It is a matter of no small amusement for the journalist and agitator Nicholas von Hoffman that his beloved mentor, Saul Alinsky, learned the craft of “organizing” at the feet of Chicago’s most notorious mobsters. This was nearly eighty years before the self-proclaimed radical became a household name, having posthumously inspired an up-and-coming organizer who went on to become the forty-fourth president of the United States. Alinsky’s entrée to the Al Capone gang (which, tellingly, he called a “public utility”) was neither his ruthlessness nor his penchant for rabble-rousing, though a surfeit of both qualities surely impressed his friend Frank (“the Enforcer”) Nitti. It was, instead, his academic credentials.
A freshly minted doctor of criminology from the University of Chicago, Alinsky sought out, bonded with, and closely studied anti-social types. His experience proved invaluable in his lifelong pursuit of “social justice,” the organizer’s panacea. Alinsky even found a Depression-era job at Joliet’s hard-knocks penitentiary, assessing the suitability of inmates for parole. Not every crook had the panache of the Enforcer, and the work soon bored Alinsky, whose promiscuous mind was easily given to boredom. Yet there was an oasis in this desert: the evaluation of an occasional con man. In an unintentionally hilarious vignette, von Hoffman relates that “one of the flim-flam men initiated Alinsky into the secrets of his trade.” We’re never told to which “his” the trade-secrets in question belonged—the flim-flammer or the organizer. It turns out not to matter. They’re both frauds.
An obscure conservative blogger strayed from his prepared remarks on Tuesday to accuse President Obama of treating the economy "like a dog".
Doug Ross was in Milwaukee to speak at the Obscure Bloggers' Conference of America, which was attended by a host of industry dignitaries including Michelle Malkin's cousin, Glenn Reynold's maternal aunt, Dan Riehl's financial advisor and one of Don Surber's neighbors.
"Some powerful special interests who have dominated the agenda in Washington since the thirties really hit the jackpot with the Obama administration," Ross said, "This White House is treating the economy like a dog. It's taught the economy to roll over and play dead, for instance."
Ross isn't known to stray off prepared remarks and also took a more aggressive tone in the speech.
"They’re betting that between now and November, you’ll come down with a case of amnesia," he said. "They think you’ll forget what their agenda did to this country. They think no one's ever heard of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, the Post Office, Social Security, Medicare and every other giant boondoggle they've ripped off and bankrupted. These are the folks who stole from every federal 'trust fund' ever created, drove our economy into the ditch with their 'houses for everyone!' programs and then bankrupted the entire country with record-setting spending! And now they're asking you for the keys back!"
"You have unions in complete control of the Democrat agenda, using money that's supposedly not from their members' dues, somehow spending more than $150 million in the midterms alone. If I didn't know better, I'd think George Soros was (Continued on Page D-14)
Photoshop: Washington, D.C.--President Obama challenged Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to a constitution-eating contest at Obama's favorite local burger joint.
The two personal embodiments of all-consuming government wolfed down huge chunks of their respective country's governing documents, with Obama starting first with the Constitution's limits to federal taxing authority before tackling the meatier provisions dealing with limits on congressional authority under the Commerce Clause.
Attorney General Eric Holder and other Justice Department employees cheered "Eat, eat, eat, eat!" while the two presidential leviathans gulped ravenously.
In the end, Obama was declared the winner.
"The U.S. Constitution's made of much older and brittler parchment," said one Obama official. "That made it easier to crumple, but at the same time more difficult to swallow. But the president's experience eating his own words made all the difference in the end."
U.S. Senator Huey Long is fatally shot in the Louisiana capitol building (1935)
German forces begin 'Siege of Leningrad' against the Soviet Union's second-largest city (1941)
U.S. troops arrive to partition the southern part of Korea in response to Soviet troops occupying the northern part of the peninsula a month earlier (1945)
President Gerald Ford pardons former President Richard Nixon (1974)
Saul Alinsky - Al Capone connection exposed!
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