Right before his death, Andrew Breitbart claimed to be working on a big scoop about President Barack Obama. The latest revelation was supposed to be so big, so scandalous, that it would strike terror into the hearts of people everywhere.
Um, yeah, not so fast. Breitbart's big "scoop" was in revealing that President Obama had once attended a 1998 production of a play about the life of Saul Alinsky. After the play, he participated in a panel discussion about political issues and how people can become active in their communities. Really terrifying stuff here.
What's even less stunning is that political figures have been calling the president a "Saul Alinsky Radical" for several months now, so it's not that huge of a surprise to discover he did attend this play. But what's the big deal? Why the outrage? Oh, right. Alinsky was a leftie radical, a community organizer of people who lived in abject poverty, a man who wanted equality for people no matter their race or social status. Alinsky wasn't a hardened or dangerous criminal. He didn't threaten to bomb anything. Nope. The most horrifying thing Alinsky did was threaten to hold a fart-in at the Chicago Philharmonic Orchestra. Noxious, perhaps. Toxic, well, you decide.
To make matters even worse for the now deceased Breitbart, Alinsky's tactics aren't just used by Liberals. Former U.S. Congressman Dick Armey is now the head of FreedomWorks, A Tea Party group known for its grassroots efforts. Armey gives copies of Alinsky's book, "Rules for Radicals," to his organization's members because they're extremely effective. FreedomWorks spokesman Adam Brandon has claimed that Tea Partiers angrily confronting lawmakers at town hall meetings is right out of Alinsky's book.
It seems that some of his tactics were even used by Breitbart himself. Have a look:
- Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.
- Keep the pressure on, with different tactics and actions, and utilize all events of the period for your purpose.
- If you push a negative hard and deep enough, it will break through into its counterside.
So, there you have it, a few points from Alinsky's book, and it's obvious that the Right, and the late Andrw Breitbart, have taken a page out of his book in attacking the Left and the president.
Oh, one more thing, Dick Armey. Have you read Alinsky's dedication page? Better check it out, because he dedicated his book to Satan. Just sayin'.
©2011 Reno Berkeley for Gather News.
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Comments: 12
Read the second source I linked to, Clark. It was not an innocent coincidence. Dick Armey gave members of his team the book and taught them how to use Alinsky's tactics. If that isn't hypocritical, I don't know what is.
It is sad, though, that fake charges against Obama - like Newt's charge that Obama wants higher gas prices - are all that republicans have. They are a bunch of incompetent clowns, who in the wake of George W. Bush, an abject failure, can only try to hang their own ineptness on Obama. It won't work. And the cowardice of the republican candidates in the face of limpbaugh's suggested voyeurism of young women using contraceptives is - well, not surprising. Talk about "tyranny".
They are grasping at straws. Everyone with any sense knows that the president has little to do with gas prices. Even if we drill, the drop in prices would be negligible.