Obama Espoused Radical Views in College

Newsmax - Obama Espoused Radical Views in College

As a college student, Barack Obama expressed Marxist views, including the need for a new socialist U.S. government, according to a student who says he shared the future president’s opinion at the time.

Such views by a college student may not be surprising. And like most students who hold radical views, Obama’s positions, at least publicly, have evolved substantially.

However, this new window on Obama’s youth and early political thinking demonstrates how little is known about the background of America’s 44th president. [...]

For the next several hours, they discussed Marxism.

“He was arguing a straightforward Marxist-Leninist class-struggle point of view, which anticipated that there would be a revolution of the working class, led by revolutionaries, who would overthrow the capitalist system and institute a new socialist government that would redistribute the wealth,” says Drew, who says he himself was then a Marxist.

“The idea was basically that wealthy people were exploiting others,” Drew says. “That this was the secret of their wealth, that they weren’t paying others enough for their work, and they were using and taking advantage of other people. He was convinced that a revolution would take place, and it would be a good thing.”

Drew concluded that Obama thought of himself as “part of an intelligent, radical vanguard that was leading the way towards this revolution and towards this new society.”