Friday, September 05, 2008

Know Any History?

What does this sound like?

Barack Obama was a founding member of the board of Public Allies in 1992, resigning before his wife became executive director of the Chicago chapter of Public Allies in 1993. Obama plans to use the nonprofit group, which he features on his campaign Web site, as the model for a national service corps. He calls his Orwellian program, "Universal Voluntary Public Service."

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The pitch Public Allies makes on its Web site doesn't seem all that radical. It promises to place young adults (18-30) in paid one-year "community leadership" positions with nonprofit or government agencies. They'll also be required to attend weekly training workshops and three retreats.

In exchange, they'll get a monthly stipend of up to $1,800, plus paid health and child care. They also get a post-service education award of $4,725 that can be used to pay off past student loans or fund future education.

But its real mission is to radicalize American youth and use them to bring about "social change" through threats, pressure, tension and confrontation — the tactics used by the father of community organizing, Saul "The Red" Alinsky.

...

The government now funds about half of Public Allies' expenses through Clinton's AmeriCorps. Obama wants to fully fund it and expand it into a national program that some see costing $500 billion. "We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded" as the military, he said.

I'll tell you what it sounds like to me. Obama wants to create a parallel "security force" to the existing military and local police, a force that will be expected to be personally loyal to a specific political ideology and, thus, a specific political party.

Hmmm...sounds a lot like this:

In Munich in late 1920, Hitler created the Ordnertruppen, a body of ex-soldiers and beer hall brawlers in order to protect gatherings of the Nazi party from disruptions from Social Democrats and Communists. On November 4, 1921 the Nazi party held a large public meeting in the Munich Hofbräuhaus. After Hitler had spoken for some time the meeting erupted into a melee in which a small company of Ordnertruppen distinguished itself by thrashing the opposition. The Nazis called this event "Saalschlacht" (meeting hall battle). After this the organization came to be called the SA. Under their popular leader Ernst Röhm, the SA grew in importance within the Nazi power structure, initially growing in size to thousands of members. In 1922, the Nazi Party created a youth section, the Jugendbund, for young men between the ages of 14 and 18 years. Its successor, the Hitler Youth, remained under SA command until May 1932.

From April 1924 until late February 1925 the SA was known as the Frontbann to avoid the temporary ban on the Nazi party. The SA carried out numerous acts of violence against socialist groups throughout the 1920s, typically in minor street-fights called Zusammenstöße ('collisions'). As the Nazis went from an extremist political party in the turbulent times of 1920's Germany to the unquestioned government of the nation, the SA was no longer needed for its original purpose. An organization that could inflict more subtle terror and obedience was needed and the thuggish SA who had been born out of street violence was simply not capable of doing so. The younger SS was more suited to this task and began to take over the previously held roles of the SA.

After Hitler took power in 1933, the SA became increasingly eager for power and saw themselves as the replacement for the German army.

If you don't want to be compared to Nazis, stop acting like them.

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