Maggie's Farm

We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.

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Friday, January 2. 2009

Gramsci Week, #5: Saul Alinsky's Rules of Power Tactics for Radicals

Alinsky is the best-known American Gramscian. The Chicago community organizer who was an inspiration to Hillary Clinton (and maybe indirectly to Obama) wrote a deeply cynical handbook for radicals who seek power.

His rules for power tactics are here. We can see those rules followed and enacted every day, mainly in Left-wing in politics.

Posted by Bird Dog in History, Politics at 12:45 | Comments (20) | Trackback (1)

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A Little Cheese with Your Whine?
Last of the Totty Those of us who have been trying to get a handle on when America went . . . . neurasthenic have been stymied when it comes to isolating a single cause. The Smothers Brothers? Sputnik? Organic Tofu? The possibilities are endless. And then there's the common sense explanation: Americans are now more European than American (a reversal of the Frontier transformaton) and unwilling, or incapable, of continuing their heritage. As my Old Dad used to say: 'We h;ain't got our seed back.' Stanislav Mishin calls us out on it (Hat Tip, Theo): It must be said,...
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Tracked: May 30, 08:13

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There is no reason Alinsky's tactics can not be used by non-collectivists and so should be studied just as Patton read Rommel and Guderian.
#1 walt moffett on 2009-01-02 13:59 (Reply)
Reading this Alinksy crap makes my blood boil. Alinsky and his sycophants' totally cynicical view of humanity reminds me of Lenin and Stalin.They must be opposed- and defeated- by any means necessary. Period.
#2 greenmtnpunter on 2009-01-02 14:55 (Reply)
"By any means necessary" is their line.
#3 bd on 2009-01-02 14:57 (Reply)
These are human power tactics, most often used by those for whom ideology is just a smokescreen. They usually work best on decent naive salt-of-the-earth types who don't know they're being used by the Machiavellians as expendable tools.
#4 commander clopfelter (Link) on 2009-01-02 16:57 (Reply)
By any means necessary describes a fight for one's survival, which is what freedom loving people are in against these fascist thugs.
#5 Paul on 2009-01-02 17:03 (Reply)
Looks like instructions to public school teachers from their local union leaders.
#6 apple pie on 2009-01-02 17:19 (Reply)
Words are their weapon of choice. We must ridicule them where ever, and when ever, and as much as we can. If we want to win this cultural war.
#7 jappy on 2009-01-02 18:03 (Reply)
'WE' need to get a lot damn smarter. 'THEY' have been winning for the last fifty or so years.

Very difficult to get people to listen to reason.

I mean... 'they' offer free everything... health-care, retirement, housing supplements, sex, speak your mind, selfishness, hedonistic bacchanal of life, self before all else.

'We' offer responsibility, discipline, self-control, care and concern for the greater good.

'We' need to rethink the paradigm I believe.

I've been drinking.
#8 Luther McLeod on 2009-01-02 21:57 (Reply)
One of the most unnerving things to me is that both our President-elect and our proposed Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, were Saul Alinsky devotees in college. Think about that for a minute. Gives me cold chills.

When I was at Columbia U. in the 1940s, there was a strong socialist organization among the students at the time. People I knew as an undergraduate were urging me to come to evening meetings at the New School for Social Research with Alinsky and other socialist leaders.


Fortunately, in spite of being incurably curious, I refused to go. Even then I was too conservative and freedom-loving to buy into that cynical nonsense. The phrases "the greater good." and "from each according to his ability to each according to his need," were give-aways. Thanks to my Logic professor, I parsed these phrases and realized, even at that young age, that the smarter you are, the harder they expect you to work for not only yourself and your family, but additionally for all those Lotos eaters who prefer to lie around in the vineyards and eat grapes while you labor.

Marianne
#9 Marianne Matthews on 2009-01-02 22:30 (Reply)
But who's really smarter, MM... who's wining this 'war'. It ain't' you and me sweetheart. Our numbers dwindle daily. Time to change our tune... or become mastodons frozen in the ice. I'm not saying give in, or accomadate... just that the message needs a different tune for us to stand a chance.
#9.1 Luther McLeod on 2009-01-02 23:21 (Reply)
Luther ... I know we aren't winning the war, and I'm baffled about what we can do. As long as leftist liberals dominate our schools and the NEA, few people in the education business are going to have the courage to stand up to the political correcters and tell them to go "butt a stump," thus risking discipline and possible firing. Therefore, the youngsters who are graduated from our secondary schools and colleges are going to have a very skewed view of how the world really works.

How can we rescue our schools and our teachers, the "boots on the ground," so to speak, when their jobs are held hostage by politically correct supervisors and principals and administrative staff. I just don't know, Luther. Meta and I had an exchange on this subject earlier today on one of the other comment threads posted, and she noted that the teachers who actually teach the young minds in their care are constantly under fire from the administrative staff, and it's quite difficult for them to stand against the pressure of political correctitude in all of its ugliness.

Somehow we need to figure out a way to fight this. I count on you, and Buddy Larsen, and Jappy, and Meta and the other bright folks on this board to figure out some way to do this -- and I have faith that you can. You're the grown-ups, the smart ones in this present day society. I have faith in you.

Marianne
#10 Marianne Matthews on 2009-01-02 23:41 (Reply)
Marianne... flattery will get you absolutely everywhere, my dear.

I read that earlier exchange between you and Meta and I have no disagreement with what was said between the two of you, nor with what you say here.

And that particular facet of our dilemma, education, is of paramount importance. But even if we were to make progress on that front... how much further along will be be down the path of mindless Alinksy before the influence of more 'suitably' educated young minds can have an influence. And will that be enough?

Jappy has a part of the solution... up thread there. But that also is just a small piece of the puzzle.

It is a great problem and we are not winning. And I don't think that attempting to bring back the past will help for the betterment of the future.
#11 Luther McLeod on 2009-01-03 00:50 (Reply)
You can never negotiate with these people. My wife and I tried very hard on the education front. When my children were very young in public school we fought very hard against the sex ed curriculum. They wanted to introduce homosexuality as a valuable lifestyle choice in the first grade. Most teachers, but not all, thought along the same lines as my wife and I but were for the above reasons mentioned could (or would) do nothing.

The mindset was if it was brought up in the classroom, the whole class would have a discussion. Being so young in age, we confronted the teacher(s) and told them that it was our job and we should determine when sex ed was taught to our children. We argued that if one child brought it up that the teacher should either call the parent(s) and say that your child brought this up in class today, how would you like me to handle it? It should be done on a one to one basis. Most of our arguments fell on deaf ears so we took our campaign public, wrote letters, went to the school board, petitioned the school board, got people aware that it was happening.

It was a battle and no matter how many people were against it or how reasoned out arguments were it did not matter. We were labeled, and here is where the words come in - homophobic, anti-education, intolerant, and far right-wing Christian wackos. I can remember coming home from some of these meetings and being so enraged I just wanted to go out and hurt somebody. Usually I would just go clean my guns to calm down. I don't know how we are going to win this and I am just as befuddled as Luther is. I don't know what is left if we can't reason with people. There are so many beachheads out there we just have to pick one and fight as hard as we can because the alternative is scary.
#12 jappy on 2009-01-03 09:44 (Reply)
Jappy said it: We must ridicule them, out-ridicule them, in public forums to win this war. Whichever side shouts the loudest wins. Much as this distasteful, debasing behavior is against the Maggie's Farmer grain, it may be the only option.

When called homophobic, anti-education, intolerant, right-wing Christian wackos our spokesperson answers in kind by addressing "them" as obsessed sexaholics/pedophiles spreading atheist lies, propaganda and disinformation by communist/authoritarian tactics. Is that a "measured" response?

Otherwise we stand politely by as our society is destroyed by these narcissistic nihilists. The thought that these people are dragging us down to their level is even more revolting. Something's gotta give.
#13 greenmtnpunter on 2009-01-03 12:17 (Reply)
Jappy, at least you still have your job (probably). All we wanted to do was for my husband to leave the school he was at--just let us move on. The femnazis would not let him go! "He either works for us, or he doesn't work!"

With regard as to what to do, here is my first suggestion:
In response to "What we can do", I believe we can take a page from their play book. We can start small like this:
grandparents, older teachers, retired professionals from any field need to organize into local groups. They then need to confront the school boards--not in their own towns, or in counties where they can hurt you, but rather in an exchange with like groups from other parts of the state, or country. In that way reasonable people will be SEEN, perhaps heard, and local children and their parents will not be penalized by the terribly brutal local unions. I think this of exchanging groups provide some protection. It's kind of like the bussing for Obama strategy. A small group forms in city A, connects with a small group 300 miles away in City B and they exchange services. The group from City A attends the school board meetings in City B and vice a versa. Someone will have to rent a bus--or organize car pooling--a bus makes it more fun and more likely to happen. A common website in the state--or at the national level--could be used as a bulletin board for co-ordinating event exchanges. In many cases when can speak their mind without giving their name, and if a group arrives in force it gets their attention!
#14 apple pie on 2009-01-03 12:29 (Reply)
When I was in school the worst way to get the chicks was to be a member of the YSA
(Youth for Socialist Action). Second worst was to be an Randroid (signaled that you were a dope smoking peacenik queer). Third worst was to be an art major (bad knees from roofing jobs). I dunno. Maybe the ladies preferred practicality.
#15 commander clopfelter (Link) on 2009-01-03 13:41 (Reply)
Last time I scrolled down this far there were only 7 posts, mostly about alinsky, whom I'm sick of hearing about one way or the other. Though this thread may be dead/dying I notice it has taken a turn toward the education front of which I have just one observation. OK, more, but just one that I hope I can state clearly and succinctly, on the odd case that anyone is listening or is willing to listen, and it is this...As long as the kind of people who believe the whole universe was created during one week in 4004 BC are taken seriously by the Republican party (or whomever the "conservative" standard bearer is/will be), no one is going to listen to what that party has to say regarding education.
#16 KRW on 2009-01-03 21:53 (Reply)
Wow, the thread went from 7 to 15 while you weren't even looking. If that can happen, then so can whatever those people want to believe.

What difference does it make, anyway --so long as they interact with you as honest, loyal, hardworking, and virtuously idealistic?

Which of course they are, by and large.

All else even, who you gonna trust around your loved ones or your valuables, a humble bible-thumper or a post-modern relativist?
#17 buddy larsen on 2009-01-04 05:04 (Reply)
Buddy, I agree with you completely regarding integrity and on a personal level. But this is a political issue not how I (or we) personally feel about bible-thumpers, etc. I've tried many times to explain to even people who are politically centrist, if I'm lying on an operating table I would feel much more comfortable knowing that my doctor got his primary education at a bible-thumper school with strict A-B-C-D-F grade scales than at one that grave grades on the circle-square-triangle theory and I will never concede that point. However on the education front you will never get the kind of support that you need from the political center when you let religion trump science.

You can pick this point apart from a conservative perspective all you want but that will do nothing to convince anyone in the political center who more than likely agree with much of what needs to change in education. Creationism is to science what socialism/communism is to economics, nonsense on stilts.
#17.1 KRW on 2009-01-04 08:43 (Reply)
I'have to concede that point --that where it impedes science, creationism hinders mankind's aquisition of knowledge. I'm sure that for some, that's a feature, not a bug. Forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge --as a road to perdition. And that to is a legitimate viewpoint, in the sense that a parent might advise a child who has become depressed over ultimate futility to "quit thinking so much".
#18 buddy larsen on 2009-01-04 16:39 (Reply)

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