Obama’s Boys of Summer (Obama Campaign Features a Who's Who of the Radical Left)

Backing a major-party candidate for president would have been anathema to Michael Klonsky 40 summers ago, when the organization he led, Students for a Democratic Society, urged young people to spurn elections. “By ’68, our line was ‘Vote in the Streets,’” Klonsky told me last spring. “We thought we had to fight with Eugene McCarthy and those people.” In August 1968, protesters clashed with police outside the Democratic Party’s national convention in Chicago—but far from being political innocents who took to the streets to protest Vietnam War hawks’ capture of the Democratic presidential nomination, many of them never supported antiwar candidates McCarthy and Robert Kennedy. “Those of us who have been in the streets for the past five days didn’t give a flying [snip] whether McCarthy would win or lose,” SDS declared in posters around Chicago, “and now that he’s lost, still don’t.” On the eve of the general election of that year—in which less than 1 percentage point would separate the popular-vote totals of Richard Nixon and Hubert Humphrey—Klonsky’s SDS bluntly proclaimed: “The elections don’t mean [snip].”

Klonsky, whose disgust for mainstream politics led him to launch a new, Maoist Communist Party in the 1970s, today supports Barack Obama so enthusiastically that until recently he was blogging on the Illinois senator’s campaign website. And boycotting this November’s election, Klonsky maintains, would be a “tragic mistake.” He notes that Barack Obama isn’t Hubert Humphrey, 2008 isn’t 1968, and the strong movement he served back then is “relatively weak” now. “My own support for Obama is not a reflection of a radically changed attitude toward the Democratic Party,” Klonsky recently explained to me. “Rather, it’s a recognition that the Obama campaign has become a rallying point for young activists and offers hope for rebuilding the civil rights and antiwar coalitions that have potential to become a real critical force in society.”

Michael Klonsky is hardly the only ’68 radical supporting Obama this year. In 1968, when Mark Rudd organized the student strike that shut down Columbia University, the SDS chapter that he chaired ridiculed Kennedy and McCarthy as “McKennedy,” claimed that “neither peace candidate offers an alternative to the war policies of Lyndon Johnson,” and suggested “sabotage” as an alternative to voting. Rudd succeeded Klonsky as national SDS leader, presiding over the organization’s metamorphosis into Weatherman and performing “a liaison function” for the plot to bomb a Fort Dix soldiers’ dance that instead killed three Weathermen, including two of Rudd’s Columbia SDS colleagues. Today, Rudd renounces bombs, embraces ballots—and supports Obama. “Probably the biggest difference between Columbia SDS people in 1968 and in 2008 is forty years,” Rudd explained in an e-mail. “Most of us have lived with compromise our whole lives. As kids we were raving idealists who thought that ‘The elections don’t mean shit’ was a slogan that meant something to somebody. It didn’t.”

Then there’s Carl Davidson, who was one of SDS’s three elected national officers in 1968, when the organization first urged young people to refrain from voting. His disillusionment with traditional politics became so pronounced that, in the post-sixties hangover that followed, Davidson joined Klonsky in rejecting traditional politics for fringe Marxist movements. More recently, he helped organize the 2002 rally in which Obama first spoke out against the Iraq War and now serves as the webmaster of Progressives for Obama. “The last thing we need is a simple repeat of 1968, which saw Nixon and the new Right as an outcome, as well as the defeat of [Humphrey],” Davidson contends. “One thing I’ve learned. Social change is not made by elections, but it certainly proceeds through them, not by ignoring them or chasing the illusion of end runs around them.”

Former SDS president Tom Hayden is also in the Obama camp. Hayden organized the made-for-TV protest outside the 1968 Chicago convention. But the catharsis of throwing debris at the Chicago police, the purer-than-thou sanctimony that tolerated no distinction between Lyndon Johnson and Eugene McCarthy, and the exhilaration of “voting in the streets” instead of in election booths combined to ensure liberal defeats. Hayden’s orchestrated anarchy proved more damaging to Humphrey’s presidential aspirations than any dirty trick Nixon’s henchmen could have dreamed up. Klonsky remembers Hayden plotting to spread nails on a highway; another SDS leader recalls Hayden encouraging activists to firebomb police cars. If the Democrats couldn’t run a convention, many Americans wondered, how could they run the country? “Did the radicalism of Chicago elect Richard Nixon?” Hayden asked, clearly pained, in his 1988 memoir. “Having struggled with that question for twenty years, I find there is no ‘neat’ answer.”

Now Hayden is one of the organizers of Progressives for Obama. “The difference is that back then the Democratic Party was directly carrying out the Vietnam War, which meant there was no anti-war critic to vote for after Kennedy was assassinated and McCarthy defeated by the establishment,” he offered in an e-mail last month. “Today the Republican Party is directly carrying out the war, which obviously will make a lot of people favor changing the presidency despite the uncertainty of what the Democratic candidate will do when in office.”

Progressives for Obama resembles a Who’s Who of SDS luminaries. In addition to Hayden, Rudd, and Davidson, the group includes Bob Pardun, SDS’s education secretary during the 1966–67 school year; Paul Buhle, a radical professor who has recently attempted to revive SDS; Mickey and Dick Flacks, red-diaper babies who helped craft 1962’s Port Huron Statement, a seminal New Left document; and SDS’s third president, Todd Gitlin. Age and experience have mellowed some of the SDSers in Obama’s camp. Gitlin, for instance, has evolved into a respected Ivy League professor and milquetoast liberal. But others still glory in a past that can only damage Obama’s future. The aging New Left still practices a therapeutic politics that places a higher value on feelings of personal liberation than on restrained pursuit of political aims.

Obama has already taken political hits for his connection to Weathermen Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn. In the sixties, Ayers advocated that young people kill their parents, and Dohrn praised the Charles Manson murders. Alongside their Weather Underground cohorts, the pair declared war on the United States and participated in a bombing campaign that hit the Capitol, the Pentagon, and numerous law enforcement agencies. The couple eventually reinvented themselves—first as academics, then as players in Chicago-area Democratic politics. Obama praised Ayers’s book in the Chicago Tribune, sat with him on a foundation’s board, and benefited from a fundraiser held at the couple’s home. Ayers spoke at events organized by Michelle Obama; Barack Obama spoke at events organized by Ayers.

With the public revelation of this unseemly relationship—between unrepentant terrorists and the man who now seeks to oversee America’s war on terror—and the impact it’s already had on voter attitudes, one would think that other sixties extremists might be more reserved in proclaiming their support for Obama, knowing the damage such associations can do to his candidacy. As for Obama, he’ll need to do some distancing of his own. He protested that he was only eight when Ayers, Dohrn, Rudd, and company embarked on their bombing campaign, and that’s reasonable enough. But he’ll need to go further.

Fortunately for him, the Left has a long history of cold-shouldering predecessors to perpetuate its ideology, cleanse it from past failures, and make it appear fresh. The New Left dissociated itself from the Old Left’s Russophilic dogmatism through the Port Huron Statement and other declarations of independence. Even the phrase “New Left” was adopted to divorce the Left from its history.

SDS’s history offers a template for eliminating the embarrassing past. Jack London, Upton Sinclair, and others founded the Intercollegiate Socialist Society (ISS) during the Progressive era, but by World War I the word “socialist” had fallen from favor. So, with the Left seeing labor unions as the agent of societal change, the ISS became the League for Industrial Democracy (LID). Then, by the end of the 1950s, theorists Herbert Marcuse, C. Wright Mills, and Norman O. Brown scoffed at the idea of blue-collar workers—often violently hostile to the Left’s aims—as transformative agents, and the LID’s student arm, the Student League for Industrial Democracy (SLID), rechristened itself Students for a Democratic Society. Just as SDS killed SLID as the fifties became the sixties, Weatherman killed SDS as the sixties became the seventies: SDS’s spirit of “participatory democracy” could not peacefully coexist with the vanguardism of Weatherman. And now, completing the circle, the SDS alumni of “progressives” for Obama resurrect a term that would have been more familiar to their distant forebears in the Intercollegiate Socialist Society. On the Left, everything old is eventually new again.

In 1968, the Left served as unwitting allies of Republicans, costing the Democrats the White House by rioting at their convention and withholding votes from Hubert Humphrey. In 2008, it is their vocal support that may cost Barack Obama the presidency. Obama can take a page from the early days of the New Left, which—initially, at least—refused to allow discredited radicals to discredit it. Either Obama publicly divorces himself from radical supporters whose association does more for them than it does for him, or he faces the prospect of Bill Ayers as his Willie Horton.

Obama and his revolutionary communist friends:

Here's a small sample...

Weather Underground Organization linked to North Vietnamese and Cuban governments, KGB
[420 pages in all on pdf]

Source: FBI, via Freedom of Information Act

In 1976, the FBI's Chicago Field Office prepared a summary which described the activities of the Weather Underground Organization, also known as Weathermen. This organization described itself as a revolutionary organization of communist men and women. The FBI's analysis of its motivations, beliefs, and international travels are outlined in this summary.

[some excerpts from the 1976 report linking the organization to foreign governments...]

From the moment in October, 1967, when Radio Hanoi announced the formation of the South Vietnamese Peoples Committee for Solidarity with American People (by the National Liberation Front (NLF), the political arm of the Viet Cong) with the objective of establishing relations with "progressive organizations and individuals in the United States," a political front was enjoined in behalf of the national interests of the Democratic Republic of North Vietnam (DRV) (and the NLF), the purpose of which was to intensify the anti-war sentiment in the United States. From the initial meeting between the Vietnamese and leading anti-war activists held in Bratislava, Czechoslovakia, in November, 1967, to the July, 1969, meeting with leading Weatherpeople held in Havana, Cuba, the influence of Vietnamese representatives on the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) leadership became sharply pronounced. At the same time, the example of the Cuban revolution became the guide for the emerging American student revolutionary. With an increasing number of trips to Havana where the youthful revolutionary could learn at first hand how to create revolution, the influence of Cuba on the developing WUO [Weather Underground Organization] was enormous.

The WUO obtained their revolutionary methodology from the Cubans and Vietnamese and, importantly, put into practice what they had learned from them. The Weathermen, of course, did not just happen to come about during the June, 1969, SDS National Convention. They fully admit their radical heritage began during experiences gained in SDS and as shown herein their international contacts with representatives of the DRV and NLF which began in 1967 increased their anti-imperialist consciousness so that by 1969 they had solidified their revolutionary commitment to include the maximum optimum of armed struggle. So, when Huynh Van Ba, representative of the Provisional Revolutionary Government of Vietnam (PRG), instructed the WUO to "look for the person who fights hardest against the cops...Don't look for the one who says the best thing. Look for the one who fights," the campus base was forgotten and the WUO began to recruit the greasers and assorted oddments who had displayed their hatred of authority in direct combat with police.

http://www.freerepublic.com/~etl/

Obama has been groomed for many years to be the radical anti-American and marxist that he is. He willful associations of long standing attest to this. His positions attetst to this. His religious ideology attests to this.

He tries to hide behind a teleprompter and shift positions everyime he speaks to a new crowd to try and mask it. The MSM is playingcover for him...but the truth is out there and relatively easy to find...and the truth is coming out.

God grant that we all will do our part in shining the light of truth on this charlatan.

BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA - CHANGE YOU CAN COUNT ON, BUT DON'T WANT

THE AUDACITY OF TRUTH ABOUT BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA

NOBAMA '08 SIGHTED IN EMMETT, ID, JULY 2ND, 2008

From Barack Obama's official website:

“I wanted to make an art piece of Barack Obama because I thought an iconic portrait of him could symbolize and amplify the importance of his mission. I believe Obama will guide this country to a future where everyone can thrive and I should support him vigorously for the sake of my two young daughters. I have made art opposing the Iraq war for several years, and making art of Obama, who opposed the war from the start, is like making art for peace. I know I have an audience of young art fans and I’m delighted if I can encourage them to see the merits of Barack Obama.”

-Shepard Fairey
http://store.barackobama.com/product_p/po26951.htm

See, it's all about "peace, love, togetherness" and "change". Here are some of Fairey's other masterpieces. Most of his works are along these same lines...

Source:
http://jonathanlevinegallery.com/?method=Artist.ArtistDetail&ArtistID=F65EBB86-3048-28EB-92D55AA4FC996E31&GalleryID=82C33C59-3048-28EB-92DB386C8C733405

From Barack Obama's official website:

-Shepard Fairey
http://store.barackobama.com/product_p/po26951.htm

See, it's all about "peace, love, togetherness" and "change". Here are some of Fairey's other masterpieces. Most of his works are along these same lines...

Source:
http://jonathanlevinegallery.com/?method=Artist.ArtistDetail&ArtistID=F65EBB86-3048-28EB-92D55AA4FC996E31&GalleryID=82C33C59-3048-28EB-92DB386C8C733405

Michael Moore endorses Wesley Clark and Obama

From Michael Moore's website, September 12th, 2003:

Michael Moore to Wesley Clark: Run!
A Citizen's Appeal to a General in a Time of War (at Home)

Dear General Wesley Clark,

I've been meaning to write to you for some time. Two days after the Oscars, when I felt very alone and somewhat frightened by the level of hatred toward me for daring to suggest that we were being led into war for "fictitious reasons," one person stuck his neck out and came to my defense on national television.

And that person was you.

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/message/index.php?messageDate=2003-09-12

__________________________________________________________________

From Moore's website, January 14th, 2004:

I'll Be Voting For Wesley Clark / Good-Bye Mr. Bush

Many of you have written to me in the past months asking, 'Who are you going to vote for this year?'

I have decided to cast my vote in the primary for Wesley Clark. That's right, a peacenik is voting for a general. What a country!

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/message/index.php?messageDate=2004-01-14

__________________________________________________________________

Michael Moore quote, also from his website...

The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not "insurgents" or "terrorists" or "The Enemy." They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win. Get it, Mr. Bush?
[actual quote from Michael Moore (2004). It still appears on his website]
http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/message/index.php?messageDate=2004-04-14

__________________________________________________________________

This one has been up for years, although I doubt if it's actually Michael Moore saying it...

The Communist Party USA (CPUSA):
"We are a party of unity in action. We are an integral part of every struggle and movement for change to eliminate poverty and joblessness, against racism and for full equality. We are participants, initiators and leaders of every movement to make life better now and much better in a socialist future." Yeah, so they supported an oppressive dictator, like the Repubs and Democrats haven't? The CP is still around, has apologized for that whole Stalin thing, and has a quickly growing youth section.
[see: MichaelMoore.com-->Links-->PoliticalAction (bottom of the page--CPUSA promo)]
http://www.michaelmoore.com/links/index.php?linkType=Political%20Action

__________________________________________________________________

From the Revolutionary Communist Party website
A Viewer's Guide to Fahrenheit 911

Revolutionary Worker #1246, July 18, 2004, posted at http://rwor.org

"People have been lied to. And many can see it. Invasion, occupation, police spying, round-ups, even torture camps--plus far-reaching changes in law, treaty and doctrine --they have all come wrapped in deceit. The President lies. His whole clique lies."

http://rwor.org/a/1246/fahrenheit_911_guide.htm

_________________________________________________________________

Monday, April 21st, 2008
My Vote's for Obama (if I could vote) ...by Michael Moore

Friends,

I don't get to vote for President this primary season. I live in Michigan. The party leaders (both here and in D.C.) couldn't get their act together, and thus our votes will not be counted.

So, if you live in Pennsylvania, can you do me a favor? Will you please cast my vote -- and yours -- on Tuesday for Senator Barack Obama?

http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/message/index.php

From RushLimbaugh.com:
Hanoi Jane Endorses Obama
April 3, 2008

REPORTER 1: Jane, who are you voting for?

REPORTER 2: Who gets your vote?

FONDA: Obama.

REPORTER 2: Oh, my God. Heaven help us all.

RUSH: The reporter for TMZ said, "Oh, God. Heaven help us all." Obviously the reporter is an Obama supporter.

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_040308/content/01125111.guest.html

_________________________________________________________________

November 22, 1970 -- During a fund-raising tour for GI deserters, Vietnam Veterans Against the War and the Black Panthers, Jane Fonda is quoted in the Detroit Free Press as telling a University of Michigan audience:

"I would think that if you understood what communism was, you would hope, you would pray on your knees that we would someday become communist," and "The peace proposal of the Viet Cong is the only honorable, just, possible way to achieve peace in Vietnam."
http://www.wintersoldier.com/index.php?topic=Timeline

Fonda made the following statement at the University of Texas:
"We've got to establish a Socialist economic structure that will limit private profit-oriented businesses. Whether the transition is peaceful depends on the way our present governmental leaders react. We must commit our lives to this transition ...... We should be very proud of our new breed of soldier. It's not organized but it's mutiny, and they have every right." --Karen Elliott Dallas Morning News December 11, 1971

From 1972: "I am not a do-gooder, I am a revolutionary. A revolutionary woman."

Source for most of the Jane Fonda material:
http://www.1stcavmedic.com/jane_fonda.htm

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.