In his victory statement in South Carolina, and again in the final Florida debate, Newt Gingrich twice accused President Obama of shaping our country to reflect the ideals of Saul Alinsky. He did so twice in his relatively short address, and he has referred to Alinsky as an undescribed villain at least twice before in his campaign. On each occasion, he has offered us nothing beyond Alinsky's name, as though he were referring to as well-known a person as, for example, Steven Spielberg or Paula Abdul. He has told us nothing of Alinsky, whether he is alive or dead and, if of this century, American or not, a political leader or a rock star and, above all, why we should go all out to defeat President Obama in order to thwart this unknown villain's influence over America.
Saul Alinsky's name is not just one of a long list of villains cited by Gingrich as scheming role models or disciples of the president; he stands alone. Alas, except in Chicago, where he spent his entire life, no member of the "Mainstream Media" has picked up on the Alinsky Menace, to tell us in any detail just who this dreaded influence is -- or was, and why we need to support Mr. Gingrich in order to thwart him -- or his memory.
As one who was quite familiar with Alinsky's ideas in the 1960s, when I tried hard -- and at some times successfully -- to put some of them into effect in Latin America as an official of the Peace Corps, I want to add at least a footnote to this campaign for the Presidency, and even to try to put Gingrich's baffling demonization of him into perspective.
Alinsky, born in 1909 and always a citizen of Chicago, was the guiding force in shaping an historic community organization called "Back of the Yards," a loose community group in the area behind the stockyards in Chicago, the very area which is the site of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle. Alinsky believed these 20th century people, if they realized their common difficulties, could be organized into a community force that could bring about real change.
Alinsky fought hard against the prejudices in the largely ethnic enclaves of Chicago. He struggled with the fact that poor workers were too afraid of their employers to fight against the economic injustices that kept them in poverty. Besides, it seemed "radical"; to form an organization or to join one -- even a labor union. Perhaps even more important, his efforts were almost unanimously opposed by the local priests in the largely Roman Catholic parishes. So Alinsky turned to Rev. Bernard Sheil, the auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Chicago, whom he knew to be a friend of labor, and together, they approached every priest in the neighborhood. Eventually, the Movement had signed up thousands of members, and within a short time the employers had yielded on all the key points Alinsky's organizers had raised.
This triumph and subsequent ones elsewhere made me an admirer and, when I became a Peace Corps official -- in Peru and later as Regional Director for Latin America -- a disciple of Alinsky's. Volunteers under my direction were trained as Community Organizers to, in Alinsky phrase, "rub raw the sores of discontent" in the urban and rural areas of poverty where they were assigned. Communities were formed from collections of individuals with grievances that went unexpressed, until a community organizer urged them to raise them together. We used American examples -- a reading club, a carpool, a credit union -- and unused land became playing fields, abandoned buildings were made into local stores and teachers sent from distant headquarters began to respect their students and their language and their culture.
That's the legacy of Saul Alinsky, Newt, you can find it wherever he or his ideas have played out. And when Saul Alinsky was awarded the Pacem In Terris Award, by a number of Catholic archdioceses and organizations in 1969 he became one of an honorable group of recipients. Among them, well, John F. Kennedy, George Kennan, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Martin Luther King Jr., Sargent Shriver, A. Philip Randolph, Mother Teresa and Lech Walesa. Maybe, Newt, you might want to add all these names with Saul Alinsky's to your own Enemies List.
I've seen the name frequently these past 3 years in right-wing-dominated news site comment threads, clearly being parroted without understanding by neocons, usually mentioning the "playbook". It originally probably was a myth created by Frank Luntz or some GOP strategist.
I think she heard "Chicago" and "Community Organizer" and the name sounded all Jewish and European-y and that just scared the bejeezus right out of her.
http://bit.ly/z217TF
The blog entry itself is at:
http://theimmoralminority.blogspot.com/2012/01/why-we-love-lawrence-odonnell-because.html
Tell you anything?
True, Beck may be completely psycho, and not merely conservative.
Well, the inclusion of Saul Alinsky certainly puts a different spin on Gingrich's faux-intellectual attempt to bamboozle Republican voters. I give Newt an 'A' for creativity and an "F" for honesty.
Adam Brandon, a spokesman for the conservative non-profit organization FreedomWorks, which is one of several groups involved in organizing Tea Party protests, says the group gives Alinsky's Rules for Radicals to its top leadership members. A shortened guide called Rules for Patriots is distributed to its entire network. In a January 2012 story that appeared in The Wall Street Journal, citing the organization's tactic of sending activists to town-hall meetings, Brandon explained, "his tactics when it comes to grass-roots organizing are incredibly effective." Former Republican House Majority Leader Dick Armey also gives copies of Alinsky's book Rules for Radicals to Tea Party leaders."
But he developed tactics of 'revolution', of disrupting/destroying whatever the establishment was, which work...
these tactics (rousing dissatisfaction, organizing, opposing conventions, disruption ) can be used by any organization towards it's goal..
Are their some alinsky tactics which any political organization seeking change (like the Tea Party) can use.. sure..
Are the goals of the Tea Party (smaller govt, less spending, more individual freedom) 100% opposite to Alinsky's golas/ideology? YES
But the goals/ends/ideology of the Tea Party (smaller/decentralized/limited govt, constitutional limitations, less spending, more individual freedom, free markets) are100% opposite to Alinsky's.
The dedication of 'Rules for Radicals'
“Lest we forget at least an over-the-shoulder acknowledgment to the very first radical: from all our legends, mythology, and history... the first radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom — Lucifer.”
… including Obama’s current attempted distraction from the abject and unremitting failure of his entire administration - in the form of a duplicitous and irrelevant “confrontation with income inequality”.
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/individualProfile.asp?indid=2314
Saul Alinsky is must reading for Tea Partiers, FreedomWorks having distributed thousands of copies to its foot soldiers. Look it up.
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/individualProfile.asp?indid=2314
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/individualProfile.asp?indid=2314
I guess ACORN looks good on a bumper sticker, though. If you are Rush Limburger, anyway.
The White House spin machine flawlessly executes the Alinsky Methods and they are masterful in their stealth. Actually I am in awe of their execution and effectiveness.
I believe you have unwittingly exposed that the article we have read is a puff piece and does not reveal the real Alinsky. If Alinsky was a "great man" as the author testifies to, then why would Obama "reject the tactics" of Alinsky? Which did he reject and why? Gosh how could this "great man", possibly have any tactics the president would have to reject? So when Obama taught the Alinsky method in Chicago what did he teach if he rejected the tactics? Now if you study Alinsky, I expect an Alinsky style attack from you or at least diversion and triangulation, but please try to answer my direct questions.
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/individualProfile.asp?indid=2314
In a Wikipedia article, "Alinsky described his plans in 1972 to begin to organize the white middle class across America, and the necessity of that project. He believed that what President Richard Nixon and Vice-President Spiro Agnew called "The Silent Majority" was living in frustration and despair, worried about their future, and ripe for a turn to radical social change, to become politically-active citizens. He feared the middle class could be driven to a right-wing viewpoint, "making them ripe for the plucking by some guy on horseback promising a return to the vanished verities of yesterday." His stated motive: "I love this goddamn country, and we're going to take it back."
Sound recently familiar?
Ginrich is rigid in his ideology and not a follower of Alinsky, but a follower of Machivelli.
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/individualProfile.asp?indid=2314