The political and religious “identity” of Barak Obama is a contentious and much debated topic these days.  Claims of, “He’s a Muslim,” and “ he’s a socialist,” abound.   The left, as well as the MSM are able to field these claims, and contradict them, at least partially.  They are able to do this because he’s neither of these things.

Religion: While Obama may have a soft spot for Islam, he sat in Jeremiah Wright’s church for over 20 years.  While Wright’s teachings are radical, they are clearly not Islamic.  Like the rest of us, the radical wing of Islam would cut his head off, unless he converted.

It is well documented that he attended an Islamic school while he lived in Indonesia.  That, in and of itself, does not mean that he is a Muslim, but unlike other Presidents, he has a depth of knowledge into Islam that unparalleled.  That might bias him, and blind him to the potential dangers that we face.  Either way, he does not appear to be Muslim, or, for that matter, Christian (or at least any Christianity with which we would be familiar).

Politics: You can call Obama a socialist.  It seems to fit his model of wealth redistribution rather nicely.  You might also call him a fascist, as his tampering in the banking, auto, and health care industries closely matches the actions of Mussolini and Hitler, for example, “Corporatism.”  You can also call him a “progressive,” as they believed that the state, run by an “intellectual” elite, can/should wield power to shape society into something more equitable and structured.  The common threads between all three are statism and elitism.  The idea that the state has primacy over all human activity seems a common thread though all of Obama’s policies.   And, of course, the idea of elitism; that a small group of “really smart people that know way better than you,” have the right and obligation to instruct everyone on how to live is central to any totalitarian view.

Some will say that the political theories and backgrounds conflict.  They do… and they don’t.  While that might come off as a contradictory statement, there is a case for stating it.  To draw the comparisons and contrasts, a brief look at history is required.

During the mid to late 19^th century, new political ideologies were emerging.  Communism and socialism were taking root in Europe, and to a lesser degree, her in the US as well.  Also, the progressive movement was emerging in the US.  The leading minds of these movements were aware of each other, and followed each other’s writings and actions closely.  It is safe to assume that they influenced each other.

When it became apparent that Europe was going to explode into war (WWI), there was much excitement among the socialists/communists.  They had been predicting that if war came, the proletariat would rise, and there would be a vast, international communist revolution.  They thought that under the stress, death, and deprivation that would come with a war, that the people would grow weary with their governments and economic systems, and “throw off their oppressors.”

It didn’t happen.  With the exception of Russia, there were no successful communist revolutions.  Communists certainly did make a nuisance of themselves, but the established order in the West held.  More surprising was the fact that many socialists were patriotic and supported their nations in the war.

This is a crucial point in history for the socialist movement, as schisms were created by their differing reactions and ideas about the failure of the international revolution.   The hard-core communists decided to use the USSR as a “base” from which to spread communism throughout the world.  A smaller group of communists in Germany decided to examine what caused the failure of the international.  Working from the “Frankfort School,” they tagged Western Culture as the culprit.  Since Western Culture promoted patriotism, individualism, religious faith, capitalism, and self-reliance, they argued, communism couldn’t take root.  Their mission, therefore, was to find ways to negate Western Culture, and allow communism to take over.  We’ll get back to the Cultural Marxists in a bit.

However, it doesn’t end there.  There was yet another wing.  Some socialists, particularly Mussolini, decided that rather than reject national pride and western culture, that they would embrace it and use it to justify their socialism.  The terms, “National Socialism and totalitarianism,” were, if memory serves, coined by Mussolini.  Since the international revolution failed, he postulated that they could be done in single nations instead-hence, National Socialism.  He proved that assumption in his takeover of Italy.  Franco (of Spain) and Hitler followed suit.

The fascists, you see, were socialists.  They used socialist rhetoric and policies.  While they didn’t take over the means of production, they controlled it completely via regulation.  They did redistribute wealth.  They did tax heavily.  They did institute massive levels of government intervention; like heavy regulation of industry, gun control, socialized medicine, and so on.  They simply used the individual cultures and histories of their nations as a “wrapper” for their policies, corrupting the culture to serve their ends.  Even Hitler himself suggested that the Nazis and the Bolsheviks had more in common than what separated them.  He simply saw them as a competing ideology, NOT an antithetical one.  From the opposite perspective, Lenin was said to lament the “loss” of Mussolini, as early in his career, Mussolini was a powerful and well thought of advocate of socialism.

At this point, it is also important to note that there was no “pure” versions of either communism or fascism.  In each nation or movement, there were wide variations in doctrine and application.  For example, fascist Italy did not rely on antisemitism to forward it’s goals.  While Mussolini wanted to restore an “Roman Empire,” Hitler espoused the superiority of the “Aryan Race.”  All had variations, just as Leninism was different from Stalinism.

Meanwhile, the progressives continued to grow in strength in the US as well.  While they never seemed to gain a doctrinal type of theory or organization, they did press foreword with all sorts of governmental controls, such as eugenics (forced sterilization), increased government control over banking, labor, industry, and so on.  Many prominent progressives were also were great admirers of both Mussolini and Hitler (until Hitler’s anti-Semitism became too inconvenient to ignore).  In turn, the Nazis took some pages out of the progressive’s playbook in terms of media manipulation and eugenics.

So, we see that the Socialists and fascists are not antithetical, but “brothers.”  They were separated by their differing opinions on how to spread socialism.  Progressivism was a cousin, or at least a fellow traveler of Socialism and fascism.  They all knew about each other, often spoke kindly of each other, and seem to have “cross pollinated” each other’s ideas.

But what happened to the Cultural Marxists?  They were booted from Germany when Hitler came to power, and they migrated to here, eventually settling at Columbia University, where they continued their work.  They proposed a “long march through the institutions” in order to destroy western culture.  They made good on that idea, and now, education, media, law, and even theology have all been “infected” with cultural Marxism.  Here is an excerpt from an article that I quoted in a previous post on Cultural Marxism.

The Frankfurt School again departed from orthodox Marxism, which argued that all of history was determined by who owned the means of production. Instead, they said history was determined by which groups, defined as men, women, races, religions, etc., had power or “dominance” over other groups. Certain groups, especially white males, were labeled “oppressors,” while other groups were defined as “victims.” Victims were automatically good, oppressors bad, just by what group they came from, regardless of individual behavior.

Does that sound familiar?  Or what about this?

Marcuse also widened the Frankfurt School’s intellectual work. In the early 1930s, Horkheimer had left open the question of who would replace the working class as the agent of Marxist revolution. In the 1950s, Marcuse answered the question, saying it would be a coalition of students, blacks, feminist women and homosexuals – the core of the student rebellion of the 1960s, and the sacred “victims groups” of political correctness today. Marcuse further took one of political correctness’s favorite words, “tolerance,” and gave it a new meaning. He defined “liberating tolerance” as tolerance for all ideas and movements coming from the left, and intolerance for all ideas and movements coming from the right. When you hear the cultural Marxists today call for “tolerance,” they mean Marcuse’s “liberating tolerance” (just as when they call for “diversity,” they mean uniformity of belief in their ideology).

The student rebellion of the 1960s, driven largely by opposition to the draft for the Vietnam War, gave Marcuse a historic opportunity. As perhaps its most famous “guru,” he injected the Frankfurt School’s cultural Marxism into the baby boom generation. Of course, they did not understand what it really was. As was true from the Institute’s beginning, Marcuse and the few other people “in the know” did not advertise that political correctness and multi-culturalism were a form of Marxism. But the effect was devastating: a whole generation of Americans, especially the university-educated elite, absorbed cultural Marxism as their own, accepting a poisonous ideology that sought to destroy America’s traditional culture and Christian faith. That generation, which runs every elite institution in America, now wages a ceaseless war on all traditional beliefs and institutions. They have largely won that war. Most of America’s traditional culture lies in ruins.

I would say that this is a correct assessment.

Needless to say, Cultural Marxism has infected all of our institutions.  When Obama said he associated with the “radical professors,” he was being steeped in Cultural Marxism.  The idea that it is somehow “unfair” that the US is so powerful and prosperous is part of that equation.  Think about many of Obama’s policies and actions, and you will see Cultural Marxism.

So, as a “progressive,” Obama stands on an intellectual base that has as its foundation, elements of fascism and Marxism.  Then, it’s finished off with a thick coat of Cultural Marxism.  It is safe to say that he is a fascist, socialist, and a “progressive.”  While none are exclusive, all are part of the foundation of his beliefs; and therefore, his actions.

© Matt Ross

 

WesternFront America

The left tends to define Conservatives by what they are against, rather that what they favor or support.  While this is a little piece of propaganda, i.e., “the party of no,” I think it’s always useful to define what we are supporting.  So, I thought I might review a few issues that most Conservatives and Libertarians would be able to support, and are, frankly, important to me.  As such, these are my opinions, not necessarily the opinions of the other contributors at the CH 2.0.  They are open for debate, as debate is good.

As for the series, I will cover what I think Conservative politicians should pursue.  I know repealing ObamaCare will be attempted (or there will be more “angry mobs”).  I also know that there will be other things that will need removing.  But rather than say what we’re against, and it’s pretty obvious what those things are, I will discuss things that we are for.

My top priority has most always been to free our children from the government and it’s influences.  I have posted several times before regarding the openly stated goal of achieving socialism by infiltrating the major institutions of our society and using them to manipulate the people towards a pre-determined goal.  That goal of course, is socialism (or fascism, or progressivism-all closely related).  The weapon of choice is Cultural Marxism, and the targets are children.  Here are some quotes from public education supporters to justify this point of view.

John Dewey, called “the father of modern education,” was an avowed socialist, the co-author of the ‘Humanist Manifesto’ and cited as belonging to fifteen Marxist-front organizations by the Committee on Un-American Activities. Do the words (the father of modern education) now take on new meaning? Remember, Dewey taught the professors who would train America’s teachers. He was obsessed with “the group.” In his own words, “You can’t make socialists out of individualists. Children who know how to think for themselves spoil the harmony of the collective society which is coming, where everyone is interdependent.”

Paul Haubner, specialist for the NEA, tells us, “The schools cannot allow parents to influence the kind of values-education their children receive in school. That is what is wrong with those who say there is a universal system of values. Our goals are incompatible with theirs. We must change their values.”

Professor Chester M. Pierce, M.D., Professor of Education and Psychiatry at Harvard, has this to say, “Every child in America entering school at the age of five is mentally ill because he comes to school with certain allegiances to our Founding Fathers, toward our elected officials, toward his parents, toward a belief in a supernatural being, and toward the sovereignty of this nation as a separate entity. It’s up to you as teachers to make all these sick children well — by creating the international child of the future.”

In the Humanist Review magazine it was observed that, “Education is thus a most powerful ally of humanism. What can a theistic Sunday school’s meeting for an hour once a week and teaching only a fraction of the children do to stem the tide of the five-day program of humanistic teaching?”

P. Blanchard, in ‘The Humanist” 1983, continues: “I think that the most important factor moving us toward a secular society has been the educational factor. Our schools may not teach Johnny how to read properly, but the fact that Johnny is in school until he is 16 tends toward the elimination of religious superstition. The average American child now acquires a high school education, and this militates against Adam and Eve and all other myths of alleged history.”

So, for many decades now, there has been a concerted effort to take over our education system.  They have succeeded.    The system itself is now set up as a progressive manipulation machine.  Why try for universal daycare?  To separate kids from the parents!  Why belittle and attempt to limit home schooling, especially when home schooled kids, as a group, out perform the public schools by a large margin?  It’s all about control!  Get the kids away from the parents, and their beliefs, and indoctrinate them into the collective/progressive drones of the future.

I wrote this a few months ago…

People that believe in freedom are already the new pariahs for the left.  One only needs to look at the media coverage of the Tea Parties to confirm this.  The drumbeat will only grow.  As it does, the left will continue to indoctrinate more and more children.  We might yet defeat the socialized medicine, and we might prevent passage of Cap and Trade.  Obama may lose his congressional majorities in 2010.  He might even be defeated in 2012.  But if we continue to give our kids to the government every day, those victories will be temporary, delaying the socialists for a few years to be sure, but in the end, futile.

So, what is the solution?  The Parental Rights Amendment has been discussed since the 90’s.  It’s gaining more and more traction as our government becomes increasingly intrusive.  Its text is simple.  The following is from the site that supports the Amendment, with an explanation of each of the three sections.

SECTION ONE

The liberty of parents to direct the upbringing and education of their children is a fundamental right.

In the 1925 decision of Pierce v. Society of Sisters, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a compulsory attendance act that required all parents to send their students to public schools, instead of private or religious schools. The court concluded that the act was unconstitutional because it “unreasonably interferes with the liberty of parents and guardians to direct the upbringing and education of children under their control.”

Section Two

Neither the United States nor any State shall infringe upon this right without demonstrating that its governmental interest as applied to the person is of the highest order and not otherwise served.

Because fundamental rights are so important to our freedom as Americans, the government must meet a heightened burden of proof in order to restrict those rights. In legal terms, the government’s case begins with a positive demonstration – they must prove that there is a government interest in restricting the right, and that the government has a specific interest in restricting the right of the particular parents whose actions are being challenged. In early 2006, the U.S. Supreme Court used this very language when talking about violations of religious liberty. According to the Court, the government must “demonstrate that the compelling interest test is satisfied through application of the challenged law ‘to the person’–the particular claimant whose sincere exercise of religion is being substantially burdened.” Gonzales v. O Centro Espirito Beneficiente Uniao do Vegetal, 548 U.S. 418, 430-431 (2006). The text of this proposed parental rights amendment merely takes this well-established principle of law, and applies it explicitly to the fundamental right of parents.

SECTION THREE

No treaty may be adopted nor shall any source of international law be employed to supersede, modify, interpret, or apply to the rights guaranteed by this article.

According to Article 38 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice, international law is comprised of international treaties, international customs which have been accepted as law by general practice, the general principles of law recognized in civilized nations, and the judicial decisions and teachings of legal authors and scholars. All four channels of international law currently pose a significant threat to parental rights.

The Parental Rights Amendment would prohibit the use of all four sources of international law in determining what rights of parents should be protected. Treaties that were ratified by the United States would need to be interpreted in light of what the Amendment guarantees to citizens, instead of using the treaty to interpret the meaning and extent of constitutional liberties. Furthermore, federal courts would not be able to impose harmful principles of customary international law on parents, because the rights granted in the text of the Constitution override and overwhelm conflicting principles of customary international law.

So, this would protect the rights of parents to raise them in accordance with their wishes and conscience.  It would provide safeguards against child abuse, and would, at the same time, make children immune from such things as UN treaties that undermine families.

Will this prevent the schools from being indoctrination centers?  No.  Will it make all the Marxist professors or “progressive” educational programs go way?  Also no.  What it will do is “etch in stone” the rights of parents to guide the upbringing of children.  It prevents the government from moving on desired usurpations of rights, and it gives parents recourse to defend their children against the indoctrination machine.

So, why make this first?  For me, it protects our children from indoctrination.  It frees home-schooled families from the fear of one day being forced to subject their children to something they may not want.  But also, it is achievable; the left will have to ties itself into knots to not appear to be anti-family.  It could also give a new Conservative administration or Congress a quick win.

Now, some will say that I’m being political and playing the game.  Perhaps that is true.  But I know the left will have a significant reaction to this.  Untold billions of dollars are tied up in the public indoctrination machine.  The unions, the special interests, and the politicians that want a complaint army of useful idiots, all have a stake in indoctrinating youth.  They won’t let this pass lying down.  So, we structure the fight so they have to show their true colors.  Let them come with false claims.  We’ll show where the money goes.  Let them deride the supporters of the Amendment.  We’ll point out that they are anti-family.  We don’t have to lie, or invent any evidence.  They do.  Let them fall on their swords for it.  It’ll take the wind out of their sails for other efforts.

© Matt Ross

Originally posted at Conservative Hideout 2.0

The Liberty Pen

 

WesternFront America

That thing that could not happen HAS, indeed, happened in America.

Back in the 18th century, some very independent folks living along the eastern seaboard of the North American continent decided they wanted to be free. They decided they did not want a sovereign of any kind, a king, a czar, an emperor, or ANY kind of sovereign, to rule over them.
So they challenged a world super power and fought a long, grueling, war for independence and, against all odds, they won! They set themselves up a government called a democratic republic. They even wrote into their laws that no citizen of their country could have a title. There would be no royalty, in this country; there would be no ruling class in this country. This country would be ruled over by its people!

So – how did that work out? Pretty good, actually… up ‘til fairly recently, that is.

So, what happened? Socialism happened. Back in the 1930’s the FDR Administration ushered socialism into America. He held the door open wide. Some say that FDR, himself, was not a socialist but was willing to TRY socialism in order to advance his political career. However, he was surrounded by socialist in the White House and some say even his wife was a socialist.

FDR’s New Deal was a socialist program. There can be no denying it. It did not bring the depression to an end; in fact, looking back on it today we can see how it prolonged The Great Depression rather than shortening it and restoring the American economy. Truth be told, it was the Second World War that ended the depression in America. But, America’s flirtation with socialism had begun. One political party seemed to really like those socialist ideas and the power of a strong central government over the lives of their fellow citizens, especially if they happened to fill those positions in which they, themselves, could wield that power. Oh, did I mention, FDR was a Democrat?

Then in the 1960’s President Lyndon Johnson introduced America to something called “The Great Society.” More socialism was introduced to the American people. The US government ballooned in size and power. And something else showed up in America for the first time — something very ugly. It was cultural Marxism. That is employing Marxist thought into the media, art, theatre, film, and other cultural institutions in a society. And, boy, did they ever! It has become so inter-twined in American society today that it is accepted as the norm.

You probably know Cultural Marxism as most American do. Today we refer to it as “Political Correctness.” The practice of political correctness is nothing more than employing Marxist thought. William S. Lind is reported to have said: “Political Correctness is cultural Marxism. It is Marxism translated from economic into cultural terms. It is an effort that goes back not to the 1960s and the hippies and the peace movement, but back to World War I. If we compare the basic tenets of Political Correctness with classical Marxism the parallels are very obvious.” Lind goes on to say that American citizens are “afraid of using the wrong word, a word denounced as offensive or insensitive, or racist, sexist, or homophobic.” He says that such changes can be attributed to the influence of cultural Marxists.

All of this was an expansion of socialism now mixed with outright Marxism and it occurred in the 1960’s under the Johnson administration. Oh, need I remind you that LBJ was a democrat?

Now, here we are today, with Barack Obama in the White House and we are starring down the barrel of another gigantic expansion of socialism in America. Socialized Medicine. I KNOW they don’t like us using that term – socialized Medicine, but THAT, dear reader, is exactly what it is! Changing the name to something like “Universal Healthcare” or “public option insurance” is political correctness and we have just learned that political correctness in nothing more that Marxism.

Since we have begun shucking this particular ear of corn, let us shuck it further: Socialism is nothing more than communism. It is not quite as bold as full-blown communism. It is stealthier than full-blown communism. A better word, I think is “sneakier.” It is socialism until it has a nation by the throat then it becomes known by its real name – COMMUNISM!

As a soldier in the US Army in the 1950’s and 1960’s I was trained to fight communism. Now I am forced to watch it take away my country, right before my eyes and if I raise my voice in protest I am shouted down as another “right-wing nut!”

The thing I want you to understand, as my readers, is this: In my opinion, American is not only becoming a socialist nation, America is becoming a communist nation. Our current government in the Congress and in the White House is leading America into the darkness from which it will not, cannot emerge. Socialism/communism rots the soul of a nation and utterly destroys it. It is a hard truth. It is a truth we had better deal with and very quickly. Much damage has been done and even if we could turn America around, on a dime today, it will be generations before we can ever claim a democratic republic again as our chosen form of government. I believe it to be that bad today.

Before I forget, I just want to be sure you understand that Barack Obama is a democrat as are the leaders in the Congress of the United States. Do I detect a trend here? You might want to consider that fact, long and hard, over the next year as we prepare to go to the polls in the 2010 elections.
If we are to save America we must begin NOW! Do not deceive yourselves, it will be a long bitter battle, and it may well end in a divided country. As it stands today the socialists and the communists have the upper hand. I am convinced that the battle to reclaim America for democratic republic she was meant to be will be lead by the Christian Conservatives. The disaffected from the left will slowly join the ranks of the “Save America” movement over time.
We must blunt the socialist/communists as best we can, these days, and the first target must be the Socialized Medicine Bill and the Cap and Trade Bill now before the current socialist dominated Congress. Neither must be allowed to pass.

The movement to Save America must begin NOW!

J. D. Longstreet

*******************************

J. D. Longstreet blogs daily at INSIGHT on Freedom … … http://csadispatch.blogspot.com/

 

WesternFront America

When people “wake up,” or are questioning the differences between what they see, and what they have been taught, they frequently ask, “How did this happen?”

People see others being rewarded for failure, or penalized for success.  Politicians lie, and lie egregiously.  People that tell the truth are vilified.  Professors and public school teachers consistently and persistently teach against our nation and heritage, and penalize those who do not “go along.”  Too many of our citizens believe that it is appropriate to confiscate the wealth of another to subsidize their own failed lifestyles.  Our president apologizes for our nation’s defending freedom, and others blame us for terrorist attacks that take the lives of thousands of innocent people.  Our children are not educated-they are indoctrinated.  Our children are over sexualized, by their schools, by their peers, and by the entertainment industry.  They know little of our nation and government, but they know how to put a condom on a banana.  The list could go on and on.  One thing is clear, our nation has changed, and it continues on a frightening course.

To describe what has happened to our nation, and more importantly, our culture, we have to look at the architects of that change.  The fact is that our culture has been targeted for decades, and most Americans are completely unaware of the nature of this attack.  It has been incremental, and has impacted all of our institutions.  To examine all of this, I will be quoting “The Culture-wise Family: Upholding Christian Values in a Mass Media World.”

First, we have to look at the term “Cultural Marxism.”

Before World War I, Marxist theory said that if Europe ever erupted in war, the working classes in every European country would rise in revolt, overthrow their governments and create a new Communist Europe. But when war broke out in the summer of 1914, that didn’t happen. Instead, the workers in every European country lined up by the millions to fight their country’s enemies. Finally, in 1917, a Communist revolution did occur, in Russia. But attempts to spread that revolution to other countries failed because the workers did not support it.

After World War I ended in 1918, Marxist theorists had to ask themselves the question: What went wrong? As good Marxists, they could not admit Marxist theory had been incorrect. Instead, two leading Marxist intellectuals, Antonio Gramsci in Italy and Georg Lukacs in Hungary (Lukacs was considered the most brilliant Marxist thinker since Marx himself) independently came up with the same answer. They said that Western culture and the Christian religion had so blinded the working class to its true, Marxist class interests, that a Communist revolution was impossible in the West, until both could be destroyed. That objective, established as cultural Marxism’s goal right at the beginning, has never changed.

Now, the meaning of the term “Western Culture” is not made explicit here.  To elaborate, here is a definition:

Western culture is a body of knowledge derived from reason.

This foundation of reason has made possible a vast accumulation of understanding related to reality or nature, including human nature.

This understanding is represented in several core ideals and values, which include individualism, happiness, rights, capitalism, science and technology.

Western culture can also be referred to as advanced culture; this is because its ideas and values promote the development and sustainment of advanced civilization.

So, when offered Communism, the workers rejected it.  Western Culture interfered.  The ideas of individuality, self reliance, success, work, owning property, the ability to rise above one’s origins, all give hope to the people, especially when the people can act upon and achieve these hopes.   The ability to earn, and keep what you earn; all lead to resistance to Communism.  After all, why would you give up the ability to earn and be successful to join a de-humanizing collective?

Christianity has another powerful role on resistance to Marxism.  Marxism is “Godless,” by it’s own description, however, I have often postulated that this is an incorrect.  I believe that in a Marxist state, God is replaced by the state as the giver of life and all things material.  Religion, and its reliance on a higher power creates a situation in which loyalty to the state is secondary to the loyalty to God.  This is intolerable to the Marxist.

Gramsci famously laid out a strategy for destroying Christianity and Western culture, one that has proven all too successful. Instead of calling for a Communist revolution up front, as in Russia, he said Marxists in the West should take political power last, after a “long march through the institutions” – the schools, the media, even the churches, every institution that could influence the culture. That “long march through the institutions” is what America has experienced, especially since the 1960s. Fortunately, Mussolini recognized the danger Gramsci posed and jailed him. His influence remained small until the 1960s, when his works, especially the “Prison Notebooks,” were rediscovered.

Georg Lukacs proved more influential. In 1918, he became deputy commissar for culture in the short-lived Bela Kun Bolshevik regime in Hungary. There, asking, “Who will save us from Western civilization?” he instituted what he called “cultural terrorism.” One of its main components was introducing sex education into Hungarian schools. Lukacs realized that if he could destroy the country’s traditional sexual morals, he would have taken a giant step toward destroying its traditional culture and Christian faith.

Please realize that Mussolini was not a good guy.  The fascists, particularly Hitler, viewed Marxism as a related, but inferior system to fascism.  Mussolini was simply imprisoning another political opponent, one from a related, but competing ideology.

I think it’s easy to see that the long march through the institutions has been largely completed, and the steps to taking political power are well underway.  They have education, law, media, and many other related fields.  Considering that they want to do away with alternative media, ban home schooling, and use law to accomplish both, the intent becomes clear.

Also, what conclusions can we make regarding the sexual revolution?  Is it about “liberating people,” or was it just about getting people away from religion?  After all, most religions teach sexual restraint.  This is taught in the home and at church.  However, if the media, and later the schools, teach the opposite, and literally encourage sexual experimentation, a disconnect with the religious instruction and belief is created.  This worked incredibly well in Communist states.

Here’s another quote that shows that perhaps I’m on the right track…

P. Blanchard, in ‘The Humanist” 1983, continues: “I think that the most important factor moving us toward a secular society has been the educational factor. Our schools may not teach Johnny how to read properly, but the fact that Johnny is in school until he is 16 tends toward the elimination of religious superstition. The average American child now acquires a high school education, and this militates against Adam and Eve and all other myths of alleged history.”

As time wore on, these men formed what was to be called the Institute for Marxism.  Realizing that people would be alarmed by that name, they instead called it the “Institute for Social Research.”  Colloquially, it was referred to as the “Frankfort School.”  I guess that this is the first example of “CALLING IT SOMETHING ELSE?”

With the help of this new blood, Horkheimer made three major advances in the development of cultural Marxism. First, he broke with Marx’s view that culture was merely part of society’s “superstructure,” which was determined by economic factors. He said that on the contrary, culture was an independent and very important factor in shaping a society.

Second, again contrary to Marx, he announced that in the future, the working class would not be the agent of revolution. He left open the question of who would play that role – a question Marcuse answered in the 1950s.

Today, when Hollywood’s cultural Marxists want to “normalize” something like homosexuality (thus “liberating” us from “repression”), they put on television show after television show where the only normal-seeming white male is a homosexual. That is how psychological conditioning works; people absorb the lessons the cultural Marxists want them to learn without even knowing they are being taught.

Brainwashing, pure and simple.  Denigrate the culture, and make this denigration appear everywhere.  Schools, media, even some churches, all promote Cultural Marxism.  The sad thing is-they don’t even know they’re doing it!  Of course, we know, because they said what they were going to do, and it’s being done!

To serve its purpose of “negating” Western culture, the Frankfurt School developed a powerful tool it called “Critical Theory.” What was the theory? The theory was to criticize. By subjecting every traditional institution, starting with family, to endless, unremitting criticism (the Frankfurt School was careful never to define what it was for, only what it was against), it hoped to bring them down. Critical Theory is the basis for the “studies” departments that now inhabit American colleges and universities. Not surprisingly, those departments are the home turf of academic political correctness.

Studies in prejudice

The Frankfurt School sought to define traditional attitudes on every issue as “prejudice” in a series of academic studies that culminated in Adorno’s immensely influential book, “The Authoritarian Personality,” published in 1950. They invented a bogus “F-scale” that purported to tie traditional beliefs on sexual morals, relations between men and women and questions touching on the family to support for fascism. Today, the favorite term the politically correct use for anyone who disagrees with them is “fascist.”

This is one of the big lies of the left.  Anyone who believes in freedom is a “fascist.”  Anyone who believes in doing what the Marxists or Fascists actually did, are progressives!   This doesn’t actually present a way of thinking and doing that might be better, it’s about silencing and discrediting dissent.  If you can discredit a person, than you discredit their ideas.  The progressives have to avoid discussing ideas, especially when the ideas are superior to what they are trying to do.

The Frankfurt School again departed from orthodox Marxism, which argued that all of history was determined by who owned the means of production. Instead, they said history was determined by which groups, defined as men, women, races, religions, etc., had power or “dominance” over other groups. Certain groups, especially white males, were labeled “oppressors,” while other groups were defined as “victims.” Victims were automatically good, oppressors bad, just by what group they came from, regardless of individual behavior.

I remember having a discussion with a group of people that claimed that I have had some level of success in my life due to “white privilege.”  Now, this claim intends to do a few things:

1. It attempts to negate the influence the actual effort and work.  This is a part of Western Culture.  I actually made a great effort to get educated, and then I worked hard at my career.  However, this is contrary to Marxism, so it must be discredited by claiming that anything I have came about because of my race.  Frankly, I don’t particularly like my efforts being discredited.
2. The ability to succeed gives hope to others.  To keep their victim classes on the “plantation,” the progressives must convince the “victims” that they are kept at a low level due to others having this “privilege.”   Victim classes can only be kept victims if they are thoroughly convinced that they cannot succeed.  What better way to do that than to convince them that successful people are only successful because of “special advantages?”  They also claim that any minorities that achieve success have “sold out.”  Remember Clarence Thomas’s confirmation?
3. Many people are prompted to feel guilt when they are brought to the understanding of their “privilege.”  Don’t laugh!  I’ve literally heard people say this!  After all, if you are feeling guilty about having things because the culture is so totally in your favor, you might not feel very bad about giving up some things to make it all right, like, for example, your freedom?

In the end, I didn’t cave in to the Marxism, so I was accused of being a racist.  In typical progressive fashion, I had to be discredited.  Facts were irrelevant, and what I said had to be discounted.  The smear is the last defense of the progressives.

Though Marxists, the members of the Frankfurt School also drew from Nietzsche (someone else they admired for his defiance of traditional morals was the Marquis de Sade). They incorporated into their cultural Marxism what Nietzsche called the “transvaluation of all values.” What that means, in plain English, is that all the old sins become virtues, and all the old virtues become sins. Homosexuality is a fine and good thing, but anyone who thinks men and women should have different social roles is an evil “fascist.” That is what political correctness now teaches children in public schools all across America. (The Frankfurt School wrote about American public education. It said it did not matter if school children learned any skills or any facts. All that mattered was that they graduate from the schools with the right “attitudes” on certain questions.)

Well, it had to bring us to education eventually.  This is what we have been talking about for years now.  Scores are down, graduation rates are down, and illiteracy is up.  But this is acceptable, as most of the children reject God, and embrace Marxist teachings!

Marcuse also widened the Frankfurt School’s intellectual work. In the early 1930s, Horkheimer had left open the question of who would replace the working class as the agent of Marxist revolution. In the 1950s, Marcuse answered the question, saying it would be a coalition of students, blacks, feminist women and homosexuals – the core of the student rebellion of the 1960s, and the sacred “victims groups” of political correctness today. Marcuse further took one of political correctness’s favorite words, “tolerance,” and gave it a new meaning. He defined “liberating tolerance” as tolerance for all ideas and movements coming from the left, and intolerance for all ideas and movements coming from the right. When you hear the cultural Marxists today call for “tolerance,” they mean Marcuse’s “liberating tolerance” (just as when they call for “diversity,” they mean uniformity of belief in their ideology).

The student rebellion of the 1960s, driven largely by opposition to the draft for the Vietnam War, gave Marcuse a historic opportunity. As perhaps its most famous “guru,” he injected the Frankfurt School’s cultural Marxism into the baby boom generation. Of course, they did not understand what it really was. As was true from the Institute’s beginning, Marcuse and the few other people “in the know” did not advertise that political correctness and multi-culturalism were a form of Marxism. But the effect was devastating: a whole generation of Americans, especially the university-educated elite, absorbed cultural Marxism as their own, accepting a poisonous ideology that sought to destroy America’s traditional culture and Christian faith. That generation, which runs every elite institution in America, now wages a ceaseless war on all traditional beliefs and institutions. They have largely won that war. Most of America’s traditional culture lies in ruins.

So, when we are referred to as racists for questioning Obama’s policies, we know why.  When there is no outrage when Van Jones is an avowed Communist, we see through the ignorance.  When an untold number of protesters swarm Washington DC, and the MSM minimizes it, we see the cause.  When our children are indoctrinated, we see the purpose.

They infiltrated the institutions, just as they said they would.  They have since trained/indoctrinated generations of people.  Think for a moment… why are so many in the MSM are ignoring Obama’s lies, his czars, and the ACORN story?  They were indoctrinated!  They went to the universities!  The Cultural Marxists occupied them first! Why are so many public school teachers towing the line?  Same thing!  They went to the universities!  The list is virtually endless.  They have turned education into a leftist indoctrination machine, allowing them to then infiltrate every other institution in our nation.

This ties together with other topics that we have discussed.  For example, the Alinsky Method seems to be nothing more than a playbook for Critical Theory and tolerant repression.  It is a method to achieve the end.  The media’s ignorance and lies serve as well.  All of the indoctrinated institutions seem to act in the same way to work towards the goals, and circles the wagons for defense.

Where does this leave us?  We are in a precarious situation.  Our institutions are in the possession of people that would fundamentally change our republic.  The vast majority of them have no clue that they are working towards Marxist goals.  That is the evil brilliance of cultural Marxism.  The minions work towards the end goal, one of which they unaware.  But, we are aware, and that is a start.

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© Matt Ross

Originally posted at Conservative Hideout 2.0

The Liberty Pen

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