The Missing Link in the Evolution of Barack Obama

By Selwyn Duke

One of the problems with the idea of “American exceptionalism” is that it exacerbates a kind of complacency common to man.  This is the phenomenon whereby people often view themselves as exceptions, saying, after some tragedy, for instance, something such as “I never thought it could happen to me.”

On a national level — and this especially plagues great nations — this manifests itself in the notion that “it” could never happen here.  Oh, the “it” could be descent into tyranny, domination by a foreign power or dissolution.  Or, maybe, it could be the election of a leader who is a Manchurian candidate, a traitor within, someone bent on destroying the nation that gave him everything.  That…“it”…couldn’t happen here.  In fact, the idea is so preposterous to many Americans that, if such a threat loomed, they would never see it coming.  And they would call a person who warned of it a nut.

So I want to present you with a hypothetical.  Let’s say a leader were elected who had, during his childhood, been mentored by an avowed Nazi.  Let us further say that his guardians had chosen this mentor for him, indicating that they likely were sympathetic to the man’s beliefs.  Now, let us say that upon reaching college, this future leader gravitated toward Nazi professors.  Moreover, we then find out that a man who knew the leader as an undergraduate and was, at the time, a Nazi himself, said that the leader was “in 100 percent, total agreement” with his Nazi professors and was a flat-out Nazi who believed in old-style Brownshirt tactics.

Okay, we’re almost done.  After graduating, the leader-to-be spends 20 years sitting in a white-power church, has an alliance with a self-proclaimed Nazi and ex-terrorist and, apparently, becomes a member of a National Socialist party for a while.  And then, upon being elected, he appoints an avowed Nazi to his administration and also a woman who cites Adolf Hitler as one of her two favorite philosophers.  Now, here’s the million-depreciated-dollar question:

What would be nuttier, to claim that this man was a Nazi or that such an assertion was a radical statement?

Furthermore, if people appeared unconcerned about the leader’s radical past, what would be the most likely explanation?

A. They’re sympathetic to Nazism.

B. They’re ignorant of his personal history.

C. They’re rationalizing away a frightening reality.

D. Some combination of the above.

Let’s now transition to the actual.  Here is a fact: If you took the above description of my hypothetical leader and replaced “Nazi” with “communist,” “flat-out Nazi” with “flat-out Marxist-Leninist,” “Brownshirt tactics” with “communist revolution,” “white-power” with “black-power,” “National Socialist” with “socialist” and “Adolf Hitler” “with Mao Tse-tung,” you would have an accurate description of a leader in power today.

His name is Barack Obama.

We’ll start from the top.  Obama’s childhood mentor was chosen by his guardians, his grandparents, and was avowed communist Frank Marshall Davis.  Obama did in fact gravitate toward communist professors in college; moreover, we now know about ex-communist John Drew, a contemporary of Obama’s at Occidental College who verifies that Obama was “in 100 percent, total agreement” with his communist professors and was a flat-out “Marxist-Leninist” who believed in old-style communist revolution.  

We also know that upon graduating, Obama spent 20 years in a black-power church, Trinity United of Reverend Jeremiah Wright fame and had an alliance with self-proclaimed communist and ex-terrorist Bill Ayers.  It also appears — and I have yet to see anyone address and disprove this association — that Obama was a member of the socialist New Party in Chicago in the 1990s.  Then, upon being elected, Obama appointed avowed communist Van Jones to his administration and also Anita Dunn, who cited mass-murderer Mao Tse-tung as one of her two favorite philosophers.  There’s more, too, but greater detail is hardly necessary.

It also shouldn’t be necessary to ask the question, but I will:

What is nuttier, to claim that this man is a communist or that such an assertion is a radical statement?

What is the obvious conclusion?

Now, some may say that a person can change markedly over a 30-year period.  This is true.  Yet not only do we have the recent evidence of Obama’s radical communist appointments, but there’s something else as well.  It hit me just the other night.

Just as we would demand that our leaders completely reject Nazi ideas, all good Americans should agree that complete rejection of communist ideas is a moral imperative as well.  Losing a little youthful zeal or adding a dose of pragmatism just isn’t enough.  A pragmatic communist, in fact, could be more dangerous than an old-guard type.

Yet a transition from flat-out “Marxist-Leninist” to someone who rejects the red menace is a pretty big change, don’t you think?  In fact, wouldn’t such a personal evolution — some might say revolution — be a kind of conversion?  I think so.

Now, many people do experience conversions.  I think here of erstwhile radical-leftist David Horowitz; ex-liberals Michael Savage and Robin of Berkeley; and President George W. Bush, who accepted Christ as an adult.  And then there’s me: I was never a liberal, but I did transition from being a scoffer at religion and an agnostic to a devout Catholic. 

There’s an interesting thing, however, about conversions.

You hear about them.      

You see, a conversion is a sea change, a rebirth, a turning point in your existence.  You may become, as Christians say, a new creation, and you’re at least a reformed old one.  And you reflect your new state of being and often want to voice it.

And those around you will know about it.

As for this writer, everyone who knows me would say that my religious conversion was a seminal point in my life.  Horowitz has spoken of his rejection of the “loony left,” Bush’s conversion is well known, Savage has talked about his on the radio and Robin of Berkeley can’t stop talking about hers.  A conversion becomes part of your life narrative.

Now consider something.  Barack Obama is one of the most famous, most discussed individuals on the planet. 

But we have not heard about any soul-changing conversion in his life.

Not a whisper.

Nothing. 

Nothing that could reconcile the flat-out Marxist-Leninist he was in his college days with the man he supposedly is today.  There’s no one who says, “Yeah, man was he was a radical guy in his youth, and I just couldn’t believe how he became disenchanted with his old ideas.”  There are no stories about a great epiphany, an overseas trip that opened his eyes or a personal tragedy that inspired growth.  There’s nothing to explain how a radical Marxist became a reasonable politician.  And if there is such an explanation, it’s the most elusive of missing links.

So could “it” happen here?  And is it really nutty to ask if, just maybe, it already has?

   This article first appeared in American Thinker

      © 2010 Selwyn Duke — All Rights Reserved

Comments

[Philip France]

Selwyn Duke is as factually correct as he is eloquent and logical.

Recommended reading:

Trickle Up Poverty: Stopping Obama's Attack on Our Borders, Economy and Security by Dr. Michael Savage, Ph.D.

The Manchurian President: Barack Obama's Ties to Communists, Socialists and Other Anti-American Extremists by Aaron Lien (with Brenda J. Elliott).

The Obama Nation: Leftists Politics and the Cult of Personality by Dr. Jerome R. Corsi, Ph.D.

Conduct Unbecoming: How Barack Obama is Destroying the Military and Endangering Our Security.

This man is treasonnous and seditious.

I have taken up the practice of confronting people still sporting Obama stickers on their bumpers by gently and quietly stating, "If you are still displaying that sticker, you are too ignorant to vote."

[Robert Berger]

Oh come on,Selwyn.You're just rehashing the same old lies about Obama.Boy are you gullible! All of the accusations you and other paranoid,right-wing loons have been making have been completely discredited long ago.
Jerome Corsi has been revealed to be a total fraud and phony,and yet you gullibly fall for the garbage he spouts.
The real threat is from awful right-wing excuses for poltiicians like the loathsome Michele Bachmann,that inbred,hillbilly,Bible-thumping ignoramus Jim Demint,the amiable but stupid Mike Huckabee,etc,and those wolves in sheep's clothing,the despicable religious right.
Thesenarrow-minded,intolerant,ignorant and self-righteous jerks should never have been elected to serve in Washington or in any political office,and it makes me ashamed as an American to see such awfulpeople in Washington.
I don't care if their Chrsitians.But I do care that they're so narrow-minded and intolerant.And it's appalling to think thatif Obama loses in 2112, America may elect a homophobic bigot as President.This is no better than having an anti-=semitic bigot in the White House.
Obama is hardly perfect,but he's still infinitely preferable to any of Republicans who might run.Sarah Palin isn't a bad person,but she is simply not very bright.Her popular image as a regular gal and moose-hunting soccer mom is nothing but a smokescreen for her wrong-headed political ideas.Nothing but a cynical ploy for right-wing extremists in Washington to get the power they must never have.
I'm no Marxist or communist,and neither is Obama.Lies,lies,and nothing but lies.

[Philip France]

Robert,

You have it exactly backwards. No one here cares what you think. Why do you bother?

Happy New Year

[yoyo]

robert i give you kudos for trying but any fool who malisciously does the Godwin has no arguement. Selwyn is just fear wrangling for the lowest IQ. Generally he has some argument but now he has nothing more than false guilt by asociation. False because most of the people that he has cited would be shot as capitalist running dogs by real communists and would be considered mildly left wing in most of the educated west. And of course selwyn has totally dog whistled the fact that a black man in Chicago may go to a culturally black church, I dont like J Wright but I cant see a great deal of difference between his philosphy than that of the Catholic liberaltion churches of central and south america. they both gave comfort to the disenfranchised, somewhat like Jesus was supposed to have done.

However the "wealth is worshipful" mega churches of Bushes family and mainstream christian faith are somehow considered beyond reproach.

Personally selwyn and philly I would judge Obama by his actions which are disapointing only in the sense he is trying to make all people happy at the same time.

[Philip France]

Happy New Year Yoyo.

You are out of your mind but I love you anyway. I consider it a shame because I believe that you are bright but that you establish your opinions from very biased sources and it appears that you do very little investigations on your own.

Your opinion that Obama "is trying to make all people happy" is ludicrous. Read the title to Michael Savage's book: "Trickle Up Poverty". THAT is his agenda. Dr. Savage is a Ph.D. There is no way to stack your credentials, nor that of anyone from whom you obtain "news" against his brilliant mind.

By dismissing Selwyn's documentary as "guilt by association" is to shamelessly miss his overall point. If it walks like a Marxist, talks like a Marxist, associates with Marxists, was raised and mentored by Marxists and quacks like a Marxist what other conclusion can be arrived at?

[Walt]

I would challenge Yoyo and Berger to read "Radical in Chief" by Stanley Kurtz.

Nazism and Communism are the same beast; both forms of total Statism we are just taught to hate Nazis more than commies because of the Holocost but we are taught to ignore the Wholeocost.

Great article Selwyn.

[Robert Berger]

Let's face it.If Obama were a conservative Republican with views and agenda diametrically opposed to the ones he has,and still had an American mother and an African-born father, the whole birther movement would never have been hatched,conservatives would love him,praise him to the skies,the idiotic notions that he is a Marxist,communist,a Muslim,hates America, that idiot Joseph Farah would never have questioned his legitimacy as President, and no on else would.
All the stupid false rumors that have been dogging Obama ever since he came to prominence are based on the fact that he has a nerve to stand up to conservatives and conservatism, to be pro-choice,pro gay rights, doesn't want to deny poor people and those of the middle class help, etc.
It's all been nothing but a pack of lies.
Conservatives would not be calling for his impeachment,saying all many of vile and disgusting things about him,and demonizing the way they have been. Pure hypocrisy.

[A High School Student]

Wow, Mr. Berger. I haven't agreed on your arguments in the past, but some of them at minimal have some sort of rational thinking. The blog you have posted is so opinionized that it sounds like something that Oprah would say on her television show. What this shows is that you cannot embrace the fact that Obama is in fact a Left-winged president. You can easily look at what he has done and the ideas that he promotes, and you can see that he mirrors FDR. All of the above information about Obama's mentor and his educational background is correct. You do not have to search very hard to find this information and it strongly supports that Obama is in fact as you said he isn't. He is a Marxist, communist, Muslim-supporting, and America hating president. All of his ideals and the legislation that he is passing supports these notion. There hasn't been any change since he was in office to show other wise. I think the whole point of this article is to show that Obama hasn't changed and will not change. We cannot sit and think that Obama will come to his senses that what he is doing is not at the country's best interest. He does it for his own interests. He is not alone, him and others that have a similar agenda are destroying this country and the Constitution is almost nonexistent. Look around you Mr. Berger! Our rights are being violated by the TSA. They do full body searches on an old woman, but refuse to do it to a Muslim because it is "profiling". This Obamacare that is trying to be passed is not constitutional in the slightest. The Arizona bill about immigration is fully constitutional and is reinforcing federal policy, but it is also considered racially discriminating by the left-wing. I do not understand at all that people are arguing against the fact that Obama is a Left-wing socalist. You cannot use emotions to judge someone's character. You use facts. Facts are used in every argument as support. Your entire argument is based on platitudes instead of facts. I am sorry Mr. Berger, but your argument is invalid.

Have a happy January 3

[yoyo]

dear high school student, I wont delve into bulk of you screed because it swmells too stongly of rupert murdoch and faux news - remember he started in my country, I know what he is capable of.

I would pick you up on the one point I have direct and concrete information on. Obama is not responsible for the obomination that is your latest series of TSA directives. They are driven by 3. things (in order)1. the movement of the previous head of the TSA to Rapiscan 2. The failure of security forces to deal with your shoe bomber despite warnings and 3.the pressure the GFM has put on airlines and airports.

The comment about screening white granny and not brown mohammed is not factual both get screened however the screening of both is ineffectual and wastely and doesn't increase security.

(PS The new board member of rapiscan was a Bush appointee as has been clear in industryjournals for many months - we are fighting to avoid this pathetic approach over here as we speak.)

[Jim Doolittle]

WOW...you are so dead to your sins...WOW!