During the 2008 presidential campaign, Candidate Obama sent red flags up all over the country when he strongly proposed "Civilian security force."

Senator Obama introduces the idea of a Civilian National Security Force

Is Obama planning to have a Civilian Security Force in addition to the military? "We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded."

"We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we've set," Obama said.  "We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded."

That plank in the future president's platform was quickly removed, but evidently not discarded.  It seems that it was merely safely tucked away until a more opportune time.

Now we see, perhaps, then-Candidate Obama's intent re-emerging -- not through the creation of a voluntary service program, but through the co-opting of various government agencies to suppress those whom this administration perceives as enemies.

Evidence is not lacking:

- The IRS has been used to target Tea Party groups and has leaked private information about other conservative organizations, such as the National Organization for Marriage. 

-The EPA has been heaping monstrous regulations upon the U.S. coal industry in order to, essentially, kill it.

- When Tea Partiers organized a small protest/press conference in front of the IRS in Washington, D.C. last May, Homeland Security vehicles outnumbered the Tea Partier attendees.  Homeland Security's overbearing, disproportionate presence was intimidating, as intended.

Homeland Security Vehicles at May 2013 Tea Party press conference in front of IRS Washington, D.C. Headquarters.

-In recent weeks, U.S. Park Service employees have been deployed to treat their fellow Americans with contempt and disdain.  Uniformed Park Service guards have intimidated and bullied senior citizens at Yellowstone Park, ostensibly holding them hostage until they could be escorted off National Park property.  A tour guide described the actions of the Park Service employees as "Gestapo tactics."

Washington, D.C.'s open-air war memorials on the National Mall have been shut down and walled off by the Park Service to prevent WWII, Korean War, and Vietnam Vets in their sixties to nineties, often in wheelchairs, from paying homage to their fallen comrades.  And when private citizens, aghast at the inhumane treatment of our aging veterans, pitched in to provide porta-potties for the vets because the Park Service had chosen to lock the public restrooms, denying access to this most basic human need to our Vets, the delivery of those porta-potties was denied.  Human dignity be damned.  Care and compassion be damned.  Let elderly vets soil themselves.

Don's Johns delivered Port-A-John's to the World War II Memorial.  National Park Service Ranger refused to accept the delivery.  (Photo courtesy Michele Tennery.)

In yesterday's Fiscal Times, Ed Morrissey explained "How Federal Workers Became Obama's Private Army."

... and it's part of a disturbing pattern emerging in the second term of Barack Obama. When law enforcement and tax enforcement become rankly political, Americans can no longer trust in their federal government, even when it's not shut down - and that won't stop after Obama leaves office, either. We are getting a clear lesson on the risks of larger government and regulatory overreach, and those risks go far beyond incompetence. Let's hope this serves as a wake-up call - and let's demand that Congress hold those accountable in the IRS and National Parks Service for their uncivil service.

One wonders if this is a test, to see just how far the far left ideologues in the administration can go until the American people push back against their increasingly heavy-handed command-and-control tactics. 

Even more disturbing is this: what we are now witnessing may also be a test to see if U.S. civil servants are willing to suppress their consciences and falsify their beliefs in order to continue to "fit in" at work.  After all, IRS, EPA, Homeland Security, and U.S Park Service employees can reassure themselves, saying, "I'm only doing my job."