← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · il ragno
Thread ID: 4910 | Posts: 11 | Started: 2003-02-10
2003-02-10 18:51 | User Profile
[url=http://www.richardpoe.com/blog_single.php?rowID=94]http://www.richardpoe.com/blog_single.php?rowID=94[/url]
Saturday, February 8, 2003
[color=purple]posted at 07:22 JUSTIN RAIMONDO - ENEMY AGENT? Richard Poe[/color]
Last Monday, Antiwar.com editor Justin Raimondo listed me in a rogue's gallery of people he considered to be "kooks," "warmongers" and "nutballs." According to Raimondo, my kookery is confirmed by two facts:
I have chided Raimondo for attempting to incite mutiny in the United States armed forces -- a charge which provoked a heated debate on FreeRepublic.com.
I have suggested that investigators Laurie Mylroie and Jayna Davis may be correct in their respective claims that Iraqi intelligence played a direct role in the 1993 and 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.
On FreeRepublic.com, Raimondo admitted to me that he had never taken the trouble to thoroughly familiarize himself with the evidence presented by Mylroie and Davis, but nevertheless felt confident in judging their theories to be "tinfoil hat material" -- FreeRepublic jargon for a conspiracy theory so bizarre and implausible that only a nut would believe it.
As regular readers of Antiwar.com know, Raimondo is trying very hard to discourage Americans from attacking Iraq. To this end he relentlessly repeats the mantra that Iraq has never attacked us -- while dismissing all evidence of such attacks as symptoms of mental illness and kookery.
We know what Raimondo is doing. The question is, why is he doing it?
Raimondo's foreign connections are worth noting. His columns have appeared in Pravda.ru -- a Web site loosely associated with the paper or tree-zine version of Pravda, house organ of the Russian Communist Party.
In its mission statement, Pravda.ru distinguishes itself from its Communist sister publication in these words:
In spite of the fact that the journalists of both versions keep in touch with each other, they have different conceptions regarding the coverage of the life of our country and abroad. As opposed to the newspaper Pravda, which analyses events from the point of view of the party's interests, PRAVDA On-line bases itself on a pro-Russian approach to forming the newspaper's policy.
What exactly does Pravda.ru mean by a "pro-Russian" approach?
One hint comes from Bill White -- a self-styled "anti-Semite" and disciple of the Italian fascist intellectual Baron Julius Evola. White was once employed by Pravda.ru as its U.S. correspondent.
Following his rancorous resignation from Pravda.ru in February 2002, White published an article on his Overthrow.com Web site, in which he described Pravda.ru as:
...an organization run by a National Bolshevik third-positionist tendency within the Russian Communist Party, who told me, on my retainer, that they were a "red-brown" "communist-fascist / communist-nationalist" organization that wanted to promote anti-imperialism, libertarianism and Constitutionalism in the United States in order to weaken the US role as imperial superpower. Though I didn't agree with their personal politics, their program for America - limited government, an end to war, and the restoration of civil rights and the Constitution, sounded fine to me - and I agreed to write for them... [emphasis added]
For those unfamiliar with Russian politics, historian Ronald Radosh defines a "Red-Brown Alliance" as "the coming together in post Soviet Russia of right-wing nationalists and unreconstructed Communists."
So, according to Mr. White, he agreed to write for Pravda.ru, with the full knowledge that he was assisting foreigners in an organized effort to undermine the United States as a global power.
Raimondo claims that he never had a formal relationship with Pravda.ru, as did White. Indeed, Raimondo says that he never granted Pravda permission to run his articles at all and that he asked them to stop doing it in February 2002. Fair enough.
Still, it is worth pondering why an institution dedicated to building a Red-Brown alliance and waging a propaganda war to undermine U.S. influence in the world would find Raimondo's work so sympatico.
To get a taste of the sort of treats Pravda.ru served up for Raimondo's Russian audience, read Raimondo's article "Terror at Home -- The Price of Hegemony," posted on Pravda.ru the day after the 9-11 attack. Raimondo writes:
The World Trade Center... is but a pile of smoldering rubble. Crashing down along with this symbol of capitalism, modernity, and civilization is the overweening hubris of a government ââ¬â and a people ââ¬â who thought themselves immune.... exempt not only from the rules that govern and limit the powers of other nations, but also from history itself. For history... tells us that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. No one is immune, and this is the meaning of the horrific events unfolding before our eyes.
According to Raimondo, 9-11 was karmic payback for our sins. But to what sins does he refer? He appears to mean the imposition of U.S. "hegemony" over the rest of the world -- what the editors of Pravda.ru might call America's "role as imperial superpower."
Raimondo concludes his article thus:
A common word we hear in foreign policy circles is "hegemonism." We stand at the apex of power, and the French have even invented a special term for the hubristic heights of the American Imperium: they call us the hyperpower. It was coined to describe a power outside human history, outside the ordinary rules and conditions attached to human existence, a power without parallel or precedent. We were all about actions, and not about consequences: unlike the empires of the past, America was thought to be exempt from any possible reaction to its imperial edicts. Now we know it isn't true: too bad we had to learn the hard way.
Our crime, according to Raimondo, is that we became too mighty, attaining "power without parallel or precedent." The slaughter of 9-11, in Raimondo's view, was a fitting punishment for that sin.
How does one repent of the sin of being too powerful? I suppose the only real repentence would be to become less powerful.
It does appear that Raimondo's writings dovetail nicely with the political goals of his erstwhile Russian editors -- that is, to "weaken the US role as imperial superpower."
In the intelligence world, an agent of influence is defined as, "An asset... who is assigned the job of influencing policy, rather than collecting intelligence." Opinion leaders of all sorts can function as agents of influence, from government officials to journalists.
Journalists are particularly effective in shaping public opinion. As agents of influence or "propaganda assets," they can be used to disseminate false, misleading or defeatist ideas to confound, bewilder and discourage their countrymen.
I am not suggesting that Raimondo actually draws money from some hostile foreign payroll. Yet he does seem to be offering services of comparable worth free of charge, on a volunteer basis.
For whatever reasons of his own, Raimondo says he no longer permits Pravda.ru to publish his work. Even so, he continues posting columns on his own Web site that can only gladden the hearts of his former Russian editors, displaying the smoothest of ideological fits with Pravda.ru's "Red-Brown" anti-American agenda.
EDITOR'S NOTE: WE ARE CURRENTLY INSTALLING A "COMMENT" FUNCTION ON THE BLOG PAGE. IN THE MEANTIME, READERS CAN DISCUSS THIS BLOG ENTRY ON FREEREPUBLIC.COM, HERE.
CORRECTION (2/9/03): Unlike major media, we try to be as diligent as possible about correcting errors when we discover them. In a lively exchange on FreeRepublic.com last night, Justin Raimondo stated that he stopped Pravda.ru from publishing his articles in February 2002. I have made the appropriate corrections in the article above. My apologies, Justin.
Bill White's take on this can be found here:
[url=http://www.overthrow.com/lsn/news.asp?articleID=3626]http://www.overthrow.com/lsn/news.asp?articleID=3626[/url]
[color=green]Raimondo And Poe They Are So Dumb [/color]
2003-02-10 19:14 | User Profile
And the Offending Item which got the snowball rolling downward:
February 3, 2003
[color=blue]THE KOOK FACTOR/Justin Raimondo[/color] Never mind the antiwar movement's marginal elements ââ¬â our warmongers have their own nutballs to explain.
We've heard much about the "radicalism" of the antiwar movement, even as it becomes more mainstream. The War Party focuses on the most marginal elements in an effort to characterize the movement as kooky. This is not only a smear, but an effort to divert attention away from the essential craziness of their own movement, the religious fundamentalist sources of pro-war sentiment in this country.
You want pro-war kooks? Then try this Washington Post article on for size: ". . . And Armageddon Tops the Bestseller List." It's all about the "Left Behind" novels, by evangelist Tim LaHaye and writer Jerry Jenkins, that sell like hot-cakes here in the Vale of Modernity:
"Come spring, many Americans will turn their attention to the battle of Armageddon. Whether or not it coincides with an actual war in the Persian Gulf, "Armageddon," the 11th entry in the best-selling series ââ¬Â¦ will appear in stores April 8. Almost certainly, it will debut as No. 1 on bestseller lists ââ¬â as have each of the last four "Left Behind" books. This time, the most popular adult fiction series in recent memory is going to war ââ¬â a cosmic battle between good and evil that will pit Satan himself, who rules the world from New Babylon, Iraq, against Israel and its Christian allies."
Let's be clear about the theme and context of these "novels": they're all about how God is going to "rapture" up into the sky all those trailer park "Christians" who give money to Pat Robertson. The rest of us depraved sinners will be left behind. But not before all the world's Jews are gathered together in Israel, where the great battle of Armageddon is supposed to take place ââ¬â signaling the End of History (Francis Fukuyama, take note!) and the Return of Christ the King. According to the "dispensationalist" con men who preach this clap-trap, Israel will take the place of the Church on earth, and a new "dispensation" (or era) will be inaugurated, as mankind approaches the "End Times."
And they say the Muslims are mired in "medievalism"!
Millions of Americans believe this pitiful nonsense. They pine for a nuclear Armageddon because it will fulfill their "prophecies." They ignore the national interests of their own country, and worship at the altar of Israel, functioning as a far more effective ââ¬â and dangerous ââ¬â fifth column than any commie "conspiracy" ever did. They are worse than Aum Shinrikyo, that nutball Japanese cult that unleashed sarin gas in the Tokyo subway, not only because they are more numerous, but because they are a potent political force in the U.S., and practically dominate the Republican party.
It's pathetic, really, to read the sniping smears of the War Party, who are trying to tar the antiwar movement with the "Communist" brush ââ¬â what about their nutballs?! What about Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, who called the 9/11 attacks "God's punishment" because all us evil queers have been partying like it's ââ¬Â¦ the end of the world? This is not some marginal sect, with less than a few hundred members, like the Workers World Party, which so much has been made of, but a mass friggin' movement, one that forms the heart and soul of the War Party.
The followers of a genocidal "Christian" heresy, who number in the millions, are determined to drive their country into World War IV. They just can't wait for that mushroom cloud to billow up over the horizon ââ¬â and we're supposed to worry about a couple of dozen Communists whose ideology is about as relevant as phrenology?
God, I just love the restrained tone of the Washington Post writer, who avers: "The timing may be perfect for the publisher, but disconcerting for others." To say the least! "Just as Europe's literature of the horrors of war has fostered pacifism and war wariness there," the Post reports, "these novels must be influencing the American view of war today."
The Europeans, in other words, have been shaped by their experience. They have gone through two world wars and the threat of a third, having lost millions of lives and seen their civilization practically destroyed. This has shaped an outlook that might be described as more patient than "pacifist," one that sees the gradual evolution and spread of the rule of law and civil society throughout the world, rather than via some radical eruption of moral righteousness. We, on the other hand, are shaped in our attitudes toward war not by recent experience but by the worst sort of pulp fiction: a cheap novel authored by a couple of religious fanatics whose moral universe is steeped in the same obscurantist mindset as Osama bin Laden's.
The thesis of Samuel Huntington is much bruited about, especially by our war birds, who claim that this is a "civilizational" war, pitting the Western values of democracy, modernity, and cultural diversity against the authoritarian medievalism that supposedly characterizes the Muslim world. But obviously the real civilizational war is going on right here at home, between our war-maddened Rapturists and the rest of the American people, religious and non-religious alike.
It is not an overstatement to describe the Rapturists as crazed. They live, after all, in a world peopled by hallucinations. They see everything as a portent, an ominous confirmation of their elaborate fantasy life: every time Ariel Sharon farts, they breathe it in with gusto, convinced that it represents the fulfillment of some prophecy regarding the "sacred" land of Israel. In their nightmare view of human existence, the immolation of the world in a bath of nuclear fire is an event to be anticipated with joy, not horror. These are the initiates of a death cult, just as surely as any suicide bomber.
If this is "Christianity," then I say: Hail, Satan!
Fortunately, the real Christians in this country, represented not only by the Vatican, of course, but also by the National Council of Churches and the mainstream Protestant denominations ââ¬â including dispensationalists who disagree emphatically with the Armageddonites ââ¬â reject this dangerous "Christian jihadism," as the Post calls it. And their voices are now being heard, much to the dismay and even panic of the War Party. The Catholic Church recently slapped the Italian defense minister on the wrist for jumping on the bandwagon for war, and the National Council of Churches is a key component of the United for Peace campaign, which has become the fulcrum of antiwar activism in the U.S.
As I pointed out in my piece on the antiwar movement in the Feb. 8 issue of The American Conservative ââ¬â hey, it's out now, and already making waves (scroll down) ââ¬â the opposition to World War IV is going way beyond the Left. This has the War Party in a panic, and they have deployed their Smear Brigade in full force.
Accuracy in Media was first out of the gate with a critique of my article, and, no, they didn't like it. Somebody with the made-up sounding name of Cliff Kincaid penned a screed stupidly entitled "Antiwar Conservatives?" As if he would even be writing about them if they didn't exist. Since Kincaid's outfit is so concerned with "accuracy," then let them take a look at the numbers: A recent Gallup poll shows nearly thirty percent of self-identified conservatives oppose invading Iraq. A minority, yes, but an articulate and increasingly vocal one.
This is precisely what scares Kincaid and the brigade of neocon smear artists like David Horowitz, Ronald Radosh, and the P. J. O'Rourke wannabes over at National Review. Their strategy is to caricature the antiwar movement as a bunch of far-out lefties, Iraqi spies, and burnt-out hippies, but they are generals fighting the last war. A Republican businessman and contributor to the Bush campaign recently shelled out $170,000 to pay for a full-page antiwar ad in the Wall Street Journal. And what about all those soccer moms waving American flags on January 18? I was not the only observer to note that the most popular slogan was "Peace is Patriotic."
Kincaid quotes my criticism of the Workers World Party-controlled A.N.S.W.E.R. group, and cites "I Ain't Marchin' Anymore" as proof that I "flip-flopped" by calling for "All Out on January 18." But the whole point was that the January 18 event, as I anticipated, would be so big as to overshadow the organizers, a signal that the antiwar movement had outgrown the Left. A.N.S.W.E.R. has been undone by their own success. The hundreds of thousands who demonstrated all over the country, on January 18, did so on account of the President's escalating war rhetoric, not because of anything coming from the organizers of the event. No one could even hear the speeches in Washington and especially San Francisco, that day, anyway: that's how big the crowds were.
Kincaid acknowledges that groups like the National Council of Churches are now taking the lead in the new United for Peace group, but, according to him, they, too, are Commie stooges. As proof, he points to their alleged support for "a communist-run conference on 'liberation struggles' in southern Africa." Opposing apartheid, it seems, makes one a "communist."
Kincaid cites some neocon front group, the "Institute on Religion and Democracy" ââ¬â virtually all these neocon outfits have the word "Democracy" in their titles, just like the commies used to refer to their "Democratic Peoples Republics" ââ¬â descrying the NCC's contention that we are seeing "a rise of militarism under President Bush." Why, only a commie would say that ââ¬â right? Never mind that only a catatonic could deny it. The NCC has also noted that "the war on terrorism has 'sacrificed' principles of 'justice, fairness and accountability.'" No doubt that commie Phyllis Schlafly and that left-wing radical Bob Barr would agree. Another crime of the NCC is that it challenges the radical increase in military spending, which puts it in the same league as the Cato Institute, the Democratic congressional caucus, and even the "cheap hawk" faction of the GOP. Off with their heads!
Kincaid's tiresome tirade notes my efforts to transform the leadership of the antiwar movement, and makes this prediction:
"Raimondo will fail. He won't succeed because the communists are hard workers and started this movement. Their alliance with radical American Muslims is strong, firm, impressive and obviously dangerous."
Fortunately, the transformation of the antiwar movement doesn't depend on little old me. If it did, we'd really be in trouble. It isn't me who is driving the movement's exponential growth, broadening it beyond the dubious categories of "left" and "right" ââ¬â it is the President of the United States, who has embarked on a crazed course for war no matter how many times the Iraqis try to surrender. What is driving this transformation is that decent people, the world over, no matter what their politics, aren't fooled by the crude propaganda coming out of this administration: our friends and allies abroad, Democrats and Republicans at home, all want to avoid a catastrophe in the Middle East. Antiwar sentiment goes way beyond the organized antiwar movement, and that is what has the War Party tossing and turning at nightââ¬Â¦.
"Another problem for Raimondo is that there's just not that many right-wing opponents of the war willing to overlook the crazies, kooks and hate-America zealots. I don't know how many libertarians and anti-war 'conservatives' marched in San Francisco, but I saw less than ten identified as such who were at the Washington event."
How the heck does Kincaid know what the politics of the tens of thousands of antiwar protestors are? Is he a mind-reader? So he went around photographing the banners of each and every obscure leftist outfit that showed up on January 18 ââ¬â big friggin' deal. And, speaking of kooksââ¬Â¦.
When I saw this article and looked at the byline, I remembered where I had heard Kincaid's name before: he interviewed me on his radio program during the Kosovo war, a war he opposed. I remember the interview because it was so ... weird. Kincaid kept talking about "the Insiders" (it sounded like he was capitalizing it...) and, finally, after the third or fourth reference to a mysterious "cabal" that was supposedly behind the Kosovo war, I asked him what the heck he was talking about. I can't recall his exact words, but it was clear, from what he said, that he meant A Certain Ethnic Group ââ¬â he was trying to get me to agree that the Jews were behind the "globalist conspiracy" to drag us into war! I don't remember his exact words, but that was the definite implication of his remarks. My reaction was pure revulsion. I thought, for a moment, that I should just hang up the phone, and cut his hate-fest short. But that would've been rude, so, instead, I told him I thought he was full of baloney, and the interview soon came to a merciful end.
You want pro-war kooks? You want real haters? Here's the "Justin Raimondo Watch" page of the Jewish Defense League website. The JDL is a terrorist organization famous for its bombings as well as ordinary street thuggery: their most recent terrorist escapade involved a plot by their nutball leader and an accomplice to bomb a southern California mosque and the office of Congressman Darrell Issa. JDL leader Irv Rubin committed suicide in jail: his accomplice has pled guilty. Take a good look at the filth peddled by these people. Not to mention the rich fantasy life they seem to enjoy, as evidenced by their wholly fictional portrayal of the most mundane details of my life.
Oh, I almost forgot to mention Richard Poe's curious piece, accusing me, in effect, of sedition. The target of his ire is a recent column, entitled "Listen Up, Soldier," that, according to Poe amounts to "reckless incitement" of the military against Bush's rush to war. And this isn't the first time I've been guilty of a crime punishable, by 20 years in prison and a $10,000 fine: he reminds readers that, during the fracas over the Florida vote count, I "urged soldiers to come out of their barracks," and, presumably, take the White House. The truth is that I did no such thing, either then or now. What I wrote, when the Democrats were disqualifying three out of four military ballots on technicalities, was this:
"Should the military just shut up and take it? Clearly, the answer must be an emphatic no. Soldiers are citizens, too, and if they fail in that aspect of their duties then they have failed the test of their vocation. At this crucial moment in our history, a turning point ââ¬â and not for the better ââ¬â Americans in uniform could play a key role and an entirely legitimate and constitutional one, merely by exercising their First Amendment right to free speech."
And that is it. No tanks in the streets, no Seven Days in May: just soldiers exercising their God-given right to free speech. U.S. soldiers are American citizens: they aren't slaves. They have the right to participate in the democratic process, and, most specifically, to vote. They also have the right to speak out on the issues of the day, especially those that involve their own lives: this is guaranteed by the Constitution, a document that has been over-ridden, in many respects, but not completely abolished. In "Listen Up, Soldier," I did directly address U.S. military personnel, urging them to read the comments of General Norman Schwarzkopf, General Anthony Zinni, and other high-ranking officers critical of our warmongering chicken-hawks. If referring my readers to this material is sedition, then so are the opinions of Schwarzkopf, Zinni, et al. Why not accuse them, too?
I knew, while I was writing that column, that somebody would charge me with "sedition." Too bad it was only Richard Poe, the former editor of David Horowitz's Frontpage website, and not the Attorney General of the United States.
C'mon, you guys: make my day!
ââ¬â Justin Raimondo
2003-02-10 19:34 | User Profile
Originally posted by il ragno@Feb 10 2003, 18:51 ** Raimondo is a real girly fag. He screams about how important he is, he demands that he be recognized as a "genius", an "artist"... **
Interesting articles generally, but the above comment has me lurching off-point, like or no.
This is bunk. I've met Raimondo and he's an ex-Libertarian (party) like me. He looks and acts like most of us married & middle age sorts; bluntly, if he had not been honest about his sexuality, nobody would have ever known.
There is a point here. Most gays a lot of us have known over the years, including an old business partner of mine, are conservative. The guy I knew was much harder to the right than I, had been a marine in Vietnam, and wanted to take a flamethrower to the "gay pride marchers". This is typical and most of you with real world experience have run into it.
White's characterization of Raimondo is of a piece with this whole "white nationalist" mindset which is why it never gets anywhere. Pim Fortuyn's assassination was another excuse to fag-bash a nationalist -- and lots of us noticed how strident and pointless all the bashing was.
Somebody needs to tell the girly Bill Whites of the world it's time to grow up. :angry:
2003-02-10 19:35 | User Profile
[SIZE=3]Richard Poe, Jew, ISRAELI AGENT?[/SIZE]
2003-02-10 19:39 | User Profile
Originally posted by Malachi@Feb 10 2003, 13:35 ** Richard Poe, Jew, ISRAELI AGENT? **
Actually, I believe he's written that he's a half-Jew, though I'm not sure what the implications of that might be in the greater scheme of things, if anything.
2003-02-10 19:46 | User Profile
Raimondo is good people, I don't go for the gay stuff but that is for God to judge them on that day not for me. I do not trust Bill White, his information has been unreliable and I wonder what is really going on with that whole setup. The jews hate Raimondo that's good enough for me.
2003-02-10 19:47 | User Profile
I too read the column where he said he was halfjew like Lenny Kravitz I guess. He sures does toe the line of the zionists. Edgar Allan he ain't.
2003-02-10 19:52 | User Profile
**The followers of a genocidal "Christian" heresy, who number in the millions, are determined to drive their country into World War IV. **
I see no evidence of this. I have never encountered anyone who purports to justify the war for these reasons.
2003-02-10 20:35 | User Profile
I agree on White: he makes good points here and there (and posts a good piece now and then as well) but comes off as unstable, and as much a grandstander as the men he accuses of it.
I included his 'take' because, when posting this originally, both his comments and Poe's were all mixed together and I had to separate them continually for clarity's sake. I am now deleting them [but leaving the url up for anyone int'd in reading them] and restricting this to Poe v Raimondo, as it should have been from the outset. My apologies.
2003-02-11 06:27 | User Profile
Our experiences with homosexuals differ dramatically.
The ones I've known almost uniformly lead lives of astonishing debauchery. Anonymous sex in bathrooms and gay porno shops, orgys at gay bathhouses, scatological sex games, and so forth. They invariably suffered from emotional problems, and of course the usual health problems like "gay bowel syndrom", all of the infectious diseases including genital warts, gonorhea of the throat, AIDS. It's all really nauseating.
Keep in my that I was on good terms with many of them. I didn't condemn them at the time, and I don't now. I don't doubt that it's at least partially genetic in origin.
But nobody could survey the wreckage of their lives and not conclude that it is a genetic disease.
Walter
2003-02-11 06:30 | User Profile
The jews hate Raimondo that's good enough for me
This is classic counter insurgency stuff. I don't wish to reflect ill on the feisty poofter, but it is a very old practice for the authorities to ostentatiously brand some person or organization as subversive so as to take advantage of the pavlovian tendency to contrarianism that strongly inheres within us all . This person/organization may be a government plant or merely a sincere but innocuous dupe that serves the government's fell purpose of preventing the opposition from coalescing around a REAL AND EFFECTIVE leader/organization.