From: Brad Dolan 
Subject: Good left essay about rights and right
Message-ID: 
Date: Wed, 1 Nov 1995 22:29:56 -0500 (EST)

The Humanist, November/December 1995

"A Magazine of Critical Inquiry and Social Concern."

Is the Extremist Right Entirely Wrong?
  -- by  Barbara Dority

SIDEBAR:  Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to
get you.  Within days of the Oklahoma City bombing, the media reported
that suspects Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols might be affiliated
with the Michigan Militia.  Although members of the Michigan Militia
have strenuously denied any involvement in the bombing, and although
the federal indictments handed down against McVeigh, Nichols, and
Michael Fortier have not implicated them in any broader "militia
conspiracy," the movement has been condemned as a hotbed of violent
right-wing extremism.

[Main Article:] Indeed, many Americans seem to believe that anyone
with the slightest connection to the "patriot movement" or militia
groups poses a serious and potentially violent threat to the internal
security of the United States.

Before the bodies had been cleared from the rubble, opportunistic
lawmakers proposed a rash of draconian "anti-terrorism" laws,
including increased electronic surveillance, secret "national
security" courts, and heightened involvement of the military in
civilian law enforcement.  Commentators, legislators, and talk-show
hosts called for a thorugh government investigation of the patriot
movement, with many Democratic politicians leading the charge.

This rush to judgment has been accompanied by a near-total avoidance
of rational analysis.  And those few brave souls who were openly
critical of the Clinton administration's proposed Omnibus Anti-
terrorism Bill have found themselves accused of callous disregard for
the bombing victims and their families! But it is the obligation of
reasonable and responsible people to insist on careful fact-finding,
especially if restrictions on the personal liberties and protections
of American citizens are offered as solutions to the "problem."  The
advocacy of reason and restraint in the face of terrorist acts does
not indicate indifference to such violence; on the contrary, it is
because these terrorist acts are so heinous that we must not fall
victim to the consequences of panic.

Much of the readily available "information" about militias and the
patriot movement is being disseminated by "anti-hate" organizations
with their own agendas.  One such group is the Southern Poverty Law
Center, whose recent direct-mail materials indicate a surprising
attitude.  Rightly acclaimed for its effective lawsuits against racist
groups that commit acts of violence, the SPLC says it has recently
established a massive computer database of "hate groups," including
reports on 14,000 individuals who have "committed hate acts" or who
are "affiliated with hate groups," as well as "extensive intelligence"
on more than 3,200 "hate and milita organizations."

From a civil-liberties standpoint, these tactics are a little too
reminiscent of organizations like the John Birch Society, which kept
extensive records on "communists and communist sympathizers."
Moreover, the SPLC campaigns for laws that will effectively deny free
speech and freedom of association to certain groups of Americans on
the basis of their beliefs.  Six times a year, the SPLC's letter
boasts, the center reports its findings to over 6,000 law-enforcement
agencies; then, withno discernable irony, it goes on to justify its
Big Brother methods in the name of "tolerance," arguing that "paranoid
militant groups" are seeking protection from "imagined threats" to
their freedoms.

In America, we don't arrest and imprison citizens because they hate
blacks or Jews or gays or the government - or because we think they
may commit crimes in the future.  In the words of Justice William O.
Douglas, a champion of individual freedom who also harbored a deep
distrust of government: "The views a citizen entertains, the beliefs
he harbors, the utterances he makes, the ideology he embraces, and the
people he associates with are no concern of government."

Although realistic estimates are difficult to uncover, after careful
research, I would venture a guess that the number of "hard-core"
milita members is well below the 10,000 estimated by the more
reasonable advocates of alarm.  But even at that number, these armed
dissidents obviously do not pose a serious military threat to the
federal government.  The patriot movement (loosely defined) has long
existed on the margins of American society, though it has definitely
grown in recent years.  With the end of the Cold War and the economic
and social upheavals of the past two decades, a large - and still
growing - number of Americans have become disaffected from and
alienated by a government that seems indifferent, if not hostile, to
their concerns.

But the beliefs and politics of "patriots" and their like are anything
but monolithic.  Those subsumed under this amorphous populist movement
include anti-Semites, white supremacists, "Identity Christians,"
homophobes, survivalists, and anti-choice militants.  Also included
are tax protesters, constitutionalists, gun collectors, hunters,
ranchers, farmers, and loggers upset by federal land-use controls.
Most of these Americans are working people with families.

There is no central control or leadership among these fiercely
independent individuals and small autonomous groups.  In fact, they
deliberately avoid stucture or leadership.  Wild and generalized
charges that all "patriots" are white supremacists, anti-Semites, or
neo-Nazis - or uniformly anti-choice, homophobic, or misogynist - are
misinformed and simplistic.

Additionally, like underground groups in the 1960s, the militias are
splintering further over questions of using violence.  Some patriot
groups are armed and state that they will countenance violence under
certain conditions.  At least an equal number, however, are unarmed
and do not countenance violence (and some of these actively ferret out
and isolate violence-prone individuals).

"The vast majority of people in the militias are not violent or
dangerous," says James Aho, a sociologist at Idaho State University,
who has interviewed hundreds of self-identified patriots.  Other
psychologists declare that many members of militias and similar groups
are ordinary people who feel they have been pushed to extremes.

The one basic attitude which all of these people have in common is a
deep distrust of government.  After much inquiry, I have formulated
the following statements which, I believe, accurately reflect the
beliefs and concerns shared by most Americans who consider themselves
"patriots":

1. Both the federal and state governments are violating their
constitutions in numerous major and dangerous ways, particularly
regarding the individual rights guaranteed to all Americans in the
Bill of Rights.

2. These documents are contracts between the government and its
citizens with the primary purpose of limiting government power, scope,
and functions.  As a result of these violations of the rights of the
people, we no longer have the same government; government will do
whatever it can get away with; government can be manipulated to the
advantage of those wielding the reins of power - and their cohorts,
associates, and financiers.

3. This type of government and social order is contrary to everything
the founders of our country tried to create.

4. The average American worker now pays over 50 percent of his or er
earnings in taxes - income tax, excise tax, sales tax, property tax,
and so forth, and the huge hidden tax of government.  Given the size
of the federal budget and our rapidly decreasing standard of living,
many Americans wonder where their hard-earned dollars are going.

5. People within the U.S. government and power elites are trying to
subsume our country under a United Nations-controlled one-world
government, endangering the sovereignty of the United States and the
validity of its constitution.

6. Beneath all the rhetoric, the New World Order is simply the
concentration of power into a few hands and a global monopoly over the
sources of wealth.

7. The mainstream media, both print and electronic, is controlled by
the same big-money monopolies working hand-in-glove with the
government, resulting in a public overwhelmed by trivia and
dangerously uninformed about the issues that affect them most.

8. America's founders warned that, somewhere down the road, citizens
might have to defend their free form of government from usurpers -
whether within or without the country's borders - and such a time may
be close at hand.

If you sympathize to any extent with these statements, you share some
of the grievances of the patriot movement.  Perhaps you even find
yourself, as I do, in strong agreement with many of them. Clark
McCauley, professor of psychology at Bryn Mawr College states: "If you
think these people are crazy, you have to ask [if] there [is] anything
the federal government could do that would make you willing to take up
arms against it.  If you can answer no, then you're entitled to think
these people are crazy. But if you say yes, then you'd better hazard a
thought that [militia members] are human beings just like you."

Due to the reprehensible act of terrorism perpetrated in Oklahoma City
and the fear and hysteria it has provoked, however, agreement with any
of the above concerns may result in feelings of discomfort or even
guilt.  But if we are to be honest and reasonable and preserve our
libertie in these dangerous times, we cannot surrender to
irrationality and fear.

Unfortunately, President Clinton has responded to what he calls "anti-
government citizens" by asking for unlimited power to designate groups
and individuals as terrorists and to act against those he opposes.
That this request comes from the president who swore to defend our
constitutional rights should alarm all civil-libertarians.  This is
precisely the trend that "anti-government groups are protesting.  In
trying to discredit and counter those who fear greater government
infringements against liberty, the president proves them right.

A recent letter-writer to the _Seattle Times_ goes even further: "It
is not enough to track the individuals who actually planted the bomb.
War has been declared.  It's time to show these people that we can
utterly destroy them.  I expect the government to retaliate in kind,
swiftly, and in a deadly manner.  If this goes against the rules, it's
time to change the rules."

Never mind that there are already more than adequate laws to prosecute
those engaged in actual organized criminal activity. Never mind that
the kinds of totalitarian measures now advocated, had they been in
place earlier, still wouldn't have prevented the Oklahoma City
tragedy.

All civil libertarians know that it's easy to forget about civil
liberties when they're somebody else's.  But, as Stephen Jones,
Timothy McVeigh's attorney, reminds us, "Here's the bottom line: if
Tim McVeigh's legal rights are protected, then yours and mine are.  If
his rights aren't protected, then yours and mine may not be.  Who
wants to take that chance?"  Jones has also stated that, in the
government's zeal to seek the death penalty in this case, it has
hampered federal prosecutors who might have been able to obtain
crucial information in exchange for a lesser sentence. Jones hopes to
use the trial to douse the "endless conspiracy theories" emerging from
the media frenzy.  I, for one, fervently hope he succeeds.

For, as the case during the McCarthy era, guilt and condemnation are
being conferred even upon those who "sympathize" with the concerns of
certain groups.  Terrorists express great distrust of government and
fear and outrage at where its policies are leading us.  Therefore,
others who express similar distrust and outrage are said to have
contributed to the "atmosphere" which "led" to the bombing in Oklahoma
City.

Several events _did_, I believe, "create an atmosphere" which fueled
that ghastly act.  When camoflaged and heavily armed federal agents
crawled through the woods in Ruby Ridge, Idaho, three years ago, they
set off a chain of lawlessness and violence that continues today.
Space does not permit an in-depth review of the tragic events of that
deadly fiasco.  In public hearings still in progress, we - the
citizens and taxpayers whose money bought the guns and bullets and
paid the salaries of the gunmen -are learning the appaling truth about
the 11-day standoff which led to the shooting deaths of Randy Weaver's
wife, his 14-year-old son, and a deputy marshal.  Now we know that
Weaver's "paranoid fantasy" that the government was conspiring against
him was true.  We also know that these same government officials then
brazenly and repeatedly lied to us abut virtually every aspect of what
happened.

In the hearings, representatives of several federal law-enforcement
agencies have declared that Randy Weaver bears sole responsibility for
all three deaths because he sold two sawed-off shotguns to an
extremely insistent undercover agent.  When the highest officials of
federal law enforcement bluntly inform the American people that the
sale of two illegal weapons is justification for the violent death of
three American citizens, shouldn't we all be seriously alarmed?

It has been confirmed that there were numerous problems with the
conduct of the FBI, the ATF, and the federal marshals.  These included
"revised" (and unconstitutional) rules of engagement involving the use
of deadly force, numerous shortcomings in command and control, and
failure to use basic crime-scene techniques in collecting evidence
after the crisis was over. High-ranking officials discarded guidelines
drafted in the 1970s to rein in FBI abuses of citizen's rights and to
prohibit federal law enforcement agencies from gathering information
on citizens or groups unless a criminal investigation is underway.
Even the Justice Department's own internal review criticizes
government prosecutor's decision to seek the death penalty for Randy
Weaver and Kevin Harris.

Then, of course, there was Waco.  Again, space doesn't permit and in-
depth review of the immoral (and illegal) conduct of law-enforcement
officals.  As the world watched, our government used tanks,
helicopters, tear gas, assault weapons, and psychological warfare
techniques against over 80 American citizens, two dozen of whom were
children.  It was this kind of lawless law enforcement to which
Justice Louis Brandeis referred when he said, "Crime is contagious.
If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for the law
and invites anarchy."

And Alexander Cockburn has written:

"It took the slaughter at Waco to display abusive police power at its
most grotesque.  That inferno was engendered by a contempt for human
and legal propreties, in turn nourished by thousands of daily affronts
to justice provoked by hatred of the have-nots and the marginal in a
society of widening economic an social divisions."

I am not so optimistic that the horror of Waco has been perceived by
most Americans.  Where was the grief and outrage?  Where was a
national day of mourning?  When did it become acceptable (albeit
"unfortunate") for the United States government to kill children? A
quote from Jon Snyder of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep
and Bear Arms is appropriate:  "We're particularly concerned about the
growing power of federal law enforcement and an arrogance bred by
federal officials' distance from local communities."

Most reporters and journalists ignored the larger civil-liberties
issues raised by Waco and Ruby Ridge.  Broader issues - like search
and seizure, the role of the military in domestic law enforcement, and
religious freedom - were only superficially addressed.  Ruby Ridge and
Waco illustrate a widespread mindset rampant within law enforcement in
America, where civil liberties are an inconvenience and deadly force
is used with impunity. "Little Wacos" occur every day in this country.
Unfortunately, it's unlikely that the politicians now expressing their
outrage at federal law-enforcement abuses during the Ruby Ridge
hearings will apply the same scrutiny to the far more widepsread
epidemic of violations perpetrated by local law-enforcement officers.
After all, these are the same lawmakers - Democrats and Republicans
alike - who have spent years increasing police power and breaking down
the legal protections of the accused.  These are the same politicans
who have so increased the number of illegal acts classified as federal
crimes that it is relatively easy to hold radical or unpopular
individuals in violation of something and give them long sentences in
federal prison.

So the current stepped-up surveillance of "patriots" and militia
groups will only confirm their suspicions of a government out to get
them.  Extreme actios spark extreme reactions, and suppressing the
free-speech of dissidents is the perfect recipe from inflaming an
already grievous situation.  Only by providing as many outlets for
free speech as possible can we create the critical safety valve needed
for the venting of anger, alienation, fear, and, yes, hatred.  The
worst possible response to these volatile emotions is to bottle them
up until they explode into violence.

All Americans must remain free to discuss and support any legal cause,
regardless of its popularity.  Patriots of whatever stripe - no matter
how hateful - must be free to speak, write, and use the same public-
access media and technological communication available to others.  To
paraphrase Justice Thurgood Marshall, history teaches us that the
gravest threats to liberty come in times of urgency, when
constitutional rights seem too extravagant to endure.  We must not
sacrifice the essential rights of a free people because of terrorist
actions.

We have an obligation instead to fight fear with reason.  To whatever
measure we are successful, to that extent will we preserve our
liberties.

[Barbara Dority is president of Humanists of Washington, executive
director of the Washington Coalition Against Censorship, and cochair
of the Northwest Feminist Anti-Censorship Taskforce.]

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