What Change Will Obama Make?

Sam Graham-Felsen

One of Barack Obama's official campaign bloggers was a self-proclaimed disciple of Karl Marx while an undergraduate at Harvard University. Like most radical children, Graham-Felsen is the product of liberal parents, a phenomenon described most ably by Midge Dector in her 1975 book Liberal Parents, Radical Children. Graham-Felsen's father had protested outside University Hall in 1969 when left-wing thugs occupied the building with the acquiescence of cowardly university officials who cowered in the face of student demands. To a significant degree, the university administration displayed the same character flaws as the protesting students' parents. Both were unwilling to teach respect for the rule of law and respect for the foundations of ordered liberty. And, ironic for an institution of higher education, they yielded to an ad hoc mob rule which disrespected the views of the majority of students. Moreover, the student protesters, both in 1969, and again in 2001, exhibited the characteristics of spoiled children, much like two-year-olds take toys away from their playmates in the sandbox.

The mind that exhibits such behavior naturally looks to some form of “intellectual” reinforcement or justification for its actions and attitudes, and is particularly drawn to the most extreme exponents of these views. Many of these radical students were drawn to the writings and philosophy of such figures as linguist and communist apologist Noam Chomsky, radical historian Howard Zinn, and South American revolutionary Che Guevara, the murderous thug and compatriot of Fidel Castro. What draws them to these personalities is their affinity for an anarchic and socialist worldview which parallels their own childlike sense of rebellion from established and democratic authority. Chomsky, who, paradoxicly, calls himself a “libertarian socialist,” is, in reality, a confused Marxist who seeks to impose a classless and anti-capitalist society devoid of property rights. And contrary to his professed pacifism, Chomsky has openly justified the terror and genocide perpetrated by the North Vietnamese on the conquered peoples of South Vietnam following the American withdrawal.

In Prospect Magazine, Chomsky’s political writings were attacked by Oliver Kamm for, among other things, "judgements that have the veneer of scholarship and reason yet verge on the pathological." Kamm’s assertions are buttressed by the fact that Chomsky has apologized for communist mass murderers, asserting that there is “no credible evidence of mass executions” in post-war Vietnam. Meeting Chomsky was a life changing experience Graham-Felsen.

After graduating from Harvard, Sam Graham-Felsen traveled to Paris to take part in street riots protesting a recently enacted French employment law which made it easier for French companies to discharge employees under twenty-six years of age. He joined with hooded protesters who used baseball bats, wooden sticks and metal bars to wreak havoc on Parisian society. He later published an article in the Socialist Viewpoint in which he expressed sympathy for the 2006 Paris street riots, and has posted dozens of comments and articles on the blog of the far-left Nation magazine. According to an article in the Harvard Crimson, when he was a senior, Graham-Felsen hung a Community Party flag behind the bar in his Quincy House suite. Graham-Felsen was one of the naïve Harvard students taken in by the literary rantings of Chomsky and his ilk.

In the blogosphere, Graham-Felsen has been described as “a hardcore Marxist.” One has to wonder why the Obama camp would choose to allow this extremist to be a public face for its campaign. But, as the old adage goes, you are known by the company you keep. And Barack Obama has defined himself by “friends” such as these. And Barack Obama has defined himself by “friends” such as these.

More on Graham-Felsen:

Sam Graham-Felsen stands for what? blog