From: NLG Civil Liberties Committee <cberlet@igc.org>
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy
Date: 28 Jul 92 18:51 PDT
Subject: Re: Bill Clinton == John Birch Society 
Nf-ID: #R:cup.portal.com:62249:cdp:1299600054:000:8561
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!cberlet    Jul 28 18:51:00 1992


I have been asked through E-MAIL to substantiate
and expand on some of my comments concerning
Bo Gritz and the Christic Institute.


True Gritz

by Chip Berlet

Bo Gritz is running for President under a variety 
of banners, but his earliest candidacy this electoral
round was under the banner of the fascist
Populist Party which began promoting Gritz for
President the summer of 1991. The banner headline
in the June 1991 <Populist Observer: Voice of the
Populist Party> was "Groundswell Building
For Gritz Presidential Run." Gritz had addressed 
the Populist Party national convention in May 1991.
In a memo sent to Populist Party regulars by Chair
Don Wassall, and signed by 11 Populist Party
Executive Committee members, Wassall wrote that
"We are reaching out to new people, and we have a
tremendous presidential candidate in Bo Gritz."
Campaign flyers mailed from the Populist Party
headquarters are headline "Bo Gritz for 
President...Vote Populist Party."

During 1991 several ultra-right political 
groups began organizing a nationwide campaign to 
build support for Populist Party candidate Bo 
Gritz. Gritz was named in 1991 to the advisory 
board of the Populist Action Committee created by 
the quasi-Nazi Liberty Lobby, publisher of the 
weekly newspaper <Spotlight>. The Populist
Party under Don Wassall is feuding with
Willis Carto and the Liberty Lobby.

According to the May 1992 issue of <The Monitor>,
"Wassall's Populist Party has been forced to take
a back seat as Gritz has cobbled together his own
organization, the America First! Coalition."

But as the <The Monitor> explains, "Gritz's standard
stump speech is an amalgam of themes popular among
white supremacists and others on the far right: the
Federal Reserve System is unconstitutional and should
be abolished and a vast conspiracy of "internationalists"
are taking over the world. In his book "Called to Serve,"
Gritz writes that "Eight jewish families virtually
control the FED," (the Federal Reserve System.)

In a January 3, 1992 letter to Willis Carto, Gritz 
urged the warring factions in the Populist Party to
cease their bickering, and told Carto he was "seeking
cooperation between you and your former allies." He also
wrote "During my first meeting with Don and Phil 
as a Populist candidate, I expressed utmost concern over
accountability of funds," thus clearly acknowledging
that he considers himself the Populist Party candidate.

Gritz has been attempting to lure the left
into his coalition of far-rightists.
In the June, 1991 issue of <The Populist 
Observer>, Gritz wrote, "I call upon you as 
Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Independent, 
right, left, conservative, liberal, et.al., to 
UNITE AS POPULISTS [emphasis in original] until 
we have our nation firmly back on her feet." 
Gritz made a similar plea at a July meeting in 
Palo Alto, California. 

Gritz's call for the left/right coalition 
apparently first surfaced publicly at his Freedom 
Call '90 conference held in July, 1990 in Las 
Vegas. Speakers at that conference included Gritz 
and notorious anti-Semite Eustace Mullins, as well as 
Father Bill Davis of the Christic Institute, 
ex-CIA official (now critic) John Stockwell, and 
author Barbara Honneger. This fact of attendence 
is not meant to imply that all these persons 
share the same views. It is meant to demonstrate 
that Gritz is attempting to draw a broad range of 
government critics into a coalition. Stockwell, 
Honneger, and Davis have all said their 
appearance at the conference should not be 
interpreted as an endorsement of Gritz's research 
or political views. Gritz's Center for Action 
still sells a set of tapes from the conference, 
including speeches by Gritz and Mullins, along 
with Father Davis, Barbara Honneger, and John 
Stockwell. This set of tapes is advertised in the 
Prevailing Winds catalog. 

John Stockwell has expressed concern over the the 
way Prevailing Winds has lumped his research 
together with research he finds problematic. In 
the past, Stockwell has been highly critical of 
Honneger as a reliable source of information, and 
has had criticisms of some aspects of Christic 
research as well. Stockwell says he "met Gritz 
there on stage" at the 1990 conference and "came 
away greatly unimpressed," and he was quick to 
distance himself from the Populist Party. 

After the controversy broke in the left press, a  3i3 

spokesperson at Prevailing Winds (who asked to be 
identified simply as Patrick) said they were now 
considering at least including a warning in their 
catalog about Bo Gritz's ties to the Populist 
Party and other rightist and anti-Jewish groups 
and individuals. Patrick said their catalog came 
out before Gritz accepted the Populist Party 
presidential nomination, but defended the 
inclusion of the Gritz material, saying that 
"middle America needs this kind of information" 
because "Bush is basically a dope-peddling Nazi." 

Patrick said the appropriateness of carrying 
Gritz's material, given his ties to the 
anti-Jewish far right, has been discussed by the 
Prevailing Winds staff, and also discussed with 
Bo Gritz and with Father Davis of Christic. 

According to the Prevailing Winds representative: 

"Its an argument we've gone back and forth on, 
it's a tough question, whether or not to make it 
available and to preserve it for research. We are 
interested in getting the information to the 
people. The good thing about it is no one else is 
trying to build these bridges between groups. We 
need to reach a rainbow of people." "

Christic's Father Bill Davis walked out of the 
1990 Gritz conference when Mullins gave his 
speech. Yet over a year after the event, Christic 
still had made no public statement distancing 
itself from Gritz or Mullins. In the meantime, 
Gritz was touring the country promoting 
Christic's Iran-Contra research and implying a 
friendly working relationship between himself and 
key Christic figures, especially Danny Sheehan. 
Sheehan is featured in a privately-distributed 
videotape program focusing on Gritz's research 
which takes a critical look at the Reagan and 
Bush Administrations' intelligence and drug 
policies. That videotape, circulated by Gritz and 
his allies, also uncritically shows a headline 
from the LaRouchian newspaper <New Federalist> 
to illustrate a point. 

Christic's national director, Sara Nelson, told 
<In These Times> that Christic apologizes for 
the appearance of Davis at the conference with 
Mullins, and no one is suggesting that Christic 
harbors any racist, anti-Jewish or fascist views. 
But Christic has not issued a clear and widely 
disseminated public statement alerting people who 
may have seen the Prevailing Winds catalog or the 
Gritz material and who now seem confused over who  33 

supports whom. This is not meant to be 
interpreted as a blanket criticism of the 
Christic Institute. Many Christic projects have 
been valuable. They circulated a tremendous 
amount of useful information about the issue of 
covert action and the Iran-Contra scandal. 
Especially notable in other areas are the work of 
Lewis Pitts at Christic South and the project by 
Andy Lang to illustrate problems with forging 
democracy in eastern Europe. Yet Christic's 
Sheehan, Davis, and Nelson have not taken 
seriously the problem of right-wing groups and 
individuals linking themselves to the Christic 
case and recruiting Christic supporters in a way 
that implies a shared agenda. While this is not 
just a problem with Christic, the role that 
Christic could, and should, be playing in 
providing leadership on this question would be 
extremely useful. 

In <Front Man for Fascism: Bo Gritz and the 
Racist Populist Party>, a report issued by the 
California anti-fascist group People Against 
Racist Terror, the extent to which Gritz has 
promoted himself on the left is thoroughly 
detailed. The report urges Christic to be more 
vocal: 

"Christic should join the campaign to expose Bo's 
campaign for the fascist vehicle it is. Christic 
should take the lead in condemning the Gritz 
campaign, rather than demanding retractions from 
those who have raised criticisms and concerns. It 
should share frankly and self-critically with its 
followers the process of deception and 
rationalization by which it was hoodwinked, so 
that others can escape the same fate.

               -30-

For a 40,000 word report on fascist overtures
to the progressive movement, send $6.50 for
"Right Woos Left" to Political Research
Associates, 678 Mass. Ave., #205, Cambridge,
MA 02139.


Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy