Obama's "community organizer" phase was about political power, not soup kitchens

Windy Citizen ^ | July 28, 2008 | John Maki

[bahblahbah]

If you've heard the term, you likely learned about it through Barack Obama's memoir or one of his speeches where he talks about his time working in poor neighborhoods on Chicago's South Side in the 1980s. He refers to this time in his life a lot. Obama leans on it, hard, while stumping. But what does it mean?

What do community organizers actually do? How do they do it? And how has Obama's experience as a community organizer shaped his run for the presidency?

Since 2002, I have worked with several Chicago-based community organizers and even done some organizing myself. My experience has taught me to view Barack Obama, Chicago's most famous community organizer, in a different light than you will likely encounter from most political commentators.

Community organizing is old-fashioned, bare-knuckle politics for the little guy.

Were you picturing Obama in a soup kitchen instead? It is not your fault. When Obama talks about his time as a community organizer, he does not go beyond a vague and benign description of how he worked with unemployed steelworkers and their families to fight for change. Media coverage of Obama's days as a community organizer has not been much better. Most journalists tend either to repeat stories that Obama has told in his books, or merely interview people who worked with him at the time without giving you a clear idea of what community organizing entails.

[TigersEye]

Here is a long but good article that tells exactly what Obama accomplished as a "community organizer" and as an IL state senator. There is a reason he doesn't talk about the details of his work there.

Grim proving ground for Obama's housing policy

[mabelkitty]

Yep. Middle America is about to get an education on Alinsky’s “Community Organizers”.

[TigersEye]

I don’t think you’re being fair to agitators. I doubt that they have ever done the damage Obama did to the community in Chicago. See article linked in #21.

[Wil H]

Obama's "community organizer" phase was about political power, not soup kitchens

Like most of what Obama says, the term "Community Organizer" can be traced back to Saul Alinsky.

He defines the role. It is the job of the Community Organizer to spread discontent in a community and then play upon their diverse fears and weaknesses to galvanize them into providing the "Community Organizer" with a power base.

In other words, it is the recruiting and manipulation of "useful idiots"

[Diver Dave]

Most journalists tend either to repeat stories that Obama has told in his books, ...

Stories from the two novels he wrote being passed off as autobiographies.

[mabelkitty]

In Cleveland, Ward Captains serve the same purpose and it’s the Dennis Kucinich way.

[mabelkitty]

I don’t think he accidentally married Michelle. She was very well-connected to the Chicago machine. Quite convenient for his Chicago career.

[D-fendr]

Use the correct term:

Party Organizer.

[TXnMA]

Ward Heeler...

[angelsonmyside]

“Someone on a Hillary website mentioned that Hitler, Pol Pot and Stalin were all community organizers.”

Wow, lol

[denydenydeny]

Basically, the civilian equivalent of the political commissar.

[unspun]

Read about Saul Alinsky’s Chicago Community organizers here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saul_Alinsky
...and Barack Obama

http://www.sovereignty.org.uk/features/activistinf/morality.html
THE 10 RULES OF THE ETHICS OF MEANS AND ENDS
Alinsky presents a set of “rules” on the ethics of means and ends.

http://www.answers.com/topic/saul-alinsky
Alinsky was a critic of a passive and ineffective mainstream liberalism. In Rules for Radicals, he argued that the most effective means are whatever will achieve the desired ends, and that an intermediate end for radicals should be democracy because of its relative ease to work within to achieve other ends of social justice.

The left is dominated by the old, Marxist, cum “radical” tactic of “the ends justifies the means” and that morality is simply a set of perceptions of the people, either as a weapon against the socialist, or a tool set for him to utilize. And the goal, mind you, is to control and manipulate the people in order to gain the power they need — in order to (funny part here) empower the people. Worked really well in Asia, last Century.

Strategy: Lie; pretend to be a democrat interested in freedom and the common principles of one’s milieu. Become messianic if you can to get power. Focus on the felt problems of the masses. But gain power however you can.