Marco investigate.

Meanwhile, Shaw's mother, Mrs. Eleanor Iselin (Angela Lansbury), drives the political career of her husband, Senator John Yerkes Iselin (James Gregory), a bombastic McCarthy-like demagogue who is dismissed by most people as a fool. Senator Iselin's political stature is established when he claims that an undetermined number of communists work within the Defense Department. However, unknown to Raymond, Mrs. Iselin is actually a Communist agent with a plan intended to secure the presidency under communist influence.

Mrs. Iselin is the American "operator" responsible for controlling Raymond, who was conditioned in Manchuria to be an unwitting assassin whose actions are triggered by a Queen of Diamonds playing card. When he sees it, he will obey the next suggestion or order given to him by anyone. When given instructions to kill selected targets, he must also kill any witnesses and never remember his actions, making him the perfect assassin. It is revealed that Shaw's heroic action was a false memory implanted in the platoon by the communists in Manchuria, and that they were covertly returned to the American lines when their conditioning was completed; the actions for which Shaw was awarded his Medal of Honor never took place.

Raymond briefly finds happiness when he rekindles a youthful romance with Jocelyn Jordan (Leslie Parrish), the daughter of Senator Thomas Jordan (John McGiver), one of his stepfather's political rivals. Raymond had previously courted Jocelyn in order to get at his parents in a Romeo and Juliet-style romance, but they then genuinely fell in love, both she and her father being the nearest thing Raymond has ever had to having friends. Mrs. Iselin broke up the relationship for obvious political reasons, but now facilitates the couple's reunion as part of her scheme to garner the support of Senator Jordan for her husband's own sudden vice presidential bid.

Jocelyn, wearing a Queen of Diamonds costume outfit, inadvertently hypnotizes Raymond at a costume party thrown by the Iselins and the couple elopes. Although pleased with the match, Senator Jordan makes it clear to Mrs. Iselin that he will move for her husband's impeachment if he makes any attempt to seek the vice-presidential nomination. Raymond's conditioning is then triggered by his mother and he is sent to assassinate Jordan. Jocelyn happens upon the scene and is also shot dead as a witness to the event. Raymond has no knowledge of his actions and is genuinely grief-stricken when he learns of the murders.

In the course of Marco's investigation, he discovers the role of the Queen of Diamonds card in putting Raymond into the hypnotic state for his assignments. Marco meets Raymond and, using a deck composed entirely of such cards, gets the full story and orders Raymond to break the links between the card and obeying any further subsequent orders. Unaware of this, Mrs. Iselin primes her son to assassinate their party's presidential candidate at the nomination convention so that Senator Iselin, as the vice-presidential candidate, will become the presidential candidate by default and give an inflammatory anti-Communist speech (written by the Communists themselves). This will cause mass hysteria that will get Iselin, "the Manchurian candidate", elected and justify emergency powers that, in Mrs. Iselin's words, "will make martial law seem like anarchy".

In a cynically moving scene, Mrs. Iselin asserts that she did not know that it was her son who was to be selected by the Communists, who apparently chose him to be the assassin because they believed it would solidify their own hold and control over her. Furious, she vows that once in power she will "grind them into the dirt".

Marco's attempt to free Raymond appears to have failed. Raymond enters the convention hall disguised as a Catholic priest and takes up a position to carry out the assassination as he was instructed, using a rifle with a scope. Marco and his supervisor, Colonel Milt (Douglas Henderson), arrive at the convention to stop him. As the Presidential nominee (Robert Riordan) makes his speech, Raymond instead takes his revenge and saves the country by shooting his stepfather and mother dead. He then commits suicide in front of Marco while wearing his Medal of Honor.

I have seen this film at least five times and own the DVD version. I consider it as one of the best political thrillers of the genre and a good example of how Hollywood used to make films with a punch.

Of course in 2004 Hollywood attempted to remake the film by turning Condon's 1959 novel upside down and showing global corporations as the villains. The new plot goes something like this:

Major Bennett "Ben" Marco (Denzel Washington) is a war veteran who begins to doubt what is commonly known about his famous Army unit. During Operation Desert Storm, Sergeant First Class Raymond Shaw (Liev Schreiber) supposedly rescued all but two members in his unit, of which Marco was the commanding officer. This made Shaw a war hero, gained him the Medal of Honor, and launched him into a career in politics. One of Marco's former NCOs, Corporal Al Melvin (Jeffrey Wright), contacts him and says that he has had some 'dreams', and mentions himself, Marco, and Shaw inside a big room, with confusing memories of the lost army unit. He is clearly deranged, but he shows Major Marco some images he has drawn from the dreams, including one of a tattooed woman.

The members begin to come together in a dystopian near-future America defined by xenophobia, defacto martial law, environmental degradation, and increasing corporate control. Shaw, now a United States Congressman, becomes his party's candidate for Vice-President. He is an unexpected candidate, as Connecticut Senator Tom Jordan (Jon Voight) was the leading choice for some time. Jordan is pushed aside by Shaw's mother, Virginia Senator Eleanor Shaw (Meryl Streep), who convinces the party leaders into nominating her son. An obvious rivalry exists between Eleanor Shaw and Tom Jordan, partly due to a past relationship between Raymond Shaw and Jordan's daughter Jocelyn (Vera Farmiga). That evening, Marco has a nightmare in which he is trapped in a large room, with tattooed women placing large television sets in front of the soldiers, and repeatedly saying, "Raymond Shaw is probably the kindest, bravest, warmest, most selfless human being I've ever known." Meanwhile, Melvin desperately pleads for Marco to help him, but Marco cannot, as he is incapacitated by his surgery, chemical infusion, and hypnotism.

After Shaw is nominated, Marco begins investigating what really happened during the war. He finds an implant inside of his back, and, having it analyzed, realizes that it is a nano-technological experiment dating from the Gulf War, connected with Manchurian Global, an international weapons manufacturer with major political connections, including former prime ministers, trust-fund terrorists, ayatollahs, and the Shaw family. Marco also finds a newspaper clipping with a person in a photograph whom he recognizes as a scientist from his nightmares. Looking him up, he finds that his name is Atticus Noyle (an anagram of Dr. Yen Lo, an evil Chinese brainwasher from the original 1962 film), a genetic engineer and soldier of fortune, who used to work for Manchurian global, on a nanotechnology experiment.

Marco shows this to Tom Jordan, who, although he doesn't entirely believe the story, does realize that there is a strong possibility that Raymond Shaw was brainwashed, and confronts the Shaws about this. When he suggests that Raymond bow out gracefully from the campaign, Eleanor Shaw pretends to think that this is an idiotic ruse to eliminate competition. Taking matters into her own hands in fear and desperation as the conspiracy is hours away from being revealed, she 'activates' her son. In a trance-like state, under his mother's orders, Raymond Shaw murders Tom Jordan and his daughter.

Eleanor Shaw is furious at Manchurian Global because they gave her their word that the brainwashing conspiracy could never have been found out, and while it's true that she was trusted with their technology, they were trusted with her son. As she becomes more and more controlling, it is soon revealed that the Vice-Presidential spot is not what she has in mind for her son, but the presidency. On election night, the newly elected president will be assassinated, and the planned assassin of Shaw's running mate is none other than Marco himself, who was also brainwashed in the war. With the help of the FBI, Marco arranges a private meeting with Shaw in a school where he was to cast his vote. Marco tries once again to convince Shaw of what is happening to him and that there is a deeper link between them that Manchurian technology has not managed to obliterate. Shaw seems to agree, and gives Marco his Medal of Honor, which he says he does not deserve. Marco takes it, and Shaw receives a phone call from his mother, who wants to talk to Marco. Marco answers it, and is soon "activated" by her.

After Eleanor Shaw activates her son, he becomes helpless and weak. The latent ambiguity of their relationship is revealed when Eleanor washes down her son, kissing him repeatedly on the lips and stroking the back of his neck. They then get ready to go to the election party.

Shaw and Marco begin to regain a conscious state even while under Manchurian Global's control. At the election night celebration party, the newly elected Shaw and Major Marco realize what must be done. Shaw leads his mother onto the stage with him, moving them into the spot where the President should be and blocking Marco's shot. Marco then fires one shot, killing both of them as they hug. Just before Marco can kill himself (which had been part of Eleanor Shaw's plan), FBI Agent Eugenie "Rosie" Rose (Kimberly Elise) stops him by shooting him in the shoulder. The FBI seemingly covers up Marco's involvement, framing a Manchurian Global conspirator with the shooting. In the last scene, Rosie takes Marco to the compound he was brainwashed in, apparently in conjunction with the FBI investigation. Marco realizes what has happened, and lets the sea take away a picture of the "lost platoon" along with Shaw's Medal of Honor.

If you have never seen the original version of the film you might enjoy the 2004 remake. I did not, as I kept thinking back to Condon's novel. Remakes always leave me with a bad taste, as the film-makers in an attempt to draw in a new audience always change the plot and the original story. This is also true of other films based on political thriller novels like Tom Clancy’s Clear and Present Danger and The Sum of All Fears where the bad guys were changed from Arab terrorist to a neo-Nazi group for reasons of political correctness after 9/11.

Now we move on to the life story of Barack Obama. The latest hubbub revolving around Barack Obama is one concerning his claim of birth. According to an article in the London Telegraph Obama’s first publisher issued a short bio to go on the bust jacket promoting his first book that he was born in Kenya. Tim Stanley writing in the Telegraph reports:

“Whatever you think of Breitbart.com’s punishing vetting process, it has exposed just how little work the mainstream media did in investigating candidate Obama back in 2008. Not all of Team Breitbart’s revelations have been election-deciders, but they have often been stuff that a simple Google would have uncovered. If they revealed tomorrow that he’d had his own cross-dressing-themed sitcom on primetime TV in the 1980s, I wouldn’t be surprised.

The latest find is a fascinating inversion of the birther conspiracy. Breitbart.com has discovered that in 1991 Barack Obama’s literary agent (who also represented New Kids on the Block) published a booklet that included a biography of the future President. The audience was “business colleagues” in the publishing industry and it was designed to promote Obama’s anticipated first book (later abandoned) called Journeys in Black and White. Here’s how it describes the author’s origins.

Barack Obama, the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review, was born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia and Hawaii. The son of an American anthropologist and a Kenyan finance minister, he attended Columbia University and worked as a financial journalist and editor for Business International Corporation.

The key phrase here is “was born in Kenya" – and this bio line was apparently being used as late as 2007.

Today, the President has satisfied all right-minded folk that he was in fact born in Hawaii. Breitbart.com itself has always rejected the absurd cult of birtherism. In fact, this story is really the opposite of birtherism – Breitbart infers that in the past Obama encouraged people to think that he was born abroad in order to establish an identity as an authentic, exotic voice in the debate on racial politics.

Obama’s old literary agent has issued a terse statement to the effect that the wording was all her fault and she never consulted her client. If that’s true, she’s a bad agent. A different agent, quoted by Breitbart.com, disagrees. He told the website “that while ‘almost nobody’ wrote his or her own biography, the non-athletes in the booklet, whom ‘the agents deal[t] with on a daily basis,’ were ‘probably’ approached to approve the text as presented.”

If we accept that Obama didn’t provide the biography, it would seem highly unlikely that he didn’t get a chance to vet it. Accepting that he didn’t do that either, it’s incredibly strange that the literary agent approached by Breitbart.com does not remember Obama calling the agency to register a complaint and make a correction. My mother spent a lot of her childhood in Grenada. If my literary agent told people I was born in the Caribbean, I’d at least pick up the phone to set the record straight.”

Now I have had a book published and before it went to print I reviewed my biography very carefully to insure its accuracy and that it conformed to what I wanted to say about myself. So either Obama reviewed his bio and found it accurate or he was willing to go forward with a bold-faced lie to sell his book.

Whether Obama was born in Kenya is not the point of my concern. The preponderance of evidence backs up his claim that he was born in Hawaii. My concern focuses on who is the real Barack Obama. Here is what we know about Barack Obama. He was probably born in Hawaii to an American citizen and his father was a Kenyan exchange student who left for Harvard University shortly after Barack’s birth and eventually returned to Kenya to serve as a minister in the communist government there. His mother then moved to Seattle to attend college and become a left-wing activist. At some point his mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, met an Indonesian by the name Lolo Soetoro, who was attending college in Hawaii. When Suharto, a military leader in Soetoro's home country, came to power in 1967, all Indonesian students studying abroad were recalled, and the family moved to the Menteng neighborhood of Jakarta. From ages six to ten, Obama attended local schools in Jakarta, including Besuki Public School and St. Francis of Assisi School. He also attended a local Madras where he studied the Quran.

In 1971, Obama returned to Honolulu to live with his maternal grandparents, Madelyn and Stanley Armour Dunham, and with the aid of a scholarship attended Punahou School, a private college preparatory school, from fifth grade until his graduation from high school in 1979.Obama's mother returned to Hawaii in 1972, remaining there until 1977 when she went back to Indonesia to work as an anthropological field worker. She finally returned to Hawaii in 1994 and lived there for one year before dying of ovarian cancer.

While in Hawaii Obama met Frank Marshal Davis, a known communist, who was one of Obama’s first mentors. Following high school, Obama moved to Los Angeles in 1979 to attend Occidental College. In February 1981, he made his first public speech, calling for Occidental to divest from South Africa in response to its policy of apartheid. In mid-1981, Obama traveled to Indonesia to visit his mother and sister Maya, and visited the families of college friends in Pakistan and India for three weeks. Later in 1981, he transferred to Columbia University in New York City, where he majored in political science with a specialty in international relations and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in 1983. He worked for a year at the Business International Corporation, then at the New York Public Interest Research Group.

Two years after graduating, Obama was hired in Chicago as director of the Developing Communities Project (DCP), a church-based community organization originally comprising eight Catholic parishes (where he met the radical priest Michael Pfleger and Rev. Jeremiah Wright) in Roseland, West Pullman, and Riverdale on Chicago's South Side. He worked there as a community organizer from June 1985 to May 1988. He helped set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants' rights organization in Altgeld Gardens. Obama also worked as a consultant and instructor for the Gamaliel Foundation, a community organizing institute. In mid-1988, he traveled for the first time in Europe for three weeks and then for five weeks in Kenya, where he met many of his paternal relatives for the first time. He returned to Kenya in August 2006 for a visit to his father's birthplace, a village near Kisumu in rural western Kenya.

In late 1988, Obama entered Harvard Law School. He was selected as an editor of the Harvard Law Review at the end of his first year, and president of the journal in his second year. During his summers, he returned to Chicago, where he worked as an associate at the law firms of Sidley Austin in 1989 and Hopkins & Sutter in 1990. After graduating with a J.D. magna cum laude from Harvard in 1991, he returned to Chicago. Obama's election as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review gained national media attention and led to a publishing contract and advance for a book about race relations, which evolved into a personal memoir. The manuscript was published in mid-1995 as Dreams from My Father.

Obama was elected to the Illinois Senate in 1996, succeeding State Senator Alice Palmer as Senator from Illinois's 13th District, which at that time spanned Chicago South Side neighborhoods from Hyde Park – Kenwood south to South Shore and west to Chicago Lawn. Once elected, Obama gained bipartisan support for legislation that reformed ethics and health care laws. He sponsored a law that increased tax credits for low-income workers, negotiated welfare reform, and promoted increased subsidies for childcare. In 2001, as co-chairman of the bipartisan Joint Committee on Administrative Rules, Obama supported Republican Governor Ryan's payday loan regulations and predatory mortgage lending regulations aimed at averting home foreclosures.

Obama was reelected to the Illinois Senate in 1998, defeating Republican Yesse Yehudah in the general election, and was reelected again in 2002. In 2000, he lost a Democratic primary run for the U.S. House of Representatives to four-term incumbent Bobby Rush by a margin of two to one.

In January 2003, Obama became chairman of the Illinois Senate's Health and Human Services Committee when Democrats, after a decade in the minority, regained a majority. He sponsored and led unanimous, bipartisan passage of legislation to monitor racial profiling by requiring police to record the race of drivers they detained, and legislation making Illinois the first state to mandate videotaping of homicide interrogations. During his 2004 general election campaign for U.S. Senate, police representatives credited Obama for his active engagement with police organizations in enacting death penalty reforms. Obama resigned from the Illinois Senate in November 2004 following his election to the U.S. Senate.

In Obama’s campaign for the United States Senate once again the ugly head of the Chicago machine snake rose to his support. He had no real record to run on and his tenure in the Illinois State Senate was lackluster at best. In 2004, Obama ran for the U.S. Senate seat to be vacated by Sen. Peter Fitzgerald. Despite opposition in the Primary Election from tough challenger Blair Hull, Hull would collapse after pressure from journalists unsealed his divorce files, with Obama taking 54% of the vote. Following his victory, Obama squared off against Republican Jack Ryan, who ultimately had to drop out of the race due to a lawsuit from the Chicago Tribune that forced the unsealing of his divorce records. Alan Keyes was chosen as the new GOP candidate. Keyes had gained much attention as a conservative firebrand in his unsuccessful presidential campaigns in 1996 and 2000. A Marylander, Keyes had established legal residency in Illinois with the nomination, the only requirement to run for office. The Chicago Tribune sarcastically greeted Keyes by editorializing: "Mr. Keyes may have noticed a large body of water as he flew into O'Hare. That is called Lake Michigan."

After a campaign in which Keyes called Obama's position on abortion, "the slave-holder's position", accused gays and lesbians of being "selfish hedonists", and claimed that Jesus would not vote for his opponent, Obama won handily in the general election, receiving 70% of the popular vote to Keyes's 27%.

It should be noted here that Anita Dunn, who worked on Barack Obama's campaign and held a White House position, formerly worked on Hull's campaign as a media strategist. Blair Hull was identified as 'Candidate C' in the famous Blagojevich scandal to sell Barack Obama's former Senate seat.

Like Ben Marco the first question I have is who financed all of Obama’s education. Columbia University is not inexpensive. All along Obama’s career he seems to have financial angels on his shoulders. Many of these angels are members of the Chicago political machine like Valerie Jarrett an Iranian born socialist. Jarrett along with other Marxists like Van Jones, Carol Browner, Anita Dunn, Tony Rezko, and scores of other fellow travelers are all close advisors to Obama.

Like the character Raymond Shaw Obama has been influenced (brainwashed if you will) by a cadré Marxists and Communists with Valerie Jarrett acting like Obama’s mother figure and the character Eleanor Iselin in the film.

Another question I have pertains to Obama’s grades at Occidental, Columbia and Harvard and what did he write. We know he never published anything while president of the Harvard Law review, but nothing of his college transcripts. Every candidate for president has had his college transcripts made public and the papers they wrote made public including Hillary Clinton, George Bush, John Kerry, and Al Gore. Even Michelle Obama’s Princeton thesis; “Princeton-Educated Blacks and the Black Community" was made public. Why not Barack Obama?

How many times have you heard from the Obama supporters and his media sycophants how brilliant Barack Obama is? The mantra goes that he is the most brilliant person ever to occupy 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Even his opponents have a hard time challenging this statement. How many times have you heard how likeable Barack Obama is? This is like hearing the phrase; “Raymond Shaw is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I've ever known in my life." This Obama mantra goes on and on without challenge of his transcripts or grades. Even his tenure as a lecturer on Constitutional Law at the University of Chicago is somewhat a fraud. He was never a professor and his knowledge of the Constitution and the mind of the framers is suspect.

Obama’s record is full of associations with Marxists and Communists. As a State senator he voted present over 100 times and the only legislation he is known to take a stand on was the Illinois Born Alive Bill, which would have prohibited the killing of a fetus that had survived a failed abortion. He voted against the bill four times.

Throughout his life Barack Obama has done nothing or written anything of importance except his own self-serving autobiography and an ideological treatise on his Marxist beliefs. Even these books are suspect and there are claims they were written by others including his friend and confident the former Weather Underground unrepentant terrorist Bill Ayres.

He never managed any large group of people or organization. He never worked for a private for profit firm. He never started a business or hires people or signed the front of a paycheck. He has lived off the largess of others, mainly his Marist angels. He has always been the product of his puppet masters and never had an original thought in his life. He certainly cannot be compared with Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Hamilton, or Lincoln yet he is considered by the media and his sycophantic supporters as the most brilliant person ever to occupy the White House.

He has made it to the top of the political rung with his ability to read a teleprompter with words written by others, his enchanting smile, his ability to talk hood speak, and his Mussolini-like chin tilt. This is what his puppet masters saw in him when they began to prepare him for the presidency. Even to this day his likeable quotient is way above his competency ratings.

Obama will rail against the evil corporations and investment bankers, but will go to these entities for his financial support, which they gladly give with the hope of having influence over him and the policies of the government. This support will come as his managers know how to milk the golden goose of politics for their money. This corporatism is much akin to the Fascism of Mussolini, but his Marxist supporters do not make such fine distinctions when there is money to be had

As Obama’s mentor Saul Alinsky wrote in his book Rules for Radicals:

“The tenth rule of the ethics of rules and means is that you do what you can with what you have and clothe it in moral arguments. …the essence of Lenin’s speeches during this period was “They have the guns and therefore we are for peace and for reformation through the ballot. When we have the guns then it will be through the bullet.” And it was — P.36-37 or Rules for Radicals.”

Obama’s puppet masters will do anything to get the guns Lenin was talking about. They may be metaphorical guns while the real weapons are the coercive power of the government. This is what ObamaCare is all about; it is the metaphorical bullets Lenin was talking about. As for Obama’s corporate and entertainment industry supporters I refer to another Alinsky quote:

“I have on occasion remarked that I felt confident that I could persuade a millionaire on a Friday to subsidize a revolution for Saturday out of which he would make a huge profit on Sunday even though he was certain to be executed on Monday. — P.150 Rules for Radicals.”

I have included this short video, which summarizes the story of Barack Hussein Obama. I have covered most of the bullet points shown in the video presentation, but there are a few I have passed over for brevity or for which I could find no immediate documentation. On the whole the video can be considered an executive summary of this blog post.

This is the hollow man we have in the White House, a person of no great intellect or moral foundation formed, prepared and managed by the dark Marxist forces of the Chicago political machine and the foundations financed by the greatest puppet master of them all — George Soros — that want to transform the United States into a socialist utopia. Be it Marxist masterminds or corporate puppeteers Barack Hussein Obama is a true Manchurian Candidate.

The Occupy Movement Is A Bust

"To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers, have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, the guarantee to everyone the free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it." — Thomas Jefferson

On Tuesday, May 1^st there were demonstrations by the Occupy Wall Street crowd in various cities across the United States. With the exception of Cleveland, Seattle, and Oakland most of the demonstrators were a big bust with little or no news coverage. In Cleveland the FBI, through a sting operation arrested five anarchists who wanted to blow up a bridge and in Seattle, known for its leftists leanings, arrests were made for vandalism and attacks on the police. Outside of these highly publicized events the occupy crowd did not make much of impact. Perhaps this was due to the coming end of the college year with final exams and the usual suspects now looking for jobs that are hard to come by.

Robert Weissberg writes in his article in American Thinker entitled Deciphering the Occupy Wall Street Movement:

“How are we to understand the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement? Is it, as many on the left insist, a commendable reaction to "obscene" inequalities in wealth? Or is it, as according to the right, a union-financed, thinly disguised Obama-supported ruse to stir up egalitarian envy? Both interpretations are partially valid, but let me offer a different take, and one that links OWS to countless similar political outcroppings that have flourished since the 1960s.

My descriptor is "recreational politics" and as such lies somewhere between, say, the well-organized ideologically driven Communist Party USA and the spontaneous, disorganized 1992 LA "Rodney King" riot. The ancestors of today's recreational politics would include a small portion of the civil rights movement and much of the opposition to the Vietnam War.

As a biologist might identify the key characteristics of new species, here are the Occupy movement's essential traits.

First, the ideological "glue" holding the movement together is a collection of alluring slogans and clichés that evaporate into nothingness when probed. Critically, if asked (and I have asked), no two participants can flesh out terms like "social justice" or "ending poverty." This is predictable, since recreational politics lacks anything resembling officially certified dogma, let alone leaders who can impose orthodoxy. No Communist Manifesto or Chairman Mao's Little Red Book here. This is make-it-up-as-you-go-along politics, and the result is, naturally, a cacophony of strident voices light-years away from anything resembling a legislative agenda.”

Mr. Weissberg is correct when he points out that the OWS movement, if it can be called a movement, lacks any comprehensive agenda, or any agenda at all. For the most part the OWS is comprised of upper middle class college students, who have been indoctrinated by a bevy of left-wing and communist leaning professors, wanting not to pay back their exorbitant student loans, loans they took with their free will for colleges and universities that promoted them knowing the federal government would guarantee the loans.

While the OWS gang point at the banks and corporations as the culprits in our stagnant economy and cause of many of the ills in the country they say nothing about the colleges who have taken them and their parents to the cleaners for, in many cases, educations that will not do them much good in the job market. I just can’t see how breaking the windows of a Starbucks, a left leaning corporation, and promoting anarchy will do them much good.

Mr. Weissberg continues:

“The ideological incoherence is displayed in any OWS event. I recently watched their Manhattan May Day parade; dozens of signs and banners abounded, most homemade, and no two were precisely alike. Messages covered the ideological waterfront -- everything from opposing racism to calling for bankers to be put on trial. There were signs for open borders, a Palestinian flag, and demands for government-supplied well-paying jobs. Some marchers just shouted obscenities at nearby police. Try assembling these messages into a sensible political agenda. Hopeless.

Second, participants gravitate to the easy, "fun" aspects of movement politics while neglecting essential drudgery. My forty years as a college professor confirms that this is typical for today's politically inclined (often lazy) youngsters. Who wants to collate mailing lists if one can chant slogans while dancing to the drum beat? With no hierarchy to assign odious tasks and monitor performance, "pop-up" crusades tend toward chaos. Beyond calling for the marchers to assemble so as to "confront the ruling class," running OWS is akin to herding cats.

Third, since the movement lacks any concrete agenda, there can be no pay-off; absent this incentive, the only available fuel is passion, and we all know how passion wilts with time. The upshot, then, is that tactics abandon accomplishing anything tangible (too tedious, anyhow) to favor behavior whose real purpose is sustaining the passion. Given a choice between, say, drafting a legislative proposal to help the poor versus walking down the middle of the Brooklyn Bridge to instigate a media-circus police confrontation, the latter wins every time. After all, who can get excited over researching the impact of the minimum wage on poverty? But five minutes on the local 6:00PM news and screaming "police brutality" is such great fun -- enough fun to keep doing it, at least for a day or two more.”

The Constitution gives these useful idiots the right of free speech, but I venture to say that most of them have no idea of the mind of our Founders, the Federalist Papers, or the rise of the progressive movement. I can’t see how a farmer in Nebraska working 24/7 or a welder in the North Dakota oil fields, who are working hard to earn a good living, give a tinker’s damn about the OWS crowd and look at them as a bunch of pampered and spoiled children who have come of age in a society devoted to progressivism, plunder, and cultural Marxism.

The presence of such a "movement" is evidence of our abysmal public education system. If each of these kids had received about two hours of training on basic economics, western civilization and United States government, they would be embarrassed to hold the silly positions they do.

If they really wanted to protest the one percent they should have demonstrated outside of last week’s correspondent’s dinner in Washington, D.C. where hundreds of liberal print and media journalists were gathered in the tuxedos and designer dresses drinking expensive champagne and eating $100 dollar meals. These are the folks that use the OWS gang for ratings and news stories, but would not relinquish one penny of their wealth to the OWS.

Professor Weissberg concludes his critique of the OWS movement by stating:

“Political participation is one of my academic specialties, and my lectures always cite the great German sociologist Max Weber to explain political successes and failures. In a nutshell, successful movements must transition from charismatic leadership to bureaucratic organizations, where aims are advanced business-like. The contemporary gay rights movement illustrates this perfectly -- from ragtag spontaneous Stonewall demonstrations to the Human Rights Campaign with an impressive Washington headquarters and a paid, ample professional staff to promote gay rights with specific proposals, expert fund-raising, and all the rest. Most bottom-up movements cannot make this transition and are thus doomed to become historical footnotes.

Finally, down deep, OWS, like so many spontaneous recreational movements before it, is not serious about accomplishing anything other than some fun therapy. How do I know? Oscar Wilde once quipped that only shallow people do not judge by appearances, and I judge by appearances. If you want to shape American public opinion, you must outwardly respect public norms, and one look at the OWS crowd shows that they don't. Thanks to living in lower Manhattan, I've long observed these people in their various habitats, and take my word: with few exceptions, they look like unwashed, ill-clothed street people. To make matters worse, their trash-laden venues only confirm this rejection of public sensibilities. And I suspect that this is intentional -- they have no interest in winning public sympathy by looking like well-scrubbed all-American college kids. Once more, fun outweighs accomplishing anything.

In general, the attire of movement participants is, in my estimation, the best indicator of seriousness. Remember the pictures of Southern blacks conducting sit-ins or marching for the right to vote? Every single participate was in a dark suit, white shirt, and tie and was neatly groomed! And they made a point of speaking clear English with zero profanities. Let their opponents dress like slobs and curse. In 1968, many students traveled to New Hampshire to elect the anti-war Eugene McCarthy, who was running in the Democratic primary against the hawkish President Lyndon Johnson. Given that many of these volunteers faced the draft, this was serious business, and their slogan was "Neat and Clean for Gene." Thus, rather than alienate conservative New Hampshire voters, they got real haircuts, shaved their scruffy beards, and dressed like preppie college students. And it was worth it -- McCarthy fell short, but his strong showing forced LBJ not to seek a second full term.

The bottom line, then, is that OWS is not a serious political movement -- not a movement to be feared, let alone respected. It exists thanks to a kind and gentle political system that has a warm spot for wackiness and dissent that stops well short of treason. Only in Western democracies do police receive special training on how to handle protestors with kid gloves. Actually, street theatre, not political activism, better depicts OWS, and perhaps we should be thankful that its most serious offense is occasionally disrupting traffic, a few minor police scuffles, making too much noise, and generating millions in police overtime. America has seen and occasionally experienced far worse.”

Professor Weissberg makes an astute academic analysis of the OWS, but as Paul Harvey used to say there is more to the story.

Last fall when the OWS began by occupying New York City's Zuccotti Park the Washington Post described the movement, which has been described as a "democratic awakening" by Cornel West, difficult to distill to a few demands. On October 12, the Los Angeles City Council became one of the first governmental bodies in the United States to adopt a resolution stating its informal support of the Occupy movement.

It did not take long for Democrat luminaries like Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama to praise the movement’s tactics and goals even though they did not know what the goals were. They were also quick to compare OWS to the Arab Spring in Cairo’s Tahrir Square — and we know how that all turned out.

It did not take long for the union bosses like Richard Trumka and the SEIU to jump on the bandwagon. Even Mayor Bloomberg took a conciliatory stance by not evicting the OWS from the park until conditions became so unsanitary and deplorable that he had to take action in the interest of public health. Also it has been reported that George Soros provided financial support for food, medicines, and kitchen and sanitary facilities.

With this in mind one has to think there is a larger elephant looming in the background. The dedicated communists and socialist have always used useful idiots like the passionate students of OWS. Hitler used it to gain power in Germany, Mussolini and Italy and the master of the use of the useful idiots Lenin in the Soviet Union. In fact it was Lenin who coined the phrase.

James Madison warned of factions such as the OWS movement in Federalist Paper No. 10 where he posed the argument for establishing a republican form of government when he wrote:

“…Among the numerous advantages promised by a well-constructed Union, none deserves to be more accurately developed than its tendency to break and control the violence of faction. The friend of popular governments never finds himself so much alarmed for their character and fate as when he contemplates their propensity to this dangerous vice. He will not fail, therefore, to set a due value on any plan which, without violating the principles to which he is attached, provides a proper cure for it. The instability, injustice, and confusion introduced into the public councils have, in truth, been the mortal diseases under which popular governments have everywhere perished, as they continue to be the favorite and fruitful topics from which the adversaries to liberty derive their most specious declamations.”

Madison continues:

…” By a faction I understand a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.”

The progressives, socialist, and communists hiding behind the scenes will no doubt hijack the OWS movement use the boneheaded radical students until they are no long of use to them. Once this happens the face of the movement will change. Gone will be the anarchists and vandals. They will be replaced with the people like Van Jones and Bill Ayers. They will look and talk like the “Clean for Gene” crowd and push their social justice and fairness agenda. This is the point Professor Weissberg misses or elected not to delve into.

America’s Useful Idiots

“The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence." — John Adams

Many years ago, a phrase was coined by the leaders of the Soviet Union to describe those in the West, like John Reed, who naively promoted the cause of Russian Communism when in reality they were held in contempt and were being cynically used by the Soviet hierarchy. The term "useful idiot" more than ever applies to a vast swath of citizens in the United States who have been cynically used by the hardcore left for a cause they are unwilling or unable to understand.

Among the mysteries confronting those who have immigrated to the United States from countries that have experienced the devastating outcome of socialist/Marxist ideology is why seemingly successful and educated people could be so easily swayed to support those whose end-game is to transform the country into a socialist "utopia" and to control the day-to-day lives of all Americans. Among these "useful idiots" are a seeming majority of the Jewish population as well as many in business, and nearly all in entertainment and the media.

The answer appears to be that despite the hardcore left accounting for less than 20% of the population, their influence extends far beyond thanks to the apparent inability of their peripheral supporters to use any modicum of reasoning — as the left in the United States has been able to identify and manipulate those susceptible to emotional arguments.

Traditionally, the age-old Marxist strategy of fomenting class warfare and demonizing capitalism has been an effective tactic with those in the lower-income and education strata, who can be easily swayed to blame others for their perceived misfortune. However, in a nation, such as the United States, which has experienced great peace and prosperity for nearly seven decades and whose population is overwhelmingly middle-class, this argument alone cannot sway a sufficient number to support the ascension of those dedicated to socialist/Marxist ideology.

Therefore, while still using the class-warfare dialog to keep the lower classes stirred up, the left has, beginning in the 1920s but accelerating in the 1960s, combined class warfare with the promotion of guilt for one's success and falsely portraying their ideological enemies as being intolerant extremists whose single-minded determination is to limit and control everyone's lifestyle, and who are at their core virulent racists. Yet leftists are just what they accuse their opponents of being.

President Barack Obama and Wall Street occupiers, along with their allies in the mainstream media and on college campuses, have maintained an ongoing attack on high-income earners, people they call 1 percenters. Listening to their deceitful demagoguery, you would naturally think of them as 99 percenters, but you'd be dead-wrong.

Last week, MSN Money posted a report titled "The richest counties in America." According to the report, residents of those 15 wealthiest counties "have median household incomes that are double the national average." Three of those counties have a median income of more than $100,000. The report goes on to say, "While many Americans struggle to find jobs, balance their budgets and get by with less, some folks are living high on the hog." Let's look at some of those counties.

Loudoun County, Va., has a median household income of $119,540, making it the nation's richest county. Virginia's Fairfax County is next, with a median household income of $103,010; the median price of a house is $507,800. Third is Howard County, Md., where the median household income is $101,771. These three richest counties have seven nearby high-income neighbors, which include Arlington and Montgomery counties. The nation's richest counties are close to Washington, D.C., where people come to do good and wind up doing well for themselves.

These 1 percenters are not wealthy right-wing Republicans; they are Obama's liberals. How can one tell? It turns out that seven of the 10 wealthiest counties in the Washington area voted overwhelmingly for Obama in 2008. These liberals portray themselves as 99 percenters when they are really 1 percenters. They're simply running a deceitful rope-a-dope, aided by the mainstream media, on the American people.

During last year's Occupy movement, truly seedy-looking characters camped out on the streets and in the parks of several of our cities, causing millions of dollars of property damage. They committed robberies, thefts and sex crimes. Some of their lowlife acts, such as defecating and urinating in public and on police vehicles, were filmed. These people also portrayed themselves as 99 percenters. It turns out that they weren't that at all.

Will Rahn, deputy editor for The Daily Caller, wrote an article titled "NYC arrest records: Many Occupy Wall Street protesters live in luxury" (Nov. 2, 2011). Nearly 1,000 protesters were arrested in New York between Sept. 18 and Oct. 15. Police collected information on each arrestee's name, age, sex, criminal charge, home address and — in most cases — race. The median value of the homes of the arrestees was $305,000 — a far higher number than the $185,400 median value of owner-occupied homes of the rest of us. Ninety-five of the arrestees lived in homes valued at more than $500,000. Those who rented paid a median rent of $1,850 per month. Of the 984 protesters arrested, at least 797 are white. One Occupy Wall Street protester arrested — presumably, if you listen to the mainstream media, penniless and from a blue-collar family — lived in an $850,000 home in the nation's capital.

Recall that while on the campaign trail, Obama promised, "We will stand up in this election to bring about the change that won't just win an election but will transform America." Along with progressives, who formerly called themselves liberals, Obama wants to transform America into a European-like socialist nation. The Occupy protesters and their useful idiots in the media and on college campuses proudly display signs and banners revealing their preferences and affiliations, such as "Communist Party USA," "Democratic Socialists of America" and "Fight for Socialism." The American Nazi Party has issued an official endorsement of Occupy. The movement is also supported by White House leftist allies such as the Working Families Party, the Service Employees International Union — as well as most other labor unions — ACORN, the New Party and the Democratic National Committee.

During the forthcoming elections, we can be assured that these people will do all they can, including violent protests, to help Obama have an additional four years to continue his transformation of our nation.

The tactic of fomenting guilt for one's success is a codicil to overt class warfare. This began with Franklin Roosevelt’s Second Bill of Rights announced in his 1944 Message to Congress where he advocated a “positive bill of rights when he stated:

“In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all—regardless of station, race, or creed.

Among these are:

• The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;
• The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
• The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
• The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;
• The right of every family to a decent home;
• The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
• The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
• The right to a good education.”

The argument begins with the benign assertion that in a nation this wealthy, surely everyone can be guaranteed a minimal level of support at the taxpayers' expense. Particularly wealthy taxpayers should be willing to part with a "fair share" of their income (as defined by the left) in order to assuage their guilt for living in a country that "facilitated" their becoming rich. Not desiring to be branded as insensitive or evil, many simply acquiesced to this not-so-subtle extortion. Further, in an attempt to buy peace, many contributed vast sums of money to the Democratic Party — now dominated by the far left.

The management of many large corporations as well as numerous successful business owners, entrepreneurs, and inheritors of wealth refused to understand that as in all protection rackets, there is never an end to the demand for payment. Additionally, these dupes were funding a political party whose end-game was to destroy the system that made them successful in the first place. All the while the money being siphoned out of the economy by the government in order to establish a so-called "safety net" was being used to create an ever-expanding dependent class who would vote to keep the left in power.

The Obama administration represents the culmination of this process, as leftists have, through an avalanche of mandates, regulations, and laws, begun weaving a suffocating web around the American free market, as they assume complete control of the economy. Firmly in their clutches will be those who fall into the ever-changing definition of rich and successful.

In the 1960s, America experienced a social revolution against historical and societal norms. An era of peace and prosperity unprecedented in the history of mankind was underway, allowing a new generation to focus on hedonistic pursuits, self-aggrandizement, and a search for so-called "meaning" in their lives. Traditions, based on the religious foundation of the country and the societal mores that sprang from them, came to be viewed as standing in the way of allowing the population to experience absolute freedom.

Coupled with the Johnson administration's mishandling of the Vietnam War, a broad movement began. The true believers of the left promptly injected themselves into this landscape, proclaiming to the gullible that not only was the United States waging an unjust war, but the U.S. was by its nature a repressive country. The siren song of a society wherein all are treated fairly and there are no absolutes found eager ears.

In short order, the left began to portray their political adversaries as intolerant religious zealots whose primary objective was to deny personal freedom and cast a beady eye toward whatever was happening in the bedroom. An unfettered lifestyle as well as being part of the in-crowd is of paramount importance to not only the vast majority of those in the entertainment and media arena, but also many in the general population. They were willing cast aside any disbelief and wholeheartedly swallow the premise that only the political left or the "progressives" could protect them from this narrow-minded right-wing horde.

This is especially true in the entertainment industry where there is a greater percentage of homosexuals than in the general population. Every totalitarian statist regime from Germany’s National Socialism and Lenin’s Communism to Islamic Sharia Law does not tolerate homosexuality in any form.

This attitude was further entrenched when many conservatives and the religious community began to organize and rightly object to abortion on demand and the concomitant coarsening of the culture. The left now had a virtual stranglehold on the self-centered, whose personal pleasure and egocentrism were the primary driving forces in their lives. They were now completely in the thrall of the left, but what has this blind loyalty wrought?

A cursory examination of those nations that fell under the control of socialist/Marxist ideology reveals that among the first actions the new regimes institute is to put in place laws to greatly limit personal freedom as a prerequisite in subjugating the populace.

The passage of ObamaCare is not a health care plan; rather, it is a blueprint to allow the government to control the day-to-day lives of all Americans, and under the guise of budgetary expediency, the bureaucrats in Washington can and eventually will declare any behavior they choose unacceptable. Meanwhile, Barack Obama and his administration have been busily issuing edicts and regulations aimed at telling the American people what food they can eat, what medicines they can take, what cars they can drive, what houses they can live in, and in due course what they can do in their bedrooms. It should be noted that in Adolph Hitler’s best-selling book Mein Kampf he advocated similar health, dietary and cultural behavior norms for the German people.

One of the most consistent supporters of the Democratic Party is the Jewish population, as the Party has been portrayed over many decades as the defender of the downtrodden and in recent years a bulwark against the supposed racist fanatics on the right. However, this is a party now dominated and controlled by hardcore leftists, many of whom are virulently anti-Semitic and opposed to the state of Israel. A hallmark of all socialist/Marxist regimes is discrimination against and persecution of minorities, in particular the Jews.

That history coupled with the policies of the Obama administration in the Middle East, the Democrats' class-warfare tactics, the past and present associates of the president, and the anti-Semitic rhetoric of many on the left should alarm the American Jewish citizenry and cause them to cast a wary eye toward the party they have blindly supported over many decades. Unfortunately, the desire to believe that the worst could never happen seems to have permeated the psyche of a people whose history should serve as a cautionary tale as they continue to vote for and financially support a party that views them with disdain.

Barack Obama would not be occupying the Oval Office if it were not for the people over the past sixty years who have blindly supported those who have lied to them. The overriding stratagem of socialism/Marxism is "the ends justify the means" — thus, no lie is too big to tell, no promise too outrageous to promote, and no tactic out of bounds. The overall strategy of the Obama re-election team confirms this mindset as it conducts a demagogic campaign based solely on emotional appeals to that part of the population its operatives consider "useful idiots."

Those who thoughtlessly supported the left in America over the years are beginning to reap what they have sown. Unfortunately so is the rest of the population.