Obama File 31 Grey Power! Ageing Texan Radicals for Obama

Obama File 30 here

In my last post (link above)I looked at the links between Movement for a Democratic Society (MDS) and Progressives for Obama (PFO).

Both organisations link former members of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) and its terrorist splinter Weather Underground, with Marxists from the Communist Party USA, Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism and Democratic Socialists of America.

All of these groups are using their influence in the Democratic Party, media, unions, churches, academia, protest organisations and social movements to make Barack Obama the next president of the USA.

This post looks at two MDS activists from Texas, Thorne Dreyer and David Hamilton.

Both are former members of the original SDS and are endorsers of the Progressives for Obama website.


Thorne Dreyer, second from left, former Weather Underground terrorist, Progressives for Obama endorser and MDS board member Mark Rudd, centre, braces, David Hamilton, right, at the MDS Convergence, Chicago November 2007

Dreyer and Hamilton are very active MDS members and have made their Austin Texas branch, one of the most active in the US.


The Movement for a Democratic Society (MDS) is a multi-issue activist organization affiliated with the newly revived Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). Many of its members are veterans of the New Left in the 60's and 70's. The goal of MDS is the creation of a more egalitarian society in both the political and economic spheres. MDS believes in participatory democracy, the expansion of human rights, universal healthcare, the rejection of discrimination based on race, gender or sexual preference, the preservation of the earth's environment, the expansion of workers' rights, a more equitable distribution of wealth, and the rejection of militarism and war as a way of resolving differences among peoples and nations.

Both men are dedicated, practical supporters of Barack Obama. Hamilton has served as an Obama delegate at a Travis County Democratic Convention.

Both believe that Obama, is like them, a socialist and that an Obama presidency would place more socialists in key governmental positions. They believe that communist/socialist/Democratic Party unity is necessary to elect Obama and to change society. They accept that Obama will have to lie about his true beliefs in order to get elected.

They're OK with that.

Excerpts from Hamilton and Dreyer's Rag Blog 23rd March 2008

Graphic in the original

Most of the activists I work with in Austin, those of us in MDS/Austin... and other progressive groups, have chosen to support and, in many cases to actively participate in the campaign of Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama, for a number of reasons. For this writer at least, those reasons include the following:

We find Barack Obama to be sincerely left-leaning and personally inspiring, and believe him worthy of trust, with the requisite reservations. We see the massive and enthusiatic and largely radical-leaning movement that his campaign has engendered to be a surprisingly positive sign in a largely lethargic times, and at the very least a fertile ground for future activism...

We believe the election of a progressive Democrat at this time in history would result in a quick end to the tragic War in Irag, the introduction of such progressive measures as universal (or virtually universal) health care, and would produce judicial and other governmental appointments that would make a very real difference in people's lives.

This would result in real, tangible changes in the lives of struggling lower income citizens, of racial minorities, of those rotting in jail because of race or victimless crimes, and, significantly, of oppressed peoples in other parts of the world.

And, taking into account that both major parties, in the long haul, represent similar if not identical vested interests, we believe that the Republicans, with their corporate masters, with their oppressive and mean-spirited politics at times verging on the neo-fascist, must be stopped.

It is of critical importance that we never latch on to a political candidate in this electoral system and herald him or her as some kind of a savior. Bottom line, the problems in this country are not based in who runs the system. The system itself is the problem. The shameful disparity in distribution of wealth between the obscenely rich and those left to struggle for their daily needs.

All that taken into account, we believe that there is much to like about Barack Obama, and that there are substantial and valid reasons to work for his election.

Thorne Dreyer



In 1936, the French Communist Party ended years of conflict with the French Socialist Party and established a united front that elected Leon Blum as the first socialist prime minister of France. That united front passed reforms that have characterized the socialist aspect of French society ever since.

I am not a Democrat. I have not voted for the presidential nominee of the Democratic Party since 1972 and have not participated in their primary process since the Jackson campaign of 1988.

I support Barack Obama enthusiastically. I do not do so because I don’t find things to criticize in what he says. I do so because, to a much greater degree than any other major party politician, I trust him. I trust him to do what he promises and talk to our supposed “enemies” instead of threaten them. In that, there is the kernel of the rejection of the militarism that is intrinsic to US imperialism...

I expect to be disappointed. I expect to have to criticize him and exert pressure on him from the left. I also expect him to make statements in order to get elected that I disagree with. But this time, I see a chance for a transformational figure who might just change the course of US history and I’m taking that chance...

Purists who reject him have no alternative other that “build an anti-imperialist movement." That is a false dichotomy. In November, hopefully you will have the opportunity to vote for Barack Obama for president. The ideal anti-imperialist won’t be on the ballot. Relate to that reality. He may disappoint somewhere along the way, but he is by far the best major party candidate I’ve ever seen.

David Hamilton

Thorne Dreyer and David Hamilton are not MDS bosses. They are not in the league of Bernardine Dohrn, Mark Rudd, Bill Fletcher, Tom Hayden, Carl Davidson, Robin DG Kelley, Charlene Mitchell or Gerald Horne.

They are good soldiers, working hard for Barack Obama and the revolution.

Obama file 32 here