Barack Hussein Alinsky

By Patrick J. Buchanan

As a large and furious demonstration was under way outside and inside the Capitol in Madison last week, Barack Obama invited in a TV camera crew from Milwaukee and proceeded to fan the flames.

Dropping the mask of The Great Compromiser, Obama reverted to his role as South Chicago community organizer, charging Gov. Scott Walker and the Wisconsin legislature with an “assault on unions.”

As the late Saul Alinsky admonished in his “Rules for Radicals,” “the community organizer … must first rub raw the resentments of the people; fan the latent hostilities to the point of overt expression.”

After Obama goaded the demonstrators, the protests swelled. All 14 Democratic state senators fled to Illinois to paralyze the upper chamber by denying it a quorum. Teachers went on strike, left kids in the classroom and came to Madison. Schools shut down.

The Winner: Rush Limbaugh

A long article, friends, but one you will find very worthwhile. It puts battles just won, and the battles yet to be fought that must be won, in perspective.

From The American Spectator
By Jeffrey Lord

"I hope he fails."

With those famous four words, uttered January 16, 2009 -- only days before Barack Obama was to be inaugurated -- Rush Limbaugh drew a line in the sand.

And as a result, this morning it is Rush Limbaugh who is the undisputed winner of the 2010 election. The White House is repudiated. The Pelosi-run House of Representatives, supported by the Democrats' Congressional Campaign Committee, also deliberately targeted Limbaugh. Speaker Pelosi is, abruptly, now history. The Senate is richer by a still-undetermined number of conservatives as this goes to Internet press.

You might even call last night's landslide results a "Rushslide."

Unlike a number of conservatives and Republican leaders, Limbaugh understood from the moment of Obama's election what the new president and his allies represented: a radical, far-left agenda designed to, in the president-elect's own words, "transform America." Obama and his administration -- with the Pelosi-run House assisting -- were about nothing less than an attempt to re-make America as a collectivist, socialist state.

Characteristically, Limbaugh was fearless in saying so -- plainly. Asked to submit a 400-word essay for the Wall Street Journal on his hopes for the new administration, he responded on the air:

Look, what he's talking about is the absorption of as much of the private sector by the U.S. government as possible, from the banking business, to the mortgage industry, the automobile business, to health care. I do not want the government in charge of all of these things… See, here's the point. Everybody thinks it's outrageous to say. Look, even my staff, "Oh, you can't do that." Why not? Why is it any different, what's new, what is unfair about my saying I hope liberalism fails? Liberalism is our problem. Liberalism is what's gotten us dangerously close to the precipice here. Why do I want more of it?

So I can answer it, four words, "I hope he fails." And that would be the most outrageous thing anybody in this climate could say. Shows you just how far gone we are. Well, I know, I know. I am the last man standing.

The outrage was instantaneous.

Five days later, a bare 24 hours after Obama had been sworn-in, Fox News host and fellow talk radio star Sean Hannity sat down with Limbaugh in Florida. As the Fox cameras rolled, Rush elaborated in answering Hannity's questions, making himself crystal clear: in spite of the uproar created by his "I hope he fails" remark, Rush Limbaugh would not be backing down. The Obama agenda, he was certain, was doomed to inevitable failure, and if others were afraid to say so, Rush Limbaugh was not.

LIMBAUGH:…When I see the media and the entire establishment on the left lay down and become cult-like and not examine who he is, what he's done, and not really examine what he says, but just praise him because of how he says it, my antenna go up.

Now I look at the things that he has said, and I'm very much concerned that our greatness is going to be redefined in such a way that it won't be great, that we're just going to become average. You cannot have this large of government role in the private sector with so many people thinking that just because they're Americans they're entitled to things, that this guy is going to pass them out and keep this country great and innovative, full of entrepreneurs, and -- these things concern me.

Now my critics, and yours, when they hear me say things like this, they -- have knee-jerk reactions. They're not listening or parsing my words, either. They're just, Limbaugh is not with the program.

…. So I shamelessly say, no, I want him to fail, if his agenda is a far-left collectivism, some people say socialism, as a conservative heartfelt, deeply, why would I want socialism to succeed?… I don't know where what he wants to try has worked…. It hasn't worked…. It doesn't work… it never has, and I don't think this is going to be the record breaker."

Hearing this, watching this, the Obama White House made a fateful decision.

As Obama and his aides began relentlessly pushing exactly the far-left agenda that Limbaugh so publicly predicted would fail, they decided to bring the hardball of Chicago politics into play: they would intimidate their opponents by making an example of America's number one conservative talk radio star. .

Which is exactly the point where the path to the conservative victory of 2010 began.

A MERE THREE DAYS after Obama took office, Republican congressional leaders were ushered into the White House for their first formal meeting with the new president. Wary of Obama proposals for a massive stimulus bill, with a huge health care bill looming beyond that, they sat quietly as Obama's Limbaugh strategy began to unfold. Borrowing a tactic from Rules for Radicals, the handbook written by Obama's hero the late Chicago radical community activist Saul Alinsky, Obama the one-time community activist become president lectured the astonished GOP leadership, saying pointedly "You can't just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done." The Republicans were barely out the door before the story leaked, causing a media feeding frenzy as the White House knew it would.

With that, the stage for the entire next two-years was set. The looming battle over the direction of America would be deliberately, willfully cast -- by the White House itself -- as a battle royal between the President of the United States and Rush Limbaugh. The specific tactic to be employed was Rule Number 12 of Alinsky's Rules for Radicals. Which reads this way:

RULE 12: Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it." Cut off the support network and isolate the target from sympathy. Go after people and not institutions; people hurt faster than institutions. (This is cruel, but very effective. Direct, personalized criticism and ridicule works.)

The Rule 12 signal was flashed by the White House to every Democrat on Capitol Hill along with every Obama ally in the media: the President personally is going to lead the charge against Rush Limbaugh and he was inviting them to join the fray.

Whatever issue was being debated -- the stimulus, health care, immigration, the topic didn't matter -- Rush Limbaugh was to be the highly personalized target of the Obama White House and all of the American Left. They would freeze his image in the public mind in as unfavorable and polarizing a fashion as they could manage. Then Limbaugh would be assaulted repeatedly in the style of Rule 12 as the next two years unfolded.

An attempt was made to intimidate Rush by going after what Alinskyites called a target's "support network" -- which is to say the Rush Limbaugh radio show was targeted when several liberal activist groups filed a "Petition for Inquiry into Hate Speech in the Media and Request to update report on The Role of Telecommunications in Hate Crimes" with the Federal Communications Commission -- the Obama-run government agency that regulates radio airwaves. Limbaugh was specifically cited by name. The unsubtle message: we are coming after your radio show.

To "isolate the target from sympathy" in Alinsky style, Rush was portrayed in as unflattering personal terms as the Obama allies could conjure up. The attacks were designed to be, as Alinsky stipulated, "cruel… direct… personalized" because "ridicule works."

And so the anti-Rush deluge began.

Having earlier said that it "is my job" to make Obama's presidency work, MSNBC's Chris Matthews, who famously said of an Obama speech that "I felt this thrill going up my leg," went to work. He memorably described Rush as "Mr. Big," the villain played by actor Yaphet Kotto in the James Bond movie Live and Let Die,taunting: "In the end they jam a big CO2 pellet in his face and he blew up. I have to tell you, Rush Limbaugh is looking more and more like Mr. Big, and at some point somebody's going to jam a CO2 pellet into his head and he's going to explode like a giant blimp. That day may come. Not yet. But we'll be there to watch. I think he's Mr. Big, I think Yaphet Kotto. Are you watching, Rush?"

"What about this bonehead Rush Limbaugh?" sneered David Letterman on his Late Night show. Newsweek, in the middle of a death spiral that eventually had it being sold by the Washington Post for one dollar plus millions in debt, produced Jonathan Alter sniggering that Rush was a "black-shirted joke" while his colleague Richard Wolffe sagely assured that Rush was an "extreme voice." On and on and on this Alinsky tactic played, with Rush depicted as everything from a "howler" to a man "transformed into [a] car-wrecking quality spectacle" -- both of these from the New York Times. Nor was the Limbaugh audience to escape this treatment, with Jack Cafferty of CNN dismissing some 20 million Americans as "right-wing nuts."

The Obama White House was eating this stuff up, convinced they had a winning strategy.

Politico reported it this way:

Top Democrats believe they have struck political gold by depicting Rush Limbaugh as the new face of the Republican Party, a full-scale effort first hatched by some of the most familiar names in politics and now being guided in part from inside the White House.

The story went on to say that liberals were lining up to bash Limbaugh as the leader of the conservative opposition.

MOST SPECTACULARLY in terms of last night's results, Pelosi loyalist Congressman Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), the head of the Democrat's Congressional Campaign Committee, boasted that House Democrats were key players in the anti-Rush strategy. "We helped get the ball rolling on this," bragged Van Hollen. As of last night, Van Hollen had succeeded in losing about 60 House seats to the GOP, a historic loss making Pelosi an ex-Speaker if not an ex-House member period if she decides to resign her San Francisco seat.

All of which is to say, Pelosi and Van Hollen, along with the Obama White House, bet the ranch on a strategy that featured as its centerpiece an attack on Rush Limbaugh. They didn't just lose, they were humiliated.

Also involved in setting this course for Democrats was the George Soros-funded left-wing Center for American Progress, led by ex-Clinton White House chief of staff John Podesta. The group jumped aboard, launching an attack against "hate radio host Rush Limbaugh." The liberal group Americans United for Change quickly put up an ad and calling the GOP "The Rush Limbaugh Party." It accused GOP Senators and House members of repeatedly saying "no" to the Obama agenda -- because they were listening to Rush Limbaugh.

Politico also named the names behind this brainchild. Specifically, in addition to the President himself, those who thought this a fabulous strategy were then-White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, White House Senior Advisor David Axelrod and ex-Clinton aides James Carville and Paul Begala.

It was Begala who would provide some of the high-level reasoning behind the selection of Rush as Obama's Number One opponent.:

But here's the secret: I don't like Rush Limbaugh. Here's the other secret: He is the most powerful person in the Republican Party today, bar none.

Obama's campaign manager, David Plouffe, meticulously crafted an op-ed for the Washington Post that was titled "Minority Leader Limbaugh." Plouffe threw down the gauntlet, portraying the battle over Obama's agenda as a one-on-one, mano-a-mano fight to the political death with Rush Limbaugh. The GOP leadership on Capitol Hill was taunted because "Rush Limbaugh has become their leader." Displaying a cocky security that can only come from drinking one's own Kool-Aid, Plouffe depicted Obama as triumphant in the polls of the moment, specifically boasting that "voters trust President Obama on the economy." Listening to Rush Limbaugh, the Obama campaign manager warned Republicans, "hardly seems like the best way out of the political wilderness."

In words that this morning look stunningly stupid, Plouffe said if the GOP kept listening to Limbaugh, the GOP was in danger of permanently losing "independent voters, who give the president high marks on his handling of the economy and his job overall." Said Plouffe of Limbaugh's challenge: "For many Americans, hungry for leadership and cooperation, this sounded like fingernails on a chalkboard…." Seemingly oblivious to the fact that leadership was exactly what Limbaugh was providing to "many Americans hungry for leadership," Plouffe vowed Republican House and Senate members would rue the day they listened to Limbaugh, all voting unanimously -- with the exception of three liberal GOP Senators -- to oppose the Obama stimulus. A stimulus which, insisted Plouffe as he dug himself even deeper, would "create or save at least 3 million jobs." Concluded Obama's campaign manager: if the GOP kept listening to Rush Limbaugh it would force the GOP to "find out what it means for a political party to hit rock bottom."

The gain, said former Speaker Newt Gingrich, would be "the largest one-party gain since 1932." The GOP needed 39-seats to win control. They were headed for at least 60 as this is written.

No word this morning whether Plouffe will be writing a piece entitled "Speaker Limbaugh."

UNDAUNTED EVEN AS THINGS looked bleak, Rush picked up the challenge. He had spent over twenty years discussing conservative principles on his show. A book just released by New York Times Book Editor Sam Tanenhaus was getting liberal media attention. The title: The Death of Conservatism. The author told NPR: "When Rush Limbaugh said he wanted Barack Obama to fail, he was not just spitting out a provocative line, he was actually handing out a kind of marching orders to the right, which they now seem to be following." And listening to what Rush Limbaugh had to say was the death knell for conservatism because Limbaugh, Tanenhaus insisted, was far out in a "fringe orbit".

Limbaugh knew in his bones not only that conservatism was not dead, but that it was neither in need of some sort of political cosmetic surgery as some sunshine conservatives were insisting. And the real people out on a fringe orbit were liberals like Tanenhaus -- not to mention Obama, Pelosi and their media allies. In a January, 2008 monologue about Ronald Reagan and Reagan conservatism, a subject that had arisen in the presidential primaries, Rush had already touched on the subject before Obama was even nominated:

Well, conservatism isn't dead because it cannot be dead. Conservatism is not manmade. Conservatism is a philosophy. It's not a scheme. It's not a plan to figure out what the American people need and want, and then give it to them. That's populism! Conservatism is a philosophy based on God-given natural rights. The Declaration of Independence, is that dead? Of course not! What's dead is leadership on the Republican side, and because there is a lack of leadership of someone who [has] the substantive understanding of liberty and the political skills to advance it, we get all this cockamamie nonsense about the death of our principles. Our principles are not dead! Our principles cannot die.

Now, under direct attack by the President and his House allies, previously scheduled to address the Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) Limbaugh showed up to be greeted as the hero of the Obama Resistance. And promptly lit into the Obama agenda. By turns serious, funny, and self-mocking -- he made the case for conservatism with his typical optimistic gusto. "If we're going to convince the American people what's about to happen to them is as disastrous as anything in their lives in peacetime, we're going to have to discuss philosophy with them. We are going to have to talk about principles…" The crowd roared its approval, cheering wildly as he demanded of sunshine conservatives who insisted that conservatism needed to be somehow redefined from Ronald Reagan's principles: "How do you get rid of Reagan from conservatism?"

The very next day White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel appeared on CBS's Face the Nation to proclaim Limbaugh as "the voice and the intellectual force and energy behind the Republican Party." It was not meant as a compliment. Once in gear, Obama's notoriously blunt top aide couldn't stop himself, going on to say:

He has laid out his vision, in my view. And he said it clearly. I compliment him for that. He's been very up front and I compliment him for that. He's not hiding. He's asked for President Obama and called for President Obama to fail. That's his view. And that's what he has enunciated. And whenever a Republican criticizes him, they have to run back and apologize to him and say they were misunderstood. He is the voice and the intellectual force and energy behind the Republican Party. He has been up front about what he views and hasn't stepped back from that, which is he hopes for failure. He said it and I compliment him for his honesty. But that's their philosophy that is enunciated by Rush Limbaugh and I think that's the wrong philosophy for America.

More tellingly -- particularly in light of the battles to come -- there was a shuffling of some conservative feet. When it came to defending Limbaugh and the timeless conservative principles he (and Reagan before him) had not only championed in both good times and bad for over twenty years, some flinched. To update the famous Thomas Paine reference ("These are the times that try men's souls: The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.") there were sunshine conservatives who took one look at the rise of Obama and headed for the philosophical hills.

Even as Rush Limbaugh, the leading conservative in the country, was under attack by every conceivable gun in the arsenal of the American Left from the President of the United States and the Speaker of the House on down, there were those who wimped, whistled, or ran.

GOP consultant Mike Murphy went on NBC's Meet the Press the very same day Emanuel was attacking Limbaugh over on CBS to insist:

The country is changing…. And if we don't modernize conservatism, we are going to have a party of 25 percent of the vote going to Limbaugh rallies, joining every applause line, ripping the furniture up, we're going to be in permanent minority status.

None of this was new, of course. Days before Obama's 2008 election, sunshine conservative Ross Douthat, a member in good standing of a species American Spectator founder R. Emmett Tyrrell calls in his book After the Hangover "Reformed Conservatives" (or, more pithily, "the Benedict Arnolds, Backstabbers, Bruti, and Bums" of the conservative movement), took to the liberal pages of the Atlantic to mock Rush's insistence on adhering to principle.

Over at the New York Times, David Brooks stated flatly a few days after Obama's election that it was not a good idea to be listening to conservative "traditionalists" like "Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity" but lamented that's what would happen. And in doing this, said Brooks, "….the Republican Party will probably veer right in the years ahead, and suffer more defeats."

BUT MURPHY, DOUTHAT, AND BROOKS were pikers when it came to former Bush speechwriter David Frum. Handed the cover of Newsweek for a lengthy article titled "Why Rush is Wrong," in a remarkable piece of writing Frum seemed to be an eager participant in a trash-for-cash article that is standard-operating-procedure for sunshine conservatives seeking approval from the liberal media. Frum chose for his venue a failing national news magazine that had traded its own reputation to the far-left in return for a soon-to-be sale by the Washington Post for -- literally - one dollar and millions in debt. The story was not only a Frum version of the personal insult-laden Alinsky strategy, also scolding Reaganites, it repeatedly insisted Rush was a distinct liability to any conservative or Republican victory -- in 2010 or any other election year.

According to Frum, who larded his three-alarm Rush-warnings throughout a piece filled with personal insults that appeared designed to appease the Washington social crowd, Rush Limbaugh was "kryptonite, weakening the GOP nationally." If the GOP listened to Limbaugh it would never win women voters who "trust and admire" Obama. Rush's CPAC speech was a terrible liability that was certain to lose votes: "Those images of crowds of CPACers cheering Rush's every rancorous word --we'll be seeing them rebroadcast for a long time." It was idiocy to be listening to Limbaugh, as so many conservatives seemed to be doing: "But do the rest of us understand what we are doing to ourselves by accepting this leadership?" And finally, the GOP could not possibly win in 2010 because "Rush Limbaugh is a seriously unpopular figure among the voters that conservatives and Republicans need to reach."

This morning, Rush Limbaugh stands vindicated.

His critics -- whether on the far-left or of the sunshine conservative variety -- have been not simply defeated but routed, humiliated. Independents fled Obama, women fled Obama, the people of Illinois fled Obama. And so on. And so on.

Yesterday wasn't just an ordinary election.

It was a "Rushslide." The latest chapter in the story not just of a conservative ascendancy, but the story of the ongoing conservative majority.

But there is one very important point here.

What Rush Limbaugh's critics have miscalculated is this. As his friend Sean Hannity says, Rush is the Babe Ruth of talk radio. It should never be forgotten that when Babe Ruth stepped onto a baseball diamond -- he was never alone. He had teammates. And the stands at Yankee Stadium and every place else he played were filled with cheering fans.

In the drive to target Rush Limbaugh, millions of Americans -- from fellow talk radio stars to Fox News to the vast audience of average Americans -- listened and watched these White House-directed anti-Limbaugh screeds first with amazement, then a growing incredulity which finally gave way to outrage.

Why?

Because all knew at the end of the day that as sure as God made little green apples what began with Rush would end with everyday Americans. You. Your friends. Your neighbors. The barber, the housewife, the independent, the Catholic, Protestant, or Jew and, yes, the law-abiding everyday Muslim. The college student, the entrepreneur, the doctor, the plumber. Americans all -- every one dreaming dreams that somebody in Washington from the President on down was scheming to control, to limit, to regulate, to tax -- and ultimately control to the point of ruin. And sure enough, like clockwork, as the Tea Party burst into existence these average Americans were targeted just as was Rush. Now it wasn't just Rush who was being smeared, the Obama/Pelosi/Reid/liberal media attack machine had turned against these everyday Americans, savaging them as nothing more than a collection of racists, Nazis, and "teabaggers," for resisting their obsession with controlling Americans' every last movement in life while spending the country into trillions of debt as far as the next several generations could see. Americans who had heard Rush predict that the Obama-era would bring an all-out assault on American values realized just short of the nick-of-time not only that he was right, but that it was up to them to stop this assault in its tracks.

And so they did.

Obama, as Rush Limbaugh predicted, has in fact now failed. Nancy Pelosi is out of a job. And thanks to Rush Limbaugh, a new generation of Americans is learning that conservatism is not simply cool -- more importantly they are learning collectivism isn't smart.

But lest there be any doubt, this fight will continue. Not all races were won last night -- not all races will ever be won. Harry Reid is still there. No one in all of American history has won a unanimous election -- with the solitary exception of George Washington. 2012 lies ahead. Fortunately for conservatives, for the Republican Party -- and America -- there is one certainty as this battle continues:

Rush Limbaugh will be on the air.

Jeffrey Lord is a former Reagan White House political director and author. He writes from Pennsylvania at jlpa1@aol.com.

Limbaugh: 'What Would Saul Alinsky Do?'

By David Limbaugh

Remember the popular motto "What would Jesus do?" which was invoked by many Christians as a moral guidepost for daily living? President Barack Obama more likely adheres to "What would Saul Alinsky do?" as most recently evidenced by his apparent defiance of a federal court order on his moratorium on offshore drilling.

Politico reports that the drilling companies who secured the court order blocking the moratorium say the administration indeed is going to defy the court order. I'm quite sure that Alinsky would applaud this move: If at first you don't succeed through proper legal channels, proceed anyway, because nothing is more important than the radical ends you seek, including the means that must be trampled in the process.

Of course, shrewd Alinskyites like Obama will always have a plausible excuse for their deceitful tactics. In this case, they are alleging newly discovered facts. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said he intends to reimpose the drilling moratorium based on information that wasn't "fully developed" in May, when the six-month moratorium was imposed. Quite convenient.

The administration is also sending mixed signals, probably to introduce sufficient confusion to cover its disobedience. The government's brief filed with the court insisted, "Of course, until a further order of this Court or the Court of Appeals granting relief from this Court's Preliminary Injunction Order, Defendants will comply with the Court's Order." But attorneys for the drilling companies warn that "Secretary Salazar's comments have the obvious effect of chilling the resumption of (outer continental shelf) activities, which is precisely the wrong this Court sought to redress through its Preliminary Injunction Order."

The companies' point, notes Politico, is that Salazar's public announcement that the administration will reinstitute the moratorium will have the same practical effect as actually doing it because companies are not about to prepare rigs for drilling when they might be shut down in a few days. The administration predictably pooh-poohs the companies' concerns and says these new "facts" present an entirely different scenario. How convenient. Whenever you can't advance the football, just move the goal posts your way.

Can't you just hear an irate Alinsky-schooled Obama behind closed doors learning of the court order audaciously purporting to limit his plenary executive authority? "Just find the damn loophole -- or say you did -- and I don't want to see you again in this office until it's done."

Defying court orders is just one of many ways Obama abuses his authority. When Congress failed with its initial efforts to impose cap-and-tax legislation designed to suppress traditional energy production and consumption in the United States for the ostensible purpose of reducing global temperature an imperceptible amount over the next century, Obama's Environmental Protection Agency just issued ultra vires regulations to accomplish similar results. It didn't matter that every literate and intellectually honest person had to concede that the EPA had no statutory (or any other) authority to issue such sweeping regulations. What mattered were the administration's radical environmental goals.

When Obama wanted to secure for his favored unions a stake in his new General Motors far exceeding their actual ownership interest and rob secured creditors of their preferred-creditor status and the value of their investment, he used the power of his office to strong-arm a restructuring of the company to accomplish his aims. When Democratic Party donor and super-lawyer Tom Lauria opposed this plan on behalf of his client, the White House, according to Lauria, threatened to destroy his client's reputation. One unnamed source described the White House as the most shocking "end justifies the means" group he had ever encountered. Another attributed Obama's negotiating tactics to a "madman theory of the presidency," saying Obama wants to be feared as someone who is willing to do anything to get his way. In return for standing up for their legal rights as secured creditors and not bending to Obama's horrendously unfair demand, er, offer, Obama maligned the recalcitrant creditors as "a small group of speculators."

When inspector general Gerald Walpin blew the whistle on the corruption of an Obama friend and supporter, Obama fired Walpin and sought to discredit him as a senile misfit -- a charge wholly unsupported by the facts.

And I won't begin to recite the many ways (e.g., reconciliation) Obama sought to circumvent the legislative process en route to Obamacare.

Alinsky is surely beaming from the other side.

David Limbaugh, brother of radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh, is an expert in law and politics and author of Bankrupt: The Intellectual and Moral Bankruptcy of Today's Democratic Party.

Alinsky Infiltrates the Church

From True North

As an optimist, I have a glimmer of hope that liberals will someday see the error of their ways. I’d like nothing more than for democrats to realize that the party they once loved, the party of JFK, is no longer the party that they vote for- wanting them, in effect, to “wake up and smell the coffee.”

It’s also time for those of us who are conservative Catholics to “wake up and smell the coffee” about the Catholic Church.

Just a warning: The coffee is very strong.

The priest scandal is old news. It’s a horrible, black mark on our Church’s soul and will be for years to come. But the pedophilia is not the only issue that Catholics should be concerned about, not the only reason to be outraged at the modern-day Church. We need to look into the financial dealings inside of this religious structure to expose lies, deceit, and actions that are diabolically opposed to what the Church is supposed to represent.

Something, you might say, “ain’t right.”

Unfortunately, we must once again start with Saul Alinsky, the original “community organizer” and a guy who wrote the now infamous book, “Rules for Radicals.”

Alinsky dedicated this book to “Lucifer, the first community organizer.”

That, alone, gives you a pretty good sense of this man.

What you need to know about Alinsky is that he was a radical socialist. He wanted strong revolutionaries to infiltrate cities and take over power from the evil corporations, giving it back to the people. He believed that poor people had to “rise up” and take what belonged to them. He’s been quoted as saying, “To hell with charity. The only thing you’ll get is what you’re strong enough to get.”

OK, so where does this tie in with the Church?

CCHD (The Campaign For Human Development) is a non-profit program run by the Catholic Bishops (USCCB). What isn’t well-known is that CCHD and ACORN are kissing-cousins of sort. Both began at the same time and both are off-shoots of Saul Alinsky’s ideology. CCHD sells itself as a mainstream Christian charity that “addresses the root causes of poverty in America”, but it is actually a funding tool for Alinsky inspired organizations.

You see, when the basket in church comes around and asks parishoners to give money “to the poor”, the money is actually going to support organizations which want to further the communist/socialist agenda in this country. For years, the Catholic Church was funding ACORN through this program, in fact, in the past decade, over $7.3 Million was given to ACORN from the CCHD.

This was money which Catholics believed was going to help the needy.

When ACORN was exposed, the Catholic Church was forced to stop the funding, but they still continue to fund other Alinsky organizations like the Midwest Academy, the Industrial Areas Foundation, PICO, DART, and the Gamaliel Foundation.

What do these organizations do?

Alinsky headed up the Industrial Areas Foundation until his death and called it “a school for professional radicals.” It is now run by an ex-seminarian.

The Midwest Academy is run by two Alinsky-taught socialists. According to David Horowitz of the Freedom Center, the academy “teaches radical activists tactics of direct action, targeting, confrontation, and intimidation.” Midwest promotes itself as a school committed to progressive, social change.

PICO was founded in 1972 by a Jesuit priest who was trained in Alinsky techniques. It is a training school for activists. This year PICO has worked with other organizations “to encourage churchgoers to campaign for a government takeover of the nation’s healthcare system.”

Why is the Catholic Church supporting these radical organizations? Former Treasury Secretary William E. Simon, served on the board of the Capital Research Center and wondered the same thing. He complained in the late 1980’s that CCHD was funding “radical left-wing political activism in the United States, rather than traditional types of charities.”

I called the Archdiocese in Minnesota and asked to speak with someone who could tell me where exactly the money they collected in the name of CCHD was going. I was given a woman in the “Social Justice” department. She told me, “Yes, we DO give money to Gamaliel, PICO, and a few others. They do such good work.” As I told her about the “work” these organizations actually do, she hung up on me.

Hmmm….

Just last week we heard rumblings from the Bishops of Los Angeles, Salt Lake, and Arizona, who were opposed to the new immigration law. They called the law, “draconian” and called upon the Administration to “review its impact on civil rights and liberties.” They made it clear that the Administration must include amnesty as a central component of any new law.

Now Nancy Pelosi has come out insisting that bishops and priests “speak from the pulpit” about immigration reform. The same woman who has tried to get God out of every aspect of our lives suddenly wants the help of the Church to advance her amnesty cause.

Hey Nancy, what happened to separation of church and state?

To add salt to the wound, CCHD, along with the Bishops Conference (USCCB) helped to finance and support the “May Day” rally in front of the White House. Both organizations are listed as financial supporters of the radical group CASA de Maryland, an illegal alien support group which helps to facilitate illegals into the Maryland area.

In 2006-2007, CCDH gave $40,000 to CASA. This is money taken directly from the parishoners at Catholic churches, money which is supposed to go “to the poor.”

It is instead used to help illegal immigrants, including those who are violent drug dealers and gang members, march for “their rights.”

Money from Catholics is going to help protest against our own country.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, folks. Look into the policies of the Catholic Church and you will find that along with the bishops, SEIU is sitting at the conference table, helping to negotiate Catholic Labor policy.

Honestly.

These same bishops (USCCB) supported the Health Care Bill, despite the fact that it was passed with language that still supported abortion. What happened to their moral fiber?

ACORN, SEIU, CASA, IAF, PICO, DART, the Gamaliel Foundation……..

What’s going on? How did Saul Alinsky and his radicals infiltrate our Church?

And what are we going to do about it now that we know?

Putting our head in the sand in the name of “being a good Catholic” will not solve the problem. We need to stand up to the corruption and demand to know why our Church has succumbed to the evil of a man who dedicated his book to Lucifer. We need to know how a Church, which professes to stand for “Life” can support organizations which are so-far Left that they support infanticide and other Maoist tactics.

We need to know.

And we need to educate others.

We ask liberals to wake up.

It’s time that we wake up, too.

Foes of Tea Party Movement to Infiltrate Rallies

Opponents of the fiscally conservative Tea Party movement say they plan to infiltrate and dismantle the political group by trying to make its members appear to be racist, homophobic, and moronic.

Jason Levin, creator of CrashTheTeaParty.org, says the group has 65 leaders in major cities across the country who are trying to recruit members to infiltrate Tea Party events for April 15 -- tax filing day.

He says they want to exaggerate the group's least appealing qualities, further distance the Tea Party from mainstream America, and damage the public's opinion of them.

The Tea Party movement generally unites on the fiscally conservative principles of small government, lower taxes, and less spending. Beyond that, the ideology of the people involved tends to vary dramatically.

Saul Alinsky and the Rise of Amorality in American Politics

From New English Review
By D. L. Adams

Saul Alinsky and his "community organizing" methods and philosophy have had a profound influence on the politics of the United States. Recent history would suggest that this influence is just short of catastrophic.

Alinsky's book, "Rules for Radicals," published in 1971 still has enormous effects on our country today. Hillary Clinton wrote her Wellesley College thesis on Alinsky, interviewing him personally for her research. After her graduation Alinsky offered her a job with his organization, which she refused to pursue other opportunities. President Obama worked for Alinsky organizations and taught seminars in Alinsky tactics and methodology during his "community organizing" period in Chicago. Michelle Obama echoed Alinsky’s words in her speech at the Democratic Convention.

Read the rest of this entry >>

Obama's Nazi Straw Man: An Old Alinsky Trick

From American Thinker
By Kyle-Anne Shiver

When I saw this video interview of Bill Burton, White House Deputy Press Secretary, I could not help but be reminded of one of old Saul Alinsky's favorite fake-em-out tricks of the revolutionary trade. Burton is reinforcing Pelosi's earlier claim that people were carrying Swastikas at townhalls, but goes even further and claims that folks are actually "dressing up like Hitler."

You got to give ole Saul a little credit. He was one wily deceiver, right after his hero, Deceiver in Spades, Lucifer.

Saul Alinsky, crusader for the downtrodden, darling of the Auxiliary Archbishop of Chicago, was just an underachieving nobody with neither guts nor moral code, who flummoxed a whole lot of willing-to-be-deceived power seekers. Saul Alinsky didn't invent a single new thing. His whole methodology, so widely-hailed by whole generations of leftists, could have been devised by any 12 year-old gang-style bully with half a brain and an ounce of charisma.

It's quite disheartening, now, to see the top echelons of the Democratic Party using Alinsky tactics in an attempt to freeze political dialogue, most especially when that dialogue is about the most intimate service we Americans procure for ourselves and our families: our medical care.

Nevertheless, they've decided to go at this whole hog, even if it means stripping off their dignity and parading their political bloomers right out in the public square.

When Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and now the president's own deputy press secretary conjure up images of Nazis at healthcare townhalls, they are engaging in one of the oldest tricks in anyone's book, but an especial favorite of their mentor, Saul Alinsky.

Alinsky himself employed this method, quite deviously. Alinsky biographer, Sanford D. Horwitt provides an anecdote using precisely this same diabolical tactic to deceive the people. From Horwitt's Let Them Call Me Rebel:

"...in the spring of 1972, at Tulane University...students asked Alinsky to help plan a protest of a scheduled speech by George H. W. Bush, then U.S. representative to the United Nations - a speech likely to include a defense of the Nixon administration's Vietnam War policies. The students told Alinsky they were thinking about picketing or disrupting Bush's address. That's the wrong approach, he rejoined, not very creative - and besides causing a disruption might get them thrown out of school. He told them, instead, to go to hear the speech dressed as members of the Ku Klux Klan, and whenever Bush said something in defense of the Vietnam War, they should cheer and wave placards reading, ‘The KKK supports Bush.' And that is what they did, with very successful, attention-getting results."

Planting major falsehoods has been a favorite Alinsky strategy from the start. His acolyte, Barack Obama, learned his Industrial Areas Foundation lessons on deceiving for power while on a side trip during his Harvard years, then taught the Alinsky power tactics at the University of Chicago.

Hardly qualifies as ‘Constitutional Law' if you ask me.

Covering for oneself by accusing the other fellow has been the left's most successful deception for decades now. It took on its best traction lately, as leftists within Moveon.org and others have used this Nazi smear tactic for the past eight years against George W. Bush. They've seen how well it's worked and just can't stop themselves now.

Here's a little hint from me on the Nazi card. If a few folks actually do start showing up at townhalls, opposing the MediCoup*, even dressed like Hitler and carrying a Swastika poster, I'll lay good hard cash on a bet that they've been sent by this Alinskyite President or his minions to deceive, just as Saul did with getting students to dress like the KKK at that rally back in the 70s.

And any newsman worth an ounce of table salt ought to be able to pin the tail right on that Alinsky donkey.

*MediCoup is a term coined by writer, James Lewis, right here on American Thinker.

Kyle-Anne Shiver is a frequent contributor to American Thinker and a newly syndicated columnist for Creators Syndicate. She welcomes your comments at kyleanneshiver.com.

Leftist 'Community Organizing' Infiltrates Churches

The following was published by the Oklahoma Family Policy Council, but the Marxist activity they highlight is occurring throughout the nation among Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish congregations. We would paraphrase the Policy Council's concluding call to their fellow Oklahomans by saying "wake up, fellow Americans! The wolf is in the White House."

Some have worried about the influence of the "religious Right." Well, it now appears we can all be concerned about the growing influence of the "religious Left" in Oklahoma.

OFPC has learned that at least 25 Oklahoma City-area churches, through November, 2008, have agreed to pay between $1,500 and $7,500 each year to align themselves with the OKC Metropolitan Area Interfaith Sponsoring Committee. The purpose of such alignment is for the churches to participate in Congregation Based Community Organizing (CBCO), an innocuous-sounding Oklahoma project of the Chicago-based Industrial Areas Foundation.

According to a letter OFPC has obtained that was written by Richard Klinge, an attorney with Oklahoma City-based Catholic Charities, these 25 Oklahoma City-area churches, which include Catholic, Methodist, Presbyterian, Nazarene, Unitarian, Baptist, and United Church of Christ congregations, will receive training and assistance from IAF experts in CBCO methods. OKC organizers hope that as many as 40 local churches will eventually join the CBCO effort, and IAF expects to have 5,000 "home meetings" by the end of 2009.

OFPC has also learned that similar IAF projects have been organized in past years in both Dallas and Austin, Texas, as well as in other U.S. cities nationwide. What's the big deal, you may ask?

Well, as we know, President Barack Obama learned his organizing and campaign skills--which he has used to pass his so-called "Economic Stimulus" measure in Congress--in the rough-and-tumble of south-side Chicago politics. One person who significantly influenced his thinking and methodology was author-activist Saul D. Alinsky, a radical Marxist, who died in 1972, and never met the Harvard-educated Mr. Obama.

In the late 1930's, Alinsky developed his techniques of "community organizing" as a way to help build an army of poor, minority, disenfranchised Chicagoans, who could be successful at challenging the existing power structures in a corrupt, post-Al Capone urban environment, which would eventually come to be ruled politically beginning in 1955 by Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley.

Many, though not all, of Alinsky's organizational and political techniques were explained in his 1946 book, Reville for Radicals, and in his better known 1971 book, Rules for Radicals, a book that begins by paying homage to Lucifer as the first radical, who "did it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom."

Alinsky taught that "politics was about moving from the world as it is to the world as it should be." He also allegedly coined the term, "think globally, act locally." And, as a Marxist, Alinsky naturally believed the world to be a place constituted by power and domination. Likewise, IAF teaches its disciples how to skillfully manufacture and manage political power.

Many Alinsky students have learned well, including Barack Obama, who is shown in this photo teaching University of Chicago law students Alinsky's concepts of "power analysis."

Mr. Obama was influenced by and thought well enough of Alinsky to write a chapter in a book entitled, After Alinsky: Community Organizing in Illinois. At Wellesley College, Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former first lady, senator, and now, U.S. secretary of state, wrote her senior honors thesis in political science, entitled 'There Is Only the Fight...': An Analysis of the Alinsky Model.

This explains the significance of Alinsky, who originally founded the Industrial Areas Foundation Training Institute, and through it, influenced so many others, including activist Cesar Chavez, with his Marxist organizing principles.

Saul Alinsky used the poor to further a radical agenda, while ostensibly helping them. Although the IAF has disavowed some of Alinsky's more extreme views, they still use his methods and seek to work within unsuspecting Catholic and Protestant congregations, and among other constituencies, to further a decidedly liberal agenda. From our research, you won't ever see IAF working with its protégés to encourage conservative principles in public policy.

OFPC has learned that a battle is now raging privately between conservatives and liberals, priests and parishioners, within Catholic parishes in central Oklahoma. The Most Reverend Eusebius J. Beltran, Archbishop of Oklahoma City, acknowledged as much in a recent article in The Sooner Catholic. We are unaware to what extent other central Oklahoma-area Protestant churches are informed or concerned about IAF's organizing and their liberal mission.

We at OFPC stand with, and are deeply concerned that, our Catholic friends--who have been leaders and allies with Protestant evangelicals through the years in so many important pro-life and marriage-related issues--are now having to defend their churches from those who are attempting to capture the Church in pursuit of a radical agenda, which is at odds with the conservative, traditional, Judeo-Christian, limited government values of most Oklahomans.

No doubt, it's the caring, compassionate, humane interest of well-meaning parishioners in pursuit of social justice that is encouraging many of these Oklahoma churches to get behind IAF's efforts. How they are being used for Leftist purposes was described by the late Balint Vazsonyi, a Hungarian immigrant and naturalized U.S. citizen, in Chapter 7 of his 2000 book, America's Thirty Years War: Who is Winning?

But, even apart from opposition to the duplicity of IAF because of its Marxist roots, there are other reasons for churches and congregants to be extremely wary.

Speaking of Alinsky, columnist Ryan Lizza, in a 2007 article in The New Republic said, "His legacy is less ideological than methodological. Alinsky's contribution to community organizing was to create a set of rules, a clear-eyed and systemic approach that ordinary citizens can use to gain public power."

Apparently, Alinsky's IAF, and the people whom they organize, are very effective at it. This phenomenon was acknowledged by Eagle Forum President Phyllis Schlafly in her recent March 20 column.

And, it is IAF's effectiveness and skill that is the real danger for unsuspecting Oklahomans.

For, if a poll were taken, most Oklahomans would surely--today and forever--prefer that their children and grandchildren continue to live in liberty. Most Oklahomans very much like our conservative, pro-life, family-friendly, faith-based, 101-year-old "red" state rather than the socialist, big-government, class-based utopia which IAF activists are so passionately trying to arrange for us.

Wake up, fellow Oklahomans! The wolf is at our doors, dressed in sheep's clothing.

Change? You Have No Idea

United States of America will be radically transformed beyond all recognition

From Canada Free Press
By Jim O'Neill

If Obama is elected President the United States of America will be radically transformed beyond all recognition. Obama, with a Democratic Congress rubber-stamping his agenda, will so quickly and radically steer the country to the extreme left that we’ll all have whip-lash.

In my last article I discussed the racial bigot, reverend “God Damn America” Wright, and homegrown terrorist Bill Ayers—both guilty of traitorous behavior and speech. Both of them close friends of Obama. (Yes, I know that Obama acts like Wright’s racist anti-American rhetoric is a huge surprise to him, and he claims to barely know Ayers. I don’t believe Obama—simple as that).

Like some devious fifth column infiltrator, Obama has left little in the way of a paper trail, but let me briefly discuss a few more of Obama’s associates. You would do well to look up more information on each of these individuals.

Frank Davis—Obama’s uncle; Communist Party member, and self-proclaimed child molester.

Dr. Khalid al-Mansour—Allegedly, helped get Obama into Harvard; wrote such books as “The Destruction of Western Civilization as Seen Through Islam,” and “The Challenges of Spreading Islam in America.”

Obonga (Ray) Obama—Obama’s half-brother and an Islamic radical.

Raila Amollo Odinga—Obama’s cousin, radical Muslim, and current Prime Minister of Kenya. Some of Odinga’s Islamic supporters burned down a Christian church –with fifty Christians locked inside it. Obama’s support for Odinga is well documented.

Saul Alinsky—Obama and his wife often quote him. In his book, “Rules for Radicals,” Alinsky wrote “Lest we forget [to acknowledge] the very first radical: ...the first radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did it so effectively that he...won his own kingdom—Lucifer.”

Unbelievable.

Given his questionable background and associations with radicals and extremists of various kinds, Obama would not qualify for a U.S. security clearance. But he can run for President.

Is there something in the water? What are people thinking, or more to the point, why are they not thinking?

A sheriff in Florida is under investigation for using Obama’s full name—Barrack Hussein Obama. You can’t talk about Obama’s Islamic heritage and connections; you can’t talk about his ties to black racists; you can’t speak his full name. All this before Obama’s elected President.

Change? You have no idea.

Born in June of 1951 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Jim O’Neill proudly served in the U.S. Navy from 1970-1974 in both UDT-21 (Underwater Demolition Team) and SEAL Team Two. A member of MENSA, he worked as a commercial diver in the waters off Scotland, India, and the United States. In 1998 while attending the University of South Florida as a journalism student, O’Neill won “First Place” in the “Carol Burnett/University of Hawaii AEJMC Research in Journalism Ethics Award. The annual contest was set up by Carol Burnett with the money she won from successfully suing the National Enquirer for libel.

Michelle's Boot Camps For Radicals

From Investor's Business Daily
Hat Tip: Gates of Vienna

Election '08: Democrats' reintroduction of militant Michelle Obama in Denver was supposed to show her softer side. But it only highlighted a radical part of her resume: Public Allies.

Barack Obama was a founding member of the board of Public Allies in 1992, resigning before his wife became executive director of the Chicago chapter of Public Allies in 1993. Obama plans to use the nonprofit group, which he features on his campaign Web site, as the model for a national service corps. He calls his Orwellian program, "Universal Voluntary Public Service."

Big Brother had nothing on the Obamas. They plan to herd American youth into government-funded reeducation camps where they'll be brainwashed into thinking America is a racist, oppressive place in need of "social change."

The pitch Public Allies makes on its Web site doesn't seem all that radical. It promises to place young adults (18-30) in paid one-year "community leadership" positions with nonprofit or government agencies. They'll also be required to attend weekly training workshops and three retreats.

In exchange, they'll get a monthly stipend of up to $1,800, plus paid health and child care. They also get a post-service education award of $4,725 that can be used to pay off past student loans or fund future education.

But its real mission is to radicalize American youth and use them to bring about "social change" through threats, pressure, tension and confrontation — the tactics used by the father of community organizing, Saul "The Red" Alinsky.

"Our alumni are more than twice as likely as 18-34 year olds to . . . engage in protest activities," Public Allies boasts in a document found with its tax filings. It has already deployed an army of 2,200 community organizers like Obama to agitate for "justice" and "equality" in his hometown of Chicago and other U.S. cities, including Cincinnati, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, New York, Phoenix, Pittsburgh and Washington. "I get to practice being an activist," and get paid for it, gushed Cincinnati recruit Amy Vincent.

Public Allies promotes "diversity and inclusion," a program paper says. More than 70% of its recruits are "people of color." When they're not protesting, they're staffing AIDS clinics, handing out condoms, bailing criminals out of jail and helping illegal aliens and the homeless obtain food stamps and other welfare.

Public Allies brags that more than 80% of graduates have continued working in nonprofit or government jobs. It's training the "next generation of nonprofit leaders" — future "social entrepreneurs."

The Obamas discourage work in the private sector. "Don't go into corporate America," Michelle has exhorted youth. "Work for the community. Be social workers." Shun the "money culture," Barack added. "Individual salvation depends on collective salvation."

"If you commit to serving your community," he pledged in his Denver acceptance speech, "we will make sure you can afford a college education." So, go through government to go to college, and then go back into government.

Many of today's youth find the pitch attractive. "I may spend the rest of my life trying to create social movement," said Brian Coovert of the Cincinnati chapter. "There is always going to be work to do. Until we have a perfect country, I'll have a job."

Not all the recruits appreciate the PC indoctrination. "It was too touchy-feely," said Nelly Nieblas, 29, of the 2005 Los Angeles class. "It's a lot of talk about race, a lot of talk about sexism, a lot of talk about homophobia, talk about -isms and phobias."

One of those -isms is "heterosexism," which a Public Allies training seminar in Chicago describes as a negative byproduct of "capitalism, white supremacy, patriarchy and male-dominated privilege."

The government now funds about half of Public Allies' expenses through Clinton's AmeriCorps. Obama wants to fully fund it and expand it into a national program that some see costing $500 billion. "We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded" as the military, he said.

The gall of it: The Obamas want to create a boot camp for radicals who hate the military — and stick American taxpayers with the bill.

Organizer In Chief

BARACK'S CONTROVERSIAL ROOTS

From The New York Post
By Steven Malanga

Barack Obama represents the first appearance in a presidential race of a relatively new political type: the community organizer.

His past as a local activist in Chicago has provoked sneers from Republicans and questions from most voters. What the heck is a community organizer, where do these folks get their money - and why are they so controversial?

The roots of community organizing stretch back to the 1930s and the efforts of organizer Saul Alinsky, founder of the Industrial Areas Foundation and author of "Rules for Radicals," to organize people in low-income areas into a political force to combat the political machine that ran Chicago.

Alinsky won many admirers on the Left, but it took President Lyndon Johnson's War On Poverty to supercharge community organizing by directing billions of federal dollars to neighborhood groups with the naive and ambiguous goal of "empowering" communities.

The federal cash, eventually supplemented by state and local tax funds, helped create a universe of government-funded groups headed by local activists running everything from job-training efforts to recreation programs to voter-registration drives - far beyond anything Alinsky could've imagined.

Thousands of groups - eventually, 3,000 in New York City alone - arose to snatch government money. One startling sign of the growth: Today, New York now has more jobs at social-service agencies, most funded with government money, than on Wall Street.

Yet those who designed Johnson's programs endowed them with vague goals such as "community empowerment" and often failed to demand specific, achievable results from those they funded. Thus, money went to inexperienced local activists to run job-training programs that failed to find people jobs. Other grants went to local groups to help businesses in poor neighborhoods get loans - with little sense of whether their clients could actually ever pay back the money.

Nothing symbolizes the failure and waste better than a federal boondoggle known as the Community Development Block Grant program. Obama calls it "an important program that provides housing and creating [sic] jobs for low- and moderate-income people and places" - yet, over the last 40 years, the CDGB has funneled some $110 billion through community groups with little sense that it has done much good.

One visible sign of failure: Buffalo, the city that's gotten the most CDGB funding (per capita), is worse off today than it was 40 years ago. An investigation by The Buffalo News several years ago found that much of the money had been wasted in grants to organizations run by politically connected activists.

New York City has seen it, too. Earlier this year, several City Council aides were indicted for sending grants to a community nonprofit they controlled. Several years ago, investigators looking into illegal loans by a well-connected Bronx nonprofit found that it was paying its top executives hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to run such programs as "homework empowerment" for teens - with no notion of what these programs achieved or how they worked.

Despite such ongoing boondoggles, the funding keeps on flowing, largely because the activists who head these groups moved into politics, wielding the power that tax dollars had bought them to build a base of neighborhood supporters.

In New York City, operators of huge social-services groups like Pedro Espada in The Bronx and Albert Vann in Brooklyn won election to state and federal posts after heading up large, powerful nonprofits. By the late '80s, nearly a fifth of City Council members were products of the tax-funded nonprofit sector - and they were among the council's most strident advocates for higher taxes and more government spending. In cities from Chicago to Cleveland to Los Angeles, the road to electoral success increasingly runs through tax-funded social services.

Meanwhile, groups like the radical ACORN have used government funding to run voter-registration drives that are supposed to be nonpartisan efforts but that have concentrated in signing up voters in heavily Democratic districts to elect politicians who advance ACORN's political goals and protect funding for community activists.

As a result, spending to these groups has boomed while the sector has staved off reform. "The nonprofit service sector has never been richer, more powerful," former welfare recipient Theresa Funiciello wrote in her book "Tyranny of Kindness." "Except to the poor, poverty is a mega-business."

Obama began his organizing life in the mid-'80s in a community group whose progress mirrored the industry's: the Developing Communities Project, formed on Chicago's South Side as a "faith-based grass-roots organization organizing and advocating for social change." Though founded with resources from a coalition of churches, over time the DCP evolved into a government contractor, with nearly 80 percent of its revenues deriving from public contracts and grants.

Obama adopted the big-government ethos that prevails among neighborhood organizers, who view attempts to reform poverty programs as attacks on the poor. Speaking in 1995 to The Chicago Reader, an alternative weekly, Obama said, "These are mean, cruel times, exemplified by a 'lock 'em up, take no prisoners' mentality that dominates the Republican-led Congress."

He also derided the "old individualistic bootstrap myth" of achievement that conservatives were touting and called self-help strategies for the poor "thinly veiled excuses for cutting back on social programs."

Obama stuck by those ideas as a state senator. His supporters count among his biggest victories his work to expand subsidized health care in Illinois with social-justice groups like United Power for Action and Justice (an offshoot of Alinsky's Industrial Areas Foundation). Meeting last November with the leaders of ACORN, he declared: "I've been fighting alongside ACORN on issues you care about my entire career," including representing the group in a court case in Illinois. ACORN's affiliated political-action committee soon endorsed Obama for president.

An Obama presidency is likely to be a huge boost to tax-funded nonprofits - because his antipoverty agenda is right out of the 1960s. His platform ranges from a commitment to boost funding for CDGB to a plan for providing "a full network of services, including early-childhood education, youth-violence prevention efforts and after-school activities . . . from birth to college" to low-income neighborhoods.

The activist community knows he's one of them. As an organ of the National Housing Institute, a social-justice group, has observed: "Barack Obama carries lessons he learned as a community organizer to the political arena. Both organizers and politicians would be wise to study them closely."

Adapted from the summer issue of City Journal, where Steven Malanga is senior editor.