Post by The Big Dog on Nov 17, 2008 13:52:31 GMT -5
A good article from American Thinker that sums up the fear of the unknown that some have concerning Barack's proposed national Civilian Security Force.
Obama: Fear and the Security Force
By Selwyn Duke
In all my life I have never seen such intense emotion surrounding a leader as that evoked by Barack Obama. Even Ronald Reagan, the Gipper himself, didn't enjoy the kind of prostration of the will offered to the president-elect by hordes of followers. Yet, while people the world over are imbued with "hope" and chant Obama's slogan "Yes, we can!" -- for instance, the French are using their translation of it, "Oui, nous pouvons!" -- some of the intense emotion is of a very different species.
It is fear.
In all my life I have never seen an American politician who could make so many Americans' blood run cold. Some may mention the left's feelings regarding Reagan or President Bush, but there is no equivalency. For all of leftists' bluster and melodrama, they weren't afraid of those men as much as they, well, just hated them. Sure, leftist ideologues said those two Republicans were scary, but the same people also said that each one was both dumb and Machiavellian. Hatred is an emotion, and emotion isn't logical; it just conjures up whatever feels right at the moment.
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With his oratorical skills and a complicit media, the president-elect will be able to sell this scheme with talk about security, equality and liberating the downtrodden. "It's the best way to combat crime, hopelessness and a lack of opportunity in the inner city," he will say. "And I know this well from my days as a community organizer on Chicago's mean streets." He will tout how it provides health care, education and skills to the have-nots, and his media-oiled silver tongue's salesmanship will prevail. It will be sold with a low-end price tag, and the Democrat-controlled Houses of Congress will echo the message and deliver the votes. Of course, just like Social Security and a trove of other government programs, its cost will make a mockery of predictions. But Uncle Sam's budget projections aren't designed for budgets, but for marketing.
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The pressure to conform will be immense, as it always is in politically-correct entities. The corps will have a huge core of true believers, who will act as ideological hammers. They will preach diversity but practice conformity.
Just like Public Allies, this program may be birthed primarily in the inner cities. That is where Obama's main support is, and, as stated before, he will claim this is where the corps' help is needed most. It will then be empowered to do "social good," which could mean anything from helping at soup kitchens to recruiting those ripe for indoctrination to forming some kind of neighborhood crime watch. As for the last task, though, given the corps' ideology and the fact that it will be drawing members from high-crime areas initially, I expect it to contain a not insignificant criminal element. It will be corrupt from the get-go and may even assume the character of an organized crime syndicate.
But its "security" mandate will be chilling. In the name of combating garden-variety crime and, more specifically, terrorism, who knows what powers the corps will be granted? Will they one day help enforce an order to seize firearms, if not via direct action than through information gathering? I can't know exactly, but I do know the powers will be misused.
By Selwyn Duke
In all my life I have never seen such intense emotion surrounding a leader as that evoked by Barack Obama. Even Ronald Reagan, the Gipper himself, didn't enjoy the kind of prostration of the will offered to the president-elect by hordes of followers. Yet, while people the world over are imbued with "hope" and chant Obama's slogan "Yes, we can!" -- for instance, the French are using their translation of it, "Oui, nous pouvons!" -- some of the intense emotion is of a very different species.
It is fear.
In all my life I have never seen an American politician who could make so many Americans' blood run cold. Some may mention the left's feelings regarding Reagan or President Bush, but there is no equivalency. For all of leftists' bluster and melodrama, they weren't afraid of those men as much as they, well, just hated them. Sure, leftist ideologues said those two Republicans were scary, but the same people also said that each one was both dumb and Machiavellian. Hatred is an emotion, and emotion isn't logical; it just conjures up whatever feels right at the moment.
<< snipped >>
With his oratorical skills and a complicit media, the president-elect will be able to sell this scheme with talk about security, equality and liberating the downtrodden. "It's the best way to combat crime, hopelessness and a lack of opportunity in the inner city," he will say. "And I know this well from my days as a community organizer on Chicago's mean streets." He will tout how it provides health care, education and skills to the have-nots, and his media-oiled silver tongue's salesmanship will prevail. It will be sold with a low-end price tag, and the Democrat-controlled Houses of Congress will echo the message and deliver the votes. Of course, just like Social Security and a trove of other government programs, its cost will make a mockery of predictions. But Uncle Sam's budget projections aren't designed for budgets, but for marketing.
<< snipped >>
The pressure to conform will be immense, as it always is in politically-correct entities. The corps will have a huge core of true believers, who will act as ideological hammers. They will preach diversity but practice conformity.
Just like Public Allies, this program may be birthed primarily in the inner cities. That is where Obama's main support is, and, as stated before, he will claim this is where the corps' help is needed most. It will then be empowered to do "social good," which could mean anything from helping at soup kitchens to recruiting those ripe for indoctrination to forming some kind of neighborhood crime watch. As for the last task, though, given the corps' ideology and the fact that it will be drawing members from high-crime areas initially, I expect it to contain a not insignificant criminal element. It will be corrupt from the get-go and may even assume the character of an organized crime syndicate.
But its "security" mandate will be chilling. In the name of combating garden-variety crime and, more specifically, terrorism, who knows what powers the corps will be granted? Will they one day help enforce an order to seize firearms, if not via direct action than through information gathering? I can't know exactly, but I do know the powers will be misused.
