With threats of a government shutdown and a possible plot to oust House Speaker John Boehner, a Boehner ally lobbed the ultimate insult at the hardliners in his party: he compared them to Saul Alinsky, a lefty community organizer who became known in the 1950s and 1960s for embracing radicalism.
“This is a continuation of the strange virus that’s running through the Republican Party, which I define as a weird form of right-wing Marxism where people are using Saul Alinsky-type tactics,” Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) told the Washington Post.
Alinsky is constantly invoked by conservatives, but it’s usually to slam the likes of President Obama, Dem 2016 frontrunner Hillary Clinton and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (R-NV). In this case, it is the maneuvering of those on the hard right in Congress that is causing Nunes and other Boehner confidantes frustration.
According to the Post story, as well as a report by Politico, the current push to shut down the government over Planned Parenthood funding could also set the stage for conservative members to attempt to overthrow Boehner.
Boehners’ backers told Politico that they believe a group of hardliners associated with the House Freedom Caucus will use the shutdown — or perhaps another high-stakes government deadline later this fall, like the raising of the debt ceiling — to launch a coup on the GOP leader. If Boehner appears to cut a deal with congressional Democrats to avoid a shutdown or another government crisis down the road, his supporters fear they will use that as an excuse for his removal, the Washington Post reported.
Way back in the day when I was in college, you want to know who absolutely LOVED Saul Alinsky’s writings, particularly Reveille for Radicals? The right wingers in my all my politics and government undergrad classes, that’s who. I went into a different area, but almost all those guys - overwhelmingly, they were guys - went into politics and government as a career or business or both. Those guys used to talk about Alinsky all the time, making slogans out of the points in his book; it was like if Alinsky were a sports star they’d have all his stats memorized and a poster of him up on their ceilings.
Because comparing them to Hitler and the Nazis is so cliché.
The best part is; They have no idea who Saul Alinsky was.
These clowns truly do live in their own bubble of derp.
Just remember, the neocons of today used to be the Trotskyites of yesterday (literally).
Like so much from the Fright-Wing™, it is invariably a case of them projecting their own state of mind and behaviors onto who they perceive as “the enemy”. From the rabid homophobes who end up being caught with male hookers, to the looniest of right-wingers who were Auber-lefty radicals in their youth. They all have skeletons in their psyche/closet.