Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Pinch Yourself

[Spectator UK]

The contrast between, on the one hand, the huge amount of material about Obama’s radical associations that has been published in on-line journals and in a few brave newspapers, and on the other the refusal by big media to address it and to vilify those who do, becomes more astounding by the day. The Obamaniacs are spinning the relationship between Obama and William Ayers, former of Weather Undergound Terrorism Inc, as of no consequence because this was supposedly a chance acquaintance and because the educational project they worked on, the Annenberg Challenge, was a worthy one.

Stanley Kurtz now nails that canard by showing how, through the Annenberg Challenge, Obama and Ayers channelled funds to extremist anti-American Afrocentric ‘educational’ programmes which were a carbon-copy of the world view of Pastor Jeremiah Wright, Obama’s black racist mentor who, under pressure, Obama was forced to repudiate. These programmes promoted, amongst other radical ideas, the ‘rites of passage’ philosophy which attempted to create a ‘virtually separate and intensely anti-American black social world’ in order to ‘counter the potentially detrimental effects of a Eurocentrically oriented society.’ One such teacher taught that

‘The submission to Western civilization and its most outstanding offspring, American civilization, is, in reality, surrender to white supremacy.’
Kurtz concludes:

However he may seek to deny it, all evidence points to the fact that, from his position as board chair of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, Barack Obama knowingly and persistently funded an educational project that shared the extremist and anti-American philosophy of Jeremiah Wright.
No surprise there, since back in June Kurtz pointed to evidence that Obama shared the black racism of the Trinity United Church of Christ. In this article Obama was reported as rejecting ‘integrationist assimilation’ and wanting to channel black rage more effectively into political organisation. Kurtz dug out a chapter in a 1990 book called After Alinsky: Community Organizing in Illinois in which Obama sketched out how radical black churches could be harnessed to help radicalise the black population. As Kurtz wrote:

So it would appear that Obama’s own writings solve the mystery of why he stayed at Trinity for 20 years. Obama’s long-held and decidedly audacious hope has been to spread Wright’s radical spirit by linking it to a viable, left-leaning political program, with Obama himself at the center. The revolutionizing power of a politically awakened black church is not some side issue, or merely a personal matter, but has been the signature theme of Obama’s grand political strategy.

Those few brave souls who do try to enlighten the public about all this come up against the kind of intimidation by Camp Obama charted here by Michael Barone:

Stanley Kurtz appeared on Milt Rosenberg's WGN radio program in Chicago. Mr. Kurtz had been researching Mr. Obama's relationship with unrepentant Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers in Chicago Annenberg Challenge papers in the Richard J. Daley Library in Chicago - papers that were closed off to him for some days, apparently at the behest of Obama supporters. Obama fans jammed WGN's phone lines and sent in hundreds of protest e-mails. The message was clear to anyone who would follow Mr. Rosenberg's example. We will make trouble for you if you let anyone make the case against The One.

Other Obama supporters have threatened critics with criminal prosecution. In September, St. Louis County Circuit Attorney Bob McCulloch and St. Louis City Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce warned citizens that they would bring criminal libel prosecutions against anyone who made statements against Mr. Obama that were ‘false.’ I had been under the impression that the Alien and Sedition Acts had gone out of existence in 1801-'02. Not so, apparently, in metropolitan St. Louis. Similarly, the Obama campaign called for a criminal investigation of the American Issues Project when it ran ads highlighting Mr. Obama's ties to Mr. Ayers.

No such threats, of course, will be made against this new book whose publication is tactfully timed for next year so as not to frighten the horses -- Race Course Against White Supremacy, by none other than William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn.

Meanwhile, it turns out that not only did Obama do favours for convicted Chicago fraudster Tony Rezko, but as this story reports Alexi Giannoulias, who reputedly bankrolled Michael ‘Jaws’ Giorango, a Chicagoan twice convicted of bookmaking and promoting prostitution, became Illinois state treasurer last year after Obama vouched for him, and has now has pledged to raise $100,000 for Obama’s campaign.

You have to pinch yourself – a Marxisant radical who all his life has been mentored by, sat at the feet of, worshipped with, befriended, endorsed the philosophy of, funded and been in turn funded, politically promoted and supported by a nexus comprising black power anti-white racists, Jew-haters, revolutionary Marxists, unrepentant former terrorists and Chicago mobsters, is on the verge of becoming President of the United States.

And apparently it’s considered impolite to say so.

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Drama Behind a $250 Billion Banking Deal

WASHINGTON — The chief executives of the nine largest banks in the United States trooped into a gilded conference room at the Treasury Department at 3 p.m. Monday. To their astonishment, they were each handed a one-page document that said they agreed to sell shares to the government, then Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. said they must sign it before they left.

The chairman of Wells Fargo, Richard M. Kovacevich, protested strongly that, unlike his New York rivals, his bank was not in trouble because of investments in exotic mortgages, and did not need a bailout... [snip]

Kenneth D. Lewis, the chairman of Bank of America, also pushed back, saying his bank had just raised $10 billion on its own. Later, Mr. Lewis urged his colleagues not to quibble with the plan’s restrictions on executive compensation for the top executives... [snip]

But by 6:30, all nine chief executives had signed — setting in motion the largest government intervention in the American banking system since the Depression - all told, the potential cost to the government of the latest bailout package comes to $2.25 trillion, triple the size of the original $700 billion rescue package...

[saw a piece on this on CNN last night with a financial guest who's certain Paulson's move is patently illegal - he forced banks that didn't need money to accept it, and the compensation restrictions that came with it. This isn't just a massive lurch toward socialism, it's a forced lurch. Think through the implications of the government being able to 'acquire' private companies and decide how much key employees will be paid - while you and I underwrite all risk to the endeavor. Now imagine Obama's "fairness doctrine" driving matters.]

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Why Obama's socialism matters

...Those are examples of hard socialism. Soft socialism is better, but it certainly isn't the American ideal. Britain springs to mind as the perfect example of soft socialism. Britain's socialist medicine is a disaster, with practically daily stories about people being denied treatment or receiving minimal treatment. Invariably, the denials arise because the State's needs trump the individual's: Either the treatment is generally deemed too costly (and there are no market forces at work) or the patients are deemed unworthy of care, especially if they're old.

British socialism has other problems, aside from the dead left behind in her hospital wards. As did Germany, Russia, and China (and as would Obama), socialist Britain took guns away (at least in London), with the evitable result that violent crime against innocent people skyrocketed.

The British socialist bureaucracy also controls people's lives at a level currently incomprehensible to Americans, who can't appreciate a state that is constantly looking out for its own good. In Britain, government protects thieves right's against property owner's, has it's public utilities urge children to report their parents for "green" crimes; tries to criminalize people taking pictures of their own children in public places; destroys perfectly good food that does not meet obsessive compulsive bureaucratic standards; and increasingly stifles free speech. (Impressively, all of the preceding examples are from just the last six months in England.) [snip]

Regardless of Obama’s presumed good intentions, socialism always brings a society to a bad ending. I don’t want to believe that Americans who live in a free society that allows people to think what they will, do what they want, and succeed if they can, will willingly hand themselves over to the socialist ideology. They must therefore be reminded, again and again and again, that socialism isn’t just another political party; it’s the death knell to freedom.

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"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries." -- Winston Churchill

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The [latest] Glories of Socialism

Nancy Pelosi said a few weeks ago that we should nationalize the oil companies.

Well, Hugo Chavez has already done that and perhaps we should examine the results.

The [oil] company now grows food after Mr Chavez's price controls emptied supermarket shelves of products like milk and eggs.

Another branch produces furniture and domestic appliances in an effort to stem the flow of imports.

What PDVSA [the oil company] seems unable to do is produce more oil...

[down 30% in ten years]

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Obama High: No child left benign

Elected officials in Chicago made international news last week by proposing to create a public high school for gay, lesbian and transgender students.

The Pride Campus of the School for Social Justice is set to open with 600 students in 2010, and its curriculum promises to "teach the history of all people who have been oppressed and the civil rights movements that have led to social justice and queer studies."

Yet no American journalist covering the presidential race has queried the Chicago-based Sen. Barack Obama about this radical development in education reform: a key issue to which the young senator has committed much of his public life and 'all of his executive experience'...

Nor has any intrepid mainstream-media reporter looked into a greater trend across the United States in segregating public school students by politically correct "victim" class for the explicit purpose of indoctrinating children in "social justice."

This loaded political term has been preached by such Obama allies and mentors as the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the Rev. Michael Pfleger and Mr. Ayers: committed left-wing agitators all, and all off-limits to the working press...

[this is concerning - regrettably Recommended {if you've children, I mean you}]

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Obama Pushed on Our Kids in 8th Grade Textbook

Over at RealDebateWisconsin Fred Dooley was contacted by the mother of a Racine Unified School District 8th grade student in Wisconsin public schools about an outrageous thing she found in her son's school textbook.

Apparently, in this textbook supposedly teaching about literature, one of the books being pushed as a perfect example of that subject is Barack Obama's memoir Dreams from my Father.

That's right, a book by a current political candidate for president is being pushed on our children as "literature." It also seems probable from campaign donation records that a principle member of the publishing company is a large Obama donor.

One would think that focusing on the ideology of a politician currently running for president would be a bit over-the-top even for our extreme left leaning system of education in this country. But there it is anyway.

The book even presents a photo of the Senator at a campaign rally with signs advertising his campaign website address to help better indoctrinate the kids.

Of course, the very first question that comes to mind is this: how wide spread would this story have become if it were a Republican featured in a kid's textbook?

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NBC Showcases Obama's Touching Moment

On Tuesday's "Today" show Andrea Mitchell highlighted John McCain's struggles, as he was forced to campaign in "red states Republicans don't usually have to defend," but when it came to Barack Obama, she promoted Obama's soft side as she aired a clip of the Democratic nominee hugging a tearful college student as she cooed:

"During two days of campaigning in Ohio, the nation's economic crisis got personal when Obama met a 19-year-old nursing student named Hannah, already deep in debt with student loans."

Mitchell then followed that tease with the following back and forth between Obama and the student:

HANNAH: I'm paying for school myself, so-

BARACK OBAMA: How much, how much you in debt?

HANNAH: Right now about $24,000 and I'm only 19.

OBAMA: Alright well we're gonna try to see if we can provide you some relief, alright?

HANNAH: Yeah I need it because the grants aren't enough.

OBAMA HUGGING STUDENT: I know, I know! I appreciate it, c'mon. Nice to meet you.

HANNAH: Thank you.


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Heard on the Radio...

Glenn Beck mentioned some statistics this morning which are worth being aware of. I haven't substantiated (and I'm not listening to hours of his show's audio), but he's proven accurate re: facts in figures in the past (the quality of 'analysis', "not so much").

Still, today's factoids:

Since 1985, the cost of...

... gas has gone up 108% -
... health care has gone up 251%
... college tuition has gone up 439%

Excuse me? Gas is due to the government preventing us from developing our own supply. Health care is due to government preventing the introduction of consumer pricing pressure and coverage mandates. But what's up with tuitions going up by a factor of 4?

A: Government (surprise) guaranteeing student loans - and constantly adding more money to the system to, get this, 'make college more affordable' to more Americans.

Problem is, our indoctrina-oops; eduction establishments have raised their tuitions in lock step with such funding increases, year in, year out. Result? Not more students - just more money to pillars of integrity like Harvard, already worth nearly 40 billion (yes that was a 'b') dollars.

We need move to an Internet based general university system. It's accessibility (home, 24/7), cost (comparatively zero), and ideological neutrality (vs. our current liberalism factories) is what would be in the best interest of the most Americans, who we're continually told will periodically neet to 'retool' over the course of their careers.

I wonder if anyone in Washington will ever take their welfare into account? Doubtful: there's not much profit in that.
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Schools used for 'social engineering', claims headteacher

A leading headmaster who is leaving one of the most popular schools in the state system to work in the private sector has accused the Government of turning teachers into ''social workers and surrogate parents''. (Snip) schools were being forced to shun traditional lessons as ministers manipulated the education system for the purposes of ''social engineering''. He said schools ''cannot solve all of society's ills'' and should be left to teach.

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Teacher suspended in Obama video scandal

The shocking video of uniformed youngsters marching and chanting about Obama we blogged yesterday turns out to have been organized during school hours by a middle school teacher at a (taxpayer funded) charter school in Kansas City. The teacher in question, whose name has not been disclosed, has been suspended and may face legal charges.

Fox News reports [snippet]:

She said she was aware of the video, and that many of the school's activities are recorded, but that the teacher had been warned in a letter not to put it on the Internet. If he did, she said, he should seek legal counsel.

I find it disturbing that the superintendent knew about the political indoctrination underway and only objected to it being made public on the internet. Now, she claims to be disturbed by the politicization of school activities. The fact that her charges have been indoctrinated to chant that "because of Obama" they will accomplish marvelous things in life is far worse than making it public.

Here is the video:

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RACIAL PREFERENCES AT LAW SCHOOLS

Two reports by the Center for Equal Opportunity (CEO) examine racial and ethnic data for applicants to the University of Arizona and Arizona State University (ASU) law schools in 2006 and 2007:

  • They found that the odds of a black applicant's admission to ASU were 1,100 times greater than a white applicant's; and 250 times greater at the University of Arizona.
  • The ASU report found that among applicants in 2007 with the median black LSAT and grade-point averages, over 98 percent of black applicants were admitted compared to fewer than 10 percent of whites.
  • Hispanic applicants with the same credentials were admitted far less often than blacks, but far more often than whites.
Law schools should grant admission based either on purely objective criteria or special individual characteristics, without using race or ethnicity as a proxy for diversity or disadvantage. Moreover, in an increasingly multi-ethnic society, it is absurd to force people to check a racial or ethnic box that will determine in large measure their opportunities.

As CEO's Roger Clegg aptly put it, "The whole enterprise is something that should give Americans the creeps."

True equal opportunity requires expanding educational opportunities at the K-12 level [read: vouchers], not pretending that certain students are more qualified than they are. Ending government's power to classify and discriminate among people on the basis of race is a good way to hasten that process.

[how long are we going to tolerate this state-sponsored racism? {A: for as long as the public-school political party is returned to power}]

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TUSD spending $550,000 to recruit minority teachers

Marivel Roybal speaks the same language her Hispanic first-graders hear at home, which she says instantly creates a bond between them.

The district has launched a $550,000 effort to recruit minority teachers, hoping to diversify its staff and give minority students a better chance of 'seeing themselves as part of the education system'...

[rather than immerse them in English, which study after study shows is the fastest way to learn the language and in turn maximize their chances of getting ahead]

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More colleges redo dorms with green touches

NEW YORK - This fall, students at Sarah Lawrence's Warren Green hall will be composting together, monitoring their electricity usage and drying their laundry on a clothesline. They will share appliances, cooking and shopping to reduce waste and energy, and use electric light as little as possible.And rising junior Justin Butler, 20, couldn't be happier to live there. "It means a lot to me that the college is thinking about this really seriously..."

[and we call them institutions of 'higher learning']

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Oregon University Hosts Talk by Notorious Holocaust Denier

The University of Oregon will play host Monday night to Holocaust denier David Irving, prompting protests from a local rights group. The Pacifica Forum, a group that holds weekly meetings on the university’s campus in Euguene, Ore., has invited Irving to make an address about free speech. Irving's presentation is part of a nationwide tour which includes what he calls the ''real history'' of Adolf Hitler and Heinrich Himmler. Irving is the third accused Holocaust denier who will have spoken to the group on campus.

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Schoolboys disciplined for 'refusing to pray to Allah'

Two schoolboys were disciplined after refusing to kneel down and "pray to Allah" during a religious education lesson. It was claimed that the boys, from a year seven class of 11 and 12-year-olds, were given detention after refusing to take part in a practical demonstration of how Allah is worshipped. Yesterday parents accused the school of breaching their human rights by forcing them to take part in the exercise.

[what is any religious 'demonstration' doing in supposedly secular schools? Another example of the aforementioned 'soft' socialism. England needs universal vouchers too.]

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Chapel Hill schools may change grading policy

Tonight, the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools Board of Education will discuss a proposal to change its grading policy. The proposal states that 61 percent is the lowest numeric grade a student could receive if he or she gets an "F" letter grade. Currently, a zero is the lowest numerical grade a student can receive. Fractions of points greater than 0.5 will be rounded up to the next whole number, the proposal says, and homework cannot count more than 20 percent of the quarterly grade.

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2008 PC

Students taking a criminology course approached me after the professor banned (fortunately in writing) the use of the word “mankind” as “sexist.” Students were threatened specifically with point deductions for every single use of the word in exams or papers. Unfortunately, students did not stand up to the professor. Now I have learned that the professor has adopted another rule – this one banning use of the terms “BC” and “AD"...

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The examples are endless. There's a reason I segued from socialism to education - it's the front line in social engineering - just ask Obama and Ayers



"An informed patriotism is what we want. And are we doing a good enough job teaching our children what America is and what she represents in the long history of the world?"
-- President Ronald Reagan
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