Claire Conner on how to recognize John Birchers today. Great video.

[madfloridian]

From her book Wrapped in the Flag.

The lurch to the right in 2010 is the unholy coalition of Tea Party, libertarian, big business, the gun lobby, the religious right and the newly reborn John Birch Society. It took 50 years, but these folks are back and they are strong.

More about Claire, in case you missed her powerful book. From her website:

Claire Conner

For 32 years, my father was a national leader in the John Birch Society.
At age 13, I became a foot soldier in its anti-Communist, anti-federal government army.
I discovered the radical right’s plan for America, a plan I could not support.
Wrapped in the Flag is my story.

I highly recommend the book. You will find yourself fascinated about how many politicians you recognize.

[madfloridian]

1. Are you living in "healthy poverty"?

[madfloridian]

2. Claire's mother: Birchers ready for when the liberals failed.

And just think about it....even many Democrats have been shoving anyone aside who claimed to be liberal.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/02/10/1185265/-The-Koch-Brothers-and-the-John-Birch-Society-Wrecking-America-One-tax-free-Think-Tank-at-a-Time#comments

By the late 1970s, I was convinced that the Birchers were irrelevant. That made it easy for me to dismiss Mother’s comments about “being ready when the liberals failed” out of hand. I couldn’t even imagine that my mother knew something I didn't.

Everyone thought that the Birch society had been reduced to a footnote of a footnote in political history. That conviction made it easy to ignore what was really happening: a group of very wealthy men—men who had been leaders of the Society or influenced by Birch ideas—were using their vast wealth to seed think tanks and tax-free foundations.

Before too long, the "Insiders" in the Council on Foreign Relations and their minions were countered by the new right wing kids on the block: The Heritage Foundation, The Cato Institute, American Legislative Exchange Council, (ALEC) Americans for Prosperity, the Club for Growth, the National Rifle Association, the American Enterprise Institute and the Tea Party.

.....Put it together and you have exactly what the Birchers longed for: a dismantled safety net, a federal government 40% of its current size and a free-for-all, laissez faire economy where the rich pay no taxes, business has no regulation and the workers have no unions.

The government will be tiny, but what is left will control your personal life, your sexual preference, your fertility and your civil rights and your right to vote.

[haikugal]

3. Thanks for this!

I didn't know about her or her book. I'm bookmarking for later, this is an important part of the puzzle...and Koch related. Are they winning do you think? I fear for our future on so many levels. My son and I have decided to not watch "news" anymore because all the stupidity and lack of rational discussion really depresses us. The John Birch society has been very apparent to me from the beginning as the manufactured " Tea Party" movement, very apparent.

I'll spend some time reading at her website as well. Thanks again for bringing her to my attention.

[madfloridian]

6. Her book is eye-opening. Obvious things I never paid attention to before.

Here's more about them, with the flyer they printed and distributed that said JFK was wanted for treason.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024088113

[Triana]

10. Highly recommend her book. n/t

[2naSalit]

4. K&R...

bookmarking for later.

Thank you!!

[starroute]

5. The Birchers seemed to have discredited themselves in the 60s

But that was only their early commies-under-the-bed phase. They never really went away. They just went underground.

The Kochs started getting involved in libertarianism by 1964. Libertarianism itself had quasi-fascist roots and ties with holocaust deniers and folks of that ilk. But for the most part they hid it well and were able to come across as more "liberal" than the conservative traditionalists of the Heritage Foundation and the religious right.

The Council for National Policy that was founded around 1980 also had strong Birch Society roots. Tim LaHaye was one of its central figures at the start -- and his Left Behind books are really just Bircherism with a light whitewash of religious nutjobbery.

At the heart of all of it is a desire to roll back the New Deal. Even the holocaust denial came out of efforts to discredit FDR immediately after the war. And that agenda has never wavered.

[starroute]

7. For anyone whose memory doesn't go back that far...

[madfloridian]

8. Reminds me...did you ever hear the John Birch Society Song from the 60s. Chad Mitchell Trio.

Yep they are back.

[madfloridian]

12. There is a series of books by Janette Oke, which features a LaHaye family.

I have not read the books, but Hallmark has made them into movies. I have wondered if they are the same family often, as they tend to be religious themes....not so overtly.

[pampango]

9. Birchers love them some conspiracies - particularly with communists or a One World Government.

Values

The organization claims to identify with a particular type of Christian principles, seeks to limit governmental powers, and opposes wealth redistribution, and economic interventionism. It opposes collectivism, totalitarianism, and communism. It opposes socialism as well, which it asserts is infiltrating U.S. governmental administration. In a 1983 edition of Crossfire, Congressman Larry McDonald (D-Georgia), then its newly appointed president, characterized the society as belonging to the Old Right rather than the New Right.

The society opposed the 1960s civil rights movement and claimed the movement had communists in important positions. In the latter half of 1965, the JBS produced a flyer titled "What's Wrong With Civil Rights?", which was used as a newspaper advertisement. In the piece, one of the answers was: "For the civil rights movement in the United States, with all of its growing agitation and riots and bitterness, and insidious steps towards the appearance of a civil war, has not been infiltrated by the Communists, as you now frequently hear. It has been deliberately and almost wholly created by the Communists patiently building up to this present stage for more than forty years." The society opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, claiming it violated the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and overstepped individual states' rights to enact laws regarding civil rights. The society opposes "one world government", and it has an immigration reduction view on immigration reform. It opposes the United Nations, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), and other free trade agreements. They argue the U.S. Constitution has been devalued in favor of political and economic globalization, and that this alleged trend is not accidental. It cited the existence of the former Security and Prosperity Partnership as evidence of a push towards a North American Union.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Birch_Society

[madfloridian]

11. And they are back.

Unfortunately.

[treestar]

14. their paranoia about the UN is almost comical

still waiting for the UN to take over.

[treestar]

13. Just finished the book

Healthy poverty?

And her mother, while aged, approved of Timothy McVeigh's terrorist acts - it's war, and kids die in wars. OMG, what a terrible woman.