Robert R. Owens, PhD
If It Wasn't So Sad It Would Be Funny
October 13, 2009

Lately the news reminds me of Monty Python. I keep waiting for President Obama to appoint a Czar of Silly Walks or Reverend Wright to resurface and declare piously, “Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!” If the situation wasn’t so serious I couldn’t take it seriously.

I mean seriously, Kevin Jennings, President Obama's Assistant Deputy Secretary of the Office of Safe and Drug Free Schools at the Department of Education failed to report a case of statutory rape involving a male sophomore who told him he was having sex with an older man. It doesn’t end there. Mr. Jennings is also on record as praising Harry Hay of the North American Association for Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA), which agitates for the legalization of sexual abuse of young boys by older men. Apparently not wanting to leave people with too little to uncover to unmask his agenda Secretary Jennings also penned the forward to a book some might find surprising for an educational administrator to promote entitled, Queering Elementary Education.

I keep waiting for ex-sportscaster Keith Olbermann or Democratic Party Spokesman Chris Mathews to say, “wink wink, nudge nudge, say no more, say no more” when they deliver such classic lines as, “President Obama has appointed Mark Lloyd as the Chief Diversity Officer at the FCC” with a straight-face. Colbert and Stewart had better watch out or MSNBC will win the sweeps as the funniest thing on TV. Officer Lloyd left his perch at the Center For American Progress funded by the likes of George Soros where he co-authored a report entitled "The Structural Imbalance of Political Talk Radio" which offered this chilling bit of advice, “This analysis suggests that any effort to encourage more responsive and balanced radio programming will first require steps to increase localism and diversify radio station ownership to better meet local and community needs.”

Localism is a re-packaged Fairness Doctrine designed to control conservative commentary. Officer Lloyd’s goals are made clear in his book “Prologue to a Farce: Communication and Democracy in America.” In this book Lloyd states, “Too often Americans use the First Amendment to end discussions of communications policy.” He continued, “This freedom is all too often an exaggeration. At the very least, blind references to freedom of speech or the press serve as a distraction from the critical examination of communications policies.”

Drawing upon the revolutionary tactics of the philosophical father of the Obama Administration Saul Alinksy Lloyd adds, “"We understood at the beginning, and were certainly reminded in the course of the campaign, that our work was not simply convincing policy makers of the logic or morality of our arguments. We understood that we were in a struggle for power against an opponent, the commercial broadcasters.” Leaving no doubt as to where he draws his inspiration Officer Lloyd comments, “"We looked to successful political campaigns and organizers as a guide, especially the civil rights movement, Saul Alinsky, and the campaign to prevent the Supreme Court nomination of the ultra-conservative jurist Robert Bork.”

And now for something completely different, what review of the Cavalcade of Czars would be complete without that zany guy President Obama appointed Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the Office of Management and Budget, Cass Sunstein. Remember all those gazillion page bills no one reads? This is the guy who interprets them and decrees how they’re implemented. In other words he’s the guy who fills in the blanks. The Administrator believes in Libertarian Paternalism or the belief that people should have the freedom to make choices and government should encourage them to make the best ones. Here’s where the nudge comes in. Sunstein believes the government should guide people “by gentling nudging them in directions that will make their lives better.” Can the wink be far behind?

A few of the Administrator’s wackiest quips highlight his madcap take on ideas for America. Speaking of free speech he says, “A system of limitless individual choices, with respect to communications, is not necessarily in the interest of citizenship and self-government.” He elaborates when commenting on broadcasting, “A legislative effort to regulate broadcasting in the interest of democratic principles should not be seen as an abridgment of the free speech guarantee.” That’s democratic as in a Democratic People’s Republic.

When talking about taxes Mr. Sunstein says we need another holiday, “In what sense is the money in our pockets and bank accounts fully ‘ours’? Did we earn it by our own autonomous efforts? Could we have inherited it without the assistance of probate courts? Do we save it without the support of bank regulators? Could we spend it if there were no public officials to coordinate the efforts and pool the resources of the community in which we live?... Without taxes there would be no liberty. Without taxes there would be no property. Without taxes, few of us would have any assets worth defending. [It is] a dim fiction that some people enjoy and exercise their rights without placing any burden whatsoever on the public. … There is no liberty without dependency. That is why we should celebrate tax day”

An advocate of adding to the rights of Americans Administrator Sunstein seeks “to uncover an important but neglected part of America’s heritage: the idea of a second bill of rights. In brief, the second bill attempts to protect both opportunity and security, by creating rights to employment, adequate food and clothing, decent shelter, education, recreation, and medical care.”

And who could forget this gem, “…[T]he Second Amendment seems to specify its own purpose, which is to protect the “well regulated Militia." If that is the purpose of the Second Amendment (as Burger believed), then we might speculate that it safeguards not individual rights but federalism.”