"Ten Years of Terror"

[H2O Man]

The Summer 2005 Intelligence Report, published by the Southern Poverty Law Center, has an article about the approximately 60 right-wing terrorist plots uncovered in the United States since the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995.

Authored by Andrew Blejwas, Anothony Griggs, and Mark Potok, this article is an eye-opening examination not only of the threat posed by the radical right, but also of the failure of the Bush administration to take the proper steps to help law-enforcement agencies address the growing dangers being sown by teachers of hatred. I suppose if one is hoping for Pat Robertson's support, it may be understandable.

"Ten years after the Oklahoma City bombing left 168 people dead, the guardians of American national security seem to have decided that the domestic radical right does not pose a substantial threat to U.S. citizens. A draft internal document from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security that was obtained this spring by The Congressional Quarterly lists the only serious domestic terrorist threats as radical animal rights and environmental groups like the Animal Liberation Front and the Earth Liberation Front. But for all the property damage they have wreaked, eco-radicals have killed no one -- something that most definitely cannot be said of the white supremacists and others who people the American radical right. In the 10 years since the April 19, 1995 bombing in Oklahoma City, in fact, the radical right has produced some 60 terrorist plots. These have included plans to bomb or burn government buildings, banks, refineries, utilities, clinics, synagogues, mosques, memorials and bridges; to assassinate police officers, judges, politicians, civil rights figures and others; to rob banks, armored cars and other criminals; and to amass illegal machine guns, missiles, explosives, and biological and chemical weapons."

The SPLC report goes on to examine each of the 60 incidents. The Intelligence Report also has a quote from CBS News, stating that the SPLC "has cracked cases even the FBI couldn't solve," and an endorsement from a Michigan Police Chief who notes, "If it weren't for an organization such as yours informing officers of (extremist) activity, I feel many more tragic events would have transpired." See: www.intelligenceproject.org

In my decades of environmental and Native American work, I've crossed paths with a handful of people advocating violence against property as an appropriate tactic. I think they have inner disturbances. Some of them were doubtlessly undercover agents. I do not support the tactics of ALF or ELF, and believe that they do harm to the environmental movement. As noted in an essay from earlier in the summer, I subscribe to a way of thinking known as The Power of the Good Mind. Violence is only to be used for self-defense, including protecting your family, your home, and yes, your country from aggressive attacks.

Rational thought can only conclude that the Homeland Security Department is concerned more with the property rights of an exclusive class, than the right to safety that human beings are supposed to enjoy in the United States. That thought has been reinforced in the past eight days, as I have watched the Bush administration's response to the hurricane.

I urge DUers to use the SPLC as a resource. It is an extremely important group to support. Thank you for your consideration.

See: www.splcenter.org and www.tolerance.org

[jus_the_facts]

1. We were broke up here in NE La. before the hurricane.....

.....STATE FARM just abandoned their Corporate Operations here and moved to Oklahoma and Missouri and Alabama..they'd been here for 40 years and thousands unemployed as a result in my city...International Paper is closing down across the parish line about 20 miles north of here that'll destroy the community of Bastrop...and on and on...there's going to have to be a LOT of charity because the gov't's BROKE from bottom to top.

It's the top 1% of the country that needs to be suffering instead of the destitude...wonder if they'll pony up and stop it with some TAX INCREASES...or has the slave class just been renewed in a New World Order DEPRESSION...brought to you by PNAC and Homeland Security?!

[H2O Man]

2. Modern feudalism .....

it is hard to appreciate the full extent of the damage this small group of people has done to our country.

[Craig3410]

4. They're closing the Int. Paper plant in Bastrop?

Oh crap; I used to live there, and I remember how many people worked there; Bastrop's screwed.

When is it slated to close?

[G_j]

3. I guess there are property rights, and then there are..

property rights

the bank will gladly take your house if you are having some 'bad luck'

I don't appreciate ALF or ELF either. Nothing like giving the fascists an excuse to mark environmentalists as "terrorists".
I'd rather tree sit, or sit down in front of a bulldozer.

[H2O Man]

5. Years ago

a few of that type came to some Council of American Indian Rights meetings. CAIR is a small group, that works with the traditional Iroquois in the northeast. Most of them seemed pretty sincere, though I thought their minds were confused. One in particular was pretty obnoxious.

He kept saying, "You need to learn ..." this and that. He was rude and obnoxious to some of our older members, and that was addressed. But he didn't stop. He started saying that we needed to protest the local Columbus Day parades. Jeepers. He wanted to break a pile of the 40-ounce bottles of Crazy Horse Malt Liquor. Ass.

I told him that it wasn't our way to offend any group of people. Why do something to insult Italian-Americans? Why not talk openly and frankly about the role Columbus played in history, both good and bad?

And why not talk to distributors about why using Crazy Horse's name was so offensive? We did that, and it worked well locally. We only had to threaten to have a public "protest" in front of one store. The Bill of Rights gives us the tools we need.

I had a feeling about this loud-mouth. Without going into details, I found out he was with an agency that wasn't really pro-environment.

[ck4829]

6. SPLC is one of my resources. I even once spoke to Mark Potok.

He is a very intelligent man. He has my admiration.

[H2O Man]

7. SPLC is great.

Their materials are of value in combating hatred in the schools and in the larger society. Democrats should be making better use of their materials in exposing the racism that defines a large segment of the republican party.

[im10ashus]

8. SPLC is a great resource for me.

You were kind enough to point me in their direction many moons ago.

Reading the list of right-wing plots on their website is mind-boggling. What's just as atrocious is the lenient sentences passed down. I would think it would be in ALL our interests to give full sentences without parole. I know a lot of these sentences were plea bargained, but why should we bargain with such terrorism.

[H2O Man]

9. How in the hell

can the Homeland Security outfit NOT see these as terrorist threats?

[im10ashus]

10. It is confounding, to say the least.

Take for example this:

December 18, 1995
An Internal Revenue Service (IRS) employee discovers a plastic drum packed with ammonium nitrate and fuel oil in a parking lot behind the IRS building in Reno, Nev. The device failed to explode a day earlier when a three-foot fuse went out prematurely. Ten days later, tax protester Joseph Martin Bailie is arrested. Bailie is eventually sentenced to 36 years in federal prison.

Compared to this:

Jan. 18, 2003
James D. Brailey, a convicted felon who once was selected as "governor" of the state of Washington by the antigovernment Washington Jural Society, is arrested after a raid on his home turns up a machine gun, an assault rifle and several handguns. One informant tells the FBI that Brailey was plotting to assassinate Gov. Gary Locke, both because Locke was the state's real governor and because he was Chinese-American. A second informant says that Brailey actually went on a "dry run" to Olympia, carrying several guns into the state Capitol building to test security. Eventually, Brailey pleads guilty to weapons charges and is sentenced to serve 15 months in prison. He is released in February 2004.

How can the sentences be so drastically different? Aren't they BOTH federal crimes? One received 36 years and the other 15 MONTHS? Our Homeland is not so secure, IMHO.