News Flash: This country has a bad case of staff infection. Cass Sunstein is a great example.

Editor's notes: From RedState, we have this story. It presents what we, here at Midknight Review, already know: the Obama administration practices subversive and clandestine tactics on those individuals and groups who oppose their ideas. Out in the open with his assault on those who oppose him, beginning with a joint Congressional speech on September 9, of '09, Obama "called out" those who would dare and has organize a civilian army, funded with tax payer dollars, to combat those who would be disagreeable. But the Red State story is not about Obama - specifically, it is about his "regulatory czar," Cass Sunstein. Understand that Sunstein would have never passed muster in the Senate, so Obama did an end run around Congress, and appointed Sunstein as one of his 42 czars. As "staff," Sunstein answers to no one but Obama. He cannot be be forced to report to Congress, no one in Congress has the right to ask him a single question -- as "staff," Sunstein has diplomatic protections. Sunstein is another radical in Obama's house of friends who opposes Constitutional values in the most transparent of ways. You must know that Obama is at the center of all that is presented below. Sunstein's words represent Obama's beliefs. --- jds

"We ought to ban hunting"

- Cass Sunstein, in a 2007 speech at Harvard University

"[A]lmost all gun control legislation is constitutionally fine. And if the Court is right, then fundamentalism does not justify the view that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to bear arms. "

- Cass Sunstein, writing in his book, "Radicals in Robes"

"Animals should be permitted to bring suit, with human beings as their representatives …"

- 2004 book Animal Rights: Current Debates and New Directions

"[Humans’] willingness to subject animals to unjustified suffering will be seen … as a form of unconscionable barbarity… morally akin to slavery and the mass extermination of human beings."

- Cass Sunstein, in a 2007 speech at Harvard University

"[T]here should be extensive regulation of the use of animals in entertainment, in scientific experiments, and in agriculture."

- Cass Sunstein, “The Rights of Animals: A Very Short Primer,” August 2002.

"A system of limitless individual choices, with respect to communications, is not necessarily in the interest of citizenship and self-government."

-Cass Sunstein, arguing for a Fairness Doctrine for the
Internet in his book, Republic.com 2.0 (page 137)

Posted by Erick Erickson (Profile)

Sunday, April 18th at 11:08AM EDT

24 Comments

“Cass Sunstein has favored the government using outside parties as government propaganda agents to paint their opposition as fringe and undermine their credibility.”

Astroturf is the act of professional interest groups designing campaigns that appear to be grassroots efforts, but are not. It is what the left has accused the tea parties of being. Only more and more it looks like the anti-tea party movement is truly astroturfing.

Writing on January 15, 2010, Glenn Greenwald at Salon noted Barack Obama’s new head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Cass Sunstein, had championed creating fake websites and using outside 501(c)(3) interest groups to act as alleged independent champions of government policy and to “cognitively infiltrate” opposition websites, etc.

In other words, Cass Sunstein has favored the government using outside parties as government propaganda agents to paint their opposition as fringe and undermine their credibility. Kind of like what has been happening with the tea party movement – lots of SEIU members pretending to be tea party activists causing violence in front of TV cameras.

Sunstein advocates that the Government’s stealth infiltration should be accomplished by sending covert agents into “chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups.” He also proposes that the Government make secret payments to so-called “independent” credible voices to bolster the Government’s messaging

Considering Sustein’s recommendations, it is not far removed to speculate the Obama administration is behind a new anti-tea party website called The Other 95, which defends the government from tea party criticisms and attacks the tea party movement as fringe.

The website purports to be authentically grassroots, though one must wonder when the last time was any grassroots activist too the time to defend the government.

The designer is affilated with MoveOn.org and other leftwing sites and causes.

But most notable, the donations page makes donations out to Democracy in Action. Democracy in Action is not for individual activists to use. It is for small and medium sized 501(c)(3) organizations and others on the left. Among its clients? ACORN, True Majority, NAACP, and others.

Hmmmm. . . .

Let’s also remember that Center for American Progress, led by Obama’s transition team director John Podesta, has regular 8 a.m. phone calls to coordinate activity on the left.

It’s a play right out of Lenin’s handbook, forget Alinsky, to call the authentic “inauthentic” and then create something inauthentic demanding it be called “authentic.”