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It was Barack Obama
himself, not I, nor anyone else, who claimed -- often --
that his community organizing with the Alinsky-designed
DCP in Chicago was the "best education" he ever had. It
was Barack Obama who touted his work with ACORN's
Project Vote. It was Barack Obama himself who taught
Alinsky Power Tactics at the University of Chicago. And
it has been Barack Obama himself, who adopted whole-hog
Alinsky's "Ideology of Change" and all of its slogans. |
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| Saul
Alinsky made a living off his own background as an
unattractive, smaller-than-average child, forced to bear
the brunt of neighborhood bullies. |
| Sanford
D. Horwitt, Alinsky's biographer, spends dozens of pages
describing young Saul's difficult childhood, where he
was a veritable outcast. What made his own shortcomings
even more potent fodder for the bully class was the fact
that his father had left his mother and wasn't there to
help the little boy figure out how to be a man of strong
character. Even worse than this was the fact that his
mother was an in-your-face, overbearing shrew of a woman
that struck fear into the hearts of everyone in her
vicinity. |
| Horwitt
relates how young Saul's mother would keep an eye on her
little boy -- the chubby, not-great-to-look-at kid
without a Dad in residence -- as he played with
neighborhood kids in the street. Whenever the group
would light into Saul, his mother would raise the window
and scream at the other children, always rushing to his
defense, and inevitably crushing his own power to save
himself. Alinsky's mother had such a vicious mouth that
she struck fear in the hearts of even the adults in the
neighborhood. |
| And Saul
absorbed these awful childhood lessons, quite to
America's detriment. Powerless to protect himself from
ridicule, seeing his mother's inflamed response, which
only served to heighten his tormenters' resolve, he
internalized what he later described in Rules for
Radicals as "man's most potent weapon," ridicule. |
|
| What is
the key to ridicule's success, according to Alinsky? |
| "...it
infuriates the opposition, who then react to
your advantage." |
| As he
witnessed his mother's infuriated response
to the bullies attacking him, he became the
observant bystander. What did he see? |
| Act I:
Bullies gang up on Saul and taunt him for
being short, chubby, not athletic, whatever. |
| Act II:
Mother takes the bait and gets into the
game, screaming at the boys for hurting
little Saul. |
| Act III:
The boys react to Mother from the safety of
the street and the protection of their
numbers, by intensifying the bully tactics. |
| Act IV:
Mother becomes so infuriated and out of
control that she finally screams threats and
near-obscenities at the little boys, who
have just magnificently played the adult for
a real fool. Mother is in complete
disarray; the boys stroll off down the
street laughing victoriously. |
| Saul
Alinsky later used this very play for the
foundation of his politics of ridicule,
specifying that the strength is not in the
ridicule. The strength of ridicule is
always, every single time, the "enemy's
reaction." |
| In his
childhood play, Mother was the enemy engaged
by the ridiculing youth. As soon as the
children gathered and began taunting little
Saul, Mother appeared at the window like
clockwork. Mother's reaction emboldened and
added great worth to the bullies. They got
to see her emotional meltdown every single
time. |
| "The
enemy properly goaded and guided in his
reaction will be your major strength," wrote
Saul Alinsky in his own middle-age. |
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