Homeland Security Targets Abortion Opposition as Warning Sign of "Rightwing Extremism"

. . . Department document authored under virulent pro-abort Janet Napolitano

From LifeSiteNews
By Kathleen Gilbert


A report summary issued by the Department of Homeland Security to local law enforcement officials across the country targets abortion opposition, among other normative conservative viewpoints, as symptomatic of a potentially violent "rightwing extremism."

(To view the full document: http://88.80.13.160.nyud.net/leak/us-dhs-right-wing-extremis...)

The nine-page document entitled "Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment," includes a footnote explaining that the term "rightwing extremism" in the U.S. "may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration," as well as groups that reject "federal authority in favor of state or local authority."

The document also warns that "rightwing extremists are harnessing this historical election as a recruitment tool," and as such are "antagonistic toward the new presidential administration and its perceived stance on a range of issues."

The document claims that such groups have "exploited a variety of social issues and political themes to increase group visibility and recruit new members," including "white supremacists' longstanding exploitation of social issues such as abortion, inter-racial crimes, and same-sex marriage."

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, prior to joining the Obama administration, was known to both sides of the abortion debate as an extreme abortion supporter. As Arizona's governor, Napolitano had vetoed several anti-abortion bills, including a partial birth abortion ban and a bill protecting pharmacists' conscience rights.

Numerous conservative and pro-life voices across the country expressed outrage at the federal document's assertions.

"Even though we were kind of concerned that this might happen, I would say this report was still pretty shocking," Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women of America (CWA), told LifeSiteNews.com (LSN) today.

Wright said the document was "deja vu" of the Clinton-era taskforce known as VAAPCON - Violence Against Abortion Providers Conspiracy - which had targeted pro-life groups as potential domestic terrorists. VAAPCON investigated groups including CWA, the Christian Coalition, the National Right to Life Committee, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, and even the late Catholic Cardinal John O'Connor of New York.

Wright wrote a letter to U.S. senators late last month to voice concern that a repeat of the VAAPCON affair could result from the return of several former Clinton administration officials in the Obama administration.

“It’s disturbing that the writers of the report consider people who want to protect innocent life from violent deaths as potential terrorists," said Wright. "It shows a dangerous bias and incompetence from people who are tasked with keeping our country safe and free.

"They clearly did not do a professional job because they failed to learn who we are and what motivates us," she continued. "Instead they projected and exposed their irrational prejudices. If pro-lifers are blindly labeled a ‘suspect group’ then DHS may be setting the stage for more serious actions against us.”

Steven Mosher, president of the Population Research Institute (PRI), objected to the document, saying, "The pro-life movement is the largest, most peaceful movement in the history of the United States."

"To group tens of millions of loving pro-life activists with a handful of hateful neo-Nazis and white supremacist groups, as the report does, libels a large segment of the American population," said Mosher. "It is deeply troubling that the government agency in charge of our nation's domestic security would resort to such guilt-by-association tactics."

Mosher also challenged the conflation of the pro-life movement with white supremacism. "Pro-lifers categorically reject this thinly veiled charge of racism," Mosher said. "In fact, the pro-life movement has long been particularly concerned with the high rate of abortion among black women, and has sought to reduce it by providing alternatives to abortion, including privately supported homes for unwed mothers."

Jay Sekulow, Chief Counsel for the conservative constitutional law group American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), says the ACLJ is preparing a legal analysis and will be launching a nationwide campaign in the days ahead to demand that the DHS remove the reference from its warning.

"This is an outrageous characterization that raises serious questions about the leadership and direction of the agency charged with protecting Americans in the ongoing battle against terrorism," said Sekulow.

"This characterization is not only offensive to millions of Americans who hold constitutionally-protected views opposing abortion - but also raises serious concerns about the political agenda of an agency with a mandate to protect America."

Youth for Western Civilization Group at Vanderbilt Stirs Furor

Founders of the local branch of Youth for Western Civilization Devin Saucier, left, and Trevor Williams at the Parthenon in Nashville. SANFORD MYERS / THE TENNESSEAN

From The Tennessean
By Jennifer Brooks

Meet the Youth for Western Civilization.

Its members, 13 strong and counting on the campus of Vanderbilt University, are out to "promote the survival of Western civilization and pride in Western heritage."

The club has sprung up at seven colleges around the country in the past few months, sounding a warning cry against "radical multiculturalism," "mass immigration" and the "leftist occupation" of America's college campuses.

To its critics, it's the new face of intolerance on America's college campuses.

At a YWC-sponsored event at Vanderbilt last week, protesters outnumbered club members by a margin of 10-to-1. The Southern Poverty Law Center has the group's national founders on a watch list, suspected of ties to white nationalist groups.

Vanderbilt sophomores Trevor Williams and Devin Saucier, who founded the local chapter last fall, say it's their critics who are intolerant.

A matter of perception

"We're not racists," Saucier said Friday, sitting on the steps of Nashville's concrete Parthenon, a monument to the kind of Western heritage he believes is vanishing from college textbooks today — squeezed out by lessons on non-Western cultures and non-Western heritage.

In other circles, Youth for Western Civilization is being hailed as a bold new right-wing youth movement, out to light a fire under fellow conservatives and wrench the national debate back to the topic of immigration.

The group had its coming-out party at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C., in February.

"There are four policies on campuses that have led to the subversion of Western values," Williams said, ticking them off one by one.

"Mass immigration without regards to assimilation. Illegal immigration. Affirmative action. And multicultural ideology."

Almost every large wave of immigration in American history has sparked a backlash. The Chinese, the Germans, the Italians and now Hispanic immigrants have stirred fears that a wave of newcomers will overwhelm the national culture, breed crime and weaken the nation.

In the mid-18th century, the Know-Nothings railed against the hordes of Irish immigrants, who sent their children to separate schools and held allegiance to a foreign pope.

Reminded of the legends about "No Irish Need Apply" signs that used to hang in shop windows, Williams thought about it for a moment, then said, "They probably had the right idea … at least, until (the Irish) assimilated."

Talk disturbs some

No one has accused the local chapter of YWC of being a hate group, but its talk of assimilation and the preservation of Western culture above all others gives many people pause.

"It's totally fine for them to talk," said Southern Poverty Law Center spokeswoman Heidi Beirich, whose organization tracks hate group activity around the country.

But the language the group is using, she said, "To us, it's racism, pure and simple."

Many recognized hate groups, from the Ku Klux Klan to the Council of Conservative Citizens, begin their mission statements with a rallying cry to preserve this country's Western heritage.

"When I hear a statement like that, I have to wonder — is it a euphemism for white civilization?," said Frank Dobson Jr., director of the Bishop Joseph Johnson Black Cultural Center at Vanderbilt.

"A lot of groups use language that's veiled, but still the intent is clear."

Immigration lecture

Last week, the YWC sponsored an evening lecture on immigration by former U.S. Treasurer Bay Buchanan, who shares the group's views on immigration and assimilation. The event attracted more than 100 protesters, all organized over the course of a single weekend by Vanderbilt junior Erica Santiago.

"All week long, I've been seeing the signs they put up against immigration," said Santiago, standing in a long line of protesters formed at the entrances to the lecture hall last Monday night, holding up pro-immigration and pro-diversity signs.

"We came here to show our disapproval. To show people that this is the face of Vandy," she said.

The message Santiago gets from this group is that immigration weakens America, and she finds that concept unacceptable.

"My mother came from Colombia. You want to take my entire existence away."

To become a recognized student organization on campus, groups must show that there is no existing campus group with similar goals and that others on campus are interested in joining their proposed organization.

Youth for Western Civilization met those criteria, filled out all the necessary paperwork and lined up a faculty adviser, said Courtney Salters, director of student governance in Vanderbilt's Office of Student Organizations.

Vanderbilt was aware of the unsavory rumors swirling around the group, she said, but found no evidence that YWC was involved in harassment or hate speech on campus.

The Southern Poverty Law Center issued a warning last month that the national founders of Youth for Western Civilization, Marcus Epstein and Kevin DeAnna, have posted to white supremacist Web sites in the past.

Youth for Western Civilization say DeAnna is the sole founder of the group. And DeAnna denies that he or Epstein has racist leanings. He blames the allegations on a "crude, tribalistic instinct that's opposed to us."

Williams and Saucier started out in the College Republicans club at Vanderbilt. The group met once or twice a year, they said, and everyone wore suits and talked about getting ahead in the party and maybe, at some point, going out and canvassing for John McCain.

Frustrated, they started looking for a group with fire in its belly. A group that could go toe-to-toe with the liberal activists on campus.

Broad agenda

The YWC's agenda spans the political and cultural spectrum. It picketed a campus production of The Vagina Monologues, branding it pornography, and invited Bay Buchanan to lecture on immigration and assimilation.

At the moment, Williams is planning a YWC-sponsored lecture series on opera and its importance in Western culture.

March was Multicultural Awareness Month at Vanderbilt, but "there wasn't a single event about Western culture," Saucier said. "Our contributions have been heavily overshadowed. We're kind of that [forgotten] voice."

But for all its opposition to multiculturalism on campus, Youth for Western Civilization welcomes it in its own ranks.

On Saturday, Saucier and Williams called in with the news that they'd recruited their 13th member — Neelam Khan. She's a Memphis-born Muslim of Pakistani descent, and YWC won her over at the Bay Buchanan speech.

"I absolutely loved it," she said. "I found I really agreed with everything they said. I felt so comfortable with them, and we agree on so many topics."

She sees nothing at odds between her Eastern heritage and her membership in a group that believes Western culture should predominate in this country.

"I love my culture, I love my heritage, but having lived here all my live, I identify more as an American," she said.

The Face of Hate in San Francisco

In the topsy-turvy world of the radical left, fascism is called liberal, evil becomes a good, hate is regarded as compassion, and terrorists become innocent victims. Hat tip to American Thinker and Zombie Time for exposing the face of hate in the streets of San Franciso.

See all pictures of Gaza War Protest and Anti-Israel Rally >>



And here's a look at the "culture" these radicals support:

Being Annoying Could Become Costly

From OneNewsNow
By Charlie Butts

Brighton, Michigan, apparently wants to stop "annoying" free speech.

The Brighton City Council recently passed a strict code for public conduct, and those who violate the law, including those who annoy someone else, could be cited and fined. LivingstonDaily.com reports Brighton Police Chief Tom Wightman issued the ordinance. Even though the edict features the word "annoy" at least twice, he contends it "is not for somebody that says something annoying" but rather for "some course of action for repeated acts."

Gary Glenn, head of American Family Association of Michigan, disagrees. "I think this ordinance in Brighton is clearly unconstitutional in that it attempts to restrict people's exercise of their free-speech rights based on the content of their speech," he says. "That's clearly viewpoint discrimination."

Police Chief Wightman says the ordinance would apply more to verbal interactions than an upsetting or annoying T-shirt, for example. However, Glen believes it could have a negative effect on individuals and pro-family groups.

"If someone dared, in a public place in Brighton, expressed their sincere religious conviction -- for example, that homosexual behavior is sinful -- obviously if someone was offended or insulted or even 'annoyed,' as the ordinance says, they might try to bring charges against somebody for merely expressing their sincerely held Christian beliefs," he points out.

The town is ripe for a lawsuit, says Glenn, if officials try to enforce the new decree.

Liberal Fascism and the End of Freedom

From Global Politician
By Ted Belman

Jonah Goldberg recently wrote the book “Liberal Fascism”. He was interviewed by Glen Beck and the interviews can be seen on YouTube.. There are six parts to watch.

Wikepedia defines “fascism”. It seeks to form a mass movement of militants who are willing to engage in violence against their political opponents and groups or individuals that the movement deems to be enemies. Fascists wish to solve existing economic, political, and social problems by achieving a millenarian national rebirth by exalting the nation or race as well as promoting cults of unity, strength and purity. Fascism opposes the political ideologies of communism, liberalism and conservatism as well as political concepts and systems such as democracy, individualism, materialism, pacifism, and pluralism.

Various scholars attribute different characteristics to fascism, but the following elements are usually seen as its integral parts: nationalism (including collectivism and populism based on nationalist values);

In a Salon interview, Goldberg defined fascism. “I see fascism as a political religion. That doesn’t mean I think there’s some book, like a bible, that if you read it you will become a convert to this political religion. Rather I think it is a religious impulse that resides in all of us — left, right, black, white, tall, short — to seek unity in all things, to believe that we need to all work together to go past any of our disagreements and that the state needs to be, almost simply as a pragmatic matter, the pace-setter, the enforcer of this cult of unity. That is what I believe fascism is.”

Read the rest of this entry >>

'Browbeating' Teacher Still Employed

From OneNewsNow
By Peter Chagnon

School officials in Fayetteville, North Carolina, have completed their investigation of a teacher following a classroom incident captured on film.

The Independent Women's Forum says the video shows an elementary school teacher browbeating a student for her support of John McCain in the school's mock presidential election. (See previous article)

"What do you all know about that war in Iraq? Talk to me because your daddy's in the military; talk. It's a senseless war," the teacher says on the video. "And by the way, Kathy, the person that you are picking for president said that our troops could stay in Iraq for another hundred years if they need to, so that means that your daddy could stay in the military for another hundred years."

Following outcry and media coverage of the incident, Cumberland County School Superintendent William Harrison launched an investigation. School officials refused to give OneNewsNow any details of the investigation results, citing a law that protects teachers in cases like this. But officials did say that the teacher, Diantha Harris, is still employed as a teacher in the Cumberland County School district.

According to media reports, the school district has received hundreds of phone calls about the incident, and the teacher involved has also received dozens of phone calls at home concerning the video. The Associated Press reported that Harris has said she regrets making the comments and that the student involved, along with her parents, has expressed support for the teacher.

Vermont School Sends Students Out of Classroom to Say Pledge of Allegiance

MSNBC: A sixth-grade student was assigned to go around to the four classrooms before classes started, gathering anyone who wanted to say it [the Pledge] and then walking them up creaky wooden steps to a second-floor gymnasium, where he led them in the pledge.

ACLU Silencing Praying Coaches

From OneNewsNow.com
By Charlie Butts

Are public school coaches permitted to pray silently alongside their players? The Rutherford Institute is taking this question to the U.S. Supreme Court for a decision.

Coach Marcus Borden ran into trouble with a new policy at East Brunswick High School in New Jersey, which stated that coaches cannot recognize prayers initiated by their players because coaches are public employees and their participation would violate "separation of church and state." Borden told WorldNetDaily that he simply wants to bow his head during the prayer out of respect for his students and his team.

John Whitehead of The Rutherford Institute says the school's policy would nullify a tradition that has been part of the high school's pre-game routine for the last 25 years.

"But in our case, all Coach Borden wanted to do was to bow his head silently as the students prayed in the locker room -- sometimes what they call 'take an eagle.' They'd go down on one knee, and he's standing outside behind the circle of players," he explains. "He's not influencing them. He's just listening and really just doing what coaches have done -- since Knute Rockne, by the way."

The Institute won on a lower level, but the ACLU convinced the school district to appeal. "It's a very important case. We've had a lot of people file briefs on our behalf," Whitehead adds. "I think the Supreme Court's going to hear this case. It's going to really set the tone for what can be done in public schools."

Whitehead believes this policy, if it stands, will strip high school teachers and coaches across the nation of their First Amendment and academic rights.

The Obamanation Under Construction: Indoctrination in the Schools

Glenn Beck played excerpts from this video on his radio program today. It is a Swedish made documentary on the indoctrination that occurs daily in America's public schools. The dialogue that occurs in this Fayetteville, North Carolina classroom is not an exception, just a small glimpse of the Obamanation under construction.

The video switches to English at the 15 second point:

Diantha Harris: We want to talk about the presidential election. Ok, what I want to ask you, who are you pulling for? Raise your hands.

(Kids seen dutifully raising their hands one states ‘Obama’)

Diantha Harris: You’re pulling for Obama

Diantha Harris: (Speaking to another student) Who you’re pulling for? And if you’re pulling for John McCain, that’s fine say him as well. Who are you pulling for?

Student’s answer: Obama.

Another student: John McCain

Diantha Harris: Oh Lord John McCain!

Another student: John McCain

Diantha Harris: Oh Jesus, John McCain! Ok, Now I want to ask you something. (to the girl who is ‘pulling’ for McCain) Why are you pulling for John McCain. Now it’s ok! But why are you pulling for John McCain?

Student: I think it’s because of my parents are going for him too.

Diantha Harris: Ok, your parents are going for him. (Now to another student) Why are you pulling for Barack? (pronounces it differently) Or Barack?

Student: Because I just want a black president sometime.

Diantha Harris: Ok, you want a black president. Addresses another student.

Student: The reason I want to pick Barack Obama is because he is making good changes, in the good country and stuff like that.

Diantha Harris: So he’s making good changes for our country. (Shaking her head affirmatively) Ok, now can you tell me just a little bit more like, like what type of changes?

Same student: Like, …..not having um, a fight between Iraq, and having soldiers killed.

Diantha Harris: Shaking head up and down) So in other words, B-a-r-a-c-k is going to end that war (shaking head up and down) in Iraq. (Speaking to the classroom) What do you all know about that war in Iraq? Now talk to me, because your dad is in the military!

(Same female student who supports McCain shown noticeably biting lips)

Diantha Harris: Talk!

(Female student shown again but doesn’t speak)

Diantha Harris: It’s a senseless war! (shown staring at her) And by the way Kathy (the girl’s name), the person that you’re picking for president said, (Harris seen shaking head) that our troops could stay in Iraq for another hundred years if they need to! (emphasis added),

(Kathy shown biting lips and looking nervously in silence, while kids stare at her smiling, laughing and smirking)

Diantha Harris: So that means that your daddy could stay in the military for another hundred years!

Update: Diatha Harris (the documentary makers spelled her first name incorrectly) teaches in the Cumberland County (NC) Public Schools.

Her School Board: http://www.communications.ccs.k12.nc.us/Board/BOE.htm

Her School: http://www.mmes.ccs.k12.nc.us/faculty_and_staff.htm

Apparently you can email her directly from the school’s website. You can use your 1st amendment rights as an American to let this woman know what you think of her educational techniques!

Email Diatha: http://www.mmes.ccs.k12.nc.us/email/diathaharris.htm

A Cuban-American Writes to the Richmond Times-Dispatch

David Horowitz on Islamo Fascism Week

Islamo Fascism Awareness Week III is Happening

Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week III has begun on over 75 campuses across the country and so have the attempts to suppress it. I’m going to speak on several campuses. Other speakers who’ll be on campus for the Freedom Center these next three weeks include Dick Morris, Daniel Pipes, author and scholar Dr. Andrew Bostom, former Muslim Nonie Darwish, and Middle East reporter Deborah Weiss.

As in the two Islamo-Fascism Awareness Weeks that preceded this one, our effort focuses on the global threat posed by the radical Islamic extremism that fuels the international jihad. But over the past year, as we have attempted to make students aware of the goals of Islamo Fascism, we have become more aware of the “stealth” jihad taking place in our own country under the protection of our constitutional freedoms and civil liberties. This movement is especially strong on our nation’s campuses, therefore, we have made the target of Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week III: Stop the Jihad on Campus in general and the Muslim Students Association (MSA) in particular.

Hiding under the cover of the campus romance with “multiculturalism,” the MSA falsely presents itself as a religious/cultural organization representing all Muslims when in fact it is a hardcore radical political organization representing Muslims who support the jihad against the West and the destruction of the Jewish state. The MSA receives student funding under false pretenses and should be compelled to make its agendas clear or renounce the jihad and terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah and Hamas.

Aside from its imposture as a non-political organization, the MSA is also an opponent of free speech and is part of a nation-wide Islamo-fascist campaign to suppress the film Obsession. This campaign is spear-headed by organizations associated with the terrorist party Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood and includes the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the Muslim American Society (MAS) in addition to the Muslim Students Association.

Here is a story from the North Carolina Daily Tar Heel about our protest on that campus. The story swallows the jihadist line that we are opposed to the MSA's funding because of its "radical ideas." This is a lie the jihadists have learned to tell from the American left whose strategy is to destroy its opponents by labeling them Islamophobic, racist and McCarthyite. The ideas of the MSA are reprehensible and morally disgusting. But this is a free country and they have a right to say what they want. But lying to student activities boards to get student funds is not a right. Presenting themselves as a religious group when they are political arm of the Islamo-fascist jihad against the West is a form of deception. Allowing them to get away with this endangers the lives and security of moderate Muslims who do not support the jihad, not to speak of the Christians, Jews and Atheists who are infidels and therefore in their path.

-- David Horowitz


Stifling Debate at Eastern Tennessee State

When East Tennessee State University (ETSU) grad student Sean Rife tried to bring author Robert Spencer to campus for Islamo Fascism Week III, he wasn’t looking to start a fight. As the president of ETSU’s Society for Intellectual Diversity (SID), a non-partisan student group that champions free debate and academic freedom, Rife was just looking to stir discussion about a subject, Islamic terrorism, which increasingly has come to dominate Americans’ concerns. But a fight – and a lesson in politically correct bullying – is exactly what he got.

It began when Rife presented his request to the school’s Student Government Association. Like any other student, Rifled filled out the required paperwork, and submitted a funding request to a student government committee. Then, on Monday, he went before the committee to discuss his request – and that’s when the trouble started.

First off, Rife was required by a student representative to defend the request. He pointed out that the idea was not to cause offense but to have a reasoned debate. As the author of several well regarded books on the subject of Islam, moreover, Spencer was more than qualified to lead a discussion under the title “Is Islam a religion of peace?” Rife further noted that his organization’s faculty sponsor, Paul Kamolnick, an associate professor in the department of sociology and anthropology, had written a letter to Taneem Aziz, the leader of an Islamic community center in neighboring Johnson City, Tennessee, inviting him to attend Spencer’s talk and present his own views. So far from ostracizing Muslims, the idea was to include them in the discussion.

None of this made a difference to the student government committee. Rife’s request to host Spencer was officially rejected. But he was taken a back at the reason for the rejection: “due to the controversial issues that [David] Horowitz’s society condones is degrading Muslims.” Spencer’s name was hardly even mentioned, nor was there any evidence given of Horowitz allegedly anti-Muslim views.

Rife’s knows politics were at play. While East Tennessee is not ruled by the sort of far left political culture that characterizes schools like UC Berkeley, it does share something in common with such bastions of political correctness: the speakers invited to the school are almost without exception from the political Left. In the past several years, the school has hosted such far-Left activists as actors Felix Justice and Danny Glover, the latter an outspoken supporter of Cuba’s dictatorial regime; radical education activist Jonathan Kozol; and black-power filmmaker Spike Lee. Just last week, the school hosted self-described “sex and relationship educators” Marshall Miller and Dorian Solot, who delivered an instructional lecture titled “I Heart Female Orgasm.”

Rife doesn’t want East Tennessee students to lose the opportunity to hear about the dangers of Islamo Fascism. He intends to bypass the student government and file a formal appeal with the administration to have Robert Spencer’s speech approved. But he knows the odds he faces. “As long as I’ve been here there has been no major discussion related to Islamic terrorism,” he says. If the student government’s censors have their way, that won’t change anytime soon.

"Liberal" Outrage: A Pro-McCain March In Manhattan

A Pro-McCain march on the Upper West Side in Manhattan on Sunday, September 21, 2008. A group of McCain-Palin supporters dare to march through the Upper West Side - infidels in the "liberal" Mecca. Local "progressives" boo, jeer, and flip fingers at them with a rage they never display even to this country's enemies.

See for yourself the Obama supporters' liberal-minded tolerance, the attitudes that academe has implanted about each finding one's own truth, their openness, and consideration of other points of view.

Would New Yorkers greet a parade of Islamist terrorists this way? Imagine what America would become were these "liberal" fascists to control the levers of government. Perhaps this is what their leader, "the Anointed One," meant when he commanded his followers to "get in their faces."

Perhaps some of the lefty bloggers can explain this; there seem to be some wanna-be Gauleiters among them.

Felons Voting In Ohio

Mayor Richard M. Daley with protege Barack Hussein Obama

Here's a change you can believe in, the corrupt machine politics of Chicago is going national.

From the New York Post

CLEVELAND - Volunteers supporting Barack Obama picked up hundreds of people at homeless shelters, soup kitchens and drug-rehab centers and drove them to a polling place yesterday on the last day that Ohioans could register and vote on the same day, almost no questions asked.

The huge effort by a pro-Obama group, Vote Today Ohio, takes advantage of a quirk in the state's elections laws that allows people to register and cast ballots at the same time without having to prove residency.

Republicans have argued that the window could lead to widespread voter fraud because officials wouldn't have an opportunity to verify registration information before ballots were cast.

Among the volunteers were Yori Stadlin and Vivian Lehrer of the Upper West Side, who got married last week and decided to spend their honeymoon shepherding voters to the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections.

Early today, Stadlin's van picked up William Woods, 59, at the soup kitchen of the Bishop Cosgrove Center.

"I never voted before," Woods said, because of a felony conviction that previously barred him from the polls. "Without this service, I would have had no way to get here."

Obama Youth: Troops of a New Social Order?

A teacher has been suspended after filming an "Obama Youth" group marching and chanting slogans while dressed in military uniforms.

From The Telegraph

Authorities at the Urban Community Leadership Academy in Kansas City, Missouri took action after a video of the pupils, who are thought to be aged 14 and 15, emerged on YouTube.

The video, which was titled "Obama Youth – Junior Fraternity Regiment", has since been removed, but copies have been re-posted.

It shows 10 teenage boys marching into a classroom, making gestures with their arms and reciting "alpha, omega".

After coming to a halt, each in turn shouts a personal mantra associating their personal goals with Mr Obama.

The first says: "Because of Obama, I aspire to be the next doctor"; the next, "Because of Obama, I aspire to be the next lawyer".

Each then shouts Mr Obama's campaign slogan: "Yes we can", before carrying out a drill combining the recital of slogans and aggressive physical gestures. The boys then each recite a different benefit of Mr Obama's healthcare plan.

Joyce McGautha, the school's superintendent, told US media that the school did not approve of the video. She said that the teacher, who has not been named in anticipation of legal action, was suspended, and that further drill activities were stopped.

YouTube viewers were quick to criticise Mr Obama's campaign for the video's content, and to compare it to 20th century political youth movements.

One wrote: "This should scare the hell out of any freedom loving American. The Democrats, their accomplices in the media and the schools, are producing the next generation of Hitler Youth. Welcome to the People's Socialist Republic of America."

The video's emergence comes soon after that of Sing for Change, a clip in which 22 children between 5 and 12 were seen singing a song praising the Democratic presidential candidate. Critics said it was improper to make children support politicians.