Wednesday, September 10, 2008
The Wrong Code
A CBS News outlet in
"I think the Republican Party is too smart to call Barack Obama 'black' in a sense that it would be a negative. But you can take something about his life, which I noticed they did at the Republican Convention – a 'community organizer.' They kept saying it, they kept laughing," he said.
Wow, that’s the end for Sen. Obama’s campaign, when all the white trash out there starts listening to Republicans and wake up to discover Obama’s black.
Gov. Paterson went on to clarify:
"I think where there are overtones is when there are uses of language that are designed to inhibit other people's progress with a subtle reference to their race," he said.
"At this point, Americans wouldn't tolerate a racial appeal. What I'm saying is that there are sneaky ways to try to hurt someone," he said.
Geez, Governor. You sound just like the pathetically ingratiating person of pallor trying to talk jive, smack, or gangsta’.
Take it from a Conservative Republican. “Community Organizer” never has been, isn’t, and never will be “code for black.” But you’re right, it is code. Anyone with a fair to middling experience with Marxism or liberal Academia knows that Community Organizing is what Unionists, Communalists, Activists, and demagogic populists do.
I’ll give you another hint. Lenin and Mao were Community Organizers. Castro was a Community Organizer.
Community Organizers organize and (temporarily) empower communities -- that’s the source of their power. They accomplish what they seek when they have successfully motivated and energized their targeted mass audience. Their stated ends aren’t even important, for in harnessing the means, the collective will of the community, they achieve another end that consumes: their own power and influence. That personal end will always justify their means, and Obama is no different, as his long-abiding Presidential ambitions attest.
Community Organizers are by and large Demagogues. To be successful in their task, they need to enflame, anger, manipulate and motivate communities to action. They tend to exaggerate, and their rhetoric is heavy on hyperbole. They rouse rabbles. They generate mass hysteria, if they are successful. They’re all about the masses, washed or unwashed.
Here’s how Conservatives view the whole concept of the need to Organize. Community Organizers are the Conservative equivalent in all major respects to the Communists, Socialists, and Marxists whose reason for living is organizing communities.
Sure, Union Organizers organize working communities, and partisan political operatives like the infamous ACORN organize voter communities for electoral purposes. But these represent very temporary organizations. Once constructed, their architects are “out of a job,” and on to the next non-union shop or electoral project. Not so the professional Community Organizer.
Presidential Candidate Obama seemingly appeared out of nowhere after the briefest of Senate and state legislative careers, and touted his Community Organizing as a major component of his leadership experience. He served his Community, even if his accomplishments were transitory and their importance tangential to his political ambitions.
Gov. Sarah Palin of
So Vice Presidential Candidate Palin had the pluck and combativeness to observe that, as the mayor of a small town in one of
That’s still a really funny line. Here’s why, Gov. Paterson, and it has nothing to do with racism.
Contrary to the idealistic but unfettered by gritty reality Community Organizer, a Mayor (or any other Executive) has specific, distinct responsibilities, which when not satisfied or fulfilled, can generate an awful lot of hell to pay. Community Organizers can keep finding communities (real or virtual, like classes of aggrieved persons) to organize, but a Mayor or Governor has to run one, with all that that entails.
Progressives (Marxist-inspired or otherwise) are really big on organizing communities, getting people to vote “in accordance with their economic interests.” Which itself is code word for “voting for their Class.” Yet, they do not officially or formally represent the communities they manipulate, and overwhelmingly take advantage of those they mobilize as stepping stones for their own personal enrichment or advancement. Sadly, much of what Community Organizers “accomplish” either turns out to be a whole lot less than advertised, evaporates after the Organizer moves on (or steps up), or engenders a whole new level of exploitation and corruption.
That’s why the small-d democratic model creates political constructs in which an individual is elected for a specific term, with a specific set of responsibilities, with a very real accounting at the end if he or she (or their party) seeks re-election. As opposed to Alinsky’s theories of Community Organizing, or similar Manifestos, which all too often in the real world create a tyranny imposed by the masses, but run by a chosen few.
Absolute power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely, however much that power started out “of the people.”
That’s just some of why Republicans laughed so heartily with Gov. Palin, when she contrasted her executive experience with a boastful, self-proclaimed Community Organizer.
(Via Drudge Report)
Etcetera
For added insight into Obama’s time as a Community Organizer in
(Via Online Journal)
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Times Plays Politics
A further tragedy here, beyond the personal one of the Spitzer family and the damage he has done to the reform cause, is that Mr. Spitzer’s targets are now relishing their tormentor’s torment. Those on Wall Street who fumed at having to make their world fairer for ordinary shareholders can now chortle with satisfaction in their private enclaves. For New York Republicans, who have blocked some of the most important reforms in Albany, it is hard to imagine the private glee — especially at a moment when they are fighting desperately to hold their majority in the State Senate.The Times lumps together as Targets State Republicans, who demonstrably have a constituency who vote for and support them, with the former Attorney General’s scapegoats on Wall Street. Corporate tycoons chortle, and NY Republicans flush with private glee. The NY Times should try publishing their Editorials in comic book form.
That’s a stunning rhetorical transition, and nakedly partisan, even for the increasingly yellow-stained Times. However much NY State Government needs reform – as any citizen more conscious than comatose surely knows – how exactly has Spitzer stood or represented any kind of reform in contrast to the State GOP?
By knowingly allowing a corrupt official stand for re-election as State Comptroller? By misusing the State Police to spy on and track the movements of his political opponents? By attempting dirty tricks of the worst kind, trying to press Federal officials to direct tax audits against these same opponents? By attempting to create a Democratic Party vote generator by giving driver’s licenses to illegal aliens, making all of New York a Sanctuary State?
One can only imagine how much more venality this particular Governor could accomplish given nearly three more years in office.
The Times is absolutely correct that the Governor betrayed the public and the public trust, as the highest elected official in the State. He cannot and will not stand above the law. Certainly the many enemies he’s made in and out of public service will be bound and determined to make sure he pays every penny due in recompense, and then some.
(Via Instapundit)
Labels: media, New York, politics
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Speaking Engagement
Our local high school has been hosting a Participation in Government speaker series. On Wednesday, November 28, they hosted a session on Pre-emptive War, the War in
The format allowed each of us 10 minutes to present our views on the three topics in turn, followed by student questions. I started. I used a brief outline, Ritter appeared to speak extemporaneously. Students and an adult or two asked questions, and towards the end the teacher who organizes the sessions augmented with questions of his own. Most allowed both of us to respond, but most were primarily directed at Ritter, but he was often offered to let me lead in response and I always had an opportunity to rebut or otherwise offer my own response.
My first impression of Ritter was of a very professional and courteous, even likeable man. His military background is evident. He was very respectful during the entire exchange, and had researched me at least as thoroughly as I researched him.
Here’s an outline of what I presented to open the session:
Pre-emptive War:
Just War Concept -- the morality of war
Why and How wars start
Aggressive, reactive, retributive, pre-emptive
Cold War, MAD, emergence of terrorism
Lessons from September 11th:
War as Risk Management
Threat of Nuclear proliferation, other WMD
Terror as proxy for state to state warfare
Potentially catastrophic cost of inaction
The War in
Gulf War and “Cessation” of Hostilities
UN Security Council Resolutions (1991-2002)
Iraq Regime Change as official
9/11 Aftermath, change in strategy:
Waiting for imminence can be catastrophic
State sponsors of terror, “safe harbor” & terror proxies
WMD Proliferation as terror threat
Human Rights and Democracy Promotion
Pre- and Post-Invasion Intelligence
Possible War with
Iranian proxies: Hezbollah, Shiite Militias
Explosively Formed Projectiles (EFP)
IEDs, weapons, funding, terrorist training
Regional influence & destabilization
Human Rights and Democratization
Iranian nuclear program:
Financial & technical resources driven by intent
Repeated obstruction and deception towards IAEA
Avowed aim the obliteration of
Concerns about proliferation, “nuke by proxy”
Ritter centered his 10 minutes on the premise that the
I later challenged that formulation on the basis of
I highlighted that for several decades, and all modern wars (since WWII), all three branches of Government have been complicit in allowing Congress to abrogate its Constitutional obligations to declare war (War Powers Act), Congressional authorizations for Presidential use of military force, etc. Hold Congress to its obligations, I’d agree, but to allow Congress to then escape responsibility and only blame the President is allowing those complicit to evade responsibility twice: first in the votes to authorize, then second in turning around and blaming the President with the results, as if they were innocent bystanders.
Ritter obviously tailored what might have been a different, more strident kind of presentation, were he not before a student audience. It really was a good, vigorous debate. He knows his UN Charter, for sure, perhaps more than he knows his Constitution, but he knows better than I, though I’m certain he cherry picks from the
He made the claim that we made Al Qaeda stronger, that we haven’t beaten them anywhere, that we discredited ourselves and our ideals by our actions. He responded to questions about
I replied with a fuller explanation of what Geneva means to signatories and non-signatories, the significance of unlawful combatants, how to conceptually deal with terrorists as POWs, when you can’t have prisoner exchanges or terms of surrender with non-state, unlawful combatants or even with the militaries of non-signatory countries. Problematic, and in other eras, such people found on the battlefield were summarily executed, and the Geneva Conventions can be found to approve of such actions. (Not that I advocate same, but that’s the problem, isn’t it?)
I also said there’s one place that we actually DID defeat Al Qaeda:
I found myself time and again returning to the context of decisions, viewing decisions in light of potential, known and unknown threats. I stressed repeatedly that we are already at war, were already at war, and that our enemies used (and use) terror proxies to do what they can’t or won’t do explicitly, openly, with their military forces. State sponsors of terror, in many ways, are more dangerous than the minions they fund, sponsor, host, hide, and direct. Safe havens should be of great concern, and nuclear and other WMD proliferation is a grave threat.
As I stated several times, there is a potentially catastrophic cost of inaction, which serious minded leaders must confront. (And do, when they are in the decision seat.)
Just based on a search I did yesterday, Ritter appeared less than 2 months ago in a college forum in
Labels: debate space, government, intelligence, Iran, Iraq, New York, UN, war on terror
Saturday, August 18, 2007
The Homegrown Threat
The Associated Press (AP) introduces the NYPD report as a comprehensive analysis of the threats and causes of homegrown terror:
The New York Police Department report released Wednesday describes a process in which young men - often legal immigrants from the Middle East who are frustrated with their lives in their adopted country - adopt a philosophy that puts them on a path to violence.The report was intended to explain how people become radicalized rather than to lay out specific strategies for thwarting terror plots. It calls for more intelligence gathering, and argues that local law enforcement agencies are in the best position to monitor potential terrorists.
NYPD’s Intelligence Division (ID) invested considerable time, effort, and expense in the detailed data gathering and analysis upon which the report is based:
The study is based on an analysis of a series of domestic plots thwarted since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, including those in Lackawanna, N.Y.; Portland, Ore.; and Virginia. It was prepared by senior analysts with the NYPD Intelligence Division who traveled to Hamburg, Madrid and other overseas spots to confer with authorities about similar cases.The AP also notes growing alarm over the phenomenon of radicalization going on among US prison populations:
Recently, authorities have taken a closer look at radicalization happening in U.S. prisons, where a study last year by George Washington University and the University of Virginia found that Islamic extremists were turning jail cells into terrorist breeding grounds by preaching violent interpretations of the Quran to their fellow inmates.However disturbing these trends, guests of US prisons are already known threats, and tracked by multiple layers of law enforcement and criminal justice organizations. More ominous still are those potential “sleeper” threats:
The NYPD report warns that more intelligence gathering is needed since most potential homegrown terrorists "have never been arrested or involved in any kind of legal trouble," the study says.Described in several press reports as “dense,” the NYPD report runs 90 pages, and reflects the impressive intelligence analysis capability of New York’s finest. In terms of dedicated resources, senior management support, sophistication, and breadth of analysis, NYPD’s Intelligence Division surpasses all but the most professional Government intelligence services in the world. Surely, they are among America’s finest within the Intelligence Community (IC).
They "look, act, talk and walk like everyone around them," the study adds. "In the early stages of their radicalization, these individuals rarely travel, are not participating in any kind of militant activity, yet they are slowly building the mind-set, intention and commitment to conduct jihad."
All that praise by way of anticipation of how thorough and comprehensive I expect this report to be. (Also by way of acknowledgement, I haven’t read it in its entirety.) Tanji’s piece at ThreatsWatch proved more digestible.
At a conference sponsored by Intelligence Educators, Larry Sanchez of the NYPD Intelligence Division (ID) briefed about NYPD’s counterterrorism approach. Based on that introduction to the NYPD ID, I will not be at all surprised if the report proves a critical resource within the IC. Likewise, based on what I’ve learned about NYPD’s efforts, those privacy purists who insist on remaining blind to obvious national security interests at a time of war will no doubt read this NYPD report as an ominous indicator of how far we’ve become a Police State in America. These purists will be wrong, as Tanji argues (convincingly, in my view and experience):
The fact of the matter is that the intelligence community is already drowning in a sea of perfectly legitimate and potentially dangerous material associated with foreigners. America’s spies are really not interested in data that is of no use, and that is what the vast majority of personal communications in this country is: useless. Ever listened in (inadvertently of course) to the average conversation of the average 20-something strolling through the mall or airport, on a commuter train or in a coffee shop?In short, the IC has no desire to read your mail, and the more we do inadvertently, the less time we have to detect, analyze, and target those foreign agents and homegrown terrorists who actually seek to wage war against us and our interests.
It will of course be argued that no self-respecting Big Brother is going to use his power for that sort of work; it’s the dissidents and opposition that will be targeted. COINTELPRO and CHAOS are offered up as proof as to how far an administration will go to advance its agenda, but for every MLK Jr. that was snooped on, there were dozens or more that belonged to groups like the Weathermen, the Klan, and many other groups hell bent on damaging if not destroying the country. Abuse on a personal level is the exception, not the rule.
The problem we face today with regards to domestic intelligence is in many ways the same problem we have always faced: how do we deal with the enemies that are among us? The solutions to date have proven to be both unimaginative and uninspiring.
Turning our national intelligence apparatus on domestic targets is not difficult from a practical perspective, but the addition of a domestic mission would merely degrade our ability to deal with the foreign missions we already have. Absent legislation that would greatly expand the size of the IC, the community is faced with hiring more contractors and exposing itself to more of the problems that such a strategy brings.
But the fight against homegrown and home-based terror is vital. As Schippert reflects:
Michael notes what is often dismissed or unnoted by critics and observers of all stripes: Information overload and its impact on the IC writ large. Even beyond the debate of domestic intelligence, this requires redress and attention. We cannot forget that this conflict is, above all, a war of intelligence — both at home and abroad. The ununiformed and civilian-enmeshed nature of the enemy dictates this reality.Often forgotten in these debates about terrorism and our military and intelligence efforts against terrorists and their state sponsors, is the fact that our enemies do not abide by the laws of war nor the Geneva Conventions. In any prior era, the proper and fully acceptable method of dealing with out of uniform saboteurs and spies was summary execution by duly activated and directed military authorities.
Nobody’s advocating, nor does NYPD’s Intelligence efforts equate to, anything extrajudicial or martial law. Reasonable, prudent, measured, and specifically targeted counter-terrorism efforts are not only justified, but have long been employed in prior and current efforts against drug dealers, organized crime, and other historical law enforcement challenges.
Labels: government, intelligence, New York, war on terror
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
Living in Tyranny
The Citizens of New York live under Dictatorship, and have for quite some time.
Oh, it’s quite benevolent, as Dictatorships go, with an organizational structure which conceals the tyranny. But it’s a Dictatorship, all the same.
New York is ruled by a triumvirate of Potentates, with varying powers, but with every power of the State divvied up between the three. Only the most naïve of New Yorkers believes that when they go through the charade of electing State Senators and Assemblypersons, they are actually gaining representation.
Sure, they do get to vote for the Governor and several Statewide positions. But as we’ve witnessed with the outrageous appointment by Assembly Leader Sheldon Silver of a wholly unqualified candidate for State Comptroller, that doesn’t translate into power. As the former Governor quite ably demonstrated, the position of Governor of New York is a lesser Power than his fellow Dictators of the Triumvirate. Besides, the Governor will likely spend his days in office filling his troth, luxuriating his political benefactors, and most seriously of all, grandstanding every opportunity to position himself for a shot at National Recognition and position.
And really, do New York citizens really get to choose their Governor, or do the State Democrats and GOP work the deals out in advance, after some kingmaker like Alphonse D’Amato decides who the candidates should be? I mean, who really wanted George Pataki for 12 years? But was there any other serious alternative, other than self-funded independents? One should note that Governor Spitzer waited until Pataki stepped down to run, and his election race was likewise a cake walk against no serious opposition. It seems the two Parties like their Dictatorship just fine the way it is, only now, it’s the Democrats who get to pretend they run the State through elected officials, rather than lifetime incumbency appointment.
Senate Leader Senator Joseph Bruno is currently under investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), details not disclosed, but even nominally clued in columnists can catalog a fair list of conflicts of interest, patronage and nepotism abuses.
Between the Governor, Bruno, and Silver, all State matters are decided. Bruno and Silver brook no contest or defiance to their absolute authority, and any rebellions, such as was attempted in 2000, are severely punished. To get anything accomplished, the Governor must kowtow to the all powerful Leaders of the State Houses. That doesn’t mean we the people, in any way, shape, form or manner. We might as well elect dogs and cats to sit in chambers, since only Bruno and Silver get to decide on anything. They’d make less of a mess, no doubt, and we wouldn’t have to worry about them getting arrested or driving drunk.
I suppose if you are a resident of the County of Rensselaer, or reside within the 64th Assembly District in lower Manhattan, the effects of living under tyranny don’t seem harmful or unpleasant. Live anywhere else in the aptly named Empire State, and you don’t have any representation in State Government.
For those who would accuse me of regional bias, it’s true, I live upstate, some miles west of the Hudson, which means I don’t benefit from the largesse of The Royal Joe, who stands out as premier among the latest trend for self-serving politicos to create giant Monuments to themselves while still serving in office. Used to be, you had to at least be retired, if not dead, but how can you bask in the self-adulating glow of that?
Newly elected Governor Eliot Spitzer is widely praised for his honesty and ethics, and all commentators loudly utter sighs of relief or plaintiff calls for salvation from this anticipated White Knight, who will clean up corruption and abuse of power. So the fable goes.
Silly people. Look no further than the selection of the new Comptroller by Emperor Silver, or the status quo budget proposed by the Governor, to see how likely any meaningful change will be.
If you say, “If you hate it so much, why don’t you move?” The answer is, if I didn’t have a child firmly established within the best Public School system in the State, I would. I should note that everything great about this school system, would be great without any state assistance whatsoever. Parents and community make this system what it is. So don’t tell me I’m benefiting from what I deplore, or biting the Royal Hand that feeds me, because it just isn’t so.
We have the highest taxes in the Nation, a continually growing state budget and Mommy State bureaucracy, and a population fully lulled into oblivious slumber. My fellow citizens are far more enraged about phantom, mythical usurpations of terrorist civil liberties, than the highly visible, very real abrogation of citizen rights within their own communities. They are taxed without representation, and every new power vested in Government adds ever more to the balance due. But it’s all about Iraq and that evil George Bush.
I’m with local radio host Paul Vandenberg, who may get a little unhinged sometimes. But not today, when he stated, that for the costs we’ve invested in Iraq, if we succeed, we will gain tremendously more benefit than what the Democrats propose. Years of living with the unintended consequences of the Welfare State should have fully demonstrated to New Yorkers, that in the end, we will never gain by yielding to all those pent up Democrat demands for ever more control, ever more services, ever more protection from any possible vicissitude of life.
And, I suppose, part of me thinks the State might be worth saving from Tyranny. But it would be nice to see somebody other than Tories, speaking up.
I direct your attention to an outstanding essay, covering much the same ground I have here, but with more facts and less emotion. (What can I say, I blog.)
The essay pleads, Help Us, Governor Spitzer!, and was written by Nicole Gelinas in the latest City Journal. I’ll try to follow up with another post on it, it’s an excellent survey of the sorrowful state of the State. Though I don’t retain any hope that the new Governor will be any more helpful than the last.
Labels: government, New York
Subscribe to Posts [Atom]
