Nancy Pelosi’s Alinsky Approach

Nancy Pelosi recently delivered the following message to a group of like-minded people in New York City:

“I think that we owe the American people to be there for them, for their financial security, respecting the dignity and worth of every person in our country, and if there’s some collateral damage for some others who do not share our view, well, so be it…”

Whether she intended to provide such a window into her political soul is unknown. However, it was a profoundly significant revelation from the woman who is desperately seeking to be Speaker of the House once again.

What Pelosi did in her unwitting confession is to telegraph just how low the Democrats were willing to stoop in their craven quest for power, so low that people who merely disagree with their socialist agenda may, as her characterization indicated, become expendable.

“Collateral damage” is a term that refers to civilians who suffer serious injuries and even death as the result of military conflict. The phrase is frequently employed as a euphemism for civilian casualties of war.

Pelosi’s cavalier attitude about potential victims of her Party’s left-wing agenda reflects a worldview that is devoid of several key moral safeguards, without which a society simply collapses from within.

As disgraceful rhetoric and unprecedented conduct on the part of the Democrats mounted, the lack of a moral rubric was made manifest. For months Hillary Clinton, Maxine Waters, Eric Holder, and other prominent Party figures signaled their indifference to the welfare of persons and property as they simultaneously fanned the flames of discontent, which prompted base supporters and myriad susceptible individuals to engage in uncivil, intrusive, and outright violent behavior against political opponents.

Then came the hearings surrounding Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination and ultimate confirmation to the High Court, which turned out to be a seminal moment in time for what was to come to light, that the Democrats had devolved into societal autocrats who were determined to punish and, if “necessary,” destroy any individual or group that would fail to conform to their ideology or thwart their political plans.

What is on display is a collective capitulation to the Machiavellian maxim “the end justifies the means.” Machiavelli used this phrase to refer to the idea that a desired result ought to be reached by any means available, even morally bankrupt ones, in order to achieve what is viewed by those exercising power as a positive result.

Author Saul Alinsky’s “Rules for Radicals” encapsulates the Machiavellian maxim and drags the concept to further depths. The book is fittingly dedicated to Lucifer.

While attending Wellesley, Hillary chose to write her undergraduate thesis on Alinsky and his tactics. Likewise, former President Barack Obama used “Rules for Radicals” as a textbook when he lectured on the subject of community organizing. The new so-called Democratic Socialists, that form a sizable portion of the base of the Party, are properly considered Alinskyites.

Alinsky devoted a chapter of his book to the topic at hand, titling it “Of Means and Ends.”

His rules relating to ethics reveal an intrinsically depraved philosophy.

Alinsky’s first rule is “One’s concern with the ethics of means and ends varies inversely with one’s personal interest in the issue.” In other words, the higher one ranks a particular issue, the less one should be concerned with whether or not the methods used to achieve it are good or evil.

“In war the end justifies almost any means” is Alinsky’s third rule, and it could easily be considered a match-up to Pelosi’s “collateral damage” phrase. Democrats have long defined their politics in military terms, where warlike strategy is employed, destruction of any and all types is deemed acceptable, and no societal construct or institution is off-limits.

Alinsky’s fourth rule, “ethical standards must be elastic to stretch in the times,” captures the essence of moral relativism. Basic logic dictates that moral standards that can be “stretched” at will cease to be actual standards.

In a twisted take-off on Fredric Neitzke’s “might makes right,” Alinsky’s seventh rule, “success or failure is a mighty determinate of ethics,” puts the outcome cart before the moral horse.

Throughout the chapter, Alinsky characterizes ethics as a hindrance to achieving political goals and is consequently expendable. As a result, any falsehood, any act of violence, any atrocity can be justified in the quest to achieve a political end.

The entire view is antithetical to the Judeo-Christian principles, which undergird Western civilization. The great theologian Thomas Aquinas wrote, “An evil action cannot be justified by reference to a good intention,” which is, in essence, the direct opposite of what Alinsky preached.

In a land that reveres the endowments of life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness for each and every individual, “collateral damage” will never be acceptable…so be it.