Cross-posting from the New Zeal blog

On September 24, about 20 FBI agents spent most of the day searching the Logan Square residence of Chicago activists Stephanie Weiner and her husband, Joseph Iosbaker, reports the Chicago Tribune.

Working for Willie Delgado
In 1998 the duo worked as leaders of the Chicago New Party, alongside Frankie Torres, Deborah McCoy, Jose Kader, Bob Palmer, Rafael Rodriguez (Board of Directors, Rosenberg Fund for Children), Yakira Nunez, Vinnie Izurieta, Pryianka Basu, Dave Rolston, and Mary Robles. Joe Iosbaker was at the time serving as Precinct Captain for Miguel del Valle in the 13th Ward (Remember that name, we investigate del Valle a little further down). He had been working election day at this same precinct for “progressive” candidates for about a decade – since far left Chicago mayor Harold Washington won re-election in 1987. Weiner and Iosbaker supported New Party candidate and member, Willie Delgado in his bid for the 35th Ward seat in the Illinois House of Representatives.

Delgado had signed up to the New Party in 1995, along with Barack Obama, Lou Pardo and Communist Party supporter Alice Palmer. Like Obama himself, Delgado was also endorsed by the Chicago Democratic Socialists of America. In 1998 won the seat against Elba Rodriguez by a very slim 241 votes. Delgado was to hold the seat until 2006.

Willie Delgado supported (and succeeded) Miguel Del Valle
As at 1995, Delgado was a key supporter of Illinois State Senator Miguel Del Valle. Del Valle had also enjoyed the endorsement of the Chicago Democratic Socialists of America. He met Barack Obama in 1992, when the latter was directing a voter-registration drive called Project Vote. In 1993 he was listed as a “contact or potential member” of Progressive Chicago (parent and sister-organization of the Chicago New Party). Then in the mid-90s, he was listed as a member of Friends of Alice Palmer, alonside Danny K. Davis, Tony Rezko, Timuel Black and Barack Obama. While both Illinois State Senators, Miguel Del Valle and Barack Obama, along with State Rep. Mary Flowers were to work closely together with ACORN representative, April Troope on the passage of “energy assistance legislation”.

In 2006, Del Valle left the Illinois State Senate, rewarding Willie Delgado’s ongoing support by appointing him to his old seat.

What was the New Party, and what was Obama’s involvement?
The New Party was an electoral alliance dedicated to electing leftist candidates to office-usually through the Democratic Party. It dissolved in 1998. Three organizations formed the backbone of the New Party – the Democratic Socialists of America, the U.S.’s largest marxist organization, ACORN and radical labor union SEIU. Also heavily involved were the Communist Party USA breakaway group Committees of Correspondence and far left “think tank” the Institute for Policy Studies.

Obama not only worked closely with these New Party candidates, he himself was a both a member of the New Party and its parent organization Progressive Chicago.  New Party News Spring 1996 page 1, celebrated the Danny K. Davis’s Congressional victory and went on to say;

“New Party members won three other primaries this Spring in Chicago: Barack Obama (State Senate), Michael Chandler (Democratic Party Committee) and Patricia Martin (Cook County Judiciary)…”these victories prove that small ‘d’ democracy can work’ said Obama”.

New Party News Spring 1996 page 2: “Winners! NP-endorsed candidates Patricia Martin (far left), Danny Davis (center), and Barack Obama (far right), celebrate with Chicago New Party members Ted Thomas and Ruth Schools after their victories in the Democratic Primary last month. (click here for full page)

What goes around comes around. In 2004, Barack Obama was able to win his 2004 U.S. senate race by stitching together a coalition of socialist/communist dominated unions and “community organizations“.
He also received the backing of several independent Latino elected officials led by State Sen. Miguel del Valle, Rep. Cynthia Soto and Alderman Ray Colon. Alderman Joe Moore also backed Obama, as did USAction leader and Communist Party sympathizer William McNary. Returning the favor once again on the event of del Valle’s election as Chicago County Clerk in 2006, Obama stated, “I am thrilled that Miguel Del Valle is now our City Clerk and I can think of nobody better to serve out a full term than Miguel Del Valle.”

The New Party folded in 1998 after its voting tactics were ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. The FBI is now undertaking what has become a high-profile investigation of former members of the organization. Was Barack Obama a member? Undoubtedly. Will the FBI investigate him? What do you think?

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Cross-posted from the New Zeal blog

The indefatigable Cliff Kincaid of Accuracy in Media draws our attention to the “One Nation Working Together” protest which is scheduled for October 2, 2010 in Washington, D.C.

“I’m proud and excited to be a part of One Nation Working Together,” says prominent leftist actor, Danny Glover. “Exciting news! We’re thrilled that Mr. Glover will be participating,” say the organizers. Hardly surprising when you take a look at the celebrity’s activites and affiliations. In August 2004 he endorsed an anti “Bush Team” Protest at the Republican National Convention in New York, organized by Not In Our Name, an organization closely associated with the anti-capitalism, Maoist Revolutionary Communist Party. A good friend of Hugo Chavez, Glover also signed a statement circulated by the Partisan Defense Committee calling for the release of convicted “cop-killer” Mumia Abu-Jamal (who by the way, serves on the National Exec for the National Lawyers Guild). Glover also joined with Barbara Ehrenreich and others in initiating Progressives for Obama.

Cliff Kincaid writes of the protest,

The “peace director” of the October 2 “One Nation Working Together” rally says that the U.S. should immediately withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan, military aid to Israel should be ended, and that Iran has the right to develop nuclear weapons as long as the U.S. has them. He also says that Marxists are invited to participate at his upcoming rally.

Michael McPhearson, one of the key organizers of the event and former executive director of Veterans for Peace, tells Accuracy in Media, “I’m not all that concerned if you’re a Republican, Democrat, or Marxist or Communist, whatever,” he said. “I just want us to work together to make our country better. That’s what I look at—not if you’re a socialist.”

The October 2 rally in Washington, D.C. is designed to counter the Tea Party, a grass roots movement of citizens devoted to limited government, and the recent “Restoring Honor” rally in the nation’s capital sponsored by Fox News personality Glenn Beck.

Below I have listed a mere handful of the plethora of leftist organizations which are backing this march:

• AFL-CIO
• American Federation of Teachers
• NAACP
• SEIU
• Jim Wallis‘s Sojourners
• American Friends Service Committee
• American Rights at Work
• Campaign for Peace and Democracy
• Coalition of Black Trade Unionists
• Communist Party USA
• Democratic Socialists of America
• Safe Schools’ Czar, Kevin Jennings‘ Gay,_Lesbian,_Straight_Education_Network
• Institute for Policy Studies
• International Socialist Organization
• Jobs with Justice
• People for the American Way
• Queers for Economic Justice
• Solidarity
• Unite Here
• Veterans for Peace
• Young People For

“This one is going to be big!” say the organizers of the planned demonstration. “Be there and help write a new page in the history of social struggle in the U.S.” The demands of the protest will be as follows:

• Jobs, Peace, Justice
• Bring Our Troops and War Dollars Home
• Fund Jobs, Not War
• End War, Rebuild America
• End the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan Now!—Bring Our War Money Home

Kincaid’s article continues,

The “national campaign manager” of the October 2 demonstration is Reverend Leah Daughtry, described on her website as “a nationally recognized teacher, preacher, speaker, organizer, leader, and Democratic strategist.” Her work for the Democratic Party includes serving as Chief Executive Officer of the 2008 Democratic National Convention Committee and Chief of Staff of the Democratic National Committee.

The mainstream media, however, can be expected not to highlight the fact that the Democratic Party and its constituency groups, which are running the rally, have made common cause with communist groups dedicated to the destruction of the American system and withdrawing U.S. military power from the Middle East in the face of global Islamic terror.

McPhearson, controversial in his own right, confirmed his participation in the 2008 national convention of the Black Radical Congress, a gathering that included representatives of the Communist Party, the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, and the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America. The theme of the event was “Forging a Black Liberation Agenda for the 21st Century.”

Be sure to visit Cliff’s original article and read the entire thing – I’ve only posted small excerpts here.

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Cross-posted from the New Zeal blog

“Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad declared Tuesday that capitalism faces inevitable defeat and called for the overhaul of “undemocratic and unjust” global decision-making bodies. He blamed capitalism and transnational corporations for “the suffering of countless women, men and children in so many countries.” His speech came on the second day of a 192-member UN anti-poverty summit.” – TVNZ

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Cross-posting Brenda J. Elliott’s article at the Real Barrack Obama blog.

“Under Democrat Harry Truman, it was the Communist bogeyman that was used to destroy the Left that had built the labor movement; today Democrat Barack Obama uses the terrorist bogeyman to try to destroy the peace movement, both actions for the same goals: To maximize the profits of the capitalist class.” – Bay Indymedia

According to the Chicago Tribune report, Federal agents, under the auspices of the Joint Terrorism Task Force, “searched homes of anti-war activists in Chicago and Minneapolis . . . in an investigation of possible links with terrorist organizations in the Middle East and South America.”

About 20 FBI agents spent most of the day searching the Logan Square residence of activists [and spouses] Stephanie Weiner and Joseph Iosbaker, Weiner said… In Jefferson Park, neighbors saw FBI agents carrying boxes from the apartment of community activist Hatem Abudayyeh, executive director of the Arab American Action Network. In addition, Chicago activist Thomas Burke said he was served a grand jury subpoena that requested records of any payments to Abudayyeh or his group.

…Melinda Power, an attorney for Weiner and Iosbaker and a longtime friend, said agents took about 30 boxes of papers dating to the 1970s, including a postcard from an old girlfriend of Iosbaker’s.

“They said they would determine what was evidence later,” Power said.

Weiner, who said she and her husband for years have been active in labor causes and the anti-war movement, complained the search was an attempt to intimidate her and other activists.

“We aren’t doing anything differently than we have in 20 years,” said Weiner, a teacher at Wilbur Wright College. Iosbaker is a staff member at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a union steward for Service Employees International Union Local 73.

Burke said he received a grand jury subpoena requesting records of payments to Abudayyeh’s organization as well as two groups among the State Department’s list of foreign terrorist organizations, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).

The subpoena also requested “items relating to trips to Colombia, Jordan, Syria, the Palestinian territories of Israel.” Burke said he toured Colombia eight years ago with members of an oil workers union there.

Burke, a former school custodian-turned-stay-at-home father, belongs to the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, a group mentioned in subpoenas and search warrants issued Friday to activists in Minneapolis.

Burke said he knows Weiner, Iosbaker and Abudayyeh from years of involvement in demonstrations and activities in Chicago. Most of the people whose homes were searched or who were issued subpoenas attended anti-war rallies at the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minn., he said.

The World Socialist Web Site adds: “The two reported Chicago raids targeted the homes of antiwar and gay rights activist Andy Thayer and Tom Burke of the Columbia Action Network.“

In Minneapolis, according to the Pioneer Press, the homes of Minnesota Anti-War Committee “organizers Mick Kelly, Jess Sundin and Meredith Aby were among those searched. The organization’s office also was searched.”

The Michael Kelly subpoena can be seen here and the search warrant for his apartment here.

“I have no idea what all this is about,” said Kelly’s attorney, Ted Dooley. “Mr. Kelly is an activist; he’s a socialist or perhaps a communist and has been forever. He never hides his political views. They’re fishing. They’re casting big nets into the sea of political activism.” . . . The home of Tracy Molms, 29, who works with Students for a Democratic Society [at the University of Minnesota], also was searched. The fifth person whose home was searched didn’t want the name made public, Sundin said.

RBO wrote in September 2008 about the “new” SDS here.

Molms said she’d traveled to “Palestine” in 2004. She said she’d raised money for the trip in the Twin Cities activist community.

Yet another Freedom Road member from Minneapolis has been named by NBC Chicago as having received a search warrant for her home — Sarah Martin. (See RBO’s follow up article here for info on Martin.)

A press release by Burke was posted at the Workers World web site. It includes the name of Steff Yorek, “one of the activists whose homes was searched.”

Yorek, a member of AFSCME who is also an organizer for the Minnesota Coalition for a People’s Bailout, as well as a member of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, is with the University of Minnesota.

Burke writes:

“The government hopes to use a grand jury to frame up activists. The goal of these raids is to harass and try to intimidate the movement against U.S. wars and occupations, and those who oppose U.S. support for repressive regimes,” said Colombia solidarity activist Tom Burke, one of those handed a subpoena by the FBI. “They are designed to suppress dissent and free speech, to divide the peace movement, and to pave the way for more U.S. military intervention in the Middle East and Latin America.”

SDS, in its statement following the raids, said it would “stand in solidarity with their brothers and sisters across the country in the face of FBI repression of progressive causes.”

The SDS item included the name of another radical group raised in the raids, National Committee to Free Ricardo Palmera. Palmera is a FARC revolutionary who was convicted in July 2007 “in federal court of helping hold three Americans hostage for years in jungle prison camps.”

Fox News Chicago reports:

“Among the targets of the raids were Jessica Sundin, who led a 10,000-person anti-war march on the opening day of the Republican National Convention in 2008, and Mick Kelly, who was part of Sundin’s 2008 protest and who has planned to march in Minneapolis if the Democratic National Convention is held there in 2012.”

The World Socialist Web Site “clarifies” the identities of these groups:

“FARC is a nationalist, peasant-based organization at war with the US-backed regime in Columbia; the PFLP is the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a faction of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, or PLO; and Hezbollah is a mass Islamic political party in Lebanon with a paramilitary wing that has fought off invasions by Israel.

The political nature of the raids was barely concealed. The warrant to raid Kelly’s home specifically cited his membership in a group calling itself socialist, the Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO).”

The Communist-affiliated International ANSWER Coalition adds:

“The targeted activists have done nothing wrong. They are long-time organizers in the struggle for justice in the United States and against U.S. wars and repression abroad. They are leaders of organizations like the Twin-Cities Anti-War Committee, the Palestine Solidarity Group, the Colombia Action Network and the Freedom Road Socialist Organization, among others. Many of the targeted activists helped organize the successful mass mobilizations at the RNC in Minneapolis, Minn. in 2008. Now, the government is attempting to implicate them in a bogus federal “terrorism” investigation. These allegations are baseless, reactionary and wrong.

The aim of the FBI raids is clearly the suppression of free speech and dissent. The government wants all activists to be afraid to speak out. And the Obama administration’s Justice Department is now leading the charge. But we cannot allow the government to stamp out the right of people to advocate for political beliefs that do not align with the aims of the Pentagon war machine. We cannot allow them to continue to erode our civil rights and civil liberties.

ANSWER encourages all anti-war activists to follow the example of the targeted activists if you are confronted by the FBI or other police agencies. The activists have refused to engage in conversations with the FBI about their political beliefs and anti-war organizing.”

P.S. The radical Left has turned on the Chosen One. Where once he was cheered, he is now reviled. Just saying.

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Cross-posted from the New Zeal blog

Upon receiving a phone-call from Fidel Castro’s office in Cuba inviting him to interview the Cuban dictator, Jeffrey Goldberg, a journalist for The Atlantic got in touch with his Institute for Policy Studies friend Julia Sweig, who is currently working for the Council on Foreign Relations. Together they travelled to Havana, Cuba for the interview with the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba.

The duo met with Castro on and off over a period of three days  (August 29 – 31). During their first meeting, Goldberg asked Castro if he believed the Cuban model was still something worth exporting.

Castro replied, “The Cuban model doesn’t even work for us anymore”.

Later in the day, Goldberg asked comrade Sweig what she thought Castro meant by this comment. Julia has known Castro for over twenty years. Sweig replied that,

“He wasn’t rejecting the ideas of the Revolution. I took it to be an acknowledgment that under ‘the Cuban model’ the state has much too big a role in the economic life of the country.”

Joel Wendland of the Communist Party USA‘s newspaper, the People’s World wrote about Goldberg and Sweig’s interview with Castro:

Cuba’s leading institutions of governance have set the stage for a number of important systemic changes toward a market-oriented economy, Sweig explained. New proposals include private ownership of land, the shift from collective farming to cooperative farming with private ownership rights, the licensing of the 250,000 to 500,000 small businesses with non-family employees (as long as social security taxes are paid), and introduction of limited foreign investments in real estate.

Just this week, the Cuban government announced a plan to shift 500,000 government workers into the private sector in order to cut unsustainable budget expenditures.

Sweig said Cuba’s internal changes and other global realities show that U.S. attempts at economic isolation of Cuba have failed and are unnecessary.

The embargo is not a foreign policy; it is a domestic policy aimed at nothing more than addressing “a perception of the Cuban American vote” in Florida, she said. “I think it’s time for the United States to recognize that 50 years of one policy haven’t achieved the intention which was to block the revolution, stop them from exporting it, and overthrow etc.,” she noted. “I think it is time to take ‘yes’ for an answer.”

Many US anti communists have seized on Castro’s remarks as a a sign that communism is finally on the way out in Cuba. That even a fanatical communist and mass murderer like Fidel Castro can see the error of his ways.

Yes and I own a large statue in New York Harbor I’d like to sell you.

Castro’s statement is pure disinformation – channelled through Cuba’s allies in the Institute for Policy Studies, Council on Foreign Relations and the Communist Party USA.

Castro knows that Obama Administrations wants to drop US trade and travel restrictions regarding Cuba – a long time goal of the Castro regime. Castro knows he has to throw Obama a bone. If Castro can create the impression that Cuban communism is crumbling, conservative opposition to easing sanctions on Cuba will be neutralized.

Communists have used this ploy countless times from the time of Lenin’s New Economic Policy in the 1920s, right up to the present day.

Castro knows that a few well chosen words to some sympathetic journalists could reap huge rewards in strategic terms.

A simple rule of thumb when evaluating communist propaganda: when communists beat the war drums and pose aggressively, they are usually weak. When communists tell the world they are weak and their system is faltering, they have a major prize in their sights.

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Cross-posted from the New Zeal blog

On August 28 I shared a video in which Glenn Beck spoke about the presence of Hezbollah in Mexico near the U.S. border. On June 23, 2010, Republican Representative Sue Myrick had written to Janet Napolitano, Secretary of Homeland Security, requesting that she,

“Engage U.S. and Mexican law enforcement and border patrol officials about Hezbollah’s presence, activities, and connections to gangs and drug cartels.”

Myrick has yet to receive a response. However her office have put together the following very informative video, which I would encourage you to spread far and wide.

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Cross-posted from the New Zeal blog

Maxine Waters is a far left Democratic member of the U.S. House of Representatives, representing the 35th district of California.

In the news recently over allegations of corruption, Maxine Waters, if the media was doing its job, should be equally well known for her socialist connections.

Waters has consistently attempted to present herself as a mainstream politician. However the facts tell a different story.

In May 1992 Waters put her name to a supplement in the Communist Party‘s newspaper, the People’s Weekly World which called for readers to “support our continuing struggle for justice and dignity.” Virtually all other signatories were known Communist Party members or supporters.

In October, later that year, she was the keynote speaker at a Coalition of Black Trade Unionists meeting in St Louis Missouri. The Coalition began as a Communist Party front.

In June 1996, the Communist Party’s People’s Weekly World held a tribute event for Southern California labor unionists Jerry Acosta and Gil Cedillo. Presentations to the honorees were made on behalf of Maxine Waters and (now U.S. Secretary of labor), Hilda Solis, by their staffers who were present at the event.

In 1997 Waters put her name to a “Jobs Bill” which had been originally introduced to Congress at the request of over 50 prominent labor leaders – many of whom were known members or supporters of the Communist Party.

Waters has been a member of the Democratic Socialists of America – linked Congressional Progressive Caucus from as early as 1998 up til the present. Her mid 1990s press secretary and speech-writer, Patrick Lacefield was  a former National Director of the D.S.A.

Waters also serves on the Advisory Board for Progressive Democrats of America, an activist network within the Democratic Party, which is led by several D.S.A. connected activists, including National Director Tim Carpenter.

In May 2008, Waters made an embarassing tongue-slip during her televised questioning of a Shell Oil Executive. She queried, “…And guess what this liberal will be all about? This liberal will be all about socializing, uh, umm – will be about, basically. taking over, and the Government running all of your companies.” The video of this incident can be viewed here.

If Maxine Waters is found guilty of ethics violations, it will one more example of the corruption/socialism connection, now so common in the U.S. Congress.

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Cross posted from New Zeal Blog

A high powered and well connected “veterans group” has issued a letter backing “Park 51″, the Islamic community center and mosque proposed for Lower Manhattan – the popularly known “Ground Zero Mosque”.

According to Joel Wendland, himself an army veteran and editor of the Communist Party USA newsite Peoples World, the organization VoteVets.org, believes that the proposed mosque should be supported on Constitutional grounds and will serve to enhance U.S. national security in the long term.

According to an August 26 Wendland article in the World ;

Authored by VoteVets.org, an organization that advocates for veterans’ issues and supports veterans for elected office, the letter urged the Park51 organizers not to abandon the project.

In addition the letter asked the group to circulate the letter to any interested party, “so they know that veterans like us see this as an important issue of our very Constitution and our national security.”

The veterans cited their sworn oath as members of the military “to uphold the Constitution” as a basic reason for their support for the project.

The letter noted the hypocrisy of the opponents of the project:

“For all the talk these days from some quarters about the importance of protecting the Constitution and allowing the free market to work unfettered, those same people are fighting against your community’s right to buy property and worship freely. Our duty to protect the Constitution didn’t end when our service did. It’s up to us to stand up for the right for all Americans to enjoy the Constitutional freedoms that so many around the world don’t have. So, we are standing up for you.”

Protection of the rights of all Americans to practice their faith in the manner of their choosing would also “deal a blow to the propaganda of al Qaeda and Islamist extremists, who recruit on the talking point that the United States is in a war against Islam.”

Finally, the letter noted that taking a stand on behalf of the Constitution promotes the safety of U.S. military forces abroad.

“As veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan,” it concluded, “we believe the construction of your community center isn’t ‘anti-America’ at all. In fact, building your community center is about as pro-America as one can get.“

For the full statement go here.

Who are these patriots, taking such a noble stand for the U.S. Constitution and the safety and security of America’s troops and citizenry?

While professing to be a non partisan group, it appears that almost all of VoteVets.org’s supported candidates are Democrats. The group’s Political Action Committee is charged with seeking to elect Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans to public office – “regardless of party”.

However, between 2006 and 2010 VoteVets.org gave $228,700 to Democratic Party candidates and only $15,100 to Republican candidates.

Also, many VoteVets.org personnel have ties to the Obama Administration, the Democratic Party, the Democrat aligned and the George Soros funded Center for American Progress and in one case, directly to the Soros Open Society Institute.

Obama Administration connections include;

• Kayla Williams of the Senior Advisory Board of VoteVets.org, and writer for VetVoice (VoteVet.org’s online newsletter) works for Obama appointee, Secretary of Veterans Affairs, Eric K. Shinseki
• Jim Mowrer of the Senior Advisory Board of VoteVets.org served as the State Veterans Director for Senator Joe Biden’s presidential campaign. He is currently an assistant organizer of the Iowa Democratic Veterans Caucus

Democrat connected personnel include;

• Alex Cornell du Houx of the Senior Advisory Board of VoteVets.org serves as the National Council Chair for the College Democrats of America and was formally the co-president of the Maine College Democrats
• David F. Everett of the Senior Advisory Board of VoteVets.org works for Democratic Congresswoman Nita Lowey, who is supported by Council for a Livable World and SEIU.
  
• Joe Kramer of the Senior Advisory Board of VoteVets.org has worked for Democrat Jim Ferlo, State Rep for PA
• J. Ashwin Madia, Vice-Chairman of VoteVets.org was a Democratic nominee for the U.S. House of Representatives for Minnesota’s 3rd Congressional District.
• Miranda Norman of the Senior Advisory Board of VoteVets.org has become active in local Democratic politics. She currently serves as the Secretary for the Oklahoma Democratic Veterans Committee, served as a delegate to the Young Democrats of America National Convention, and is a member of the University of Oklahoma College Democrats
• Miguel A. Sapp of the Senior Advisory Board of VoteVets.org has works as chief of staff and legislative director for Congressional Progressive Caucus member, Sheila Jackson-Lee. In addition he has served as an attorney for the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.

Open Society Institute connected personnel include;

• Matthew Alexander (pseudonym) writes for VoteVets.org online project VetVoice. He is a former senior military interrogator. He led an interrogation team in Iraq that located Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, the former Al Qaida leader, who was killed in a subsequent airstrike. He has conducted more than 300 interrogations and supervised more than 1,000. Alexander has served for 17 years in the Air Force and Air Force Reserves. Alexander is a fellow at the Open Society Institute.

At least four members of VoteVets.org’s Board of Advisors are also involved with the Center for American Progress;

• General Wesley K. Clark (ret.) is an author of the books Winning Modern Wars and Waging Modern War, published by PublicAffairs Books, which has also published authors such as George Soros. Wesley Clark has served as a Trustee of the Center for American Progress and was a 2008 Democratic party presidential hopeful.
• Elaine C. Kamarck is a Lecturer in Public Policy, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Kennedy School, Harvard University. In the 1980s, Kamarck was one of the founders of the New Democrat movement that helped elect Bill Clinton president. She served in the White House from 1993 to 1997, where she created and managed the Clinton Administration’s National Performance Review, also known as reinventing government. In 1979 she was involved with Democratic Agenda, an attempt by socialist leader Michael Harrington (founder of Democratic Socialists of America) to move the Democratic Party to the left. Lamarck serves on the Advisory Board of the Center for American Progress.
• Bob Kerrey, a former Democratic Party Senator from Nebraska and a Trustee of the Center for American Progress
• Lawrence J. Korb, a Fellow of the Center for American Progress

The “Ground Zero Mosque” issue has divided America. Pro mosque “progressives” are on the defensive against a huge groundswell of public opinion against the project.

Is the the call by VoteVets.org, for Park51 to go ahead a genuine attempt to shed light the issue, by calling for tolerance and extending an olive branch to moderate Islam?

Or is it a cynical ploy by the Obama Administration and its allies, to take some heat out of the issue, by using “veterans” as cover for what is essentially a “progressive” agenda?

Americans rightly respect their veterans and tend to listen to their opinions. Would the public be happy to know that VoteVets.org was connected to both President Barack Obama and the not so popular George Soros?

Do they really want to be on the same side as the Communist Party USA on this issue?

The former servicemen and women of VoteVets.org are genuine veterans, but are their paymasters genuine patriots?

Should VoteVets.org’s opinions on this issue be respected? Or should Americans view them as little but cynical propaganda from quarters who have previously shown little regard for the U.S. Constitution, national security, or the well-being of American troops in the field?

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Must see doco on U.S. fundraising for Hamas.

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Cross posted from New Zeal Blog

Glenn Beck has a great new news site The Blaze – check it out.

From today’s edition, a video of Democratic Socialists of America member Dolores Huerta on a government sponsored campaign for the “rights” of illegal immigrants and also praising Venezuela’s marxist leader Hugo Chavez.

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