Benj,

I am looking forward to sitting down to Captain West’s writings. His perspective, given where he has been and what he has been, should prove a worthwhile comparison to say General Pace’s observations. And a breath of fresh air, opposed to observations which may not be so worthy of the time or effort required to read them.

Just an observation…,
Marx is descriptive, Lenin (and Stalin and Trotsky) are prescriptive. Alas no patient can survive such quackery, and unlike the plague, there has been found no useful application for it, either as a benign or invasive agent. What SDS evolved from I am unsure, what it was turned into was a violent Leninist effort. The effort failed, the reasons had less to do with the application as they did with the efforts of those who sought to apply the prescription. The patient’s condition was unchanged.

The result was the determined effort to erect a non violent application of Marxist philosophy using a revolutionary model. It is the Code Pink’s and the Soros’, and Clinton’s and resurrected Ayres’ of that movement that have wrested control of the Democratic party taking it in directions that would have FDR (he of the “temporary” Social Security plan, and a Lend Lease act that armed nations Allied in a fight against tyranny) calling foul.

I see not even a hint of FDR in Obama, but quite a generous amount of Leninism potentially in the mix. His pronouncements (and your well stated defense of them) do little to assuage my fears of his talking calmly like a College Professor, while acting recklessly (like a Bolshevik). His Father’s Dreams are not at all the Dreams of my forefathers, and forebears. His version of Democracy as practiced by Acorn in Washington State, and by the DNC in determining a “presumptive” candidate, is not my vision of Democracy in action. “OH”s version of the land of opportunity appears to be a spoils abetting, favors spreading machine abetting arrangement to me. It may not even be a fact, but it has not been disproved only ignored. Objections are not faced but rather they are sidestepped. In point of fact even more questions are raised in the act of running the things down. How am I to ask my representatives, the military, my children, or my wife to trust the policies of the man, when I do not find him worthy of my nations trust?