Bill O'Reilly: Put up or shut up

Joe Conason precisely characterizes the latest Bill O'Reilly column as a "self-pitying" whine-fest [that would gag a maggot, I must add; read only with a strong stomach].

I especially had to take note of a couple of lines:

Attempting to smear and destroy the reputations of those with whom you politically disagree is not satire.

No, it's not.

It's called the Arkansas Project.

Or it's called "Al Gore invented the Internet".

And it's called labeling your political opponents "traitors."

No, that's not satire. That's using your medium to carelessly malign people with whom you disagree politically.

That's selling falsehoods that benefit your own political agenda.

That's selling your journalistic soul in the service of spewing partisan propaganda.

And no matter how you cut it, Fox and Bill O'Reilly do it. In spades.

Of course, I also noticed this passage:

It makes me sick to see intellectually dishonest individuals hide behind the First Amendment to spread propaganda, libel and slander.

I trust that he keeps a barfbag handy while he's on the air, then.

The truth is this: If Al Franken committed libel, then make your case in court on that basis, Mr. O'Reilly -- not on risibly baseless harassment suits like the one you filed.

You see, Franken's book is not protected from a libel suit by the First Amendment. You can file such a suit at any time, Mr. O'Reilly.

But if you can't prove he libeled you, then you have no basis for claiming in public that he did.

Let's put it this way, Mr. O'Reilly: Your claim that Al Franken libeled you is false; in fact, every word he printed about you was perfectly accurate and factual in every respect. You know this -- indeed, you have yet to publish or broadcast any kind of factual refutation of Franken's account -- rather, you have only blustered and blithely claimed that Franken "libeled" you and that he "got it wrong," but you offer no facts in evidence of these claims. You know you'd lose any libel suit you brought on the matter of truthfulness alone (let alone the malicious-intent clause).

Bill O'Reilly is clearly a liar. He can feel free to sue me for saying that -- but the truth is, he would lose.

Rush, Newspeak and Fascism

[Parts I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII and VIII. See my explanatory note.]

IX: Media Transmitters

As seemingly psychotic cranks go, Ann Coulter has carved out a nice little career for herself as an obsessive hater of all things liberal, flavoring her television appearances with a frothing, twitchy dyspepsia that seems to infect everyone on the sound stage.

Along the way Coulter, like many of her media compatriots on the right, first developed a significant role in transmitting memes from the extremist Clinton-hating right into the mainstream of conservatism, and since then has expanded into other fields. During that process, she's been important in bringing the two sectors even closer together.

Of course, Coulter has built much of her reputation on being outrageous, as on the recent occasion when she penned a column about Muslims that concluded: "We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity." Unsurprisingly, she has indulged in a litany of Clinton-hating memes that originated in the extremist right, ranging from equating him with Hitler, to hinting before Y2K that he intended to declare martial law, to indulging in later-disproven rumors that he had fathered an illegitimate black child.

The quintessential Coulter "transmission" remark, though, came after Sept. 11, in an interview with the New York Observer:

"My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times Building."

Most of the commentary about this remark focused on its seeming endorsement of terrorist violence, which her defenders, such as the Wall Street Journal op-ed page, dismissed airily as merely lacking in humor: "Why would anybody even pretend to believe that Ms. Coulter wishes any real harm to the New York Times or wishes to convert all Muslims forcibly to Christianity?" (Peculiarly, this piece ran on the same day as Coulter's Observer interview.)

This line of defense is nearly identical to that deployed by Rush Limbaugh when he tries to claim that he's merely an "entertainer" -- something along the lines of, "Why would you take them seriously in the first place?" Well, I don't know, you tell me: Why would anyone take them seriously? Just because they have audiences of millions who hang on their every word as Received Wisdom? Just because every major broadcast and cable-news network has presented them, and people like them, as serious thinkers whose words are worthy of the public's consideration?

More to the point, exactly which parts of Ann Coulter are we not supposed to take seriously? Just those parts when she writes like a banshee from hell? And how, exactly, are we supposed to discern those parts from the rest? Where does the 'fierce raillery' about which 'everybody laughs afterwards' end? And does that mean talking about blowing up hundreds of New Yorkers is supposed to be humorous?

In any event, there should have been no question that this remark was beyond the pale of acceptable public discourse, much more so than anything Trent Lott has ever said. Coulter should have become a pariah, at least on the public airwaves. Indeed, I should have expected not merely journalists to denounce her for this remark, but fellow conservatives as well. That this hasn't happened -- that in fact that conservatives have defended her avidly, and indeed she seems to be back on the air more than ever -- is significant in its own.

However, there are even more consequential subtexts here.

First, Coulter is clearly suggesting here that the only thing wrong with McVeigh's attack was his choice of targets. Coulter would have preferred the NYT Building; but she otherwise appears to be suggesting that bombing government employees (including a day care full of toddlers) was acceptable as well. I would argue that this aspect of her remark is even more egregious, and should earn her the permanent scorn of every decent American.

The important point that all of the postmortems about Coulter's remark missed, however, was the very context that was its foundation: Namely, a recognition that the extremist right of Timothy McVeigh was allied with, and indirectly doing the bidding of, ostensibly mainstream conservatives like herself.

In many ways, Coulter's remark is just an acknowledgement of the relationship. I'm certain it will gain her even more fans among the Patriot crowd. And that's how the ties grow stronger.

A number of analysts have noted over the years that violent right-wing extremists have often been viewed by mainstream conservatives as useful tools for enacting their own agenda. The history of this dates back as far as monarchists' attacks on liberal thinkers in the 16th and 17th centuries, and includes the American lynching phenomenon of 1870-1930, as well the McCarthyite/Bircher exploitation of the Communist threat and the opposition to desegregation and the civil-rights movement.

As I've been documenting, for the past six years or so this uneasy alliance is re-emerging, as ideological and political traffic between movement conservatives and right-wing extremists becomes increasingly common. Sometimes this happens almost accidentally, often in the meeting-ground of personal ambition and lurking agendas, as when David Horowitz published the views of white supremacist Jared Taylor at his Frontpage Webzine. Sometimes, as with Coulter, it is done with apparently full intent.

Her McVeigh remark really makes the relationship quite clear, depending of course on the extent to which mainstream conservatives view Coulter as one of them. Judging by their continuing silence about her obvious extremism, I'd have to assume that most of them are happy to claim her.

This kind of meshing of mainstream corporate interests with right-wing thuggery is in fact a hallmark of incipient fascism. A compliant media that portrays this kind of phenomenon as unremarkable is also important in its development.

And that is the role that media transmitters like Coulter play: Not only do they inject the extremist meme into mainstream conservatism, they also condition the mainstream to think of extremists in a generous and even collegial light. Simultaneously, they persuade extremists who might otherwise align themselves with marginal and powerless fringe groups to instead perceive that mainstream conservatives are capable of addressing their issues, thereby drawing them into the political ranks of mainstream conservatism.

For all her notoriety, Coulter is in some ways a minor player as a media transmitter. Let's look a little further at the various sectors of the media where transmitters operate:

A. Radio

While many of his critics would like to lump conservative radio-talk megastar Rush Limbaugh in with some of his contemporaries on the hard right, the Big Fat Idiot appears mostly to be a secular conservative who only occasionally treads into xenophobic or theocratic dogma. However, Limbaugh artfully presents ideas from the hard right for legitimate consideration by the mainstream, and thus plays a major role as a transmitter of ideas from other sectors -- especially in light of his considerable reach.

Limbaugh’s transmissions are clearest when he’s at his most shrill, decrying bureaucrats in Washington who "would just as soon do away with democracy" and similar hyperbole. "The second violent American revolution is just about--I got my fingers about a quarter of an inch apart -- is just about that far away," he told a Washington Post reporter, describing the sentiments behind the Patriot movement. "Because these people are sick and tired of a bunch of bureaucrats in Washington driving in to town and telling them what they can and can't do with their land." It’s a line that would have played well at a militia meeting.

At other times, Limbaugh has dabbled in wink-and-nudge racism: On his thankfully short-lived TV program, for instance, Limbaugh one night promised to show his audience footage of everyday life among welfare recipients. He then ran video of the antics of a variety of great apes -- mostly orangutans, gorillas and chimpanzees -- hanging about zoos. The audience, of course, applauded and laughed.

Limbaugh also sounds themes that often are taken whole from stories circulated first among the Patriot right: Clinton body counts, education conspiracies, phony medical and environmental tales. Perhaps this is most important role: As a font of outright misinformation. (Limbaugh has never, to my knowledge, issued a correction for any of his voluminous factual errors.)

Limbaugh likes to dress himself up in public as an "entertainer," but what he really is above all, as I've observed, is a propagandist. This is apparent from many aspects of his programs, ranging from his refusal to engage in any kind of open or honest debate to the endless spew of disinformation that flows into his microphone. The latter is perhaps the most telling, because this is the essence of Newspeak: to render the meanings of words empty by assaulting them with falsification.

Just as significant on the airwaves are the horde of Limbaugh imitators who appear willing to say anything outrageous in the hope of garnering higher ratings. Foremost among these is Michael Savage, the obnoxiously xenophobic hatemonger who recently was awarded a slot on MSNBC's Saturday lineup.

Savage is particularly gifted at presenting overtly racial appeals in soft wrapping, so that his listeners know what he means, even if he can't be pinned down for it later. But at times his appeal to racism is nearly naked. When he calls for the deportation of all immigrants, and the internment of Muslim-Americans, it isn't hard to discern a racial purpose to it all.

Perhaps just as disturbing about Savage is the eliminationist tone of much of his rhetoric, much of it aimed not at a racial or ethnic group but at liberals generally: "I say round them up and hang 'em high!" and "When I hear someone's in the civil rights business, I oil up my AR-15!" Here was a recent rant aimed at liberal critics:

"I'm more powerful than you are you little hateful nothings. You call yourself this for that and that for this. You say you represent groups, you represent nobody but the perverts that you hang around with and I'm warning you if you try to damage me any further with lies, be aware of something: that which you stoke shall come to burn you, the ashes of the fireplace will come and burn your own house down. Be very careful, you are living in incendiary times. You can't just throw things at people and walk away thinking that you had a little fun. I warn you; I'm gonna warn you again, if you harm me and I pray that no harm comes to you, but I can't guarantee that it won't."

The level of intolerance and the implied threat in remarks like these -- and they are common in his diatribes -- raise reminders of similar eliminationism that ran rampant in Germany in the 1930s.

Another Limbaugh-wannabee with a more modest reach is Chuck Harder, a Florida-based talk-show host whose topics range from United Nations takeovers to the coming Y2K Apocalypse -- as well as the full complement of Clinton scandals. In the past, Harder has broadcast daily updates from the Freemen standoff in Montana, and once featured renowned anti-Semite Eustace Mullins -- one of the radical right’s revered figures -- as an "expert" on the Federal Reserve.

B. Cable TV

Among transmitters of memes that originated in the far right, one entity stands in a class all its own: Fox News.

The cable-news behemoth touts itself as "fair and balanced," but no one has ever really figured out just who they think they're kidding. Probably the dittoheads who buy up Ann Coulter books.

Well, an open bias is one thing. But broadcasting far-right conspiracy theories is another. And that's what Fox has done on numerous occasions.

The most noteworthy of these -- though it received almost no attention at the time -- occurred Feb. 21, 2001, when Brit Hume interviewed a fellow named Bob Schulz of We the People Foundation. Schulz was propounding on television a tax scheme that is built upon a hash of groundless conspiracy theories which have their origins in the far-right Posse Comitatus and other extremist "tax protest" schemes. It was, in fact, remarkably similar to the Montana Freemen's theories as well.

Here's the transcript of Hume's interview [from the videotape excerpt provided at the time by Fox News]:

Brit Hume: ... Coming to the conclusion that there is no law on the books that actually requires them -- or most others for that matter -- to pay income taxes. Most astonishing, noted the Times, those companies were not only not being pursued by the IRS, but some of them have actually collected refunds on taxes previously paid but now they claim were never owed. So is there something to their argument? Bob Schulz thinks so. He's the leader of a small but vigorous movement that is seeking to convince Americans that the income tax is a massive fraud on the public. He joins me now from Albany, N.Y.

Well, this will come as quite astonishing news to a great many Americans, Mr. Schulz -- what's the basis of the claim?

Bob Schulz: There is a very substantial, credible body of evidence by as many as 87 researchers that has concluded that the 16th Amendment was fraudulently certified in 1913, and that in fact three-fourths of the states had not approved or ratified, properly ratified the 16th Amendment, the income-tax amendment.

Hume: And what have the courts ruled on that matter?

Schulz: The courts have not ruled on the fraudulent ratification of the 16th Amendment. Bill Benson, the individual, the professional who went around to the archives of all 48 states that were in existence in 1913, obtained 17,000 notarized and certified documents relating to the ratification process in that state, he put his report together and went to court with it, and the courts ruled it's a political question for Congress. He then took the issue to Congress, and Congress said it's an issue for the courts.

Hume: And so basically it stands because the folks who could have upset it have let it stand.

Schulz: Right.

Hume: Right. Now let me ask you about the tax code itself. Now, I know that you contend that within the tax code there is a definition of what is called taxable income, and that somehow, although it appears to apply to all income from all sources, it does not, because of what is called Section 861. Can you explain what Section 861 is?

Schulz: Yeah. There is no law, no statute, or regulation that requires most citizens to file a tax return -- most U.S. citizens to file a tax return or to pay the income tax. As an example, under Section 861 of the federal code of regulations, it says clearly that there's a list of income items, and unless the item of income comes from one of the sources which the code lists, then the code doesn't apply to the, um ...

Hume: -- To the taxpayer in question.

Schulz: Right. And so all of those sources are foreign sources. Unless you are a foreigner working here, or a U.S. citizen working or earning your money abroad, then the tax code does not apply to you. That's clear in the code.

Hume: Now, I work for Fox News Channel, which was -- is a division of a company that has its headquarters overseas. It is a domestic enterprise. And it is from that that I realize my income. Now if I were to take the position this year that I was owed a refund because the taxes that the company does withhold -- and I don't think I can convince them not to -- that I was owed a refund, and applied for that, would I get it?

Schulz: Um, heh, it might be difficult, because of the size of your corporation. Clearly, the federal government is nervous, Brit. A growing number of employers -- so far they're small employers -- have taken this position and have received refunds back for the money they're withheld from the paychecks of their employers. So far, no large company has taken this position.

This wasn't the only occasion when Fox interviewed Schulz. When he staged a "hunger strike" (there's no evidence he actually went without food) later that year, Fox's Hannity and Colmes interviewed him, and were only a little less credulous than Hume.

[Schulz, for those interested, gave up his "hunger strike" after the intervention of Republican Rep. Roscoe Bartlett of Maryland, who at first promised to give Schulz's group a briefing on tax laws with IRS officials, but even called that off when Schulz announced the meeting would be "putting the IRS on trial." Last anyone heard of Schulz, last November, he was threatening the federal government with a "final warning" to all branches of government to "obey the Constitution, or else." Um, OK, Bob.]

Then there's Bill O'Reilly, the former tabloid-TV-show host who now poses as a "journalist" as the chief talking head at Fox. O'Reilly in particular has a penchant for conspiracy theories.

O'Reilly, who especially prides himself at "no spin" broadcasts, bristles at such suggestions. So let's roll the tape, courtesy of the fine folks at WorldNetDaily, the Web site where O'Reilly's online column originally appeared, and with whom O'Reilly has had a long association. (Its own significant role as a transmitter is discussed below. WND has long been a clearinghouse for a number of other "New World Order" style conspiracy theories.)

This is from a piece dated March 21, 2001, titled "Oklahoma City blast linked to bin Laden":

A former investigative reporter for the NBC affiliate in Oklahoma City last night told Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly she has gathered massive evidence of a foreign conspiracy involving Saudi terrorist leader Osama bin Laden in the 1995 bombing of the federal building that killed 168 people.

This wasn't the only time O'Reilly touted this theory. From a story by NewsMax (another conspiracism-rich Web publication) later that year, titled "McVeigh's Trial Attorney Alleges FBI Blocked Conspiracy Probe":

During an interview Monday night on Fox News Channel's "The O'Reilly Factor," host Bill O'Reilly asked Jones whether he believed McVeigh had acted alone.

It is worth noting, however, that this time O'Reilly at least interviews the source of all these theories -- McVeigh's attorney, Stephen Jones.

It has remained an O'Reilly favorite. From a Fox transcript of May 8, 2002, "Are the OKC Bombing & 9/11 Linked?":

Last year, we interviewed investigative reporter [Jayna] Davis from Oklahoma, who believes there was a tie-in between the bombing in Oklahoma City and 9/11.

Joining us now from Washington is Larry Johnson, the former deputy director of the State Department's Office on Counter-terrorism under Presidents Bush and Clinton.

So you think there's some validity to this?

LARRY JOHNSON, FORMER STATE DEPARTMENT COUNTER-TERRORISM OFFICE DEPUTY DIRECTOR: I was skeptical at first, Bill. I took the evidence, I looked at it, and I started talking to some of the witnesses. Where there's smoke, there's fire. You've got several things going on here that have not been thoroughly looked at and need to be checked out.

O'Reilly's record extends well beyond his propensity for right-wing conspiracy theories. There have been such slips, for instance, as when he recently referred to Mexicans as "wetbacks."

O'Reilly also has been sounding an ominous theme that likewise is becoming popular on the Patriot right: That liberals who criticize Bush's war efforts are "traitors." His recent remarks were especially noteworthy:

Americans, and indeed our foreign allies who actively work against our military once the war is underway, will be considered enemies of the state by me.

Just fair warning to you, Barbra Streisand and others who see the world as you do. I don't want to demonize anyone, but anyone who hurts this country in a time like this, well, let's just say you will be spotlighted.

This, from the same fellow who accused Clinton of malfeasance during the Bosnian campaign, and who undermined our position abroad by openly suggesting that Clinton's missile attacks on Al Qaeda were an attempt to 'wag the dog.'

These, of course, are mere samplings. If you happen to watch Fox News with any regularity, these far-right themes come popping out from all kinds of corners, usually uttered by spokesmen from transmitter political organizations such as those I identified in the last installment. (The popular Hannity and Colmes program is also a rife with this kind of rhetoric.) The result is a steady drip of extremist memes blending into the day's Republican talking points.

C. The Internet

Anyone who's followed the conservative movement's growth in the past five years is well familiar with the Free Republic, the ultra-conservative Web site that is in a class all its own in transmitting the extremist agenda into mainstream conservatism.

Free Republic (like the Patriot movement) avoids wading into racial or religious discussions, and presents itself as purely a "conservative" political forum, but it has become one of the chief breeding grounds for conspiracy theories on the right. During Bill Clinton's presidential tenure, many of these involved his alleged plans for overthrowing democracy and installing a "New World Order" dictatorship. Any number of extremist memes have over the years received extensive play at the site, including several post-9/11 threads blaming the entirety of that disaster on Clinton. In recent months, the site has gradually shifted its focus to a bellicose defense of President Bush's Iraq war plans, with an emphasis on intimidating liberal antiwar protesters.

The most significant part of the Web site's reach, though, is the kind of following it has created. Self-labeled "Freepers" have in recent years become increasingly organized manifestations of some of the extreme sentiments that circulate at the site, to the point of having serious real-world effects: Freepers played significant roles in several incidents involving thuggery and intimidation during the post-election Florida debacle, including disrupting an appearance by Jesse Jackson (in concert, as it happens, with white supremacists) and engaging in noisy, intimidating protests outside of Al Gore's vice-presidential residence.

Not quite as potent but certainly as vivid of transmitters of far-right memes are a couple of well-read Webzines: NewsMax and WorldNetDaily. Both have at various times been funded by right-wing guru Richard Mellon Scaife, who has on several occasions displayed his own predilection for extremist beliefs. Certainly these two Webzines reflect that. (Both magazines, incidentally, also carried breathless coverage of Bob Schulz's anti-tax campaign.)

WorldNetDaily in particular has been extremely conspiracy-prone over the years. In the run-up to Y2K, for example, its major theme was the Patriot belief that Clinton intended to use the social chaos certain to proceed from the looming technological disaster as a pretext for declaring martial law and thereby establishing his dictatorship. Of course, one of the chief promoters of this theory was the zine's editor, Joseph Farah, who penned numerous columns on the subject.

NewsMax has similarly been a major conduit of extremist anti-Clinton propaganda, especially since its reins were taken over by Christopher Ruddy, the Scaife-funded 'investigative reporter' who devoted years to proving Clinton had Vince Foster murdered (though of course he also pursued dozens of other Clinton conspiracy theories, all equally groundless). In recent months NewsMax has shifted its focus to attacks on Muslims and liberals as "traitors," while loudly defending President Bush's war plans.

D. The Press

The Wall Street Journal remains a well-respected paper within journalistic circles for its reporting staff, but the paper's editorial page has for the better part of a decade become one of the real scandals of newspapering, particularly its rampant unethical behavior in publishing material that is provably false and often little more than thinly disguised smears of various liberals, particularly Clinton during his tenure, and refusing at time to correct even gross errors of fact. Not surprisingly, many of these false memes were generated by right-wing extremists of various stripes and then given the mantle of respectability by the WSJ.

This propensity had manifested itself well before Clinton -- as when, for example, it championed the work of Charles Murray, co-author of the now-infamous The Bell Curve. As Lucy Williams explained it in her analysis of the way conservatives treated Murray:

By articulating a definition of poverty that associated it explicitly with illegitimacy, then associating illegitimacy with race, the Right made it acceptable to express blatantly racist concepts without shame. For example, when Charles Murray wrote The Bell Curve ten years after Losing Ground, he argued that welfare should be abolished, not simply because of the economic incentives it creates, but because it encourages "dysgenesis," the outbreeding of intelligent whites by genetically inferior African Americans, Hispanics, and poor whites.

Likewise, the WSJ indulged all kinds of extremist propaganda in its pursuit of Clinton. One of its chief sources was Floyd Brown, a longtime enemy of Bill from Arkansas days. Brown was responsible for the circulation of much of the early Whitewater dirt on Bill Clinton, mostly through Citizens United's top investigator, David Bossie (who later gained notoriety as the erstwhile chief investigator for Rep. Dan Burton's campaign-finance probe, and has in recent months been turning up as a pundit on Fox News).

Brown's credibility was already of questionable value; by 1998, this had become unmistakable. For instance, at Brown's Citizens United Web site -- in addition, naturally, to a bevy of Monica-related impeachment screeds -- you could find screaming exposes of the Clintons’ alleged involvement in the United Nations one-world-government plot. A streaming banner on the site shouted: "Secret United Nations Agenda Exposed In Explosive New Video!" (The video in question prominently featured an appearance by then-Sen. John Ashcroft.) A little further down, the site explains: "This timely new video reveals how the liberal regime of Bill Clinton is actively conspiring to aid and abet the United Nations in its drive for global supremacy." For those who follow the militia movement, these tales have more than a familiar ring.

Yet in 1994, members of the WSJ's editorial board sat down with Brown and examined his anti-Clinton information -- which in nature was not appreciably different from what he was flogging four years later -- and shortly thereafter, nearly half of the Journal's editorial page was devoted one day to reprinting materials obtained from Brown. Moreover, the WSJ continued to recycle the allegations from that material for much of the following six years.

The other major organ that transmits right-wing memes is the Moonie-owned newspaper The Washington Times, which suffers from a variety of ethical maladies. Most of these are related to spreading extremist memes about Bill Clinton, as well as championing various white-nationalist causes exuding from the neo-Confederate movement (two senior editors have long associations with the movement). But the conspiracy-mongering has continued well since Clinton left office, with a stream of recent pieces suggesting that Al Qaeda and not white supremacists were really behind the Oklahoma City bombing.

E. Pundits

These are the rich orphans of the media business -- some of them are former reporters, some are former political operatives, and some are just propagandists in the Limbaugh mold. Their ranks are filled with all kinds and shapes of transmitters, many of whom gladly resort to extremist memes because of their outrageousness quotient -- and if there's any way to make your reputation as a pundit, it's to say something that makes headlines. No publicity is bad publicity, as they say.

These range from ex-liberals like Andrew Sullivan and Christopher Hitchens, who gladly traded in several extremist memes about Clinton in the course of excreting their voluminous bile toward him, to barely concealed extremists like David Horowitz and Michael Savage. In between, it was never unusual to hear the late Barbara Olson repeat a Patriot legend, or even now for Peggy Noonan to indulge in plainly irresponsible speculation about Muslims.

The most notorious of them, though, is Ann Coulter, whose behavior continues to provide us with nearly perfect models of how transmitters work, and why they are so effective. Indeed, there seems to be no end in sight.

Next: Reaching the Receivers

Is MEChA racist?

Tacitus has a long post up questioning Cruz Bustamante's associations with Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan, or MEChA, a Latino-rights organization that Tacitus contends is racist.

But the evidence that MEChA is racist, including that presented by Tacitus, is rather thin and problematic at best. In reality, it most resembles a typical college-campus ethnic-pride organization, with all the accompanying baggage of fiery rhetoric from its more radical contingents but largely a record of advocating for its rights entirely within the system and with an emphasis on multiculturalism, which is the antithesis of the racism practiced by most so-called "hate" groups.

First, let's try to make our terms clear: What, exactly, makes an organization racist? The Southern Poverty Law Center's definition of a "hate" group is probably the most clear and useful:

All hate groups have beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people, typically for their immutable characteristics.

It goes without saying, of course, that there are many, many racial/ethnic/identity-pride organizations, ranging from the Irish-American Cultural Institute to the Japanese American Citizens League, none of which are racist in any shape.

Many of these are devoted to not merely advocating for equal rights for their constituencies but (particularly with certain black-pride and gay-pride organizations) with arguing for a kind of nationalism, promoting the greater virtues of their particular identities and often fiercely denouncing the oppression they believe they continue to suffer. Again, there is nothing inherently racist in this.

These groups definitively become racist, however, when they tread over that line and begin attacking other ethnicities or identity groups. In the case of groups like neo-Nazis and the Klan, of course, this means serially denigrating non-whites and Jews in the lowest terms; it can also take such purportedly high-minded forms as the white-nationalist American Renaissance organization or the nakedly anti-Semitic and racist Nation of Islam. As mentioned previously, La Voz de Aztlan is clearly a racist hate group as well, and the SPLC identifies them as such.

But the connections between La Voz and MEChA, however, are tenuous at best. There are no MEChA links on the La Voz Web site, and the latter's use of the "Aztlan" concept is the same kind of cultural hijacking of legitimate ethnic-heritage symbolism that is common among white supremacists. It no more colors MEChA than does the neo-Nazi Stormfront's adoption of the Celtic Cross as a symbol impugn Celtic organizations (which is to say, not at all). The publishers of La Voz are ex-Mechistas, but again, that kind of "connection" is actually a very thin thread, particularly if they have no current associations with either national MEChA or any of its chapters.

Now let's look at the evidence Tacitus presents that MEChA is racist. Most of this is in the form of text he extracts from various Mechista writings, including the group's founding documents. Chief among the latter of these is El Plan de Santa Barbara:

The widespread use of the term Chicano today signals a rebirth of pride and confidence. Chicanismo simply embodies and ancient truth: that a person is never closer to his/her true self as when he/she is close to his/her community. Chicanismo draws its faith and strength from two main sources: from the just struggle of our people and from an objective analysis of our community's strategic needs....

Commitment to the struggle for Chicano liberation is the operative definition of the ideology used here. Chicanismo involves a crucial distinction in political consciousness between a Mexican American (or Hispanic) and a Chicano mentality. The Mexican American or Hispanic is a person who lacks self-respect and pride in one's ethnic and cultural background. Thus, the Chicano acts with confidence and with a range of alternatives in the political world. He is capable of developing and effective ideology through action.

Mexican Americans (or Hispanics) must be viewed as potential Chicanos. Chicanismo is flexible enough to relate to the varying levels of consciousness within La Raza. Regional variations must always be kept in mind as well as the different levels of development, composition, maturity, achievement, and experience in political action. Cultural nationalism is a means of total Chicano liberation.

There are definite advantages to cultural nationalism, but no inherent limitations. A Chicano ideology, especially as it involves cultural nationalism, should be positively phrased in the form of propositions to the Movement. Chicanismo is a concept that integrates self-awareness with cultural identity, a necessary step in developing political consciousness. As such, it serves as a basis for political action, flexible enough to include the possibility of coalitions. The related concept of La Raza provides an internationalist scope of Chicanismo, and La Raza Cosmica furnishes a philosophical precedent.

Discomfiting and short-sighted as this may seem, there is in fact nothing inherently racist in this -- ethnic nationalism is not racism. It only becomes so when it attacks or maligns other races, and there is nothing in this text (or anywhere else in El Plan) that does so. Tacitus goes on to cite text from El Plan Spiritual de Aztlan that continues largely in this vein, though with more strident language decrying their "oppressors." There is, however, one disturbing sentence:

Brotherhood unites us, and love for our brothers makes us a people whose time has come and who struggles against the foreigner "gabacho" who exploits our riches and destroys our culture.

This is borderline racist, since "gabacho" has a clearly derogatory meaning, and it paints a picture of all white people as intending the destruction of Latino culture.

However, the bulk of these screeds are simply demanding a place at the table for Chicanos, albeit a powerful one -- like most such ethnic-nationalist worldviews, it sees itself in the leading role. Indeed, a careful reading of the rest of El Plan Spiritual reveals that it goes on to discuss its political role both as a majority and a minority, which indicates it sees itself working in a context of others, with no hint of eliminationism.

Tacitus' next excerpt is far more damning in that it is unequivocally racist:

According to Miguel Perez, mechista of Cal State Northridge, "The ultimate ideology is the liberation of Aztlan. [Communism would be closest]....Non-Chicanos would have to be expelled....opposition groups would have to be quashed because you have to keep the power."

It is one thing to advocate ethnic nationalism, even in strident terms; it is another thing altogether to advocate the removal of differing ethnicities and their political oppression. This is only a step removed from the viciousness of La Voz de Aztlan, frankly. Eliminationist rhetoric should be condemned in whatever form it appears.

However, the rantings of one person from a single chapter does not make an entire organization racist. The question is whether MEChA as a whole reflects these kinds of eliminationist views, or whether they are common among the ranks of Mechistas. And so far, I have uncovered no evidence that this is the case.

It is clear, in fact, that MEChA in fact is mostly a decentralized organization that encompasses fairly diverse worldviews and politics -- and moreover, the vast bulk of its activism stresses Chicano rights, but advocates them through cooperative action and working within the system (though obviously much of this is tinged with 1960s-style "revolutionary" fervor). It manifests itself mostly on college campuses, where chapters largely reflect the politics of the constituent students, and these range from the relatively moderate to the relatively radical. You can find MEChA chapters everywhere from Oregon to Yale, and a quick perusal of their Web sites reveals that these are largely benign groups that stress multiculturalism, not racism.

So far, it appears there is scant evidence throughout the rest of MEChA (including National MEChA) of much of Miguel Perez's racism, and it requires mostly a tendentious reading of the founding documents to find traces of racism there. It is important to remember that most true "hate" groups are positively obsessed not merely with the superiority of their identity but with attacking and maligning the Others.

Consider, for instance, the example of David Duke's National Organization for the Advancement of White People. As suggested by its name, its chief pose was not as a "hate" group but simply as an organization devoted to defending the rights of white people. But the NAAWP was unmistakably racist because it in fact devoted large portions, if not nearly the entirety, of its advocacy to attacking maligning blacks, Jews, homosexuals, "foreigners" and anyone else who was not white.

MEChA does not fit this kind of profile, even remotely. The tinges of racism it has acquired are not central to its philosophy, but are more a product of its ethnic nationalism, which by its nature can be problematic (just because it can be a breeding ground for racism) but is not in itself racist.

It is important to stress, however, that all of us are working from a limited set of data. I myself have only a handful of Mechista writings and position papers to work from, as does, I suspect, Tacitus. It may well be that a more thorough examination of Mechista writings and positions reveals widespread racism and eliminationism.

I contacted Mark Potok at the SPLC's Intelligence Report to inquire about their assessment of MEChA yesterday, and he replied that for the most part, MEChA has been viewed as a typical progressive multiculturalist campus organization. He indicates, however, that the recent concerns that have been raised about MEChA have sparked their interest, and that the SPLC is now in the process of doing a serious assessment of the matter. If they do so, it is probable that SPLC researchers will be working from a much broader database, which will likely include queries for clarification from national MEChA leadership.

Until we get a more thorough assessment, it is clear that it is best to reserve judgment about MEChA's racism, since the evidence for the charge is very thin and relies largely on "associations" that, so far at least, are tenuous at best and interpretations of rhetoric that lean tendentious.

Of course, one of the charges regularly leveled at "the left" generally (and the SPLC particularly) is that it applies the "racist" label too easily and readily -- after all, such charges can be personally and professionally damaging, and ultimately constitute a smear when they are not well-grounded. While I agree that this occurs with ridiculous regularity among the less thoughtful partisans of the left, particularly among various ethnic advocates, in reality such groups as the SPLC, like most mainstream liberals, are very circumspect and rely upon the weight of substantial evidence before naming an organization racist.

Such judiciousness would be fitting from the left's accusers as well.

[A note: It appears that the FrontPage Magazine article I cited in the previous post on Bustamante has now been edited to remove the reference to La Voz de Aztlan. In the original version, one of the paragraphs described La Voz's wretched anti-Semitism and concluded by asking why Bustamante did not denounce them. You can still find references to this at Alan Henderson's blog (which clearly connects Bustamante to La Voz) as well.]

Rush, Newspeak and Fascism

[Parts I, II, III, IV, V, VI and VII. See my explanatory note.]

VIII: Official Transmtters

The strange thing about watching Trent Lott's slow-motion toppling late last year was that the whole uproar was about something that was not particularly new or unknown about Lott.

Lott's lack of judgment, like that of many Republicans, is embodied in his dalliances with right-wing extremists, which had been well observed previously. In Lott's case, he had an open alliance with the Southern variant of extremism, embodied in the neo-Confederate movement, a band of Southern revivalists who unabashedly argue for modern-day secession by the former Confederate States: "The central idea that drives our organisation is the redemption of our independence as a nation," says the mission statement for the League of the South.

Of course, like most right-wing extremists, they also pathologically hated Bill Clinton: "Impeach Clintigula Now!" shouted a typical banner from a Neo-Confed site. As with their militia brethren elsewhere in the country, the hatred of the former president proved a potent recruiting tool, particularly for making inroads into mainstream conservatism.

Lott contributed a regular column to the neo-Confederate Citizen Informer magazine, usually pontificating on mainstream issues -- while being joined by other columnists who would rant about "Aracial Whites" and discuss the logistics of secession. The CofCC and other Neo-Confeds have a fondness for Mississippi's senior senator dating back to his efforts to rehabilitate the name and reputation of Jefferson Davis, and the senator in return has lent them both his ear and the air of legitimacy that his name as a columnist gives their magazine. He also told CofCC gatherings that they "stand for the right principles and the right philosophy."

When finally called out on this behavior, amid the counteraccusations that flew during the Clinton impeachment, Lott offered a startlingly misleading denial: "This group harbors views which Senator Lott firmly rejects. He has absolutely no involvement with them either now or in the future." Of course, the questions were about his past.

This all finally caught up with Lott after his now-infamous bout of nostalgia at Strom Thurmond's farewell banquet. But in addition to the collective amnesia that had let Lott slide through beforehand, the really curious thing about the way the Lott matter eventually played out was the compartmentalization of its resolution: All neat and tidy, with no ramifications for anyone else -- including, say, Attorney General John Ashcroft, who has had his own dalliances with neo-Confederates. It had the distinct flavor of a political hit by Team Rove, rather than signifying any sea change on the part of the GOP.

This no doubt serves the purposes of Republican strategists, who are hoping to remake the party's image so that it can finally shake the shadow of the Southern Strategy. But they have to do so carefully without upsetting their Southern base too deeply, and the Bush administration's later attacks on affirmative action, as well as its resurrection of such nominations as Charles Pickering's, may have gone a long way to mollify those voters.

In any case, these strategists are probably not really aiming to make significant inroads into the minority communities, particularly not with blacks. Instead, their obvious target in remaking their image is moderate white suburban voters, whose reluctance to vote Republican is often associated with the GOP's lily-white racial image. But the affirmative-action and other recent moves have made clear that the Bush team is primarily interested in empty symbolic gestures -- like Lott's fall -- to appeal to these voters.

The larger reality is that the Republican Party, and mainstream conservatism generally, has for some time now engaged in such dalliances with extremists across a broad range of issues, and in a number of different sectors and political blocs. Lott was merely the tip of the iceberg.

Lott, and politicians like him, play an important role for right-wing extremists. They are transmitters, figures who straddle both the mainstream and extremist sectors of the right. They help lend such segments as the neo-Confederates a veneer of legitimacy that they otherwise would utterly lack. And they help get their ideas, and ultimately their agendas, into the mainstream.

Let's examine the different kinds of transmitters:

Politicians and public officials

Lott was far from alone among Republicans in maintaining ties to neo-Confederates and other Southern racists. Rep. Bob Barr of Georgia, chief sponsor of a 1997 bill to impeach Clinton, also made appearances before the CofCC, and over the years has had open associations with the populist-right John Birch Society, as well as a striking penchant for placing the militias’ issues -- gun control, tearing down the United Nations, fighting "globalism" -- atop his list. Ex-Mississippi Gov. Kirk Fordice maintained open ties with the CofCC and other neo-Confederate factions. And Louisiana Gov. Mike Foster -- who was President Bush's campaign chair in that state -- maintained an interesting relationship with white supremacist David Duke: He liked to buy Duke's mailing lists. (He also tried to conceal his purchase of the lists and was caught and fined for it.)

The South, however, was only one of many staging grounds for ostensibly mainstream conservative politicians to commingle with right-wing extremists. In fact, it happened in every corner of the country. In New Hampshire, Republican Sen. Bob Smith made open alliances with the Patriot/militia-oriented Constitution Party (indeed, he nearly ran for president on the party's ticket). Former Rep. Helen Chenoweth of Idaho, who chaired a natural-resources subcommittee and was one of the first to join Barr as an impeachment co-sponsor, had long associations with her home district’s militiamen -- and you can still buy her anti-environmental video, "America in Crisis," from the Militia of Montana. Former Republican Rep. Steve Stockman of Texas likewise made open alliances with several Texas Patriot groups, and defended their agenda in Congress. Republican Rep. Ron Paul of Texas continues to peddle pseudo-Patriot "New World Order" conspiracy theories to his constituents.

Probably not surprisingly, nearly every single noteworthy transmitter in politics is a conservative Republican. The only exception was ex-Rep. James Traficant, an Ohio Democrat who was recently drummed out of Congress in the wake of his corruption convictions. Traficant trotted out a broad range of Patriot theories and agenda items during his career, but he was a near-total pariah in his own party. (Indeed, before his convictions, Republicans attempted to persuade him to change aisles.)

The spectrum of transmitters also includes a bevy of local and state officials who tread comfortably in multiple universes. Several state legislatures, notably Montana's, have had significant Patriot presences among their ranks, all of them ultraconservative Republicans. And then there was the GOP's 1996 nominee for governor in Washington state: Ellen Craswell, a religious conservative who argued for remaking America as a "Christian nation" and blamed a horrendous January 1993 storm in Seattle on God's wrath for the Clintons' inauguration, which had taken place that day. Craswell later left the GOP to play a prominent role in the pro-militia U.S. Taxpayers Party and its Washington offshoot, the American Heritage Party (both of which later morphed into the Constitution Party), but reportedly has since returned to the fold.

There are also political organizations that often transmit far-right memes in mainstream settings. The most notable of these is the Free Congress Foundation, run by right-wing guru Paul Weyrich, who was one of the architects of the Reagan Revolution, a founder of the Heritage Foundation, and reputedly someone who still enjoys considerable influence even in the current White House. Weyrich's far-right dalliances have been mounting lately, as the Southern Poverty Law Center recently detailed in a scathing report.

Other groups that transmit far-right memes into mainstream include Larry Pratt's Gun Owners of America, whose connections to the extremist right have been thoroughly documented; Gary Bauer's co-production with James Dobson, the Family Research Council, which spread numerous anti-homosexual memes that originated on the far right; the anti-affirmative action group Center for Individual Rights, which has its origins with the white-supremacist Pioneer Institute, but also has been the "driving force" in the campaign against the University of Michigan's AA program; so-called "Wise Use" groups, which spread anti-environmentalist conspiracy theories into the mainstream; and Operation Rescue (now called Rescue America), which openly consorted with a number of violent anti-abortion extremist groups, and sympathized with their calls for the murder of abortion providers. A complete list of such transmitter organizations, which would include advocacy groups across a broad range of issues, would make even more clear how these groups pick up ideas and themes from extremist organizations and repackage them as mainstream conservative talking points.


Religious figures

Among the leaders of America's religious right, Pat Robertson enjoys a uniquely powerful position, both as overseer of a large broadcasting and evangelical empire, but also as the first fundamentalist Christian leader in recent times to make a significant run for the presidency. He also has a pronounced history of transmitting far-right themes into the mainstream, most especially his frequent claims that America is a "Christian nation," and similar advocacy of installing a theocratic government.

His most notorious instance of trafficking extremist material came with the publication of his 1992 tome, The New World Order, which of course enjoyed a considerable audience on the extremist right. The book is literally riven with conspiracist allegations and references, including his invocation of the well-known Patriot belief that the Freemason conspiracy is "revealed in the great seal adopted at the founding of the United States."

Two articles -- one by Michael Lind and another by Jacob Heilbrunn -- in the New York Review of Books demonstrated conclusively that the bulk of the concepts in the book were clearly drawn directly from such notorious anti-Semitic works as Nesta Webster's Secret Societies and Subversive Movements and Eustace Mullins' Secrets of the Federal Reserve. What's truly remarkable about Robertson's tactic is that he soft-pedals these well-worn tropes in the cloak of references to "international bankers" and the like, much the same way the Patriot movement cloaks its own conspiracy theories.

Robertson's cohort in right-wing evangelizing, Jerry Falwell, likewise has a history of trotting out far-right themes, including the time he attempted to demonstrate that the Antichrist was a Jewish man currently alive. Falwell likewise was closely involved in promoting The Clinton Chronicles, which spread far-right conspiracy theories about the former president. Recently, of course, Falwell has again been in the news, first creating a national uproar by suggesting that gays, and lesbians and liberals in general were responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks, then creating an international uproar by proclaiming that Mohammad, Islam's chief prophet, was a "terrorist."

Robertson and Falwell, however, are merely to the religious right what Limbaugh is to the army of imitators who fill the ranks of the rest of talk-radio land. The nation's fundamentalist pastors often play similar roles, repeating themes and ideas that originally circulated among extremists, but presenting them in mainstream contexts which lend them a sudden facade of legitimacy.

Perhaps the most significant sector of these fundamentalists are the Christian Reconstructionists, whose agenda is openly theocratic. Their stated purpose is to install a "Christian" government that draws its legal foundations from Scripture, not the Constitution. Their radical agenda, however, is endorsed by a broad array of conservative politicians, notably by the powerful Council for National Policy, which boasts a membership from across a range of mainstream conservatism, but which in fact was co-founded by R.J. Rushdoony, one of the leading lights of Reconstructionism.

This sector is gaining increasing significance as a meeting-ground for mainstream conservatism and right-wing extremism precisely because of the emphasis being placed on his own fundamentalist beliefs by President Bush. As I'll discuss later, the commingling of the two sectors is occurring at an increasing rate because of this, and it may wind up playing an important role in how the Bush camp responds to criticism of its policies -- particularly its war plans -- and potential threats to its hold on power.

Finally, there are the media transmitters. But they have earned a chapter unto themselves.

Next: Media Transmitters

The hate begins

Somewhat unsurprisingly, the debate over Mel Gibson's The Passion is bringing the haters out of the woodwork.

The Anti-Defamation League, which has been at the forefront in raising red flags about the anti-Semitic content of the film, reports that it is being flooded with hate mail and phone calls.

A sampling:

"You should be more concerned about the conduct of Jews in our government and financial markets … and stock scams promoted by Jews…" "The hypocracy [sic] going on by Jews in this nation such as your radical Marxist liberal people in government … and the entire diatribe [sic] that opposes our Christian faith and daily tries to undermine our Constitution. … "If a backlash comes it will be a result of that kind of conduct we see out of Jews … not a result of some historically based film …. Many people are just not going to be pushed around much longer."

"I find it sad that you would attempt to censor Gibson. Whether you like it or not, the Jews of the time were instrumental in Jesus' death. We don't need anymore revisionist history. Didn't the Holocaust teach you anything?"

"Shame on the ADL and its attempt at censorship! Where is the ADL when Holocaust films come out that cause feelings of hate toward Germans? … Stop trying to control world opinion and get over yourselves!"

[Note: I particularly enjoy the inherent irony of this argument, which I've been hearing increasingly on the right. It doesn't seem to occur to the writer that what Holocaust films inspire is hatred not of Germans (I happen to be of German descent) but of Nazis. Or is the writer unaware of the difference?]

"All anti-Semitism is the fault of Jews. If you would direct your people to quit being so dishonest, immoral, atheistic, and Marxist, this stigma would go away…. If you want people to quit their prejudice, then quit giving them reasons to be prejudiced. As long as you act like immoral heathens people will treat you the same way."

"Why are you so upset about Gibson's movie? What he portrays is the truth! Jews were responsible for the death of Jesus! … Maybe when Jesus returns as the Messiah, you won't try to do it again."

So much for all the skepticism that The Passion might inflame latent anti-Semitism.

Of course, if any of these same skeptics bothered to read La Voz de Aztlan (to which certain critics are attempting to link Cruz Bustamanate), they'd know that the debate over the movie is already serving as a significant pretext for spreading anti-Semitism.

Bustamante and the bigots

Is Cruz Bustamante, the Latino Democrat who recently moved into the lead in the race to replace Gray Davis as California's governor, a secret racist?

Republicans -- stung, perhaps, by the steady drip drip drip of news about the unsavory associations of their favorite candidate, Arnold Schwarzenegger -- have begun trotting out this meme. Is there any truth to it?

In a word, no -- though Bustamante himself would probably do everyone a favor by clearing it up definitively.

The chief accusation revolves around Bustamante's supposed connections to La Voz de Aztlan, a publication produced in Los Angeles that is openly racist (that is, it favors Latino racial supremacy) and is viciously anti-Semitic. A quick perusal of its site contents may leave you reeling. (Among the links it provides is the complete text of the notorious "Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion.")

Bustamante is not a known supporter of the publication, nor does he have any known political ties to its publisher.

What conservatives point out -- particularly Lowell Ponte in David Horowitz's considerably-less-than-reliable Frontpage magazine -- is that when he was in college at Fresno State University, Bustamante became involved in "Moviemiento Estudiantil Chicano de AZTLAN," or the Chicano Student Movement of Aztlan, known by its acronym MEChA.

Among MEChA's idealistic positions was the belief that California and the southwestern United States -- lands that were taken from Mexico at the end of the Mexican-American War -- constituted "Aztlan," which the "Mechistas" hoped to someday reclaim for Chicanos, or "la Raza."

Since that time, the Aztlan beliefs mutated in some cases into the virulent racism of La Voz de Aztlan, whose publisher is an ex-Mechista like Bustamante. However, the entire La Voz organization, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, is constituted of about a dozen people. Bustamante has never been involved, nor does he have any continuing connections to anyone who is.

Moreover, there is simply no evidence that at the time Bustamante participated in MEChA that it espoused the kind of naked racism and virulent anti-Semitism as can be found in La Voz. Nor is there a smidgen of evidence that Bustamante ever held such views or endorsed them. The best that Ponte can do is to demand that Bustamante publicly disavow such groups.

This is, incidentally, precisely the kind of "guilt by association" of which right-wing characters like Horowitz and others regularly accuse the left and civil-rights organizations like the SPLC. But unlike the associations that the SPLC finds, say, between mainstream Republicans like Trent Lott and neo-Confederate organizations, the evidence to support such linkage is not only extremely thin in Bustamante's case, it is nearly non-existent.

It probably would help clear the air if Bustamante were to make his position regarding La Voz de Aztlan unmistakable.

However, even without such a statement, the "connections" to La Voz evaporate when one consults the publication's own positions regarding Bustamante:

He is described, variously, as "totally useless to our community and has done nothing to improve the lives of La Raza" and "a known lackey of the Jewish dominated Democratic Party in Alta California." In its most recent commentary, it had this to say:

Cruz "El Gordito" Bustamante of the corrupt Democratic Party is not a viable alternative. He is a lackey and a mere hispanic "replica" of the incompetent and crooked Gray Davis who is called "Our Jewish Governor" by the Jews of California. Bustamante is a college dropout who just last year bought a degree in chicano studies. In 1997, when then-Governor Peter "Pito" Wilson said he would support legislation that would permit executing 14 year olds, then-California Assembly Speaker Cruz Bustamante said he would support executions for "children" as young as 13. Bustamante was given marching orders to run for governor by the Jewess and US Senator Barbara Boxer. The Jewish dominated Democratic Party of California wants a fallback position in case their "Jewish Governor" Gray Davis is ousted.

Is this Ponte's idea of a "close association"?

By the logic with which Cruz Bustamante is "connected" to these haters, George W. Bush could be similarly "connected" to the Ku Klux Klan.

Rush, Newspeak and Fascism

[Parts I, II, III, IV, V and VI. See my explanatory note.]

VII: The Transmission Belt

"Hitler was more moral than Clinton," intoned the nice-looking, dark-haired man in the three-piece suit. "He had fewer girlfriends."

The audience laughed and applauded, loudly.

A remark like that might hardly have raised an eyebrow in post-Monica America, particularly in the meeting-halls of mainstream conservatism, where it often seemed, by the end of Bill Clinton's tenure in the White House, that no hyperbole is too overblown in the campaign to depose him -- mostly, it seems, by convincing the rest of us that he was too grossly immoral to continue to hold the presidency.

As the scandal wore on, the volume, intensity and downright nastiness of his critics reached impressive levels. It wasn't unusual to hear of congressmen calling him a "scumbag" and a "cancer on the presidency," or for mainstream conservative commentary to refer to him, as Orlando Sentinel columnist Charley Reese did at one point, as "a sociopath, a liar, a sexual predator, a man with recklessly bad judgment and a scofflaw." Even right-wing scribe Andrew Sullivan played the armchair psychologist on national television, describing Clinton as "sociopathic."

But the scene above took place four years before Monica, in 1994, long before Clinton handed his enemies a scandal on a platter that seemingly made such references acceptable. It was not at a Republican caucus or Christian Coalition meeting, but at a gathering of right-wing "Patriots" who had come to hear about forming militias and common-law courts and defending their gun rights -- indeed, their families -- from the New World Order. They numbered only a hundred or so and only half-filled the little convention hall in Bellevue, Washington, but their fervor saturated the room with its own paranoid energy.

And the speaker, who could have passed even then for a local Republican public official -- actually, he was nominally a Democrat -- in fact was one of the nation's leading Patriot figures: Richard Mack, then sheriff of Arizona's mostly rural Graham County. As a leader in the fight against gun control (his lawsuit eventually led to the Supreme Court overturning a section of the so-called Brady Law), Mack was in high demand on the right-wing lecture circuit as he promoted the militia concept to his eager acolytes. He usually sprinkles his "constitutional" gun-rights thesis with his theories on church-state separation -- it’s a "myth," he claims -- and "the New World Order conspiracy."

The similarities between Mack’s 1994 sentiments and the hyperbole directed at Clinton in 1998 are not accidental. Rather, they offer a stark example of the way the far right's ideas, rhetoric and issues feed into the mainstream -- and in the process, exert a gravitational pull that draws the nation's agenda increasingly rightward. For that matter, much of the conservative anti-Clinton paroxysm could be traced directly to some of the smears that circulated first in militia and white-supremacist circles.

It's also important to understand how the migration of these ideas occurs. Richard Mack, for instance, doesn't compare Bill Clinton's morality to Adolph Hitler's at every speaking opportunity. His remark didn’t show up, for instance, when he had his moment in the sun with the National Rifle Association.

It just pops out when he's in front of an audience of Patriot believers. That's when he knows it will gain the most appreciation. It mixes well with the fear of the New World Order he foments, in his quiet, almost sedate speaking tone.

Mack is a transmitter -- someone who treads the boundaries of the various sectors of America’s right wing and appears to belong to each of them at various times. Mack's gun-control message still sells well with mainstream, secular NRA audiences. His claims that church-state separation is a myth resonate nicely with the theocratic right crowd as well. And he cultivates a quasi-legitimate image by taking leadership positions in groups like Larry Pratt's Gun Owners of America. But he is most at home in his native base: the populist right, the world of militias, constitutionalists and pseudo-libertarians. Mack even occasionally consorts with the hard right, as when he granted front-page interviews to the Christian Identity newspaper The Jubilee.

At the same time he tours the countryside preaching the Patriot message, Mack cuts a seemingly mainstream conservative figure. As one of the key players in the effort to overturn the Brady Bill gun-control law -- which Mack claims infringes on his rights as sheriff -- he gained his highest public notice in 1995 when the National Rifle Association honored him as their Law Enforcement Officer of the Year. The image boost let him tour nationwide, speaking at numerous Patriot gatherings and hawking his books (From My Cold Dead Fingers and Government, God and Freedom).

Mack's Clinton-bashing was mostly a gratuitous nod to one of the Patriot movement's favorite themes: an almost pathological hatred of the former occupants of the Oval Office, manifested as a willingness to believe almost any slander directed at "Billary," as they like to refer to the Clintons. Had you gone to any militia gathering -- held usually in small town halls or county fairgrounds, sometimes under the guise of "preparedness expos," "patriotic meetings" or even gun shows -- you could always find a wealth of material aimed at proving Clinton the worst kind of treasonous villain imaginable. Bill and Hillary Clinton, after all, occupy a central position in Patriots’ "New World Order" paranoiac fantasy.

"For those in this right-wing conspiracist subculture, Clinton as President represents a constitutional crisis because he is seen as a traitor betraying the country to secret elites plotting a collectivist totalitarian rule through a global New World Order," observes Chip Berlet of the Cambridge, Mass., think tank Political Research Associates. "Stories of Clinton's alleged sexual misconduct buttress this notion because they demonstrate symptoms of his liberal secular humanist outlook, which ties him to what is seen as a longstanding conspiracy against God, individual responsibility, and national sovereignty." The Clintons’ conspiracy is believed to have its roots in global Communism and, ultimately, the "international bankers" (read: Jews) who pull all the world’s political strings.

Go to the Militia of Montana’s table at any Patriot gathering and you can find, alongside Army manuals on "Booby Traps" and guerrilla-warfare manuals like The Road Back, a healthy selection of books and tapes devoted to Clinton’s many perfidies:

-- Black Helicopters Over America: Strikeforce for the New World Order, Jim Keith’s militia classic that, besides postulating global preparations for the enslavement of mankind, identified Bill Clinton as an "obvious socialist and possible Soviet agent" whose administration has "ushered in the New World Order."

-- "Executive Orders for the New World Order," MOM’s popular pamphlet with a list of presidential orders -- mostly related to national emergencies under the aegis of that X-Files bugaboo, the Federal Emergency Management Administration -- which ostensibly show how Clinton has prepared for the NWO takeover.

-- Big Sister is Watching You, a supposed expose of Hillary’s secretive claque of "Feminazis" (with several suggestions that a witch’s coven might be lurking in the White House). The MOM catalog describes it thus: "These are the woman who tell Bill Clinton what to do: Lesbians, sex perverts, child-molester advocates, Christian haters and the most doctrinaire of Communists, whose goal is to end American sovereignty and bring about a global Marxist paradise."

-- Martial Law Rule, an "exposé" by Oregon white supremacist Robert Wangrud, of Clinton’s continuing imposition of "martial law" in the U.S. (which he claims began under Lincoln and has remained in place since). Elsewhere, Wangrud has been known to argue that civil-rights legislation constitutes the treasonous act of "race betrayal."

-- The Death of Vince Foster and The Clinton Chronicles, the now-infamous creations of Citizens for Honest Government which supposedly laid bare Clinton’s involvement in the murder of his aide as well as a web of drug-running and murders in rural Mena, Arkansas.

Indeed, the militia movement provided most of the early audience for The Clinton Chronicles; large stacks of the books and videos sold well at Patriot gatherings, and the Mena tales continue to be regarded as articles of faith. The wild and bizarre accusations -- easily refuted both in mainstream media and by a congressional investigation -- gained an extended half-life in a milieu where counter-evidence is only considered further proof of a conspiracy. This echo effect resonated long enough that the claims were certain to regain currency in the mainstream -- and eventually, they did.

This is how the Patriot movement pulls the national debate towards its own agenda. Regardless of how far-fetched or provably false their claims or ideas might be, they stay alive in the everything-fits conspiracist mindset of the far right. The ideas that have a long-term resonance are transmitted to the mainstream, stripped of their racial or religious origins -- which often is the swamps of supremacist Christian Identity belief -- by being presented as purely "political" claims or conjecture. As the ideas gain more traction in the mainstream, the far right’s agenda becomes realized incrementally.

David Duke knows all about this technique -- it is one he has mastered over the years as one of the nation’s leading white-supremacist figures. For years -- especially during his Populist Party presidential bid in 1988 and his nearly successful U.S. Senate campaign in 1990 -- Duke denied being a white racist, despite his background as a KKK leader.

Finally, in his 1996 Senate race (which he lost), Duke abandoned his pretense and began campaigning almost exclusively on the issue of "saving white heritage" and other "racial realities"; his campaign literature listed his former Klan leadership, and his Web site contained Duke’s favorite theories on racial separation. Noting wryly the similarities between the 1996 GOP platform and his own 1988 presidential platform -- anti-immigration, anti-affirmative action, anti-welfare, anti-abortion -- Duke made it clear he saw no reason not to revert to his true self, since he was driving the debate: "The nation has come to me," he observed.

The Patriot movement (which has deep roots in white supremacy, but is a separate phenomenon) effects its agenda in much the same way. A network of transmitters -- those people who maintain mainstream positions and public images but who have a foot firmly planted in the Byzantine gardens of the far right -- carry into mainstream settings the Patriots’ uniquely reactionary positions in the national debate, whether the topic is gun control, environmental policy, education or abortion, and the ripples draw the debate in their direction. And deposing the epitome of evil itself -- Bill Clinton -- has, naturally, always been near the top of the list.

Consider, if you will, the "Clinton Body Count."

Everybody who’s on e-mail, probably, has received a version of this urban legend at some time or another. Friends, or friends of friends, pass it along like one of those dreaded chain e-mails, or the latest Monica Lewinsky joke.

It’s gruesome -- all those dead people associated somehow with Bill Clinton. (You’d think he was someone famous who came into contact with a lot of people or something.) In some cases, the count is as high as 80. Some of them you know about, like Vincent Foster. But what about that former intern, gunned down in a mysterious Georgetown coffee-shop killing? Or those two little boys found dead on the railroad tracks in Arkansas? Obviously, one is meant to conclude that that Bill Clinton is nothing less than a murderous, blood-stained monster.

The "body count" is one of the Internet’s versions of an urban legend, built around the creepy supposition that Clinton is somehow responsible for the deaths of any people who’ve had dealings with him -- and many more who haven’t, but who’ve been connected to him through the conspiracy grapevine. These include not only Commerce Secretary Ron Brown (offed for knowing too much, the body-counters suggest) but some obscure figures vaguely related to the Mena, Arkansas, operations detailed in The Clinton Chronicles.

The Clinton Body Count also happens to be one of the Patriot movement’s hoariest traditions. It appears to have originated with (now-discredited) militia leader Linda Thompson’s 1993 essay, which detailed 29 deaths linked to the then-new president. The concept flourished among the movement, showing up at a lot of homemade Web sites, like the 1994 version at a Web site called The Patriot, with 28 bodies and three "ongoing" cases, some different from Thompson’s. Soon the list was growing exponentially, especially as the non-militia types who shared a hatred of Clinton joined in the fun, and more Clinton-haters linked more conspiracies to the president over the years.

By 1998, there were at least 30 sites keeping track of the Clinton Body Count; though their numbers have declined since Clinton left office, many remain active today. One current site, operated by a believer in a wide range of Clinton conspiracies, lists 52 bodies. Another racks up a total of 79. And by 1999, you could read about it at mainstream conservative Web sites like radio commentator Ken Hamblin’s -- not to mention "conservative" Web sites like Free Republic, which for a time featured entire sections of its forum devoted to "Suspicious Deaths" and the "Clinton Death Squad." And, lest we forget, Clinton’s supposed onetime paramour, Gennifer Flowers, keeps a version of the Clinton Body Count on her Web site, linked alongside copies of her taped conversations with Clinton, a CD of her singing debut, and glamour pix.

Of course, to believe any of these lists, you also have to believe in virtually all of the conspiracies, assassinations and misdeeds in which the Clintons are alleged to have taken part: Mena, Vince Foster, Ron Brown, and the Georgetown Starbucks murders (not to mention the larger New World Order plot, which links him retroactively to JFK’s assassination). You also have to believe that all those dead military personnel were once his "bodyguards." In short, you have to believe that he is probably the anti-Christ.

This happens to be a view not in short supply these past eight years, judging by the flow of rhetoric, first from the Patriots, and then from more mainstream sources, of the past eight years. It has, of course, been debunked roundly on several occasions, but then, so have most of the Patriots’ other conspiracy theories. That doesn’t stop them from purveying them anyway.

The White House tried to draw attention to the flow of what it called "fringe stories" into the mainstream in a 331-page report obliquely titled The Communication Stream of Conspiracy Commerce, which posited that the scandals the Clintons faced were manufactured by his political enemies out of groundless rumors that bubble up from the extreme right.

However, the report suffered from several fatal flaws. On the all-important public-relations front, it cast all this anti-Clinton activity in a conspiratorial light -- while the campaign in fact has been fairly open and public in its desire to end Clinton’s presidency, and was often spontaneous in nature and uncoordinated.

Conservative commentators had a field day, accusing the White House of finding conspiracies under rocks, comparing the report to Nixon’s "enemies" list and offering the Clintons rides in black helicopters. Some even accused the White House of embarking on a conspiracy of its own -- attempting to intimidate its enemies by linking them to wackos: conspiracies within conspiracies within conspiracies within conspiracies.

More important, the report missed its own target. While it accurately detailed the way groundless stories like the Vince Foster suicide/murder circulated outside of the normal media venues with helpful nudges from well-moneyed enemies like Richard Mellon Scaife, it cast its net only as wide as conservative think tanks and largely mainstream circles, treating the venues for the false stories as merely "fringe" elements and failing to recognize the interaction of larger segments of conservatism in the stories’ spread. It reflected in essence a kind of Beltway bias that neglected to assess the central role played by the far-right echo chamber as a way of spreading extreme ideas into the mainstream.

In any event, the very trend it described had come to full flower by 1998. The rhetoric once common among the militia had become indistinguishable from that bandied about on Rush Limbaugh's radio program or, for that matter, on Fox News cable gabfests or MSNBC's Hardball. The migration of the accusations against Clinton from the far right to the mainstream was instructive, because it indicated how more deeply enmeshed conservatives became during the 1990s with genuine extremists.

And in subsequent years, this commingling of ideologies has begun to play a role in the presidency of George W. Bush, as well. As we've already discussed, many of these same far-right factions are now involved in demonizing liberals who dissent from Bush's Iraq war plans.

Chip Berlet's model of the American right is accurate and helpful in understanding this transformation. He divides the right into three sectors:

The secular conservative right. This comprises mainstream Republicans and white-collar professionals, glad to play government critic but strong defenders of the social status quo.

The theocratic right. So-called 'conservative Christians' and their like-minded counterparts among Jews, Mormons and Unification Church followers, as well as Christian nationalists. Some of the more powerful elements of this faction argue that the United States is a "Christian nation," and still others -- called "Reconstructionists" -- argue for remaking the nation as a theocratic state.

The xenophobic right. These include the ultra-conservatives and reactionaries who make broad appeals to working-class and blue-collar constituencies, particularly in rural areas, with a notable predilection for wrapping themselves in the flag. [See Pat Buchanan.] This faction ranges from the relatively mild-mannered Libertarians -- who also have made big inroads into the computer-geek universe -- to the more virulent and paranoid militia/Patriot movement, and finally to the hard right: the neo-Nazis, Klansmen, Posse Comitatus and various white supremacists -- including some of the nastier elements of the Patriot movement -- all of whom wish nothing more than to tear down modern democratic America and start over. This is the faction where some of the more insidious ideas (like bizarre tax-protest theories) and conspiracies (from black helicopters to the Protocols) originate, making their appearance in mainstream settings somewhat disturbing.

Transitional figures like Richard Mack and Rush Limbaugh play a central role in the way the right’s competing sectors interact. By transmitting ideas across the various sectors, they gain wider currency until they finally become part of the larger national debate. Secondarily, shape-shifters like Mack are increasingly important for the xenophobic right, because they lend an aura of mainstream legitimacy to ideas, agendas and organizations that are widely perceived otherwise as radical.

Transmitters operate in an array of related venues, often coordinating messages with their allies and timing the release of information for maximum emotional effect. There is a broad array of arenas in which they primarily operate: politics and public officialdom, including the military and law enforcement; the mainstream press; radio and the Internet; and religion.

Indeed, what fascinates Berlet about the interaction of the sectors is watching "the transmission belt -- how stuff gets essentially a trial run in the Christian right or even the far right, and the messages will get refined, and then they’ll be picked up by these intermediary groups and individuals, and refined some more, and then there’ll be a buzz that’s created, and then that gets media attention in the mainstream press.

"That isn’t some conspiracy theory out of the White House. That’s how this stuff works, and it’s always worked this way. The joke is that it’s not a conspiracy -- it’s the way people organize each other."

Next: Official Transmitters

Fair and Balanced Fascist Memes

In honor of Fair and Balanced Friday, I thought it appropriate to rerun this excerpt from "Rush, Newspeak and Fascism":

Cable TV

Among transmitters of memes [into the mainstream] that originated in the far right, one entity stands in a class all its own: Fox News.

The cable-news behemoth touts itself as "fair and balanced," but no one has ever really figured out just who they think they're kidding. Probably the dittoheads who buy up Ann Coulter books.

Well, an open bias is one thing. But broadcasting far-right conspiracy theories is another. And that's what Fox has done on numerous occasions.

The most noteworthy of these -- though it received almost no attention at the time -- occurred Feb. 21, 2001, when Brit Hume interviewed a fellow named Bob Schulz of We the People Foundation. Schulz was propounding on television a tax scheme that is built upon a hash of groundless conspiracy theories which have their origins in the far-right Posse Comitatus and other extremist "tax protest" schemes. It was, in fact, remarkably similar to the Montana Freemen's theories as well.

Here's the transcript of Hume's interview [from the videotape excerpt provided at the time by Fox News]:

Brit Hume: ... Coming to the conclusion that there is no law on the books that actually requires them -- or most others for that matter -- to pay income taxes. Most astonishing, noted the Times, those companies were not only not being pursued by the IRS, but some of them have actually collected refunds on taxes previously paid but now they claim were never owed. So is there something to their argument? Bob Schulz thinks so. He's the leader of a small but vigorous movement that is seeking to convince Americans that the income tax is a massive fraud on the public. He joins me now from Albany, N.Y.

Well, this will come as quite astonishing news to a great many Americans, Mr. Schulz -- what's the basis of the claim?

Bob Schulz: There is a very substantial, credible body of evidence by as many as 87 researchers that has concluded that the 16th Amendment was fraudulently certified in 1913, and that in fact three-fourths of the states had not approved or ratified, properly ratified the 16th Amendment, the income-tax amendment.

Hume: And what have the courts ruled on that matter?

Schulz: The courts have not ruled on the fraudulent ratification of the 16th Amendment. Bill Benson, the individual, the professional who went around to the archives of all 48 states that were in existence in 1913, obtained 17,000 notarized and certified documents relating to the ratification process in that state, he put his report together and went to court with it, and the courts ruled it's a political question for Congress. He then took the issue to Congress, and Congress said it's an issue for the courts.

Hume: And so basically it stands because the folks who could have upset it have let it stand.

Schulz: Right.

Hume: Right. Now let me ask you about the tax code itself. Now, I know that you contend that within the tax code there is a definition of what is called taxable income, and that somehow, although it appears to apply to all income from all sources, it does not, because of what is called Section 861. Can you explain what Section 861 is?

Schulz: Yeah. There is no law, no statute, or regulation that requires most citizens to file a tax return -- most U.S. citizens to file a tax return or to pay the income tax. As an example, under Section 861 of the federal code of regulations, it says clearly that there's a list of income items, and unless the item of income comes from one of the sources which the code lists, then the code doesn't apply to the, um ...

Hume: -- To the taxpayer in question.

Schulz: Right. And so all of those sources are foreign sources. Unless you are a foreigner working here, or a U.S. citizen working or earning your money abroad, then the tax code does not apply to you. That's clear in the code.

Hume: Now, I work for Fox News Channel, which was -- is a division of a company that has its headquarters overseas. It is a domestic enterprise. And it is from that that I realize my income. Now if I were to take the position this year that I was owed a refund because the taxes that the company does withhold -- and I don't think I can convince them not to -- that I was owed a refund, and applied for that, would I get it?

Schulz: Um, heh, it might be difficult, because of the size of your corporation. Clearly, the federal government is nervous, Brit. A growing number of employers -- so far they're small employers -- have taken this position and have received refunds back for the money they're withheld from the paychecks of their employers. So far, no large company has taken this position.

This wasn't the only occasion when Fox interviewed Schulz. When he staged a "hunger strike" (there's no evidence he actually went without food) later that year, Fox's Hannity and Colmes interviewed him, and were only a little less credulous than Hume.

[Schulz, for those interested, gave up his "hunger strike" after the intervention of Republican Rep. Roscoe Bartlett of Maryland, who at first promised to give Schulz's group a briefing on tax laws with IRS officials, but even called that off when Schulz announced the meeting would be "putting the IRS on trial." Last anyone heard of Schulz, last November, he was threatening the federal government with a "final warning" to all branches of government to "obey the Constitution, or else." Um, OK, Bob.]

Then there's Bill O'Reilly, the former tabloid-TV-show host who now poses as a "journalist" as the chief talking head at Fox. O'Reilly in particular has a penchant for conspiracy theories.

O'Reilly, who especially prides himself at "no spin" broadcasts, bristles at such suggestions. So let's roll the tape, courtesy of the fine folks at WorldNetDaily, the Web site where O'Reilly's online column originally appeared, and with whom O'Reilly has had a long association. (Its own significant role as a transmitter is discussed below. WND has long been a clearinghouse for a number of other "New World Order" style conspiracy theories.)

This is from a piece dated March 21, 2001, titled "Oklahoma City blast linked to bin Laden":

A former investigative reporter for the NBC affiliate in Oklahoma City last night told Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly she has gathered massive evidence of a foreign conspiracy involving Saudi terrorist leader Osama bin Laden in the 1995 bombing of the federal building that killed 168 people.

This wasn't the only time O'Reilly touted this theory. From a story by NewsMax (another conspiracism-rich Web publication) later that year, titled "McVeigh's Trial Attorney Alleges FBI Blocked Conspiracy Probe":

During an interview Monday night on Fox News Channel's "The O'Reilly Factor," host Bill O'Reilly asked Jones whether he believed McVeigh had acted alone.

It is worth noting, however, that this time O'Reilly at least interviews the source of all these theories -- McVeigh's attorney, Stephen Jones.

It has remained an O'Reilly favorite. From a Fox transcript of May 8, 2002, "Are the OKC Bombing & 9/11 Linked?":

Last year, we interviewed investigative reporter [Jayna] Davis from Oklahoma, who believes there was a tie-in between the bombing in Oklahoma City and 9/11.

Joining us now from Washington is Larry Johnson, the former deputy director of the State Department's Office on Counter-terrorism under Presidents Bush and Clinton.

So you think there's some validity to this?

LARRY JOHNSON, FORMER STATE DEPARTMENT COUNTER-TERRORISM OFFICE DEPUTY DIRECTOR: I was skeptical at first, Bill. I took the evidence, I looked at it, and I started talking to some of the witnesses. Where there's smoke, there's fire. You've got several things going on here that have not been thoroughly looked at and need to be checked out.

O'Reilly's record extends well beyond his propensity for right-wing conspiracy theories. There have been such slips, for instance, as when he recently referred to Mexicans as "wetbacks."

O'Reilly also has been sounding an ominous theme that likewise is becoming popular on the Patriot right: That liberals who criticize Bush's war efforts are "traitors." His recent remarks were especially noteworthy:

Americans, and indeed our foreign allies who actively work against our military once the war is underway, will be considered enemies of the state by me.

Just fair warning to you, Barbra Streisand and others who see the world as you do. I don't want to demonize anyone, but anyone who hurts this country in a time like this, well, let's just say you will be spotlighted.

This, from the same fellow who accused Clinton of malfeasance during the Bosnian campaign, and who undermined our position abroad by openly suggesting that Clinton's missile attacks on Al Qaeda were an attempt to 'wag the dog.'

These, of course, are mere samplings. If you happen to watch Fox News with any regularity, these far-right themes come popping out from all kinds of corners, usually uttered by spokesmen from transmitter political organizations such as those I identified in the last installment. (The popular Hannity and Colmes program is also rife with this kind of rhetoric.) The result is a steady drip of extremist memes blending into the day's Republican talking points.

[This excerpt will reappear in a few days, when I republish Part IX, from which it is taken.]