Eleanor Duckwall's Spotlight

What Does Fabian Socialism Mean for America's Future?

Sandra Carney:

Editor’s note: This is the final in a series about whether Barack Obama could be a Fabian socialist. Click here for part one and here for part two.

In the Communist Manifesto Karl Marx argued for the abolition of the nation state:
“The Communists are further reproached with desiring to abolish countries and nationality.”

Do Fabians support these ideas of abolishing countries and nationality?

At the behest of the Fabian Sydney Webb, Leonard Woolf (husband of Virginia Woolf) published his book “International Government” which is one of the foundational documents of the twentieth century towards Global Governance.

Are we going to be subservient to the United Nations?

Does Barack Obama believe in an independent U.S.?

Do we want non-elected bureaucrats such as the European Union Commissioners dictating to U.S. citizens?

"We need a new Global financial order ... The European Union and the U.S., we can make a difference together." said European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso at the Camp David meeting to President George Bush and other world leaders.
Oct.18, 2008.

If Obama is a Fabian Socialist, What's the Big Deal?

Sandra Carney:

Editor's note: This article is a continuation of Could Barak Obama Be a Fabian Socialist?

The early Fabians, like most self-proclaimed intellectuals, loved symbolism. They chose tortoise as their emblem, signifying the slow but persistent progression toward their eventual goal.

The stained glass door of the Fabian Society was designed by George Bernard Shaw. On the right hand pane the world is on an anvil and George Bernard Shaw and Sidney Webb are hitting it with hammers in order to change it. (Change: does that remind you of somebody?) Above the world there is a small pane with image of a wolf in sheep's clothing.

We might ask, "Are the Fabians just fuzzy headed intellectuals with a sense of superiority over the masses who are not educated in the Classics?"

A Second Bill of Rights?

Oliver North:

Pierre, SD – My son and I are on ground where one of my heroes -- the legendary Joe Foss, U.S. Marine, America's leading ace in aerial combat, Medal of Honor recipient, mentor and friend -- once stood beside me. We're hunting -- and exercising our Second Amendment right "to keep and bear arms." We will be back home in time to vote in hopes that this "right of the people" won't be "infringed." But I wonder.

Last week in Ohio, the Obama for President Campaign suggested that Americans need a "second Bill of Rights." The idea -- not a new one for liberals -- came this time from Rep. Marcy Kaptur (OH-9) as she introduced Senator Obama at a rally in Toledo. Congressman Kaptur enthusiastically endorsed the initiative -- first proffered by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt on January 11, 1944. Senator Obama said nothing to disabuse his enthusiastic followers of the notion. It was a bad idea when FDR advocated it -- and it is now.

President Roosevelt made the proposal in his State of the Union address -- delivered over the radio from the White House -- instead of in person before Congress. He claimed that he had "the flu" and that his doctors would not permit him "to go up to the Capitol." The nation was then -- as we are today -- at war. And FDR – the "indispensable leader" -- was already preparing for his 4th presidential campaign.

In promoting his new "Bill of Rights," Mr. Roosevelt observed that we already enjoyed "certain inalienable political rights -- among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures." He then said, "They were our rights to life and liberty." Notably, FDR used the past tense and omitted the Second Amendment in its entirety -- no small lapse when nearly 16 million Americans were under arms.

Axelrod's Mastry - Goebbel's 2.0

Campaigns based on personalties have always given me pause. Although I was born after the rise of Adolph Hitler and Stalin, the monsters of my parents' generation, I lived through Jim Jones, the Branch Davidians, and others that were mesmerized by strong personality. A dangerous mesmerizer, this is how I see Barak Obama. Here is Claude "Inky" Benson at Family Security Matters:

Perhaps the most difficult aspect for people under 60 or 70 years old to comprehend about the rise of Nazi power in Germany is how the intelligent German people did not see it coming and allowed it to occur. It is difficult to comprehend the effects of sublimely effective propaganda when caught under its influence.

With that in mind, let’s be clear from the start—Barack Obama is not Adolph Hitler, has no “final solution” plan, evidences no intention whatsoever to run armies through neighboring countries in a totalitarian effort to establish the superior Aryan race throughout the world and so on. Any reference to the Nazi experience must be done only in the most delicate manner.

That being said, if Joseph Goebbels, Hitler’s master propagandist, were alive today, the Barack Obama Show is precisely what he would produce for the current America.

Perhaps the Goebbels in this case is David Axelrod, Obama’s campaign manipulator. If so, Axelrod and his Chicago political machine, seemingly far more devious than Karl Rove has ever been, has done more to con the American people than any other director of political phenomenon in American history. Assuming, as done here, that he is the puppeteer, Axelrod is wagging not just the dog but the entire kennel.

Goebbels had his work cut out for him. He had to sculpt a hero figure out of a pathetic, humorless, genocidal, unsightly failed soldier and convict with limited intelligence and even more limited emotional range... Obama, on the other hand, offered Axelrod and crew quite a different and more workable set of raw material—good looks, style, demeanor, emotional control and range, acting talent, educational resume, and, as he confesses, the self-developed ability to not scare whites, and, to be sure, nothing that resembles Adolph Hitler. Nonetheless, the national idol Axelrod has sold America far exceeds the credentials Obama actually brings to the table.

Jama 'at al-Fuqara': An Overblown Threat?

Farhana Ali, a former U.S. government analyst, an international policy analyst at RAND, and Dr. William Rosenau, a former policy advisor in the State Department’s counter-terrorism office, a political scientist at RAND’s Washington office, and an adjunct professor in the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University have authored an interesting article on the obscure Muslim group Jama 'at al-Fuqara'. Readers of Gates of Vienna should recognize this group, occasionally covered by Baron Bodissey.

Here is the Rand article (go to page 15):

Although Jama`At Al-Fuqara’ (jf) is virtually unknown to the general public, the group has periodically generated concern within U.S. intelligence and law enforcement circles. A Muslim sect with a long criminal past and extensive international connections, including ties to Pakistan’s political and religious fringes, JF’s activities have received heightened official and media scrutiny since 9/11. The organization has been described as a “terrorist outfit” with extensive links to al-Qa`ida;1 as “one of the most elusive terrorist groups resident in the U.S.”;2 and as “perhaps the most dangerous fundamentalist sect operating in the United States.”3 In 1999, the U.S. Department of State categorized JF as a “terrorist group,”4 and more recently, in his important CTC Sentinel article on the organization, terrorism analyst Christopher Heffelfinger categorized JF as “a high risk for U.S. security.”5

This article will offer some additional perspective on JF, or as the organization prefers to call itself, Muslims of the Americas (MOA).6 It will develop a deeper understanding of the group by exploring some particularly salient issues, such as the nature of the JF/MOA’s rural compounds, and the organization’s ongoing evolution. In addition, the article will touch on the relatively unexplored subject of group leader Shaykh Mubarak Ali Gilani’s activities in Pakistan, drawing on interviews conducted by one of the authors in that country in the spring and summer of 2008. The article will conclude with a reframing of JF/MOA that positions the organization as a public-safety rather than a counter-terrorism challenge.

Trick Or Treat!!!

All Charisma, No Heart:

Sen. Barack Obama is apparently quite a cheapskate when it comes to giving to charity. From 2001 to 2004, the tax returns for Mr. and Mrs. Ebenezer Obama show less than $8,500 in donations out of the nearly $1 million they made.

In 2005 and 2006, with book royalties making them millionaires, their charitable contributions rose to about 5% of income. But how "charitable" are some of the causes Obama supports? In 2006, for instance, he gave more than $20,000 to the notorious Rev. Jeremiah Wright's Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago.
Imagine that. Giving tens of thousands of dollars to someone who preaches "not God Bless America; God damn America!" from the pulpit. It remains incomprehensible that John McCain chose not to hammer home Obama's close association with Wright. The Wright issue has nothing to do with race, and everything to do with radical ideology.

Another supposed charitable donation was the more than $13,000 Obama gave to the Congressional Black Caucus. The CBC last year confirmed that it is a hard-core segregationist organization. When white liberal Democrat Steve Cohen ran in a majority-black House district in Memphis in 2006, he pledged to become the first white CBC member. But once he won, caucus members told him that whites need not apply.

Survival Skill for the Voter: Spotting the Camouflaged Candidate

[Image: Florida rough
green snake]

At the age of seven, Dad engaged in what we call a "teachable moment:" he scared me silly to save my life. What he did was to ask me to pick up some yard waste that contained a snake to make a point: assess the possible dangers before making your move. But to a seven-year-old, after soothing her fear, he used the most basic: "Use a stick to thrash and turn over the pile before you pick it up. That way the snake (in this case a harmless green grass snake among the palm fronds) will run in the other direction. At that time he also mentioned animal camouflage.

We are all tired of the ad nauseam attacks on Barak Obama: his past and present associations, his Leftist upbringing and ideology, etc. We see ... but we don't see for the same reason I didn't see the snake: camouflage. Here is Randy Fardal's "Spotting the Camouflaged Candidate," American Thinker, October 31, 2008:

Sometimes it's possible to spot a camouflaged animal not by watching for motion but by doing just the opposite: watching for motionlessness. Skilled birdwatchers might notice for instance, that all but two reed stems seem to be blowing in the breeze and correctly guess that those "stems" actually are the legs of a heron that's trying to hide.

Journalists traditionally acted as pointers - highly skilled birddogs constantly watching candidates in a political campaign to let us know where they are. But those birddogs quietly stopped using their left paws and now expose only candidates to their right.

Video - Islamification: an Infidel Warning!

Defeating Eurabia, Part 2

This is the second of five installments of Fjordman’s book Defeating Eurabia. Part 1 is here.

For those who wish to republish his work, please read his conditions.

For a complete Fjordman blogography, see The Fjordman Files. There is also a multi-index listing here.

Ten Reasons to Get Rid of the European Union

This text was published at the Gates of Vienna blog in early October 2008. It is published here with some later additions.

The EU Promotes Crime and Instability

The EU does not protect the peace in Europe. On the contrary, it undermines stability in the continent by dismantling border controls at a time of the greatest population movements in human history, with many migrants coming from politically unstable countries whose instability spills over to European states. Through its senseless immigration policies, the EU could become partly responsible for triggering civil wars in several European countries. Maybe it will be remembered as the “peace project” which brought war to Europe, again.

The European Union has created a borderless region from Greece to France and from Portugal to Finland, yet the citizens of these countries still pay most of their taxes to nation states whose borders are no longer upheld. It is ridiculous to pay up to half of your income to an entity that no longer controls its own territory or legislation. Unless national borders are re-established, the citizens of EU member states no longer have any obligation to pay taxes at all.

How the U.S. Government Has Mismanaged the Country

It's time to stop being a nation of nitwits

America has been failed by its government and the nation now faces catastrophic consequences unless that government changes its ways, Wharton management professor Lawrence G. Hrebiniak concludes in his new book, The Mismanagement of America, Inc. Among the biggest problems he sees: A looming explosion of government entitlement payments for Medicare and Social Security that could bankrupt the nation as its Baby Boom generation heads into retirement, and an uncoordinated band of intelligence agencies that are no better equipped to avoid another September 11 disaster than they were before those terrorist attacks. Hrebiniak spoke to Knowledge@Wharton about what the nation must do to avoid economic meltdown.

Knowledge@Wharton: You frame America as "a failing corporation." Why did you use that analogy?

Hrebiniak: That's a good question to start with. I had done a lot of work over the years with corporations. I worked with a lot of global organizations and of course I was familiar with the corporate model. I began looking at the United States and I thought to myself "This is like America, Inc. Look at it, it's huge. It's over $3.5 trillion a year. It's a big business." America is diversified: It's in defense, education, media, energy, banking and finance, engineering, science, transportation, you name it.

America is a diversified large organization globally. It acts like a business. It hires people, fires people, has health care plans, and has retirement programs. So, I started looking at it that way and said "If I look at this organization, as a large global player, trying to be efficient and effective, run by top management and I'm only focusing on top management -- the White House and Congress; let's see what we can say. Let's compare this organization to a large corporation to see how it is being managed."

As you know, most of my work in the past has been in management, strategic management. So, this to me was an interesting sort of challenge -- to relate what I know about business to America Incorporated.