11 Reasons the Left Has Not Won the Culture War

breitbart

By John Nolte 

It is not just Markos of Daily Kos infamy claiming the Left has won the culture war. The Week's Matt Lewis is saying the same. Yeah, they are both kinda trolling. So 'scuse me while I take the bait. Let's start with the biggie: same-sex marriage.

Yes, polls show gay marriage is breaking out all over, but when put to a vote same-sex marriage has lost (even in California) much more often than not. Furthermore, gay marriage is not being legalized through popular opinion or demand, it is being legalized through activist judges. There is no question that attitudes have changed dramatically towards homosexuals getting gay-married. But the difference between what opinion polls and actual votes have produced should give The Culture Conquerors some pause.

Granted, many of the referendums passed in favor of traditional marriage some years back probably wouldn’t today. But it is still absurd to call the entire culture war over when you have to rely on autocratic judges to get your way because there is no Civil Rights-style uprising in favor of gay marriage. There is a lot of whining and bullying and cry-babying and media bias pushing gay marriage. But no one is taking it to the streets, or even the ballot box.

Bottom line: Gay marriage has had to be forced on an American people that is either indifferent or opposed. A win's a win, I guess, but it's an ugly and divisive win that did not come with popular acceptance.

The silliest part of The Culture War Is Over talk is the lack of historical context. During the hedonistic Roaring 20's and the Dirty Filthy Hippie 60's, the Left was probably pretty sure they had won the culture wars. Then post-war America and the 80's happened.  

And even today…

1. While judges are legalizing gay marriage, Christianity is making a major comeback in the free market of  entertainment.  

2. While pot is being legalized in a few states, the pro-abortion movement is on its heels in a majority of states and in opinion polls.  

3. While television shows become more sex-driven, elsewhere on television the masculine male is making a comeback on wildly popular reality shows that celebrate the working class and their traditional values.  

4. While Colbert wins David Letterman's spot, Jimmy Fallon figured out he had to remain apolitical if he wanted to remain number one.

5. While the rise of the weak, neurotic, man-child metrosexual-nerd dominates one forgettable movie after another, a new Golden Age in television has brought us an assembly line of flawed but masculine anti-heroes -- "real men" protagonists like Jack Bauer, Don Draper, Walter White, Raylan Givens, Tony Soprano, the cast of The Walking Dead, Boardwalk Empire, and even House of Cards. 

6. While Miley twerks and MTV baby-mamas, unions and the union mentality are dying.

7. While the left-wing mainstream media figures out how to survive, conservative media is on the upswing.

8. While the gaystapo makes war against those who don't wish to celebrate the gay-married,  the demand for charter schools and school choice grows.  

9. While we're paying for Sandra Fluke's right to birth control, we're prevailing on our Second Amendment civil rights in ways unimagined just ten years ago.

10. While our federal government is constructing Orwellian First Amendment Zones, the Supreme Court is slowly suffocating the campaign finance laws that gave our government, union and media overseers a near-monopoly on political speech.

11. Occupy is dead. The Tea Party lives.

Moreover, we live in a culture that will never again (or at least in the foreseeable future) spit on the American Serviceman or get weak-kneed on crime. Those are seismic wins for the political Right. Young people might find this hard to believe, but forty years ago the Left was all about coddling violent criminals and denigrating our fighting men as "baby killers." 

Markos is right about one thing, and he's pretty excited about it:

For a crowd that flinches at any notion of sex, it's gotta be impossible to escape sexual imagery, from advertising to media to Miley Cyrus' latest whatever-the-hell she is doing.

Yes, Markos, you've done it: our culture is now so grotesquely coarse that young women publicly degrading and exploiting themselves is acceptable and profitable. 

Well done.

Take a bow. 

But while you're patting yourself on the back with one hand and doing I don't want to know what with the other, consider reading a book. We saw the same during the Roaring 20's. It didn't last.

You see, it's not just the American culture but the human condition itself that is cyclical. Anyone who understands American and world history -- hell, anyone who is my age understands this.

I'm old enough to remember San Francisco liberals spitting on soldiers and our flag. Today Nancy Pelosi knows that she has to speak openly about patriotism and her support for our troops. She even talks about Jesus.

History proves that the culture ebbs and it flows. Times change and then they change back. American Christianity wanes (as it is now) and then it surges. In the long run on that particular point, my money is on a fella named Francis, not Barack.

The Right has won some culture battles. The Left has won some culture battles. The war, however, rages on. And as things stand right now, let me just say that if "losing" means that in ten years millions are gay-married while the abomination of abortion is halfway through its last gap, feel free to throw me in the briar patch.

Venezuela: contrarrevolución o barbarie

Néstor Díaz de Villegas

En su discurso del 21 de mayo de 1971 ante el parlamento chileno, Salvador Allende expuso el programa político que terminaría siendo el modelo de las modernas dictaduras constitucionales latinoamericanas:

"Chile se encuentra ante la necesidad de iniciar una manera nueva de construir la sociedad socialista: la vía revolucionaria nuestra, la vía pluralista, anticipada por los clásicos del marxismo, pero jamás antes concretada."

En Latinoamérica, el discurso marxista provee la coartada que permite al demagogo actuar con relativa impunidad. A partir de Allende, el desmontaje de las instituciones democráticas queda expresado arbitrariamente en lenguaje populista:

"Es necesario adecuar las instituciones políticas a la nueva realidad. Por eso, en un momento oportuno, someteremos a la voluntad soberana del pueblo la necesidad de reemplazar la actual Constitución, de fundamento liberal, por una Constitución de orientación socialista. Y el sistema bicameral en funciones, por la Cámara Única."

¿Cómo lograr la aceptación de un programa tan abarcador si la Unidad Popular contaba apenas con un tercio de los votos? ¿Cómo alcanzar la mayoría aplastante y la "Cámara Única"? Nathaniel Davis, embajador norteamericano en Chile durante los dos últimos años del gobierno de la Unidad Popular, nota, con genuino entusiasmo, que "mediante las nacionalizaciones, de facto o formalmente decretadas, Allende amplió el sector público día por día, de manera que su gobierno pudo dar empleo a miles de partidarios de la Unidad Popular."

Las textilera SUMAR contrató a mil trabajadores adicionales y Cervecerías Unidas duplicó su fuerza laboral luego de ser nacionalizada. La mina de cobre El Teniente sumó cuatro mil nuevos operarios. "Era el gran momento de los nombramientos políticos a todo lo largo y ancho de la burocracia estatal, hasta a nivel de conserjes", recuerda Davis, en su libro Los dos últimos años de Salvador Allende. "Por poner un solo ejemplo: la Corporación de Trabajadores Municipales (CORMU) creció durante el gobierno de Allende, de 200 a 12 mil empleados."

En cuanto a la procedencia del dinero para las reformas socialistas, el embajador explica: "Los altos precios del cobre permitieron al gobierno de Frei acumular alrededor de 350 a 400 millones en divisas. La Unidad Popular usó liberalmente ese dinero."

Nuevo modelo antiparlamentario

En Latinoamérica, el moderno golpe de Estado es un golpe asestado desde adentro, desde el corazón del sistema parlamentario y la burocracia estatal, y ratificado en las urnas. Las dictaduras latinoamericanas basadas en el reelecionismo rectifican y expanden la experiencia chilena.

La explicación vulgar del allendismo insiste en su ascendencia marxista; hay, incluso, algo de sano fanatismo en la manera en que Allende confía en la infalibilidad de "los clásicos". Pero, ¿qué tal si buscamos el significado del antiparlamentarismo en otras fuentes, en nuevas claves históricas, en los clásicos oscuros, censurados, que entran por la puerta del fondo a la cosmovisión izquierdista? La destrucción del parlamentarismo bicameral ocurriría de todas maneras, sustentada en un programa socialista, pero no de "orientación marxista", sino fascista. De hecho, las distinciones entre estos dos términos son cada vez más tenues:

"Así, nuestro movimiento se vio enfrentado a la siguiente disyuntiva: ¿debíamos, a fin de destruir el parlamento, integrarnos a él y hacerlo explotar desde adentro, o lanzar la ofensiva desde afuera, asaltando las instituciones como tales?"

Las pregunta de Hitler (en Mein Kampf, pg. 102, traducción inglesa de Ralph Manheim) sobre cómo destruir el parlamento, encuentra la respuesta definitiva en el discurso de Allende del 21 de mayo de 1971. El constitucionalismo burgués deberá ser atacado desde adentro y desde afuera; impugnado simultáneamente desde la ideología marxista y la praxis fascista.

Continuar leyendo en Diario de Cuba >>

Con los Castro no hay lógica

Diario de Cuba

Roberto Álvarez Quiñones

A partir de la legitimidad que le dio al castrismo la cumbre de la CELAC en La Habana, y de la decisión de la Unión Europea (UE) de ignorar la violación de los derechos humanos y negociar un acuerdo de cooperación con Cuba, los hermanos Castro andan de plácemes: ya no tienen presión internacional para hacer cambios verdaderos. En la isla, "todo está bien".

Los mandatarios latinoamericanos y europeos tal vez piensan que abrazar a los Castro es una buena estrategia para "contagiarles" la democracia y presionarlos para que flexibilicen el régimen. Craso error. Lo que logran es envalentonar a la más prolongada tiranía en la historia de las Américas.

La cúpula militar cubana ahora sabe que haga lo que haga no va a pagar ningún precio político o diplomático. Tiene el visto bueno internacional para no hacer cambios reales y seguir asfixiando las libertades individuales más elementales. No hacen falta ya máscaras para hacer creer que habrá reformas. 

Si las democracias latinoamericanas hubiesen acudido a Santiago de Chile a fines de los años 80 a dar un espaldarazo continental a la dictadura de Augusto Pinochet porque éste había moderado los asesinatos y las desapariciones, y algunos exiliados estaban regresando al país, el general golpista no habría convocado el plebiscito (que él pensaba ganar) que puso fin a su tiranía de 17 años. De haberse conformado los presidentes latinoamericanos, la OEA, la ONU y la UE con aquellos "cambios positivos", Pinochet posiblemente habría seguido siendo dictador hasta su muerte en 2006.

¿Por qué los gobiernos de Latinoamérica, y también los europeos, incluso los de derecha, se niegan a apoyar al pueblo cubano y convalidan la dictadura?

Puede haber muchas respuestas para estas interrogantes, pero a mi modo de ver, además del interés en hacer negocios en la Isla, hay tres que, combinadas, dan en el clavo: 1) a Cuba se le aplica una lógica política y diplomática que corresponde a un país normal, sin serlo; 2) es el pensamiento de Gramsci y no el de Marx, Mao, o el Che Guevara, el que marca la pauta de la izquierda radical en la región; y 3) buena parte de la clase política latinoamericana está "actualizando" el viejo populismo de la primera mitad del siglo XX.

El 'beso de Judas' no funciona

Cuba no es un país normal. Está al margen de toda lógica política. Es un país comunista ortodoxo y encima padece una autocracia dinástica que considera una "traición a la revolución" ceder un ápice en el control absoluto que tiene de la sociedad. Con los Castro no hay diálogo posible. Nunca han concedido nada. Siempre hay que ceder ante ellos, y mucho.

Por eso, con el gobierno cubano no funciona el bíblico "beso de Judas". Resulta inútil acercarse al dictador y mimarlo para comprometerlo a que haga reformas. No las hará.

Más a la izquierda

Hay otro factor fundamental. Antonio Gramsci, fundador del Partido Comunista de Italia, quien ideológicamente era más peligroso que Marx, en los años 30 del siglo pasado sostenía que la única vía realmente viable para llegar al socialismo no era la revolución violenta como propugnaba Lenin, sino ir arrebatándole paulatinamente a la burguesía la hegemonía cultural y mediática mediante la creación de lo que llamó una "fuerza contra-hegemónica".

Para Gramsci no era necesario jugarse la vida en insurrecciones armadas para tomar el poder del Estado, sino lograr el control ideológico de las escuelas, las universidades y sobre todo de los medios de comunicación. O sea, él proponía una verdadera guerra cultural desde abajo, subrepticia.

Eso en buena medida está sucediendo hoy en Latinoamérica, y también en Estados Unidos y Europa (no tanto en Asia y África). Ello explica la paradoja de que pese al derrumbe del "socialismo real" en el Viejo Continente y su desmantelamiento gradual en China y Vietnam, los socialistas tienen ahora más influencia política que durante la guerra fría.

La sovietización de la sociedad  ya no es una opción válida, y la izquierda democrática —que cree en el libre mercado— predomina sobre la "revolucionaria". Pero también es cierto que las universidades, los centros de investigación de las ciencias sociales, la historia y la política, así como los medios de comunicación, cuentan cada vez más con personas que se definen a sí mismas como "anticapitalistas". Actúan como comunistas y no lo saben. Otros lo saben, pero no lo admiten.

Hoy muchos profesores, académicos, artistas, intelectuales, periodistas, editores de medios de comunicación, que tienen una cosmovisión de la realidad social, económica y política mucho más a la izquierda que hace tres o cuatro décadas.

La guerra cultural que propugnaba Gramsci se observa incluso en EEUU, donde a los izquierdistas radicales erróneamente se les considera como "liberales" cuando en realidad son la antípoda del liberalismo. Son lo opuesto a Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine y demás fundadores del pensamiento liberal estadounidense.

El liberalismo reivindica las libertades individuales y aboga por poner límites al Estado y subordinarlo a la autonomía de la persona, mientras que los mal llamados "liberales" promueven la intervención del Estado en el ámbito económico y social. Al respecto, dijo Jefferson: "Cuando el pueblo teme al Gobierno, hay tiranía; cuando el Gobierno teme al pueblo, hay libertad".

Fuerza electoral

En todo Occidente se advierte una influencia creciente de la izquierda en la TV, la prensa escrita, las revistas, el cine, la radio, la internet, etc. Por otra parte, se trata de un segmento social politizado, muy activo en los partidos políticos, los sindicatos, las organizaciones no gubernamentales (ONG), y lo más importante: acude a las urnas a votar.

En los porcentajes de abstención que hay en los procesos electorales latinoamericanos no abundan los izquierdistas, que sí votan, eligen candidatos, y por tanto constituyen hoy una gran fuerza electoral que todo político está obligado a cortejar, en cualquier país.

Esa fuerza política es la que ha llevado al poder a la mayoría de los actuales jefes de Estado en América Latina. Pero en varios países son ellos los responsable del renacimiento del populismo nacionalista y estatista, con su carga de controles gubernamentales y restricciones de todo tipo. Fueron los gobiernos populistas estatistas, al estilo del de Juan Domingo Perón en Argentina, o del Estado Novo de Getulio Vargas en Brasil, los que retardaron el desarrollo económico latinoamericano en el siglo pasado.

La CELAC fue un invento chavista-castrista para enfrentarse políticamente a Estados Unidos,  dinamitar a la OEA, regresar al keynesianismo y el estatismo, e instalar a la dictadura cubana de igual a igual en el concierto de naciones democráticas de América Latina.

Lamentablemente, los gobernantes no asociados al eje populista del ALBA —o a los simpatizantes suyos como los de Argentina, Brasil y Uruguay— también están bailando con la música que tocan en Caracas y en La Habana.

Sea por no enajenar los votos de la izquierda en sus respectivos países, o por creer que a Cuba se le pueden aplicar las mismas reglas de decencia política que a los países con estadistas elegidos en las urnas, definitivamente a los gobernantes latinoamericanos les importa un comino la larga tragedia cubana.

Y que lo aprendan de una vez: con los Castro no hay lógica que valga.

Pro-Castro aspirante democrata a alcalde de Nueva York

martinoticias

Chirlane McCray and Bill de Blasio/ www.nydailynews.com

Diarios neoyorquinos pusieron de relieve el fin de semana la filiación izquierdista y los escarceos con los sandinistas nicaragüenses y con Cuba del candidato demócrata a la alcaldía de Nueva York, Bill de Blasio, quien el 5 de noviembre próximo se medirá en las urnas con el republicano Joe Lhota.

Un comentario publicado en The New York Times dice que “de Blasio, el defensor público de la ciudad, ha mencionado solo ocasionalmente el tiempo que fue un joven idealista que se opuso a las guerras en el extranjero (…) a fines de 1980 y principios de 1990” y su activismo ha sido “omitido en el sitio web de la campaña”.

Pero una revisión de cientos de páginas de archivos y “más de una docena de entrevistas sugieren—señalan—que su época de joven activista fue más influyente en dar forma a su ideología de lo que se conocía, y con mucho fue más política que un trabajo típicamente humanitario”.

El Times destaca que De Blasio se convirtió en un ardiente simpatizante de los revolucionarios nicaragüenses. “Ayudó a recaudar fondos para los sandinistas en Nueva York y se suscribió al periódico del partido, Barricada”, y cuando se le preguntó en 1990 sobre sus metas sociales dijo que “era un defensor del socialismo democrático”.

Tras apuntar que el político demócrata se declara ahora “progresista” y que en su época de activista hasta dio publicidad a fiestas parta celebrar la revolución cubana, destaca que incluso pasó su luna de miel en la isla en 1991 “en violación de la prohibición de viajes establecida por EE.UU.” y hasta hoy habla “con admiración” de los sandinistas.

Un artículo difundido por el periódico New York Post, apunta que de acuerdo con la visión que tiene De Blasio de “combatir la desigualdad y la injusticia económica” podría mirarse a lo que sucede en Cuba, donde las cifras “reflejan el paraíso” que describe el político.

El Post subraya que luego de 54 años en los que Fidel y Raúl Castro han sacado adelante el sueño socialista “todo el mundo es igualmente pobre, con salarios promedios al mes de $19 dólares, mientras un par de zapatos de niño cuesta casi esa cantidad”.

Según el periódico, el alboroto armado con el sistema de salud cubano es “un chiste”, porque cada cual debe llevar sus propias sábanas, orinales y comida a los hospitales, y “rezar para no morir de una infección o por negligencia”.

El autor del artículo narra sus propias experiencias de un viaje a Cuba y dice haberse quedado pasmado por la “total ruina” de todo excepto de la policía. “La una vez gloriosa arquitectura de La Habana se derrumba, y hay pollos y puercos en una buena parte del centro de la ciudad, pero no agua corriente”, añade.

Dice que la mitad de los carros son propiedad del gobierno, que las pequeñas ciudades dan la impresión de haberse quedado detenidas “en el Siglo XIX”, y que el transporte público “consiste en un hombre conduciendo una carreta halada por un caballo”.

También destaca que la TV e Internet son escasas y “fuertemente controladas” y que cualquiera que se queje de eso “puede terminar en una celda”. 

Balaguer explica la Internacional Castrista post Union Sovietica

Cuba Hoy

Destituido por el Congreso el Presidente paraguayo Fernando Lugo

democracia constitutucional en accion. duro golpe para los albistas e idiotas izquierdosos  latinoamericanos 

------------------------------------- 

Abandonado el palacio de gobierno

By Daniela Desantis

ASUNCION — Ousted Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo said on Friday he accepted Congress' decision to remove him from office after a lightning-quick impeachment trial.

Lugo, a former Roman Catholic bishop who was due to finish his term next year, urged supporters angered by his ouster to protest peacefully. In a television address, he said he already considered himself a "former president."

Lugo, a silver-haired former Roman Catholic bishop who quit the Church to run for the presidency, was found guilty of mishandling armed clashes over a land eviction in which 17 police and peasant farmers were killed last week.

In line with Paraguay's constitution, Lugo will be replaced by Vice President Federico Franco, who has been a fierce opponent of the president.

Lugo's rivals firmly control both congressional houses. The Senate voted 39-4 to remove him the day after Lawmakers in the lower house agreed in a sudden, near-unanimous vote to impeach him.

Several thousand Lugo supporters gathered outside Congress in the capital, Asuncion, and tried to break through police lines as the verdict was given. Police fired teargas and rubber bullets to disperse the crowd.

"This is an 'express' coup because (lawmakers) have done it in the wee hours of the night," Lugo told television station Telesur late on Thursday.

Lugo had refused to resign, resisting pressure from Church leaders to step down to ease mounting tension in the soy-exporting nation of 6 million people, one of the poorest and least stable in South America.

The next presidential election is in 2013 and Franco had been expected to run for office.

It was not clear whether Franco would be able to run next year if he assumes the presidency now because the constitution limits leaders to a single term.

Re-election has been banned since the constitution was overhauled following the 1989 fall of General Alfredo Stroessner's brutal 35-year dictatorship.

Lugo, 61, a mild-mannered leftist who speaks the Guarani Indian language, vowed to champion the needs of poor Paraguayans when he was elected four years ago, ending six decades of rule by the Colorado party.

The quickness of the impeachment trial raised concern among South American governments, which dispatched their foreign ministers to Asuncion late on Thursday. So me warned of possible sanctions if Lugo was ousted.

"Pepe" Mujica: Cuando pase Chávez, no habrá construido ningún socialismo

Globovisión

José Mujica: Admiro el Socialismo del Siglo XXI... by Globovision

Nuclear Treason: Who Is Jerome Grossman? — Emerging Corruption

Jerome Grossman

From  Emerging Corruption

In my first post in this series, I looked at Leo Szilard – communist sympathizer, accused Soviet agent and founder of Council for a Livable World (C.L.W.), America’s oldest and most influential Political Action Committee which is dedicated to funding pro-disarmament candidates into the U.S. Congress and Senate.

According to C.L.W.’s website, “its purpose is to campaign against the proliferation of nuclear weapons through lobbying and by supporting candidates who share their vision.” Next up, I profile C.L.W’s major  guiding force, Massachusetts businessman, activist and power broker  Jerome Grossman.
Born in 1917, Jerome Grossman worked in his  family business, the Massachussets Envelope Company,  for thirty-five years.  After selling his interest in the firm, Grossman,  accepted a position as the President and National Executive Director of Council for a Livable World, before becoming after 12 years, the  chairman of the organization. He is still officially Chairman Emeritus on the board of the C.L.W.
While coming from a business background, there is no doubt that Grossman is a socialist at heart.
Grossman told  interviewer  Nancy Earsy in 1996;

“The dynamics of the modern world under capitalism tend toward the growth of large corporations with semimonopoly positions. That’s my basis for supporting a big government, is to control big corporations.”

Jerome Grossman, grew up in a “liberal” household, reading The Nation and watching his father supporting supporting several  Massachusetts leftist politicians.

By this time he had left the business. When I was twenty-four he gave me the keys, and says, “You run it.” So that’s what he did. So he was known as a capable, effective, well-respected political person. I’m known as the Massachusetts liberal. Not radical––liberal. Although a lot of people think I’m radical––I’m more radical than they think. But my activities have been along those lines.

Grossman began his own political activism in the 1950s, working through the “peace movement” of the time, but became dissatisfied with lack of progress.

This in the middle 1950’s. And, of course, everybody was still terrified of McCarthyism, unwilling to do anything that appeared to recognize the existence of the Soviet Union and that they had a right to exist. It was interpreted as being against the Cold War. I was against the Cold War and I wanted it resolved. The reason why I wanted it resolved is so that nuclear weapons ought not to be used. So I became involved in National Committee For A Sane Nuclear Policy and various other organizations that were founded virtually every other year in response to various pressures.

Of course what we were working on then was the nuclear test ban. We’re still working on the nuclear test ban to try to complete it. But I was the one who became quite dissatisfied with the fact that we were essentially talking to each other in church basements and academic meetings, middle class, upper class, highly educated people. We weren’t reaching the public.

Founded in 1957,  the National Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy, became known as SANE and later Peace Action. The organization has been guided by communists and socialists throughout its history. In the early days Communist Party supporters  like Abe Bloom and General Hugh B. Hester served alongside Socialist Party types such as James Farmer, Victor Reuther and Norman Thomas.

H. Stuart Hughes

Grossman decided to move into electoral politics to achieve his goals. In 1962, the Massachusetts Socialist Party promoted their own “peace” candidate in the Massachusetts Senate elections – Communist Party front activist, chair of the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy and Harvard Professor, H. Stuart Hughes. Jerome Grossman chaired the campaign committee, while ultra radical Chester Hartman was the organizer of the massive signature drive required to place Hughes on the ballot. Hughes gained only a tiny vote  in an election that first put Ted Kennedy into the senate, but the campaign had far reaching implications. According to Grossman;

In the process we built a town-by-town organization all over the state, a structure that remains in place today. A clear result has been the election over recent decades of so many progressive voices to the state’s first-rate Congressional delegation, including Michael Harrington, Father Robert Drinan, Gerry Studds,Jim McGovern, Barney Frank, Ed Markey, John Tierney, Michael Capuano andJohn Kerry.
The Hughes campaign built the strongest statewide peace movement in the country, a movement that changed the face and reputation of Massachusetts politics.

Grossman played a major role in recruiting “peace candidate” Eugene McCarthy in the 1968 presidential campaign.

My worry about the Vietnam War was that it could result in a nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union or the United States and China. That was my main motivation. We were working in various ways. Then the presidential election of 1968 was looming. I worked with Allard Lowenstein and Curtis Gansto try to find a candidate who would run against Lyndon Johnson for the Democratic nomination on the issue of the Vietnam War. We went to George McGovern and he turned us down. He was Senator then. We went to Senator J. William Fulbright of Arkansas who was the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and had had very good hearings. He turned us down. We went to Bobby Kennedy and he turned us down. We had nobody.
Then one day in August, 1967––I’ll never forget it–– I got a telephone call out of the blue from this obscure Senator from Minnesota, Eugene J. McCarthy, wanting to talk to me about his running for President. What do you think he said? He asked me all kinds of questions. I said, “You know, I’m thrilled that you called,” I said, “but we have to talk about this.” He says, “Can you come down to Washington tomorrow?” So I went down there the next day. I took with me people from the Mass Pax organization, the fellow who had been the organizer of the grassroots, Chester Hartman, he came with me; Marty Peretz and his wife, Ann Peretz , I took them down because they were the money people…

Well, everybody went crazy. It was a focus, right? And we worked very hard in the campaign. As you know, the prime issue was the Vietnam War. We propelled Bobby Kennedy into the race. Then, of course, Nixon was elected…

Fr. Robert Drinan

One of Grossman’s next projects was the recruitment of Jesuit priest, Fr. Robert Drinan, to run for Congress. Communist fronter Drinan turned out to be one of the  most far left Representatives to ever serve in the U.S. Congress. He played a lead role in ending U.S. government investigations into subversive activities. This campaign also led to Grossman’s connection to future U.S. Senator and Presidential candidate, the leftist John Kerry.

We decided that we wanted to elect a member of the House of Representatives who was against the Vietnam War… So we furthered our activities against the Vietnam War by using the most Democratic tactics, by bringing in all of the two thousand anti-Vietnam War activists in the fourth Congressional district; bringing them all into a school for an all-day session and selecting a candidate from people who ran.
I was a candidate, and I was the likely candidate, until I found a Jesuit priest, Father Robert F. Drinan, the Dean of the Boston College Law School… Okay. So when I heard that Drinan, a well known priest, the Dean of the Boston College Law School, might be interested in running, I called him up immediately and said, “I’m dropping my candidacy; I will work for you.” So we nominated him at the caucus, and we elected him. And electing him was part of the process.
While this was going on I got a telephone call from somebody I had never heard of… This fellow calls me up and he says, “You don’t know me, but I have a brother who is a natural politician, and he’s over in Vietnam now. He’s coming back. And he wants to run in the caucus that you are organizing.” And I said, “I already have a candidate.” He says, “Yes, but my brother is special.” I said, “Who’s your brother?” He says, “John Kerry.” This was Cameron Kerry who at the time was a junior at Harvard College. He interested me so I said, “Get over here.” He hopped a bus and he came over in his sweater and everything. And we talked. John Kerry did run in that caucus and did very, very well in the caucus. I was hard pressed to beat him. But John Kerry, after he lost, he stood up and he said, “I’m going to respect the wishes of the caucus. I’m not going to run in the primary. I will dedicate the rest of the campaign to working for Father Drinan.” And that’s why I have been a supporter of John Kerry every since.

In  1982, Jerome Grossman, was a member of the American Committee on East-West Accord. The A.C.E.W.A., based in Washington, D.C., was a tax-exempt “independent educational organization”, with the stated aim of “improving East/West relations, with special focus on U.S.-Soviet relations.”
One of the key pro-disarmament organizations of the “Cold war”, A.C.E.W.A., while attempting to maintain an aura of respectability was riddled with far leftists.

Prominent A.C.E.W.A. members included;

• Bernard Feld – A  member of President Nixon’s famous “Enemies list”, Feld was heavily involved with the communist influenced and Leo Szilard sponsoredBulletin of the Atomic Scientists and with the Council for a Livable World.
• Joseph Filner – A former Pennsylvania Communist Party  official  turned international businessman. Filner focused on metal and technology trading with the Soviet Union and was a major funder of leftist causes. He was the father of current Democratic Socialists of America-affiliated California Congressman, Bob Filner
• Philip Klutznik – Former U.S. Secretary of Commerce, who later served on far leftist Chicago Mayor Harold Washington‘s transition oversight Committee. It was Washington’s election that inspired Barack Obama to first move to Chicago
• Bernard Lown – A lifelong Communist Party front activist and co-president of  International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War
• George Mcgovern – Far left U.S. Senator
• Erwin Salk – A communist affiliated, F.B.I. monitored  Chicago lawyer, and President of  the Board of Directors of the Chicago Center for US/USSR Relations and Exchanges, where he worked with Communist Party USA member Larry McGurty and Democratic Socialists of America member and future Progressives for Obama supporter Betty Willhoite



Joseph Filner

• Jeremy Stone -  President of the far left and pro-disarmament Federation of American Scientists, affiliate of the even further left Institute for Policy Studies and son of alleged one time Soviet agent I. F. Stone. In November, 1983 the F.A.S. sent a party to the Soviet Union, which included Jeremy Stone, and future Obama “Science Czar”, John Holdren

There is some evidence also that Grossman, a former member of the Democratic National Committee may also be a member of Democratic Socialists of America – the U.S.’s largest Marxist organization.

In 2010, Jerome Grossman’s son Steve Grossman, was endorsed by the Boston Democratic Socialists of America, in his run for the Massachusetts treasurer job.

Son of CPPAX founder Jerome Grossman (one of DSA’s first Debs-Thomas honorees),  Steve Grossman has strong labor backing and says he will use this office to leverage progressive issues.

Jerome Grossman is also listed on the advisory board of the Democratic Socialists of America-affiliated National Jobs For All Coalition, alongside identified D.S.A. members Elaine Bernard, Noreen Connell, Staughton Lynd, Manning Marable, Lawrence Mishel,Rep.  Jerrold Nadler, Juliet Schor, Ruth Sidel,  Victor Sidel, Theda Skocpol, Joseph B. Uehlein, Cornel West (Barack Obama’s Black Advisory Council 2008), and William Julius Wilson (a panelist with Obama at a D.S.A. sponsored forum in Chicago in 1996).

Though little known nationally, Jerome Grossman has probably had more influence on U.S. disarmament policy than any living person in the country.

‘Democrats, Socialists and Communists…We Are All Together’: Piven Draws Chilling Connections

TrevorLoudon.com/

Veteran Indiana GOP senator Richard Lugar, faces a serious primary challenge this election cycle.

Every patriotic american should be praying that “Dangerous Dick’” is soundly defeated, and is never elected, or appointed  to any form of public office again.

Richard Lugar is not merely a leftist Republican – there are plenty of those.  “Dangerous Dick” is in a league all of his own.

What makes Lugar so dangerous is his long standing ties to an anti – American,  Marxist led “peace” Political Action Committee, which has campaigned to cut US military preparedness and defense capabilities for 50 years.

Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev

The New START Disarmament Treaty with Moscow passed the Senate in late December 2010, 71 votes to 26.

Several Republicans voted with the Democrats and Independents, despite strong pressure from the GOP grassroots to vote against it.

There is no question that Richard Lugar , as co-leader, with far leftist Democrat John Kerry of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was the leading Republican in favor of the treaty, and must ultimately take responsibility for its ratification.

Leftist journalist and member of the infamous JournoList, Spencer Ackerman wrote in The Washington Independent,

In the spirit of self-criticism, something that I see my New START coverage has taken for granted is the support of Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), the leading arms-control baron on the Republican side in the Senate…

Lugar is firmly behind the Obama administration’s new treaty to reduce the U.S.-Russian nuclear stockpile and the deployed systems that can deliver those deadly payloads. So if you assume every Democratic senator will vote for the treaty when it comes up for ratification, Lugar’s vote brings the count to 60. The question is whether Lugar’s vote can bring along seven other Republicans.

In the end Lugar convinced more than enough Republicans to vote for a treaty that was enthusiastically backed by the Democrats, the Russians, the Socialist International and the Communist Party USA.

How is it that a GOP Senator from Republican stronghold Indiana could be such a life-long proponent of disarmament treaties?

In my view, the answer  lies  in Lugar’s long time connection to the Council for a Livable World.

Council for a Livable World endorsements 2010

Founded in 1962 by Manhattan Project nuclear scientist, leftist and reported  Soviet agent Leo Szilard, and led by long time Socialist Party USA/Democratic Socialists of America affiliate  Jerome Grossman and more lately   senior Democrat Congressman turned D.S.A. member  David Bonior, C.L.W.is the U.S.’s leading pro-disarmament lobby group/PAC.
The C.L.W. has funded hundreds of U.S. Senators and Congressmen in its history, almost all Democrats. In recent years Lugar has been the only Republican to receive C.L.W. largess.

C.L.W.’s long time CEO Jerome Grossman claims that by funding Senators at the beginning of their careers, the C.L.W. was able to influence them later when needed.

Jerome Grossman

Now Council for a Livable World is playing the money game… We try to find obscure people who would make good Senators or Representatives and early on try to give them the initial funding. Now we can’t compete with the big money. We only raise a million and a half each election cycle. But that’s a million and a half that has no cost to them. Because we get in early, and because it’s tied to issues, seems to have some kind of an effect. Then if we elect somebody they’re eternally grateful. Then we go and we are able to get a hearing.

While a token amount, Jerome Grossman (on behalf of C.L.W.) did donate to Lugar’s campaign in the 1999/2000 election cycle.

I do not know how much money Lugar has received from C.L.W. over the years, but as he has been in the U.S. Senate since 1976, it could be a considerable amount. How much influence did this money buy?

Why would a socialist like Jerome Grossman ever fund a Republican Senator – what would he hope to gain for his cause?

Grossman penned an article for the opinion page of the Atlantic Community.org, January 22, 2010 in which he called for Republicans to be brought to the nuclear disarmament cause – by invoking the farcical line that giving up U.S. nuclear superiority would strengthen “U.S. hegemony”.

A world without nuclear weapons would do much in terms of security, but more so, it would enhance and protect the superpower status of the United States. Giving up nuclear weapons and accepting US hegemony may be the price humanity must pay to avert the threat of total annihilation.

President Barack Obama has called for a major change in world policy on nuclear weapons, leading to eventual elimination. His initiative is supported by a powerful group of conservative and military allies led by former Republican Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and George Schultz and Democrats former Secretary of Defense William Perry and Sam Nunn, longtime Chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

These leaders recognize that nuclear weapons are the most inhumane and dangerous ever conceived, that kill and maim without discrimination, the only weapons ever invented that could destroy all life on planet Earth. That must not happen. Disarmament is the only answer: If any country has nuclear weapons, others will want them. Then, some day they will be used by accident, mistake, or design – the ultimate catastrophe.

These conservative leaders agree with the Democrats in the US Senate. Both argue for dramatic reforms in the US and world nuclear policy. The problem is political, how to persuade the Republican Senators to adopt these reforms. It won’t happen unless Kissinger et al do some serious lobbying. Obama can not do it alone and GOP support is essential…

So to a man like Jerome Grossman, who has dedicated his life to leftist causes and U.S. disarmament, financing a key Republican like Dick Lugar would make perfect sense.

According to C.L.W.’s own website “notable achievements to which the Council-supported candidates who were elected have contributed” include:

• Ratifying the Chemical Weapons Convention and Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces, Conventional Forces in Europe, and Strategic Arms Reduction (START) treaty
• Establishing a U.S. nuclear testing moratorium in 1992
• Limiting the deployment of the MX missile and B-2 bomber
• Blocking deployment of National Missile Defense by the Clinton administration
• Eliminating funding for the nuclear “Bunker Buster” and “Reliable Replacement Warhead”

C.L.W. has clearly had influence. The organization has funded hundreds of pro-disarmament Democrats, including Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton and John Kerry.

Barack Obama, Jerome Grossman, 1994

However Republican support would always be needed to get treaties ratified in the U.S. Senate.

Lugar and Obama, Perm, Russia, August 2008

There is no doubt that Dick Lugar has been Barack Obama’s chief Republican ally on this issue.

How deep are Dick Lugar’s ties to the Council for a Livable World? Would New START have been ratified without C.L.W. influence?

Given C.L.W.’s far left and even pro-Moscow  connections, should the GOP even consider running an ally of the anti – american far left, like “Dangerous Dick’ Lugar?

Meet Lisa Fithian: The Anarchist Leaders Behind The ‘Leaderless’ Occupy Movement

BigGoverment/ by Lee Stranahan

• Longtime community organizer and direct-action agitator
• A key organizer of the violent demonstrations that caused the shutdown of the 1999 WTO meetings in Seattle
• Served as a human shield in actions conducted by the International Solidarity Movement in the Palestinian cities of Jenin and Nablus
• Has accused Israel of “slaughter[ing] Palestinians every single day in Gaza and the Occupied territories”
• Seeks to “create crisis, because crisis is that edge where change is possible”
• Is the top street-level organizer of the Occupy Wall Street movement 

The #OccupyWallStreet movement that been embraced by Democratic politicians, liberal pundits, progressive groups, Big Labor and celebrities was actually created and is being led behind the scenes by far-left anarchists whose goal isn’t reform, but the total annihilation of the American economic and political system.

“Occupy Everything” is the culmination of a decades-long effort by militant radicals to create and fund a mass movement that has broad popular appeal. With the enthusiastic help of the institutional left, that effort finally seems to be working.

Case in point: Lisa Fithian. Fithian is a career “community organizer” and anarchist who specializes in “direct action” protests, and who has close ties to labor unions. She has been on the ground at the #OccupyWallStreet demonstration since its inception.

Local television station NY1 interviewed her as an ordinary “woman on the street,” presenting her as just another well-intentioned New Yorker who’s worried about the big, mean banks.

NY1 did not mention that Fithian lives in Austin, Texas, and failed to inform its audience about Fithian’s true motivations or her lengthy activist resume.

“Wall Street is certainly the heart of why we’re here. It’s the corporations — the big banks in this country have been destroying this country.”
Lisa Fithian says she’s not part of any official group–that this event is the work of many people coming together with the same message.
“Overfees or high mortgages, student loans–the banks are touching every aspect of our lives.”
She says banks and the wealthy have taken money for their own interests and their own survival.
“And the people here are saying enough of that.”
Inspired by events around the world, she drew the analogy to Tahrir Square in Egypt, and says the power of the people is leading to change.

It doesn’t take much digging to discover the real Lisa Fithian.
Here’s how Byron York described Fithian in his 2005 article on her role in Cindy Sheehan’s anti-war protests near President George W. Bush’s ranch in Texas:

Fithian is a legendary organizer who operates in the world of anti-globalism anarchists, antiwar protesters, and union activists; an advocate of aggressive “direct action” demonstrations, she protested the first Gulf war, played an important role in the violent shutdown of Seattle during the 1999 World Trade Organization meeting, was a key planner in protests at the Republican and Democratic national conventions in 2000 and 2004, and organized demonstrations at trade meetings in Washington, D.C., Prague, and Genoa.

Fithian went on to try and co-opt volunteer work that was being done in post-Katrina New Orleans, and helped train protestors for the “RNC Welcoming Committee,” an event that led to the widely publicized story of two young men being convicted of making Molotov cocktails and shields with sharp screws that they intended to use to keep Republican delegates away from the convention.
Her webpage shows that Fithian also has extensive ties to the labor unions that have embraced and Astroturfed the #Occupy movement. In the 1990s, for example, she began working with the AFL-CIO and United Auto Workers across the country performing “direct action” protests, such as harassing employers or staging displays of civil disobedience whose intent was to provoke police into arresting hundreds or even thousands of people.
As York noted:

In November 2003, Fithian was profiled by The New York Times Magazine as she prepared to take part in protests at the Free Trade Area of the Americas meeting in Miami. As she did with NRO, Fithian demurred when asked if she was a leader of the demonstrations — she claimed that the movement was “nonauthoritarian” and “nonhierarchical” and had no leaders at all — but the Times was not convinced. “To say that Fithian is not a leader is an admirable political idea, but it’s not entirely honest,” the paper reported.
And she was a tough-minded leader, not at all a peace-and-love type. Her specialty was action; she wanted to break in, cut through fences, and shut things down. “You don’t go to Fithian when you want to carry a placard,” the Times profile said. “You go to her when you want to make sure there are enough bolt cutters to go around.” Asked for a fuller explanation of her role in the protests, Fithian said, “When people ask me, ‘What do you do?’ I say I create crisis, because crisis is that edge where change is possible.”

Last year, in a radio interview, Fithian confirmed these descriptions in talking about her own activist philosophy:

“I am not a pacifist. Part of the way I talk about that is that I was raised in this culture, which is a very violent culture and I understand that I have some violence in who I am.” (about 19:00 in)

In that interview, Fithian also discussed (about 49:00 in) the tactical use of masks, describing how groups wearing black handkerchiefs were deployed during the Seattle protests.

It was many young people, masking themselves, covering their identity and engaging in property destruction…or not. They might just be more aggressive in their energy, right? They have some powerful and effective energy out there. But it has been really hard to build a mass movement because that type of approach is – vulnerable. It scares a lot of people and it makes it hard to do mass building, as well.

In #OccupyWallStreet, that black handkerchief has been largely replaced by the Guy Fawkes / V For Vendetta masks that appear at nearly every major demonstration site.
Fithian’s statement to NY1 about the “work of many people coming together” is her standard line when she is involved in protests: she downplays her own involvement while directing the action behind the scenes.

If history is any judge, when Lisa Fithian shows up in your town and starts saying that she’s “not part of any official group” and that something “is the work of many people coming together”, it’s time to expect riots, mass arrests, and violence in the streets.
That’s the true background of the movement that the Democratic Party and its cheerleaders in the mainstream media have embraced.

Leftist Talking Points of 2011

American Thinker - Matt Palumbo/

Talking points of the left conjured up this year have been about as numerous as they have been wrong.  Many of these talking points previously existed, but never before have they been used with such frequency, and never before have they received so much media attention.

First off, who better to call for higher taxes than a billionaire himself?  Warren Buffett's claim that he was paying a lower tax rate than his secretary helped the left build a case for higher taxes.  After all, even if the average person previously did not want taxes on anyone raised, Americans certainly do not want to be paying a higher rate than a billionaire is.  Then came the analysis.  As the center-left Brookings Institute showed, of the 237,000 millionaires filing taxes in 2009, only around 1,000 paid a smaller percentage in taxes than their secretaries (or a person earning the same salary as the average secretary).  As it would later turn out, these people are the only ones on Buffett's radar.  In a CNBC appearance, Buffett clarified his position, saying:

[M]y program would be on the very high incomes that are taxed very low - not just high incomes, not just some guy making $50 million playing baseball, his taxes won't change.  Make $50 million appearing on TV, his income won't change.  But if they make a lot of money and they pay a very low tax rate, like me, it would be changed by a minimum tax that would only bring them up to what the other people pay.

Buffett then estimated that his plan would apply to only around 50,000 people, but as the Brookings Institute estimate showed, Buffett is far-off in his estimation.   

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/12/leftist_talking_points_of_2011.html#ixzz1i6GA2ApZ

Occupy Wall Street Gets Big “Thumbs Ups” from Third World Revolutionaries

New Zeal Blog/

The Occupy Wall Street movement got big cheers at a recent international gathering of “resistance fighters,” mainly third world communist parties and front organizations, in Dhakar, Bangladesh.

A delegation attended from the ruling communist party of North Korea, plus a cadre from the ultra-militant US Workers World Party.

The Third International Conference of the International Anti-Imperialist and Peoples Solidarity Coordinating Committee met in Dhaka, Bangladesh, from Nov. 27 to 29. The conference’s theme was “Imperialist Attack: Economic, Political, Cultural and Military Aggression and Occupation.” Special reference was made to imperialist aggression in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, Afghanistan, Cuba and the Democratic Peoples ­Republic of Korea.

The international program opened with an outdoor rally of 20,000 militants organized by the Socialist Party of Bangladesh, a co-sponsor of the assembly. It was followed by a militant march through the capital city’s crowded streets.
The 800 official delegates represented anti-imperialist forces from 24 countries. There was strong representation from South Asia, including from Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Two women guerrilla fighters were sent from Nepal. The DPRK sent a delegation. Resistance organizations were represented from Middle Eastern and African countries, including Lebanon, Palestine, Jordan, Sudan, Iran, Turkey, Algeria, Morocco and Chad.
Straight from Tahrir Square in Cairo, an Egyptian delegate gave greetings from the revolutionary people of Egypt. A representative from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine militantly greeted the assembly. Additionally, representatives came from Europe, the United States and Canada.
Manik Mukerjee, Secretary General of the IAPSCC, gave the keynote speech. He said, “Today we are witnessing … throughout the world, including in the Middle East, North Africa, Latin America, and even in the metropolitan capitalist countries and in the very citadel of imperialism, waves of people’s movements surging forth.”

Sara Flounders, a Workers World Party Secretariat member, who is on the ­IAPSCC’s executive committee, expressed solidarity with the conference at a time when people of the world are rising up. When she mentioned Occupy Wall Street, the “crowd roared.”

Sara Flounders’ party is neck deep in the Occupy movement, especially in centers such as New York, Detroit, Chicago, Los Angeles and the Bay Area.

The mood of the gathering was optimistic. Participants definitely saw the tide of history surging their way.  More >>

The War on Police and UC Davis Pepper Spray Incident

New Zeal Blog/  By: Cliff Kincaid

Accuracy in Media

Rather than being victims of police brutality, a new video shows that Occupiers at UC Davis knew they were going to be pepper sprayed and didn’t mind it. Indeed, the new video evidence indicates that the entire confrontation with the police was staged for the benefit of the media, which took the bait and ran with it, making police out to be cruel and heartless villains. The new video evidence demonstrates that the police had not only warned the protesters in advance about what was going to happen but one demonstrator says to the police, “You’re shooting us?” and, after getting an affirmative answer, replies, “That’s fine.” Another tells her comrades, “Keep your eyes closed.” Several are seen covering their faces.

Despite misleading stories about the “peaceful protest” at UC Davis, the campus police had been ordered by Chancellor Linda Katehi to remove the protesters using pepper spray, determined to be the best way to do so without causing long-lasting physical injuries, because they had erected an illegal tent city on campus and were blocking a sidewalk. The police could have used batons, like they did during an earlier confrontation at UC Berkeley, but that was ruled out by the UC Davis campus police chief. The video shows the police holding and shaking the pepper spray canisters during a time period of several minutes. They gave the protesters more than enough time to disperse.

On his NBC Nightly News broadcast, NBC’s Brian Williams had called the lawbreakers “kids” and implied that parents should be outraged over their treatment. There is no evidence, however, that these “kids” being sprayed on the sidewalk were all students. Chancellor Katehi said in a statement that non-students had been active on campus and part of the protests. Indeed, these non-students were undoubtedly the organizers of the affair.

As Brian Williams should know, since he claims to be so concerned about parents and their “kids” on campus, safety is a top priority because of the ability of outsiders to enter the grounds and threaten or assault students. Crime on campus is a major issue for parents and young people looking for a safe educational environment. Under these circumstances, it would have been utter dereliction of duty for any college or university president to condone what the Occupiers were doing at UC Davis. That is why Katehi ordered the tent city dismantled and the protesters evicted.

Despite the numerous stories about alleged police brutality, which have led to putting the campus police chief and two officers on leave, there is no evidence the police did anything wrong. The operations plan used by UC Davis included the use of pepper spray. The police followed acceptable procedures.

The public should be quickly educated by the media about what is really going on here. The so-called Occupy movement, underway for several months now, is based on seizing public and private property. Since the public has demanded that the protesters be evicted from these spaces, and many mayors are ordering the police to do so, the leaders have decided to move on to college campuses. UC Berkeley and UC Davis were some of the first targets.

The effort to discredit the police is an old Marxist tactic, designed to lay the groundwork for larger mob actions. Congressional investigations were held in the 1960s into how communists foment riots and disturbances. The aim is to demonize and then paralyze the police. Since members of the Democratic Socialists of America have discussed plans to take over city halls and state capitals in the next several months, we can see that the stakes are rising as the Occupy movement gets more violent and confrontational over time. This is the time to support the police, not undermine their ability to preserve law and order.   More >>

The Opium of the Intellectuals

 

Quote/Counterquote

PJ Media/ By Roger Kimball

How many people still remember The Opium of the Intellectuals, the French philosopher Raymond Aron’s masterpiece? First published in France in 1955, at the height of the Cold War, L’Opium des intellectuels was an immediate sensation. It caused something of a sensation in the United States, too, when an English translation was published in 1957. Writing in The New York Times, the historian Crane Brinton spoke for many when he said that the book was “a kind of running commentary on the Western world today.”

Unaccountably the book was been out of print for many years. It was therefore welcome news indeed that Transaction Publishers brought out a new edition of Opium in 2001. The deformations that Aron analyzed are still very much with us, even if the figures that represent them have changed.

Aron’s subject is the bewitchment — the moral and intellectual disordering — that comes with adherence to certain ideologies. Why is it, he wondered, that certain intellectuals are “merciless toward the failings of the democracies but ready to tolerate the worst crimes as long as they are committed in the name of the proper doctrines”?

Aron’s title is an inversion of Marx’s contemptuous remark that religion is “the opium of the people.” He quotes the French writer Simone Weil’s sly reversal of Marx: “Marxism is undoubtedly a religion, in the lowest sense of the word. . . . [I]t has been continually used . . . as an opiate for the people.”

In fact, Weil got it only partly right.

Marxism and kindred forms of thought never really became the people’s narcotic. But they certainly became — and in essentials they still are — the drug of choice for the group that Aron anatomized: the intellectuals. The Opium of the Intellectuals is a seminal book of the twentieth century, an indispensable contribution to the literature of intellectual disabusement.  More >

Marcos Rubio - Lo van a hacer cenizas

Por Andrés Pascual

Meterse con la izquierda es un peligro: son chanchulleros, chusmas...capaces de utilizar lo inimaginable para golpear bajo; por ejemplo, el poderoso circuito de la media americana, a los pies (mejor que al servicio) de la rancia caterva liberal del país, encabezados por el partido demócrata y filocomunistas ellos mismos, que han visto como un dolor de cabeza que alguien de origen cubano anticastrista, como el senador Marcos Rubio, se convierta en una figura digna del rótulo "manéjese con cuidado", están tratando de bloquear su promisoria carrera política con argumentos tan estúpidos como “su legalidad en asuntos migratorios familiares” y, porque fue lo que aparentó, casi que “un soldado castellano del siglo XIX, ascendiente familiar del joven, mató a 4 moros en una "desigual batalla desfavorable a los sarracenos", bueno, si argumentaron lo de un familiar de su esposa hace más de 20 años, cuando Rubio tenía solo 16, cualquier cosa es posible de esta gente: "a lo Castro, a lo Lenin, a lo Stalin, a lo Brheznev..."

El problema de Julian Assange es grave, está confirmado: "se puso fatal", porque resulta que de su vertedero, como desde los baños de los pocos restaurantes que hay en La Habana, en los que orine y excremento se unen en una singular y curiosa corriente, desembocó en la acera demócrata.

El destape de Wikileaks se produjo con Obama en el poder y eso, porque tiene a toda la media nacional bajo control partidista, ni imaginó el tipo en el peligro que incurría: acaban de fallar en Inglaterra que será enviado a Suecia para que enfrente acusaciones de las que no lo salva ni el medico chino.

El dominio de la Media por el partido demócrata, arreciado con la gestión de Obama, casi tiránica para una democracia como la de Estados Unidos es tal que, las noticias sobre los cables "filtrados" desaparecieron de titulares de importancia desde hace rato; pero no para siempre, sino que irán resucitando cuando crean y como lo entiendan en la Casa Blanca.

Por ejemplo, hace pocos días se supo que Assange se quedó sin patrocinadores y la noticia la dio el propio individuo desde donde se encontraba detenido, como: "nos bloquearon las tarjetas de crédito..." lo que quiere decir que aquellos que estaban jugando al "chucho (chicote en el libro de lecturas de 5to grado de Luis Pérez Espinós, colección El Sembrador) escondido", tal vez fueron visitados por personas no muy amables y los convencieron para que le dijeran al individuo que “se había terminado el pastel” ¿Quién sabe?

Assange es hoy un prisionero de su propia estupidez, parece que creyó el cuento de que podía contra enemigos tan formidables para convertirse en titán, no de la verdad, sino del interés a base de métodos sucios. El tipo perdió el juego.

Hace dos semanas declaró que se paralizaba el liqueo por lo de las tarjetas, cuando la suspicacia sugiere que le cubrieron la gotera con materiales más resistentes que los que se emplean para lo mismo en las plantas nucleares.

A mi me encanta el entredicho, más cuando coloca en condiciones miserables al partido del musulmán y al propio Califa de la Casa Blanca: la actividad de Wikileaks pudo haber sido habilitada por el partido demócrata, con la aprobación de Obama, como otra forma grosera e indecente de poner en situación delicada a los republicanos; esta vez, internacionalmente, desde Reagan hasta George W. sin embargo, como que también se les "fueron" algunas informaciones que involucran a su administración, pues pusieron en marcha la enorme maquinaria de ejecución y limpieza posterior a que acostumbran y las noticias de un Assange totalmente desarmado son cuando quieran y a cuenta gotas, como esta de que se lo llevan para Suecia y no hay un solo titular de primera llamativo ni posibilidades de que se repita mañana. Así es esta gente de sucia, por eso son peligrosos...