From: pierce@lanai.cs.ucla.edu (Brad Pierce)
Subject: Re: More on Gritz
Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department
Distribution: usa
Date: Sat, 18 Apr 92 21:03:39 GMT
Status: RO

------------  Reprinted without permission  --------------------------

Front Man For Fascism: "Bo" Gritz and the Racist Populist Party
A Background Research Report 

by People Against Racist Terror (PART), Burbank, California

	Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas. "Bo" Gritz and his 
supporters must know the truth of this bit of country common 
sense.
	Yet four years ago, Bo Gritz (rhymes with Knights) 
accepted a nomination to run for Vice-President of the United 
States on a ticket with "former" Ku Klux Klan grand dragon 
David Duke, from the Populist Party. And now, Bo is preparing 
to run as the Populist Party candidate for President in 1992. In 
1988, Bo had the good sense to resign from the ticket and run for 
Congress from Nevada instead. But even as neo-nazi David 
Duke parlayed the credibility he got from his Populist 
presidential run into electoral success in Louisiana as a 
Republican, Bo Gritz has attached himself irrevocably to the 
Populist Party as its candidate for President.
	In recent years, Gritz has re-established  a good deal of 
the credibility he lost several years ago after his naked self-
promotion for an abortive "raid" on south-east Asia. He claimed 
he was going to find and free MIA's supposedly still held 
captive. Whereas then, Gritz directed most of his fund-raising 
efforts at the Hollywood right, like Clint Eastwood and William 
Shatner, he has recently been focusing his speaking and fund-
raising activities in California and elsewhere around the 
country more at progressives and others concerned about 
George Bush and the New World Order. Gritz has been 
speaking out about his discoveries of CIA involvement in heroin 
trading in south-east Asia and his awareness while heading 
Green Beret counter-insurgency efforts in Latin America of 
similar involvement in cocaine dealing.
	As a result, he has been developing a wide audience, and 
to some degree a following, among opponents of U.S. 
intervention in the Third World. Leftists and even pacifists, who 
would otherwise be extremely suspicious of this militarist, have 
gone to hear him speak and been impressed by his exposes of 
government double-dealing and corruption. He has had 
substantial air-time on Pacifica radio; representatives of groups 
such as the Christic Institute have made joint appearances 
with him. Now, Gritz is trying to influence such people into 
supporting his Populist Party presidential bid.
	The Populist Party, in spite of its friendly, democratic 
sounding name, is an amalgamation of "former" Klansmen, 
nazis, and other racist far-right wingers that was cobbled 
together in 1984 with the support of Willis Carto, long 
considered an anti-Semite and Hitler apologist, and his Liberty 
Lobby. Carto was a member of the Populists' National Executive 
Committee from its inception. The Party's first presidential 
candidate in 1984, Rev. Bob Richards, virtually ceased 
campaigning in embarrassment over the racist nature of the 
party apparatus. Duke, its 1988 nominee, of course had no such 
misgivings. Its first chairman, Robert Weems, a former 
Mississippi KKK leader, described its strategy; "We Populists 
have adopted a tri-partisan approach... we share with Lyndon 
LaRouche..., within both major parties and through the 
Populist Party itself." (Lyndon LaRouche is another neo-nazi 
political figure backed by Carto who is now in federal prison.)
	Carrying out this strategy, the KKK/Populist David Duke 
ran in the Democratic Presidential primaries, then in the 
general election as a Populist, then in a special election in 
Louisiana as a Republican. He used the notoriety, name 
recognition, and national fund-raising base he built with the 
Populists to win a seat in the state legislature and espouse his 
"sanitized" racism. Even after winning office as a Republican 
in 1989, Duke met with the Populists, including such party 
stalwarts as Chicago nazi leader Art Jones. "Bo" has been 
following the same multi-party strategy. Even after he resigned 
from the Populist ticket with Duke in 19888, to run in the 
Republican primary in Nevada, he wrote to the party, "I intend 
to offer the Populist Party platform in my campaign, and carry 
it forward in public office." Luckily, he lost in the primary.
	What is the Populist Party platform and who are the 
Populist leaders? Racism and racists, only thinly disguised. 
Don Wassall, the Pennsylvania state chairman who became 
National Executive Director and now is locked in a power 
struggle with Carto--the latest in a series of faction fights over 
control of party finances--used the party's newspaper, the 
Populist Observer, to reprint explicitly racist material from the 
"National Democratic Front," an avowed white supremacist 
group based in Maryland.
	Ralph Forbes, who ran Duke's Populist Campaign, is 
another "ex" nazi and "ex" Klansman, who then switched 
parties to run for office in Arkansas. While with the Populists, 
he ran a "Christian Identity"-oriented radio ministry called 
"The Sword of Christ." He recently filed suit to prevent a 
medical school in his state from teaching about abortions. 
Forbes continues to be closely associated with the Knights of the 
Ku Klux Klan leader Thom Robb, who recently declared that the 
KKK intends to train "one thousand David Dukes."
	Van Loman, who chaired the Ohio chapter of the Populist 
Party, and ran under its banner for the Cincinnati City Council, 
was formerly the Grand Dragon of the Ohio Knights of the Ku 
Klux Klan.
	Jerry Pope, once the state Populist chair in Kentucky, 
was an organizer of the National States Rights Party, the 
segregationist, anti-semitic grouping led by convicted 
Birmingham church bomber J.B. Stoner. (Interestingly, when 
Duke switched to the Republicans and won a seat in the 
Louisiana legislature, his opponent, endorsed by the "official" 
Republican apparatus from Reagan and Bush on down, had 
also been a member of the racist NSRP.)
	In Washington State, in 1989, the United Front Against 
Fascism held several successful demonstrations against the 
Populists, thwarting their efforts to obtain ballot status in one 
county. As a result, anti-racist organizers received death 
threats, The Christian Sons of Liberty, an "Identity" group 
central to Populist organizing there, put out viscous red-baiting 
and anti-gay attacks on UFAF leaders. The CSL published 
home addresses of UFAF organizers, in a clear attempt to 
foment violence.
	Locally in California, the Populist Part is cut from the 
same mold. California has always been one of the strongest 
state affiliates of the Populists. David Duke raised 11% of the 
funds for his Louisiana legislative race in California. Half the 
money for his gubernatorial campaign came from outside of 
Louisiana, much of it from California. Local leaders of the 
Populists have included former San Fernando/Simi Valley 
Klan leader Dennis Hilligoss, and Harbor-area nazi activist Joe 
Fields, an associate of Nazi party chieftain Stan Witek and Tom 
Metzger of WAR (White Aryan Resistance). Fields is, in fact, a 
member of the party's National Executive Committee.
	Behind the Gritz campaign, the Populists have become 
the most active neo-nazi group in southern California, and are 
successfully uniting a variety of racists in their ranks. This 
year, the Populists have sponsored several programs in Orange 
County, one featuring John Tyndall, leader of the neo-nazi 
National Front in England. Another spotlighted the impeached 
ex-governor of Arizona, Evan Mecham, whose reactionary 
forces have allied with fundamentalist preacher Pat Robertson 
to take over the Republican Party in his home state. Among the 
participants at the Populist parlay was Kim Badynski, head of 
the virulent Northwest Knights of the Ku Klux Klan based in 
Washington State. In Ventura County and up north to Alameda 
County, the California Populists have held party meetings to 
commemorate Aldolf Hitler's birthday. Such Populist 
organizing legitimizes the fear and hatred of the privileged for 
the oppressed that generates hate crime.
	The danger of the Populists and the Gritz campaign is 
not that he will win the presidency. As of this writing, the 
Populists have not yet achieved ballot status in any state; 
(although here in California, they will presumably run under 
the American Independent banner, a recognized state party 
still on the ballot since running George Wallace for President in 
the sixties). The real danger is that the Populists will succeed in 
further legitimizing racist and anti-semitic politics. They have 
a long-range goal, of unifying Christian rightists and Christian 
patriots, anti-abortionists and anti-semites, into an apparatus 
dominated by neo-nazis. With Gritz, they have the added bonus 
at the same time of coopting or at least disarming progressive 
forces that would have otherwise have exposed and opposed 
them. Unifying with Gritz would inevitably discredit the white 
left with the movements for immigrants rights, Black 
empowerment, women's liberation and gay and lesbian dignity.
	No one concerned about conspiracies and abuse of 
government power, about spiritual development or the survival 
of the planet, should offer the racist and fascistic oriented 
Populist Party a shred of legitimacy. The Ku Klux Klan has 
always been the number one racist conspiratorial group in U.S. 
history, seeking power to carry out its divisive and destructive 
program. The Populist Party is the latest hood these night 
riders have put on to mask their identities so they can win 
popular support for carrying out their racist terror. DON'T BE 
HOOD-WINKED!
	The problem with "Bo" Gritz's Populist candidacy is not 
merely one of guilt by association with neo-nazis. Gritz himself 
openly embraces the Populists' politics of anti-semitism, 
racism, anti-immigrant hysteria and anti-gay bigotry. As 
criticism has begun to emerge of the Populists, Gritz has 
claimed in his speaking engagements that he has "cleaned 
house" since the Duke days. But this is an outright lie. Joe 
Fields, for example, the open neo-nazi who heads the Populists 
in L.A., is also a current national officer of the Party. What's 
more, Gritz's connections to racists and anti-semites extend 
beyond the ranks of the Populist Party itself.
	For example, Gritz is a member of the board of the 
Populist Action Committee (PAC), established by Willis Carto of 
the Spotlight. Although Carto is on the outs with the current 
leadership of the Populist Party, accusing them of financial 
mismanagement, he supports Gritz, and Gritz in turn supports 
the PAC's approach of backing sympathetic Democrats and 
Republicans as well as Populists. While many of Gritz's 
southern California speaking appearances seem directed at 
progressives, the bulk of his organizing and speech-making is 
carried out through the apparatus of the "Christian Identity" 
movement, which preaches that Anglo-Americans are the true 
"chosen people" of the Bible, that Jews are satan-spawn, and 
that non-whites are "pre-Adamic," that is, sub-human. The 
Coalition for Human Dignity in Portland, OR has documented 
the involvement of the so-called "Christian Patriot" Identity 
churches in the Gritz campaign in that state, as well as 
participation by nazi skins.
	In particular, Gritz is closely tied to the Rev.  Pete Peters, 
a national leader of Christian Identity based in Ft. Collins, CO. 
Gritz has spoken at Peters' "Scriptures for America" Rocky 
Mountain Bible Retreat, also attended by such noted anti-
semites as "Col." Jack Mohr and by KKK defense attorney Kirk 
Lyons. Lyons' Patriotic Defense Foundation has represented 
nazi boneheads, the Order white supremacy underground 
sedition defendants, and is now coordination Tom Metzger's 
appeal of his liability for the nazi skin killing of an Ethiopian 
refugee. Gritz has spoken at similar Christian Identity 
gatherings in the northwest, in Nampa, Idaho, and in North 
Carolina, where he has shared the rostrum with neo-nazis.
	The connection to Mohr and Peters is particularly 
striking because the two were part of the incident which 
precipitated the murderous birth of the "Order" or "Bruder 
Schweigen," a neo-nazi underground, in the early 1980's. 
Richard Mathews and David Lane, the founders of this 
clandestine, para-military outfit, hooked up at Peter's La Porte 
based "church." And it was the humiliation of Jack Mohr, a 
guest of Peter's in Colorado, by Denver talk show host Alan 
Berg, which prompted the Order conspirators to execute Berg 
and initiate their reign of racist terror. (This incident was 
dramatized in the films "Talk Radio" and "Betrayed.") Mohr, 
meanwhile, has been promoting the Populist Party since its 
inception through his para-military network, the Christian 
Patriots Defense League.
	In a speech to Peter's retreat, Gritz acknowledged that 
the money to print his self-published campaign autobiography, 
"Called to Serve," came from Rev. Peters. "Called to Serve" 
spells out Gritz's own far-right views pretty clearly. He refers to 
the "Rockefeller/Rothschild" Federal Reserve System as being 
controlled by "seven Jewish families." This is not a momentary 
aberration or a slip of the tongue. At his "Call for Action '90" 
conference in Nevada, Gritz featured the anti-semitic views of 
Eustace Mullins in analyzing the Federal reserve, and he 
distributes the work of Mullins, who was a supporter of Erza 
Pound and the Italian fascists. Reflecting his Christian Identity 
beliefs, Gritz refers to America in "Called to Serve" as "the new 
Zion," and white Christians as "the gathering tribes of Israel."
	These views are also reflected and expressed in Gritz's 
own campaign literature for his Populist candidacy. In a four-
page brochure signed and authorized by Gritz, the ex-Green 
Beret couches his program less in electoral than in 
revolutionist terms. "We can, we will, we must oust 'the' 
government and restore 'our' sovereignty. We need a second 
American Revolution." The racist nature of this revolutionism 
is evident in the rest of the platform he puts forward. Referring 
to his enemy as "seditious bankers" and  "satanic globalists," 
Gritz pledges to "derail their plans and send them back into the 
abyss." The platform is full of xenophobia and racism. "It's 
time to return America to the Americans,... halt the illegal 
immigration that is turning America into a Third World 
country,... end affirmative action,... end this country's decedent, 
degenerate ways. I've spent my life fighting for America, and 
now it's time to fight again. Will you be a part of my grassroots 
army?"
	This militaristic rhetoric, wrapped in thinly-veiled code 
words for anti-Semitism, racism, sexism, and homophobia, is 
an invitation to his followers to engage in cross-burnings, gay-
bashings and vandalism. Nor does Gritz try to separate himself 
from the party as a whole. He specifically tries to develop "coat-
tails" in his campaign literature, calling on his backers to 
support other Populist candidates for state and local offices.

	Progressives and anti-racists must draw a clear line 
that exposes and condemns Gritz and his racist and neo-
fascist allies in the Populist Party. For more information about 
the campaign to oppose Gritz and the Populists, and to obtain 
the full text of this report, contact PART, People Against Racist 
Terror, P.O. Box 1990, Burbank CA 91507; (818) 509-3435.

---------------------------------------------------------------------








-- 
mwise@acs.bu.edu                                     _Pryck_:a bodyart magazine
student: Can essential Buddha-nature be destroyed?
Coyote: Yes. Do you have an eraser?

Xref: sparky talk.rumors:1013 alt.conspiracy:10638