"Organization For Action" (OFA): Obama's Effort To End Democracy

by Charles Krauthammer

I do not understand how living in a country with its democracy established over 200 years ago, and now, for the first time in history, suddenly we have one of our former presidents set up a group called "Organizing for Action" (OFA).

OFA is 30,000+ strong and working to disrupt everything that our current president’s administration is trying to do. This organization goes against our Democracy, and it is an operation that will destroy our way of governing. It goes against our Constitution, our laws, and the processes established over 200 years ago. If it is allowed to proceed then we will be living in chaos very much like third world countries are run. What good is it to have an established government if it is not going to be respected and allowed to follow our laws?

If you had an army some 30,000 strong and a court system stacked over the decades with judges who would allow you to break the laws, how much damage could you do to a country? We are about to find out in America!

Our ex-president said he was going to stay involved through community organizing and speak out on the issues and that appears to be one post-administration promise he intends to keep. He has moved many of his administration's top dogs over to Organizing for Action.

OFA is behind the strategic and tactical implementation of the resistance to the Trump Administration that we are seeing across America, and politically active courts are providing the leverage for this revolution.

OFA is dedicated to organizing communities for "progressive" change. Its issues are gun control, socialist healthcare, abortion, sexual equality, climate change, and of course, immigration reform.

OFA members were propped up by the ex-president's message from the shadows: "Organizing is the building block of everything great we have accomplished Organizers around the country are fighting for change in their communities and OFA is one of the groups on the front lines. Commit to this work in 2017 and beyond."

OFA's website says it obtained its "digital" assets from the ex-president's re-election effort and that he inspired the movement. In short, it is the shadow government organization aimed at resisting and tearing down the Constitutional Republic we know as AMERICA.

Paul Sperry, writing for the New York Post, says, “The OFA will fight President Donald Trump at every turn of his presidency and the ex-president will command them from a bunker less than two miles from the White House."

Sperry writes that, “The ex-president is setting up a shadow government to sabotage the Trump administration through a network of non-profits led by OFA, which is growing its war chest (more than $40 million) and has some 250 offices nationwide. The OFA IRS filings, according to Sperry, indicate that the OFA has 32,525 (and growing) volunteers nationwide. The ex-president and his wife will oversee the operation from their home/ office in Washington DC.

Think about how this works.. For example: Trump issues an immigration executive order; the OFA signals for protests and statements from pro-immigrant groups; the ACLU lawyers file lawsuits in jurisdictions where activist judges obstruct the laws; volunteers are called to protest at airports and Congressional town hall meetings; the leftist media springs to action in support of these activities; the twitter sphere lights up with social media; and violence follows. All of this happens from the ex-president's signal that he is heartened by the protests.

If Barack Obama did not do enough to destroy this country in the 8 years he was in office, it appears his future plans are to destroy the foundation on which this country has operated on for the last 241 years.

If this does not scare you, then we are in worse trouble than you know.

So, do your part. You have read it, so at least pass this on so others will know what we are up against. We are losing our country and we are so compliant. We are becoming a "PERFECT TARGET" for our enemy!

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Obama Slashes Military Pay By 44%

HEADLINES New York Times:
Army will be on duty Monday through Thursday
Air Force will be on duty Wednesday through Saturday
Navy and Marines will be on duty Friday through Monday

President Obama stated in a 3 minute address that sequestration of the Military pay will have zero impact on our national defense.  The President added that they all volunteers and as such, they should not expect to be paid.

Okay, the Times did not print those headlines--

But they would have if they could transfer the blame for the cuts on Congress; as they did with the sequestration.

However, I guarantee you that the President believes that the military should serve without pay.

Here is what happened:

President Obama has notified Congress that he is capping next year's pay raise for military personnel at 1 percent instead of the 1.8 percent called for by federal law.

The federal law says military pay raises must be based on the Employment Cost Index compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which ties military raises to private sector pay growth. Under that formula, military personnel should be getting a 1.8 percent pay raise beginning in January 2014.

However, the law allows; “if because of national emergency or serious economic conditions affecting the general welfare, the president considers the pay adjustment which would otherwise be required by this section in any year to be inappropriate.”, the president can inform Congress of an alternative pay adjustment "

Obama wrote to congressional leaders: "I am strongly committed to supporting our uniformed service members, who have made such great contributions to our nation over the past decade of war. As our country continues to recover from serious economic conditions affecting the general welfare, however, we must maintain efforts to keep our nation on a sustainable fiscal course."

Enough is enough!  It was the military and only the military that suffered an actual cut in budget as a result of the Presidents sequestration.  The military has suffered major program cuts under this administration; many of which have a negative impact on the future safety of our troops.  Some negatively impact national defense.

He asserted that his decision "will not materially affect the federal government's ability to attract and retain well-qualified members" of the military.

If you believe that, I want to talk to you about ocean-front property in Arizona.

In July, the House passed a bill   authorizing the full 1.8 percent raise; the anti-military Democrat controlled Senate set the raise at the 1 percent recommended by Obama.

Military pay rose 1.6 percent in 2012 and 1.6 percent for 2013.

Retired Air Force Col. Mike Hayden, director of government relations for the Military Officers Association of America (MOAA), calculated that the reduced pay raise could cost an officer with 10

Numerous studies have shown that about 75 percent of civil servants are overpaid.  Furthermore, all civil servants receive extremely good retirements and health benefits.

It is the military that puts their lives on the line, not the civil servants.

Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that the military tends to vote conservatively while civil servants tend to vote for the liberals?

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IRS Has Been Used As A Weapon From Day One

As Attorney General Eric Holder orders an investigation of the Internal Revenue Service after a top official admitted targeting conservative groups with extra scrutiny, an outspoken critic of Obama who claimed more than half a year ago that the administration was using the IRS to punish him is feeling vindicated.

In October,  Wayne Allyn Root claimed that the order for the IRS to audit him, “must have come from the highest levels of government.  I believe it came from Obama”

Mr. Root said, “I don't believe that thjis was done by rogue agents.  Who would be risking their pension and careers?  I feel like a million bucks. I feel absolutely vindicated. I knew this was going on.”

He added, “Obama is using the power of the IRS and other government agencies to punish his political opposition and intimidate and silence his critics,”

When Root made claims, he was calling for congressional hearings “to determine if the Obama administration is misusing its power to damage or ruin the lives, drain the finances, or just distract Obama’s critics and political opposition.”

Now, the House Ways and Means Committee has scheduled a formal hearing for Friday to probe the IRS scandal.

In March 2012 hearings before the Financial Services and the Ways and Means Oversight subcommittees, former IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman twice denied that the IRS had targeted conservative groups.

On Monday, Root contacted the office of Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., offering to testify before Congress.

Root said that until this week, he would not have expected scrutiny of the Obama administration to get much traction, but with the news Monday that the Justice Department secretly obtained two months of telephone records of Associated Press journalists, he thinks the media “woke up overnight and realized this is a tyrant that we’ve got in charge.”

Root has been a relentless critic of Obama in thousands of appearances on political talk shows on TV and radio over the past four and a half years, focusing on what he calls the president’s anti-capitalist policies. He also writes columns and commentaries for many popular conservative websites.

He is the author of “The Ultimate Obama Survival Guide: How to Survive, Thrive, and Prosper During Obamageddon, which was published last month.

A pre-law and political science major in the class of 1983, like the president, Root told WND that he received an “unsettling” telephone call from an IRS agent in January 2011 who called himself a fan of his and considered it “an honor” to audit him.

Root won a complete victory last summer in tax court, which found no taxes owed in his 2007 and 2008 filings. But then, he said, he and his tax attorney were shocked when he was hit with a new audit just five days later, for 2009 and 2010.

Root told said that in he knew of many cases like his that pointed to a pattern of abuse by the Obama administration, including audits of high-profile friends who contribute to the Republican Party and GOP bundlers.

Last year, billionaire Frank VanderSloot became the target of investigations by both the IRS and the Labor Department after he gave $1 million to a super PAC that supported Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney. The GOP’s biggest donor, Las Vegas casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, said a federal criminal investigation into his company’s business practices was politically motivated. Another casino giant, Steve Wynn, also has been investigated.

This week, Root has received many emails from people who identify as conservative and believe the IRS has been harassing them for political reasons.

He said he was contacted by a Mormon man who said everyone he knew in his small Mormon community was being audited for the first time in their lives.

The man told Root the Mormons are easy to identify because their tax forms show they give 10 percent of their income to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

Root said the Mormon man told him, “Everywhere I go, I run into people who are being audited, and they have never been audited before.”

Root sees the alleged targeting of Mormons as consistent with the report Tuesday that the IRS was targeting Jewish groups that are pro-Israel.

“Who in America would be more conservative Republican and donate more to Romney than Mormons?” he asked.

Root has charged that Obama is borrowing from the radical, collectivist strategy of former Columbia professors Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven.

The aim is to overwhelm the welfare system for the purpose of collapsing it and replacing it with a system of guaranteed annual income.

“I’ve been saying it since he was elected in 2008,” Root said of Obama, “his goal is the Cloward and Piven plan we learned at Columbia University – you’ve got to bankrupt your opposition and you’ve got to bankrupt the United States of America. You’ve got to bankrupt it with debts, entitlements and spending. And it’s all happening in front of our very eyes.”

The new admission by the IRS, he said, supports his contention that Obama aims to attack business owners who fund conservative candidates and causes until they have no money left.

“If you raise people’s taxes and regulate them to death, and assess IRS liens and audit them to death, eventually the people who write all the big checks to conservative causes will go bankrupt,” he said.

\Root acknowledges his assessment of Obama opens himself to charges that he is extreme, but he insists anyone who has met him “would describe him as a family man or a man of faith” who does not exaggerate or “wear a tin foil hat.”

“And yet,” he said. “I believe with every bone in my body that Barack Obama is a Marxist out to destroy capitalism and the United States of America.”

Now, he said, as Obama is hit with a perfect storm of scandals, “you tell me if anything I’ve said now appears to be extreme.”

“No,” he said, “the only extremists here are the radical Marxists sitting in the White House.”

After Obama’s inaugural speech in January, House Speaker John Boehner seemed to agree that Obama was undertaking a scorched-earth political strategy, notably declaring that he believed the president wanted to “annihilate” the Republican Party.

Boehner said the broader goal of the administration was “to just shove us into the dustbin of history.”

Recalling Boehner’s statement, Root commented: “That’s how you become a communist or socialist nation.”

In September, Root announced that he was stepping down from his positions in the Libertarian Party to focus on helping elect Republicans to office who share his small-government values. He reasoned that it’s not enough to have a “philosophical foundation rooted in liberty” if you can’t win as a third-party candidate.

Root drew wide attention as the Libertarian Party vice presidential candidate in 2008 when he contended that although he and Obama were both pre-law and political science majors in Columbia’s class of 1983, he never even heard of Obama during his time at the university. None of the classmates with whom he’s spoken knew of him either, he claimed. A 2008 Wall Street Journal article cited a Fox News survey of 400 people who were Columbia students from 1981 to 1983 and found no one who remembered Obama.

Root said, "It’s telling that still no one from his Columbia days has come forward and declared any knowledge of Obama during that time."

“Every kid I went to school with was a liberal, trending toward Marxist. They all said it. They all said they were proud Marxists,” Root said. “You would think they would defend the president, and you would have students saying, ‘I knew him, and Wayne Root is wrong.’ No one has.”

"There’s just dead silence."

“Nobody saw him there. There is something wrong with the story, I am telling you.”

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Diminished Trust And Woodward’s Woes

by Austin Hill
It’s difficult to imagine that he was surprised by the outcome.

But the White House response that ensued after Author and Journalist Bob Woodward dared to question and criticize the President should be an eye-opener to the world. And the fact that America’s beltway media culture has essentially “sided” with the President and seems quite comfortable with the White House hostility is a very telling sign.

Consider the relationship between the presidency and the press over the course of American history. Believe it or not, the White House has been home to lots of outlandish and at times illegal behavior over the past two hundred years or so, much of which was known to White House reporters at the time but was never reported.

I wouldn’t have believed this, necessarily, until I began researching and writing my first book “White House: Confidential” back in 2005. It was at that time that it became glaringly apparent to me that everything changed in this important relationship during the Nixon presidency. And that very necessary change was mostly brought about by Bob Woodward, and his former Washington Post colleague Carl Bernstein.

First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln, wife of President Abraham Lincoln, conducted séances at the White House in an attempt to “contact the spirit” of their son William, who died at the age of twelve while Lincoln was still President. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt recruited and hired White House reporter Lorena Hickok, and the two of them lived together at the White House in what many believe was a lesbian relationship.

Senator Warren G. Harding was widely known to have had a mistresses and an out-of-wedlock child. So before he was recruited to run for President, his party – the Republican Party – paid the mistress to leave the country until his presidency was completed (she returned after Harding died in office).

President and former Senator James Buchanan, America’s only bachelor President, was known to have shared bedroom quarters during his congressional days with Senator (and future Vice President) William R. King (the press called them “Mr. Buchanan and Aunt Fancy”). And our two Presidents Adams – John, and his son John Quincy- were so ticked-off about being un-elected after one term in office that the both left town a day before their presidencies were completed, and didn’t attend the inaugurations of their respective predecessors.

Was there scandalous behavior at the White House before Richard Nixon arrived? Absolutely. And while historical records suggest that much of it was known to the press, most of it never got reported. Presumably journalists of the day were concerned that such “news” could have been damaging to the presidency, or perhaps to the entire nation.

But everything changed with Nixon – and with Woodward and Bernstein. The two young thirty-something reporters from the Washington Post quickly discovered that the presidency could be a harbinger for serious, and potentially deadly corruption. One can argue that the fraud of the Nixon presidency helped make a lucrative career for Woodward, but Woodward couldn’t have known that while he was in the process of confronting the corruption head-on.

The courage of Woodward still exists today, largely with independent, web-based media operatives like Matt Drudge, James O’Keefe, and those associated with the late Andrew Breitbart. Most in the traditional media, however, have become so comfortable with the thuggish behavior of  ”their President” that, rather than express any real concern over this latest episode of abuse, they’ve instead turned on Woodward himself.

There are many very good reasons why Americans’ trust in traditional media is at an all-time low. Consider Bob Woodward’s story as one of them.

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Egyptian Magazine Confirms Muslim Agents Influence Obama Administration

by Tad Cronn (January 4, 2013)
GOP concerns about Muslim Brotherhood infiltration at the highest levels of the Obama Administration recently got confirmation from an Egyptian magazine, Rose El-Youssef.

The article, which was translated into English by the Investigative Project on Terrorism, named six influential Muslims within and without the Obama Administration who it said turned the White House “from a position hostile to Islamic groups and organizations in the world to the largest and most important supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood.”

The six named in the article are: Rashad Hussain, U.S. special envoy to the Organization of the Islamic Conference; Arif Alikhan, assistant secretary of Homeland Security for policy development; Eboo Patel, President Obama’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based Neighborhood Partnerships; Mohammed Elibiary, Homeland Security Advisory Council; Salam al-Marayati, co-founder of the Muslim Public Affairs Council; and Imam Mohamed Magid, Islamic Society of North America president.

Last June, five Republican members of Congress raised the mainstream media’s hackles and alarmed the Left by sending a letter to Homeland Security and heads of other agencies raising questions about infiltration of the Obama Administration by the Muslim Brotherhood, which is an umbrella group for Islamist terrorist groups around the world that has called for restoration of the Muslim caliphate and ultimately global dominance.

That letter was met with manufactured outrage and spin from the Left and RINOs in Congress, such as Sen. John McCain, who tried to spin the matter as a personal attack on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s top aide, Huma Abedin, whose family has undisputed ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. Questions about her security clearance were only a small section of the letter, though it was almost all the mainstream media discussed.

Republican congressman Louie Gohmert, one of the five signatories to the letter, has called for a full-scale investigation of Muslim Brotherhood influence, particularly in light of the Administration’s involvement in the “Arab Spring” uprisings across the Muslim world.

President Obama has quietly been a cheerleader, fundraiser and often instigator of the rebellions that have overthrown governments in several countries, including Libya and Egypt, which have become his two most notorious mistakes.

He involved our military in the effort to overthrow Libyan strongman Moammar Gadhaffi without congressional approval, he gave repeated public support to the overthrow of a longtime U.S.-friendly regime in Egypt, and he is currently providing under-the-table financial and military aid to the “rebels” in Syria, one of the most open of secrets around.

The Administration’s adventurism in Libya and elsewhere led directly to the disaster of Benghazi that killed four Americans and that subsequently was covered up by the Administration, which tried to blame the fatal events on a YouTube video rather than admit that the attack was aimed at a secret U.S. operation to smuggle arms to Turkey for the Syrian war.

In Libya, Obama’s policies have armed the Muslim Brotherhood and its offshoots, leaving the country partially under the control of Islamist gangs that also influence the supposedly secular government.
In Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood overran the stirrings of democracy, electing one of their own to the presidency, taking over the military, nullifying the courts and forcing adoption of a constitution that enshrines most of the precepts of Shariah law. Since the Brotherhood came to power in Egypt, Christians and Jews have been slaughtered, and rockets have been launched into Israel.

In Syria, the so-called rebels are controlled by U.S.-armed, al-Qaida-linked Islamist groups that are being used to topple the Assad government, which is allied with Russia and Iran, resulting in a confrontation between the Russians and NATO, which now has troops massed in Turkey to the north and Jordan to the south.

So once again, the U.S. is the Muslim Brotherhood’s sugar daddy, but Muslim agents have apparently done a good job of leading the Administration astray. The Muslim Brotherhood has no friends, only fools it uses until they’re bled dry.

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Free Stuff Nation?

by Idaho Conservative Blogger (ICB)
I have to admit that I had a hard time getting out of bed this morning. On twitter last night my last tweet was “Maybe I'll wake up in the morning to find Obama winning a second term was just a nightmare and Romney is Pres.” I knew it wasn’t so. This morning the spin is in full swing. Everyone is trying to explain why Obama won and Romney lost. Even those whose opinion I respect were wrong and are trying to make sense out of the election results.

Dick Morris who said Romney will win by a landslide wrote this morning, “I’ve got egg on my face. I predicted a Romney landslide and, instead, we ended up with an Obama squeaker. The key reason for my bum prediction is that I mistakenly believed that the 2008 surge in black, Latino, and young voter turnout would recede in 2012 to “normal” levels. Didn’t happen.”

Michael Barone who was with Morris on the landslide prediction said today, “What happened? I think fundamentals were trumped by mechanics and, to a lesser extent, by demographics.”

This morning Wall Street reacted negatively to Obama’s re-election by plummeting 200 points.

Some including Dick Morris are partially blaming NJ Governor Chris Christie for his post storm love-fest with Obama. In the same article Morris said, “But the more proximate cause of my error was that I did not take full account of the impact of hurricane Sandy and of Governor Chris Christie’s bipartisan march through New Jersey arm in arm with President (Barack) Obama. Not to mention Christe’s (sic) fawning promotion of Obama’s presidential leadership,” Morris writes. “It made all the difference.”

Some have said America just wasn’t in the mood to throw out our first black President. I'm not sure I subscribe to that though, I do believe Obama’s race played a part in his 2008 win. I wrote last month of Obama’s 2008 win, “There was strangeness in the air. Hope and Change was resonating with many Americans. Many who don’t normally vote or first time voters saw something in Obama that was appealing. The problem: It was all style over substance. It was being able to feel like a part of history. The ability to say, “I voted America’s first black president.” We showed the world despite our history of slavery and racism, we have finally moved past that nasty time. The election of Barack Obama proves it.”

I tend to agree with some of what Bill O’Reilly said last night on Fox News. "It's a changing country," O'Reilly said during Fox News' coverage. "The demographics are changing. It's not a traditional America anymore. And there are 50 percent of the voting public who want stuff. They want things. And who is going to give them things? President Obama. He knows it. And he ran on it."

"Whereby 20 years ago President Obama would have been roundly defeated by an establishment candidate like Mitt Romney, the white establishment is now the minority," O'Reilly added. "And the voters, many of them, feel that this economic system is stacked against them, and they want stuff. You're going to see a tremendous Hispanic vote for President Obama. Overwhelming black vote for President Obama. And women will probably break President Obama's way. People feel that they are entitled to things, and which candidate between the two is going to give them things?"

When all the counting is done President Obama will probably win just over 50% of the popular vote. Just fewer than 50% of American’s don’t pay any federal income tax, correlation? Why would those who don’t pay any taxes care if those who do pay taxes have to pay more? Taxes will raise now that Obama will be President for another four years.

Obama famous for style without substance did run on one thing, giving free stuff to people. Free health care, free contraception, free Obama phones, etc. I saw this recently and it brought a smile. It reminded me that all good comedy is based on truth. “Latest Chinese Proverb: "Give a man a welfare check, a cell phone, cash for his clunker, food stamps, section 8 housing, Medicaid, 100 weeks of unemployment checks, a 40-ounce malt liquor, needles, drugs, contraceptives, and designer Air Jordan shoes.....and he will vote Democrat for a lifetime."

Has American changed into a free stuff nation? Today, it appears so.

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With 2008 Enthusiasm Gone, Obama Will Lose

 by Idaho Conservative Blogger (ICB)
I’m a gut instinct kinda person. My gut told me George W. Bush would win his elections for President. My gut told me to be worried when John McCain won the Republican Nomination for President. My gut tells me Mitt Romney will be the next President of the United States.

Now don’t get me wrong. Losing to Obama in 2008 was not entirely McCain’s fault. There was strangeness in the air. Hope and Change was resonating with many Americans. Many who don’t normally vote or first time voters saw something in Obama that was appealing. The problem: It was all style over substance. It was being able to feel like a part of history. The ability to say, “I voted America’s first black president.” We showed the world despite our history of slavery and racism, we have finally moved past that nasty time. The election of Barack Obama proves it. The Problem: As noble as the idea is, he was completely unqualified. The color of a man’s skin should not determine a vote. I don’t care if the candidate is male, female, white, brown, black, yellow, or green. I want the most qualified person for the job to win.

Obama promised to bring all of American’s together and end partisan bickering. The Problem: His rhetoric has divided us more than ever while the President Plays class warfare and passed Healthcare reform without one Republican vote. The President said many times to Republicans in his first year. I won you guys lost.

Mitt Romney has much going for him. He has performed well in two debates against Obama. His qualifications and experience speak for itself. Bigger than both of those things is the Obama 2008 enthusiasm gap is all but gone. Poll after poll shows Republicans have the edge in enthusiasm. Many Obama supports that were all excited and hopeful last time around have abandoned him and those who haven’t are defensive and scared.

The 2008 Obama voters who support Romney today are angry with Obama. They will not necessarily vote FOR Romney but rather AGAINST Obama because he let them down or even stronger, they think he lied to them.

Hispanics primarily are feeling lied to by Obama. Recently on Univision he was drilled with questions on fast and furious and his lack of immigration reform.

"I think up to 100 Mexicans might have died (in Operation Fast and Furious) and also American agent Brian Terry,There's a report that 14 agents were responsible for the operation, but shouldn't the attorney general, Eric Holder, ... have known about that and if he didn't, should you fire him?"

"Why don't we have ... an independent investigation that is not done by the Justice Department?"

"You promised that (reform), and a promise is a promise, and with all due respect, you didn't keep that promise."

Many others feel let down on the economy and high unemployment. He promised to fix both and failed. He promised to cut the national debt and he raised it. These things have not gone unnoticed by many former Obama voters.

Former Obama supporters are simply disappointed that he presented himself as a different kind of politician and has shown he is the worst kind of Politician. Chicago thuggery and all talk with no results.

These moderate democrats and independents who voted for Obama in 2008 but wont in 2012 have enthusiasm, enthusiasm to make up for their mistake in 2008. They will vote in droves for Mitt Romney and help secure his place as the next President of the United States.


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Could This Be Like Nixon In 1972?

by Austin Hill
President Richard Nixon won a second term in the White House, by being the avenger of left-wing cultural chaos.

Will challenger Mitt Romney win a first term as President, because he provides a similar alternative?

This year’s election will mark the fortieth anniversary of another historic contest. In November of 1972 President Richard Nixon defeated his opponent George McGovern in the Electoral College by a landslide margin of 49 states to 1. Setting the U.S. presidential record for the widest margin of victory among the popular vote, Nixon received nearly 18 million more votes than McGovern.

While Nixon is most often remembered for his downfall and near-impeachment following his second inauguration, his re-election victory – and the cultural conditions that led up to it – was nonetheless dramatic. And in an age where overwhelming majorities believe that America is “heading in the wrong direction,” it’s worth noting how concerns of “right and wrong” shook the election of 40 years ago – and how these concerns might play out this year.

During Nixon’s first term, a great awakening began among a broad sector of the American population. After decades of having been disengaged from politics and public policy debates, and without much in the way of formal organization, millions of faith-based Americans—at that time mostly white, middle-class, Protestant and evangelical Christians—had become increasingly alarmed at the cultural trends and growing civil unrest of the late 1960s and early 1970s.

The challenges to marriage and Judeo-Christian sexual norms posed by the so-called “sexual revolution;” the youthful rebellion against societal authority

structures brought about by the so-called “hippie” culture; and the Vietnam

War protests by the first generation of American youth who thought it was something less than “honorable” to fight on behalf of the country—all these developments and others proved to be quite unnerving to these millions of Americans.

In the midst of this upheaval, Nixon delivered an important address to the nation during his first term in office, on November 3, 1969. In the speech, Nixon famously made reference to a so-called “silent majority” of Americans—people who supposedly agreed with him on issues of culture, “law and order,” and his desire to fight back against Communism, even though the views of this “silent majority” were largely ignored by political, media, and academic elites.

In using the “silent majority” language, Nixon sought to politically awaken and unify this huge chunk of the American population that had little or no voice in American media and who often did not vote. This sector of American society was very real, and very frustrated by what they believed was a degradation of America and its institutions. Nixon successfully conveyed that he understood those frustrations, and the bond he created with the “silent majority” helped bring about his landslide re-election.

So does today’s cultural upheaval compare to that of 40 years ago? There’s no doubt that the United States of 2012 is quite different from the country Nixon served.

In 1972 the nation’s population was slightly over 200 million, while today there are over 314 million of us. In 1972 over 80% of the American population was White and of European descent. Today, according to some demographic reports, Whites make up as little as 74% of the population, while there is universal agreement that this majority is rapidly eroding.

In 1972 roughly 90% of Americans identified themselves as Christian. Today that figure is approximately 73%, as other religions, and a preference for no religious affiliation at all, become more prevalent.

So the United States of 2012 is more racially and ideologically pluralistic than was Nixon’s America. Yet concerns about the degradation of America are as prevalent today as they were in 1972. And while the radicalized influences that sought to upend the foundations of America were playing out on college campuses and in local communities across the country forty years ago, today they are in the White House, itself, and Americans sense the dangers that this poses.

Despite his promises of unifying America, President Barack Obama has exacerbated our divisions and violated many of our common understandings of right and wrong. When Arizona and Alabama sought two years ago to clarify the rule of law as it regards legal and illegal immigration, our President sided with the U.N., China, the dictator of Venezuela and Mexican President Felipe Calderon in opposing these two states, and then punished the residents there with costly federal lawsuits.

When South Carolina and Florida pursued voter ID laws so as to prevent non-citizens from voting, President Obama sued them to prevent the laws from being implemented. When Ohio sought to streamline early voting for military service personnel, President Obama sued Ohio to stop the troops from voting.

President Obama praises government employees, but calls private business owners “greedy.” As his policies have expanded government dependency, removed the work requirement for welfare, decreased the workforce participation rate and run-up over $5 trillion in deficit spending, he insists that he is moving our country “forward.”

Mr. Obama has undercut our nation’s ally Israel in the Middle East, but calls militant Islamists in the region our “friends” – even as they kill American civilians, military personnel, and a U.S. Ambassador (Christopher Stevens). And while his predecessor oversaw the construction of an offshore detention center (Guantanamo Bay) in which to detain and interrogate foreign terror suspects, President Obama has sought to welcome those very dangerous characters into the domestic U.S. and grant them access to American courts.

Indeed, we are surrounded by left-wing cultural chaos. What was once wrong is now right, and right is now wrong, in Obama’s America. If Mitt Romney can continue to convince America that he is as keenly aware of America’s degradation as millions of the rest of us are, he may find a majority of us standing with him in November.


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CH 9: The Arab-American Network Behind Obama

The following is a reprint from a Special Report published by the Washington Examiner dated September 20, 2012. A link to the Washington Examiner maybe found in our 'Links' Listings.

Ray Hanania, a Chicago-based Arab-American journalist and activist, described the network in a 2007 interview with Chicago magazine as "a small cluster of activists." Chief among them was Obama mentor Tony Rezko, above. Stuart Levine, right, Rezko's former partner and the government's star witness in the Rezko trial, testified that Obama met Nadhmi Auchi at a private Rezko reception held at Chicago's Four Seasons hotel. President Obama's controversial relationships with radical figures like Columbia University professor Rashid Khalidi have been well-publicized in recent years.

Prior to his academic career in the United States, Khalidi worked for Yasser Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization when it was classified by the State Department as a terrorist group.

Less well-known is a cluster of Chicago businessmen who formed an Arab-American network at the heart of Obama's political apparatus. Ray Hanania, a Chicago-based Arab-American journalist and activist, described the network in a 2007 interview with Chicago magazine as "a small cluster of activists" in the business community who were politically involved.

Chief among them was Obama mentor Tony Rezko. Born in Aleppo, Syria, home of strongman Bashar al-Assad, Rezko migrated to the U.S. in the late 1970s and built a political and financial empire in Chicago and Springfield, the Illinois capital.

Rezko is now serving a 10-year federal prison sentence following his convictions on federal fraud and bribery charges related to disgraced Gov. Rod Blagojevich and state contracting.

Rezko offered Obama a job at his Rezmar Corp. after he finished at Harvard Law School, but the new lawyer instead accepted a position at a Chicago firm with close personal and professional ties to Rezko. Their relationship steadily deepened in the years thereafter.

For example, Obama asked Rezko to assess the $1.6 million Hyde Park/Kenwood home that he and Michelle were considering buying in 2005, a controversial transaction that Rezko's wife assisted by purchasing an adjoining lot for $625,000. (The owner of the home and adjoining lot insisted that they be sold together.)

Rezko and his Arab-American business associates have contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to Obama's political campaigns. Following Rezko's conviction, though, Obama donated to charity at least $85,000 in Rezko contributions to his 2008 presidential campaign.

The Chicago Sun-Times estimated Obama received at least "$168,308 from Rezko and his circle," while ABC News put the total to be as much as $100,000 higher than the amount claimed by Obama.

While he was in the Illinois Senate, Obama helped key Rezko associates gain appointments to the state board that controlled health facility contracting for building expansions.

Once his associates were appointed, Rezko sought kickbacks from contractors favored by his friends in a process that became the heart of the federal case against him.

When Obama became chairman of the state Senate health committee that oversaw appointments to the medical board, among his first acts was to gain fast-track passage of a bill to reduce the board from 15 to nine members, thus making it somewhat easier to gain the panel's approval for contracts.

Rezko then used his connections with Blagojevich to stack the restructured board with his political cronies. Their appointments were confirmed by Obama's committee, then sent to the Senate floor.

Soon thereafter, contributions from Rezko and his health board allies began pouring into Obama's campaign coffers, according to federal and state campaign finance data.

Rezko associate Dr. Michel Malek, for example, donated $15,000 to Obama after gaining appointment to the health board.

Dr. Imad Almanaseer, another Rezko ally appointed to the health board, initially gave Obama $3,000. Over the next three years, he and members of his family donated nearly $10,000 more to Obama.

Fortunee Massuda, another Rezko associate, donated $2,000 in January 2004 shortly after winning her assignment to the key panel.

Other Rezko allies who were not on the health board also contributed to Obama. Elie Maloof was granted immunity by federal prosecutors after he told U.S. attorneys he funneled two $10,000 contributions to Obama through Rezko. Prosecutors noted Maloof's assertion in their opening arguments at Rezko's trial, but no additional charges were filed.

Rezko business partner Abdelhamid Chaib donated $10,000 to Obama, then was convicted on federal corruption charges in 2010 after trying to pressure a Chicago hospital executive to steer contracts to Rezko companies.

Another Rezko partner, Ali Ata, was a key witness during Rezko's 2008 federal corruption trial. He donated $5,000 to Obama's campaign and claimed to have given an additional $10,000 in "straw donations."

Ata was a former president of the Chicago Chapter of the Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee.

Ata also was an investor with Rezko and Nadhmi Auchi, an Iraqi-British businessman and former Iraqi Baathist who was on a terror watch list and thus barred from entering the United States.

Rezko asked federal authorities in 2004 to permit Auchi to join him in Chicago for a business deal, according to the New York Times.

Stuart Levine, Rezko's former partner and the government's star witness in the Rezko trial, testified that Obama met Auchi at a private Rezko reception held at Chicago's Four Seasons hotel.

Auchi wired $3.5 million to Rezko during the 2008 trial. Federal prosecutors asked for Rezko's bail to be revoked when they discovered the Auchi wire transfer.

Another Rezko supporter was Mustafa Abdalla, who donated $1,000 to Obama. Abdalla put up property as collateral for Rezko's bail.

Rezko was a generous financial supporter of Chicago-based Arab-American activist groups, including the Arab American Democratic Club, or AADC, and the Arab American Action Network, or AAAN.

Rezko was involved in the AADC with Khalil Shalabi. Shalabi was fired from a state government job in 2007 after the Illinois inspector general reported he had been fundraising at work for Rezko and Blagojevich.

The Obamas attended several AAAN dinners, including one honoring Khalidi. More recently, Hatem Abudayyeh, AAAN's executive director, attended an April 22, 2010, Obama policy briefing, according to White House visitor logs.

In September 2010, FBI investigators raided Abudayyeh's Chicago home reportedly seeking evidence of AAAN being used as a conduit for funding to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and other Middle Eastern terrorist groups.

Next: Chapter 10: Obama brings Chicago politics to Washington

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CH 8: Obama's State Pension Scheme

The following is a reprint from a Special Report published by the Washington Examiner dated September 20, 2012. A link to the Washington Examiner maybe found in our 'Links' Listings.

William Atwood, executive director of the giant Illinois State Board of Investment, told The Washington Examiner that Obama was relentless in applying pressure. "Anytime I saw him, he brought the issue up. I would see him in Springfield or I would see him at a function and invariably he raised the issue." State Sen. Barack Obama and members of an Illinois lobbying group representing politically connected minority-owned businesses launched a campaign in 2000 to pressure state pension funds to help their friends and donors.

Obama and his cohorts targeted state officials in charge of pension funds for teachers, police and firemen, and regular government employees.

Much as the Rev. Jesse Jackson had been doing for years to Fortune 500 corporations, Obama and the Alliance of Business Leaders & Entrepreneurs, or ABLE, demanded that the officials set aside at least 15 percent of pension assets for management by minority-owned investment companies.

If their plan succeeded, the favored investment companies would add lucrative assets to their portfolios, which in turn would help push even more business their way.

John Rogers, Ariel Capital Management's CEO, and James Reynolds, founder of Loop Capital, were ABLE leaders and longtime Obama supporters. Louis A. Holland, chairman of Holland Capital Management, was also an ABLE leader and Obama donor.

Rogers was especially close, having played basketball with Michelle Obama's brother at Princeton and shot hoops with Barack Obama. Reynolds and Obama played basketball at Chicago's chic East Bank Club and golfed at the South Shore course.

Rogers recalled the state pension scheme in a 2007 interview in which he prudently cast it as an effort "to force other industries to have their 'Jackie Robinson' moment," just as Jackson had done with many Fortune 500 companies.

Obama not only met regularly with the ABLE leaders to plot strategy, he enlisted powerful Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan to accompany him in meetings with officials of the targeted pension funds.

Just as important, Senate President Emil Jones, the cagey Springfield veteran who was Obama's legislative mentor, gave him additional leverage by assigning him to a committee that oversaw public pension funds, according to the New York Times.

William Atwood, executive director of the giant Illinois State Board of Investment, or ISBI, told The Washington Examiner that Obama was relentless in applying pressure.

"Anytime I saw him, he brought the issue up. I would see him in Springfield or I would see him at a function and invariably he raised the issue," Atwood said.

The campaign succeeded in early 2001 when more than $500 million from the pension funds was transferred to Ariel and Holland, and Loop was retained as a brokerage firm, according to pension fund documents obtained by the Examiner. The State Universities Retirement System of Illinois, or SURS, awarded Ariel $49 million, while Holland got $26 million. Loop handled the trading of 2.3 million shares, according to SURS documents obtained by the Examiner.

The ISBI awarded $178 million to Ariel. The Teachers' Retirement System of the State of Illinois, or TRS, handed over $210 million to Ariel and $75 million to Holland Capital Management.

Ariel's assets increased dramatically following the infusion from the pension funds, rising from $2.8 billion to $15 billion between 1999 and 2002, according to the firm's Securities and Exchange Commission filings.

Even so, things did not go well a few years later. Ariel and Holland were terminated by ISBI and SURS for what pension board officials described as "underperformance."

Rogers also wasn't helped when U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald revealed in federal court proceedings that Rogers had given $22,500 to bundler Tony Rezko, who was later convicted of influence peddling.

Rogers' money was destined for the campaign of Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who, like Rezko, is now serving a federal prison sentence for public corruption. No charges were ever filed against Rogers in connection with the $22,500.

Rogers remains an Obama confidant. He has visited the White House at least 37 times since Obama's 2009 inauguration for both business and social meetings with the president, senior aides in the White House and the first lady.

Ariel's president, Mellody Hobson, received a presidential appointment in 2009 to serve on an SEC investment advisory committee.

During the 2008 presidential campaign, ABC News reported that employees of the three firms had donated $765,000 to Obama, who was also said to have used private jets owned by two of the firms.

Rogers now ranks as the third-biggest bundler for Obama, raking in $1.5 million for the president's re-election effort. He also is a $50,000 donor to pro-Obama super-PAC Priorities USA.

Holland and CEO Monica L. Walker have given $57,000 to Obama and the Democratic National Committee since 2000, according to federal campaign finance records.

Obama boasted about his success in the pension campaign during a 2007 address before the National Urban League conference.

Referring to ABLE, he declared, "some of the financial service leaders there, they came to me and said, 'You know, we are not getting any business from our own state pensions.' "

Obama was proud of his accomplishment. "In about six months, they got about a half-billion dollars' worth of business," Obama declared.

The campaign was aggressive. A toughly worded statement by the minority firms was distributed to a Jan. 19, 2001 board meeting of the ISBI, according to minutes of the event obtained by the Examiner.

The firms demanded that the fund "immediately require that all current ISBI money managers do 15 percent of their brokerage business with African-American owned broker/dealers." They also insisted that 15 percent of the fund assets be allocated to "African-American owned investment management firms."

What was left unstated was that Rogers' Ariel fund already had a small presence at ISBI, but that it was underperforming.

In 1999, for example, the ISBI said Ariel was in the lowest 87th percentile among midcap companies on the Russell Index, according to minutes of a special Nov. 17, 2006, ISBI meeting obtained by the Examiner. Still, the ISBI awarded $178 million to Ariel.

Ariel's underperformance continued until its termination in 2006 after Marquette Associates and Iron Capital Advisors reported to ISBI that Ariel had "failed to meet ISBI expectations regarding performance going back a number of years." It fell to the 96th percentile in 2006.

In criticizing Ariel, the ISBI reported that in 2006 the firm grew only 8.35 percent, compared with an average of 17.41 percent for its peer group.

In May 2006, the TRS also cancelled Ariel's $210 million account and terminated Holland's $75 million in funds.

Next: Chapter 9: The Arab-American network behind Obama


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CH 7: The myth of Obama as state Senate Reformer

The following is a reprint from a Special Report published by the Washington Examiner dated September 20, 2012. A link to the Washington Examiner maybe found in our 'Links' Listings.

Former Illinois state Sen. Peter Fitzgerald, a maverick Republican and reformer, said Obama never fought corruption, by Republicans or by Democrats: "He never wanted to upset the apple cart with the Chicago machine." Shortly after Barack Obama won the 2008 presidential election, Prairie State Blue, a liberal blog, attributed his victory to the fact that Illinois' deeply entrenched government corruption had forced "political reformers" in the state legislature like Obama "to network outside the traditional political circles."

The claim illustrated Obama's success throughout his career at presenting himself as an outsider and reformer even as he became a skillful operator inside one of the nation's most corrupt political systems.

Earlier this year, a study by the Illinois Institute of Government and Public Affairs pointed to the convictions in recent years of four governors, two congressmen, a state treasurer, an attorney general and 11 state legislators.

"The two worst crime zones in Illinois are the governor's mansion in Springfield and the City Council Chambers in Chicago," said study author Dick Simpson.

It was into such an environment that Obama stepped when he was first elected in 1996 as an Illinois state senator.

Former Illinois Sen. Peter Fitzgerald, a maverick Republican and reformer, told The Washington Examiner that Obama never fought corruption, even when it was being done by Republicans.

"I've never seen him fight corruption. He never wanted to upset the apple cart with the Chicago machine," Fitzgerald said.

After serving with Obama for two years in the Illinois Senate, Fitzgerald defeated Sen. Carol Moseley Braun in 1998 and served one term in the U.S. Senate. His family has been in Illinois banking for several generations.

In Springfield, Fitzgerald was a leader of a reform-minded state legislative caucus known as the "Fab Five." The group's members were Republicans who had been elected in 1992. They fought the establishments in both major parties while seeking to increase openness and transparency in government.

Fab Fiver Steve Rauschenberger told the Examiner that he and his reformist colleagues were taken aback when Obama rejected the group's informal invitations to join them.

"When Barack first arrived, there was a lot of hope that maybe he was the intellectual bridge, the pragmatic Democrat from Chicago who was not part of the machine that we could perhaps talk to about broad-based consensus policies to change public policy that wasn't working," he said.

"He appeared to be interested for a good 90 days," Rauschenberger said. "In March or April of that year, though, he had made it pretty clear he wasn't interested in risk-taking or challenging institutions or challenging the Chicago machine's lock on a lot of the mechanics of government in Cook County in Chicago."

An Examiner review of Fab Five initiatives from 1995 to 2000 identified 22 proposals, including sweeping government procurement reforms like requiring open, competitive bidding for state contracts. Obama missed votes on several of the proposals, and those he supported were approved unanimously.
"He was nowhere to be found on reform," Fab Fiver Chris Lauzen told the Examiner. "I reached out to Barack. My wife and I took Barack and Michelle to dinner."

Lauzen said Obama "was not on the playing field. In my opinion, Barack Obama was a product and beneficiary of how politics are practiced in Illinois. It would be impossible to call him a reformer."

State Sen. Dave Syverson, another Fab Fiver, said, "I don't recall any cases when he was overtly standing up to the machine at all."

Some of Obama's reluctance about the Fab Five may have stemmed from his occasional golf outings and lunches with the state's top gambling lobbyist, Alfred G. Ronan.

Ronan was well-known in Illinois political circles for passing out cash contributions to supporters off the floor of the legislative chambers. Obama himself took $10,500 from Ronan and changed his position on a gambling bill afterward, according to the Los Angeles Times. Ronan told the Times that Obama always paid his own way on the outings.

There was also the regular Wednesday night poker game organized by Democratic state Sen. Terry Link. Obama and three other state Senate Democrats in Springfield were regular attendees, along with several lobbyists, Link said.

"It started out with five of us, then it escalated where there were a couple of lobbyists that were friends of us that we brought in," Link told the Examiner.

"Barack was not of the machine, but he was adjacent to it," said Cynthia Canary, former director of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, the largest statewide reform organization.

Paul Green, director of the Institute for Politics at Chicago's Roosevelt University and a popular WGN radio host, noted David Axelrod, Obama's campaign strategist, originated from Mayor Richard M. Daley's camp.

"You see his main adviser, David Axelrod, who also was Daley's chief adviser and ran his campaigns. So it was very much that Obama's people were in the Daley camp."

A month after Daley's patronage chief was indicted for rigging city jobs and promotions, Axelrod defended patronage in a 2005 Chicago Tribune op-ed. He argued that to satisfy constituent needs, politicians are often forced to "use the influence they have to meet those needs, including sometimes the exchange of favors -- consideration for jobs being just one."

Fitzgerald said Obama never confronted Daley. "He never took on Mayor Daley, even when clearly city hall was out of bounds. He never fought corruption in Cook County government."

Canary said Obama's endorsement of Rod Blagojevich and other Daley allies worried her.

"Obama has made a number of endorsements, not just the Blagojevich one -- he gave a number for the Chicago City Council that were complete whack jobs. I have never understood it or why he felt he needed to it," she said.

Some have noted that Obama helped write a 1997 legislative gift ban. The bipartisan effort included 23 exemptions.

Green pointed out that the gift ban didn't stop corruption. "In 1998, George Ryan was governor; now he's in prison. After him, Rod Blagojevich went to prison, so clearly it didn't have any impact."

Next: Chapter: 8 Obama's state pension scheme

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CH 6: The Poor People Obama Left Behind

The following is a reprint from a Special Report published by the Washington Examiner dated September 20, 2012. A link to the Washington Examiner maybe found in our 'Links' Listings.

A man moves furniture at the Altgeld Gardens housing project Thursday, Feb. 14, 2008, on Chicago's South Side. where Democratic presidential hopeful, Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., used to work as a community organizer. (AP Photo) Four years after Barack Obama's historic election as president, little seems to have changed for the African-American communities on Chicago's South Side.

The lack of change -- or the sense that these neighborhoods are getting worse -- is eroding the president's standing among African-Americans in his hometown.

In 2011, Chicago suffered the third-highest black jobless rate among the nation's major metropolitan areas, at 19 percent, according to the liberal Economic Policy Institute.

Chicago still lacks enough affordable housing. Not only did the city demolish 25,000 public housing units in the previous decade, it also experienced more than 80,000 foreclosures, mainly in low-income neighborhoods.

Chicago "black nationalist" Eddie Read contends Obama has never fought for the black community. "I would not honestly tag Obama as a fighter for black people, black agenda or black issues," Read told The Washington Examiner.

After Obama's election, Read said, "I hoped that it would change."

But four years later, as he looks around Chicago's neighborhoods, he said things haven't improved under Obama.

"I don't see where the quality of life or the quality has changed," he said, "except that it's worse."

Dr. Conrad Worrill is an African-American educator, activist and former radio talk show host on Chicago's African-American-oriented station WVON. He told the Examiner that Obama was an inspirational speaker who moved people. But in the end, he became just another Chicago politician.

"His rise in politics, his trajectory in politics has led him to make adjustments in his political decision-making. And that's the case with many politicians. So he's no different from many others in that regard. He's a politician," Worrill said.

Cheryl Johnson and her mother, Hazel, lived in the economically deprived Altgeld Gardens housing project when young Obama was a community organizer there. Her late mother also was an organizer at the housing complex and often welcomed Obama into her kitchen.

="He's everybody's president," Cheryl Johnson told the Examiner, saying she is proud she knows him. But has he made a difference? "We, as poor people, don't feel it and don't see it," she said. Read believes Obama's problem is that he does not understand the unique needs of Chicago blacks.

"Obama came through Chicago through Saul Alinsky organizing," he said. "The Alinsky piece seemed to have had an agenda about what it thought was in the best interest of black folks, from the white liberal perspective."

Obama instead allied himself with Chicago's MacArthur Foundation, local housing nonprofits and real estate developers. Valerie Jarrett and Allison Davis, Martin Nesbitt and Tony Rezko -- all Obama friends -- were at the epicenter of that powerful coalition.

Obama's low-income-housing campaign still resonates among Chicago's poor today. Deborah Taylor, a public housing tenant in the Kenwood section of Chicago, also told the Examiner things are as bad as ever for poor tenants.

"The residents at the end of the day still suffer here," she said. "A lot of times a lot of people start out idealistically thinking they are helping," Taylor said.

"I don't think any of them are in favor of the tenants," she said. "Everybody's in it for the money. It's all about profit now. So the residents lose, lose, lose."

D'Anna Carter, a neighborhood activist in Chicago's Woodlawn section, singled out the Habitat Co., which was run by Jarrett, now Obama's closest White House adviser.


They were never interested in poor people," she told the Examiner. "They would sell poor people a bill of goods," she said bitterly in an interview.

Wardell Lavender has been a Woodlawn resident since 1951. His was the first black family to move into the neighborhood. He also blames Habitat.

"Habitat was bad landlords at the time. They didn't care too much about the blacks," he told the Examiner.

According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the enticement to the poor to buy condos they could not afford caused widespread losses in Chicago.

Foreclosures fell hard on Chicago's poor residents. The Urban Institute reported in May 2009 that most were displaced or homeless, credit ratings were damaged and violence increased as empty units remained vacant.

Worrill said he still supports Obama but adds that the lack of progress in Chicago's black community is palpable.

"He has been supported, but the position he's in now, he's in a heck of a predicament."

Next: Chapte 7: The myth of Obama as state Senate reformer


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CH 5: Obama's Toughest Critics On The Left

The following is a reprint from a Special Report published by the Washington Examiner dated September 20, 2012. A link to the Washington Examiner maybe found in our 'Links' Listings.

Obama’s toughest critic on the Left, the late Robert Fitch, charged that Obama’s most trusted aide, Valerie Jarrett, made a fortune as a real estate developer. Fitch, a radical leftist and freelance journalist who specialized in urban politics and economics, said Obama surrounded himself with people who got rich on Chicago’s $1.6 billion neighborhood demolition program known officially as the Plan for Transformation. Barack Obama's carefully constructed image as a civil rights lawyer who wanted to heal the black community was greeted with skepticism by some Chicago activists.

"I never drank the Kool-Aid about Barack Obama," veteran Chicago black activist Eddie Read told The Washington Examiner. Read is president of the Black Independent Political Organization, one of Chicago's largest black community groups.

Read -- who describes himself as a "black nationalist" -- said Chicago streets are filled with genuine "street gangsters" and phonies known as "studio gangsters." The latter are impersonators who make money acting in studio-produced rap videos.

The same dichotomy is found among Chicago's street activists, Read said. "So what you get from me is I'm still up in the air on whether or not my brother Obama was a real activist or a studio activist."

Robert Stark, director of the liberal Harold Washington Institute for Research and Policy Studies, told the Examiner that the demolition effort required to clear the way for the new affordable-housing projects advocated by Obama was disastrous for low-income blacks on Chicago's South Side.

"Obviously, when you're talking about the demolition of housing, there has been a great deal of controversy because poor people were not given an opportunity to come back to the housing that replaced the demolished housing," said Stark, whose institute is based at Northeastern Illinois University.

Wardell Lavender is a tenant activist who has lived in the Woodlawn section of Chicago since 1951. "We don't know what happened to those people," Lavender told the Examiner. "What we didn't do was keep track of them because a lot of them ended up homeless."

Obama's toughest critic on the Left, however, was the late Robert Fitch. Fitch, a radical leftist and freelance journalist who specialized in urban politics and economics, said Obama surrounded himself with people who got rich on Chicago's $1.6 billion neighborhood demolition program known officially as the Plan for Transformation.

At least 25,000 low-income apartments in Chicago were destroyed under the program, which forced thousands of black families -- many of whom lived in Obama's state Senate district -- to move out of the city. Obama's political allies directed the effort.

"What we see is that the Chicago core of the Obama coalition is made up of blacks who've moved up by moving poor blacks out of the community," Fitch charged in a 2008 speech before the Harlem Tenants Association. Fitch died in 2011.

Fitch claimed in that speech that Obama sold out to a corrupt Chicago establishment. "Obama's political base comes primarily from Chicago FIRE -- the finance, insurance and real estate industry," he said.

"It's also true that key black members of the Obama inner circle are Daley administration alumni, but they've moved up -- now they're part of Chicago FIRE," he said.

Fitch singled out Obama's most trusted aide, Valerie Jarrett, as one who stood out among those who made fortunes as real estate operators. Jarrett once worked for Mayor Daley, then later became CEO of the Habitat Co., one of the city's largest real estate development firms.

Fitch also criticized Martin Nesbitt, Daley's former head of the Chicago Housing Authority and vice president of Pritzker Realty. Like Jarrett, Nesbitt is among Obama's closest personal friends.

Also in Fitch's cross hairs was Allison Davis, Obama's law firm boss who built a real estate empire by dealing in low-income housing with business partner Tony Rezko, Obama's mentor who is now serving a federal prison sentence.

In that 2008 speech in Harlem, N.Y., Fitch also blasted Chicago church leaders who he said profited on the poor. Chief among these "real estate reverends," as Fitch called them, was Bishop Arthur Brazier.

Brazier, a close Obama confidant and law client, ran the crumbling Grove Parc project alongside his Apostolic Church of God. Jarrett, Davis and Rezko were all involved with Grove Parc. Grove Parc is still owned by WPIC but has more recently been managed by the Project on Affordable Housing, a Boston-based nonprofit organization that obtains large, multifamily properties and refinances them for long-term affordability.

Three weeks after Obama won the 2008 election, Fitch warned his Harlem audience about "hope and change," saying, "we have to make some distinctions between the change they believe in and the change we believe in; between our interests and theirs."

Michael Hudson, a real estate economist at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, was Fitch's editor at the Village Voice. He said Fitch despised Chicago political insiders like Obama, who, he argued, became wealthy while cloaking themselves as reformers.

"Bob Fitch's basic premise," Hudson told the Examiner, "was to show that the reform Democrats always have been the pro-financial real estate interests to do insider dealings. They are people who wear halos when in fact they are predators."
Hudson said Fitch thought the Plan for Transformation was a con game. "The essence of a con game is to pose as you're doing a public service. That's the cover story for getting the public money both to redevelop buildings or to get rid of all the tenants."

Obama's political endorsements also worried liberal reformers concerned about good government. Cynthia Canary, former head of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, recalled Obama's endorsement of corrupt officials like the imprisoned Gov. Rod Blagojevich and Chicago City Council members.

"The thing that startled me," she said, "was when Obama made endorsements of certain City Council members and people who we already knew were in trouble," she told the Examiner.

Next: Chapter 6: The poor people Obama left behind


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CH 4: For The Slumlord's Defense, Barack Obama, Esq

The following is a reprint from a Special Report published by the Washington Examiner dated September 20, 2012. A link to the Washington Examiner maybe found in our 'Links' Listings.

A security company owned by now-jailed political fundraiser Tony Rezko sought help from Obama and then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich in an effort to gain a lucrative contract in Iraq, according to a report published in 2007. Writing in his 1995 autobiography, "Dreams from My Father," Obama said he became "a civil rights lawyer" because "to lend meaning to a community's suffering and take part in its healing -- that required something more."

There was indeed "something more" to Obama's legal career, but it wasn't civil rights litigation at the Chicago law firm of Davis, Miner, Barnhill & Galland, where he was employed for a decade.

"He spent about half his time working with Bill Miceli and my former partner, Allison Davis, and that team," senior partner Judson Miner told The Washington Examiner. Most of the entries on Obama's client list for the firm from that period were in real estate, construction and finance.

Miceli and Davis were the partners in charge of the firm's housing and real estate practices. Davis would later leave the firm to join Obama mentor Tony Rezko in the real estate development business

In March 1994, a year before "Dreams" was published, Obama was the lead defense attorney on an obscure case in Cook County Court that has heretofore escaped examination by the national media.

In this case, Obama defended a Chicago slumlord and powerful political ally who was charged with a long list of offenses against poor residents. The defendant was the Woodlawn Preservation & Investment Corp., controlled by Bishop Arthur Brazier, a South Side Chicago preacher and political operator.

Brazier's burgeoning real estate empire included a low-income housing project at 6223 South University. Today, MapQuest describes the Woodlawn neighborhood as "quaint and sedate." But in the winter of 1994, it was a frigid hell.

Brazier was closely allied with Obama and his firm, not least because Davis was on WPIC's Board of Directors. Davis was also the corporation's registered agent, and he received the court summons when the city filed suit on the South University apartments.

Brazier's WPIC had failed for nearly a month to supply heat and running water for the complex's 15 crumbling apartments. On Jan. 18, 1994, the day the heat went off, Chicago's official high temperature was 11 below zero, the day after it was 19 below.

Even worse, the residents were then ordered to leave the WPIC complex in the winter chill without the due process they would have been afforded by an eviction procedure.

In court documents reviewed by The Washington Examiner, Daniel W. Weil, commissioner of Chicago's Buildings Department, slammed WPIC for multiple municipal code violations, including "failure to maintain adequate heat," failure "to provide every family unit with approved heating facilities," and "failure to provide adequate" supplies of either hot or cold running water.

Things were so bad that the city's outraged corporation counsel declared that "the levying of a fine is not an adequate remedy" and asked the court for a permanent injunction against WPIC, appointment of a receiver and imposition of a lien on WPIC to pay for repairs, attorneys' fees and court costs.

But Obama did his work so well that in the end, on March 3, 1994, the court simply fined WPIC $50. Only then did Obama tell the court of the forcible removal of tenants in the bitter cold.

An experienced Chicago housing attorney who reviewed the case at the Examiner's request said $50 fines against politically powerful slumlords were not uncommon at that time. The lawyer, who currently works for the city, asked to remain anonymous for fear of reprisal.

The attorney termed the forcible removal of the residents in the frigid Chicago winter "outrageous," and said it looked like "a way to avoid a lengthy eviction process by law. And if the tenants had leases, they should have been bought out with a cash payment in return for leaving the premises early."

The South University apartments eventually became part of a real estate syndication deal that Obama helped negotiate. Brazier remained as the controlling general partner, while the syndicated investors became limited partners.

The merging of Brazier's insider contacts and influence with the limited partners' financial resources enabled them to benefit collectively from bigger, more profitable deals than they would have each been able to do individually.

A Chicago housing expert with direct knowledge of WPIC's real estate dealings told the Examiner that the syndication deal involving the apartments likely was being negotiated when the building lost heat.

"The property was one of five or six that was bundled together into a partnership and syndicated with tax credits," he said. It was a "prelude to being put into the partnership, which it ultimately was for purposes of the refinancing and syndication."

The WPIC case illustrates how Obama functioned at the center of a historic accommodation then developing between the Daley machine and its traditional opponents among the city's liberal reformers.

Lubricating the deal was a flood of public and nonprofit federal and state tax credits and funding for low-income-housing projects that would enrich developers and empower ambitious politicians like Obama, at the expense of taxpayers and, especially, the poor.

Brazier was not merely an Obama legal client. A disciple of Chicago's famous radical activist Saul Alinsky, Brazier was also a close political ally of Daley's and one of the key movers and shakers among the city's progressive political elite who in the years ahead would advance Obama at every turn.

Obama also did legal work involved in the establishment of four Brazier-Rezko limited partnerships: Woodlawn Partners Ltd., Central Woodlawn Partnership, KRMB Limited Partnership and Woodlawn Drexel Ltd. Partnership. Rezko is now serving a 10-year federal prison sentence for fraud and attempted bribery on state government contracts.

The former Obama firm still represents WPIC, as well as Brazier's church, the Apostolic Church of God, and his Fund for Community Redevelopment and Revitalization. Brazier's son now oversees the properties.

As Brazier clung to life in 2010 in a Chicago hospital, Obama called him from the White House for what relatives described as an extremely tearful farewell.

Shortly after Brazier died, Obama issued a statement saying of the man he had once helped put 15 poor families on the street in the dead of winter:

"There is no way that we can replace the gentle heart and boundless determination that Bishop Brazier brought to some of the most pressing challenges facing Chicago and our nation."

Next: Chapter 5: Obama's toughest critics on the left


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CH 3: The 1997 Speech That Launched Obama

The following is a reprint from a Special Report published by the Washington Examiner dated September 20, 2012. A link to the Washington Examiner maybe found in our 'Links' Listings.

Like so many in the liberal powerbase that served as a springboard for Obama, Marilyn Katz’s activist roots stretch back to her days as a Students for a Democratic Society operative. Today, Katz is an influential political operative in Chicago who has visited the White House 26 times since 2009. Few doubt that Barack Obama's stirring oration before the 2004 Democratic National Convention vaulted him into the national limelight.

But another, less-heralded Obama address -- delivered on Valentine's Day 1997 at First Chicago Bank -- was equally essential to his later successes. Without it, it is doubtful that he would have ever been in position to assume so prominent a role in 2004.

Obama was a newly elected Illinois state senator in 1997 when he addressed an audience that included many of Chicago's most powerful political insiders and activists, nonprofit executives, business movers and shakers, and philanthropic funders.

The occasion was a meeting of the Futures Committee, an elite Chicago civic leadership group created by the Local Initiatives Support Corp., or LISC, a liberal, nonprofit, low-income-housing activist group.


o authenticated text of Obama's speech -- which was billed beforehand by LISC in a promotional flier obtained by The Washington Examiner as "a local perspective on effective communities" -- is now known to exist.

But people interviewed by the Examiner who heard him speak say Obama laid out a powerful vision for a political strategy that ultimately reshaped housing activism on the Left, first in Chicago and then nationwide, even as it paved the way for an accommodation between the corrupt political machine of Mayor Richard M. Daley and its long-standing nemesis, the city's coalition of white liberal reformers and black community organizers.

Obama described a practical strategy for building on the federal Low Income Housing Tax Credit, or LIHTC, contained in the 1986 Tax Reform Act, plus federal, state and local funds and programs, to create new public-private development partnerships.

The LIHTC encouraged the partnerships needed to unite government officials and progressive nonprofit activists behind the cause of building thousands of new affordable-housing units, first on Chicago's poor South Side and then, as the movement spread, to similar neighborhoods across the nation.

]Obama spoke at a time of great ferment on the Left in which federal housing policies became a central focus for political activism.

He was drawing from the same well that had produced the Community Reinvestment Act, relaxed federal standards for mortgage qualifications, and creative financial packaging of subprime loans, but doing so in a manner uniquely matched to conditions on the political ground of Chicago.

Public-private partnerships for affordable-housing projects were not a new idea to some of Obama's listeners, since philanthropic groups like the Ford Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation had been promoting the concept for several years.

Not coincidentally, it was a MacArthur vice president, Rebecca Riley, who arranged for Obama to speak at the Valentine's Day gathering.

Obama's innovation was to expand the concept beyond simply building affordable apartments and high-rises. It encompassed a cradle-to-grave vision of providing for the material needs of the low-income families residing in the new housing, including their schools, child care, job training, medical coverage, clothing and food.

In turn, the residents would campaign and vote for the officials advocating the partnerships, adding significantly to their political power.

Left unstated was the underlying reality that politically connected developers who built the housing would profit handsomely and could be expected to gratefully give millions of dollars in campaign contributions to politicians like Obama who made it all possible.

Chicago thus became the proving ground for Obama's vision, which, according to LISC spokesman Joel Bookman, "really changed the direction of community development in Chicago and ultimately nationally."

It was an irresistible combination of money, politics and idealism that also offered endless opportunities for greed and tragic abuse of the poor.

That made it an ideal tool for uniting the Daley machine with the reform coalition that had elected Harold Washington as the city's first African-American mayor in 1983. (Richard M. Daley, who reinvigorated the machine and became mayor in 1989, was the son of the machine's founder, Richard J. Daley, who died in 1976.)

The key to Obama's vision in Chicago, according to Marilyn Katz, was the city's most famous radical: "Remember, this is the community of Saul Alinsky. And most of the first housing groups were the Alinsky groups who were still banging at the door."

Katz, an influential Chicago public relations executive and longtime Obama friend and political operative, has visited the White House more than two dozen times since 2009.

Like so many in the liberal power base that served as a springboard for Obama, Katz had activist roots stretching back to her days as a Students for a Democratic Society operative in Chicago.

A Futures Committee handout for the Valentine's Day meeting titled, "Barack Obama's principles of community development," said the proposed program had "to organize around production, not just consumption."

Such words were a clarion call to activists raised on a thousand variations of the Marxist labor theory of value and capitalist alienation.

"He really questioned the kind of surrogate capitalist strategy that most of the nonprofit community-based organizations had been pursuing," Katz told the Examiner.

"And he suggested that a real estate strategy for redevelopment of communities was not enough and that you had to really go into the quality-of-life issues, education, wealth building, amenities that were the hallmarks of any community needs," she said.

Obama's vision "changed the direction and the nature of the 123 groups that were working in the various communities in the city. It was a very influential speech," she said.

The LISC vision speech was a critical turning point for Obama because his position with the Chicago law firm of Davis, Miner, Barnhill & Galland put him at ground zero with what Katz called "the tangential and interlocking circles between the Left-liberal political community, the urban redevelopment community, the legal community and politicos" who controlled Chicago, then and to this day.

It was from that point that Obama cultivated the personal, professional and political relationships that would serve him well all the way to the White House.

Next: Chapter 4: For the slumlord's defense, Barack Obama, Esq.


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