Esquire: Letters of Tim McVeigh were Cheerful, Articulate | NowPublic News Coverage

Esquire: Letters of Tim McVeigh were Cheerful, Articulate | NowPublic News Coverage

Esquire Magazine journalist Phil Bacharach revisits his time interviewing Oklahoma Federal building bomber Timothy McVeigh, and the packet of letters he received from the terrorist in 1996.

• MSNBC's Maddow to air audiotapes of McVeigh April 19
• Clinton parallels current mood with pre-OK bombing one 

McVeigh, in person, and in his letters,  appears intelligent, charming, cheerful,  articulate,  and without any sense of remorse:  

26 NOV 96

Phil,

After reading your most recent article, I am tempted to use it as a springboard to start correcting some of those "myths" that you mention. In the interest of brevity (and fearing the wrath of my attorneys), however, I will stick to a single issue.

I commend you for your excellent recall and your absolute fairness. (Now I know why you can't get a job at The Washington Post.) Your notes on one point, though, are slightly inaccurate. You quote me as saying that the FBI are "wizards at PR." What I actually said is that they are wizards of propaganda--which Webster's defenes as "information or ideas methodically spread to promote or injure a cause." This is where I drew the parallel between the FBI's efforts in my case, and those at Waco.

Source: esquire.com

Bacharach tells of his surprise at the way McVeigh greeted him with a warm smile and a boyish laugh, a polite handshake, and joked about Oklahoma media and New York winters.   He looked forward to watching Seinfeld episodes,  joked about being moved to a better section of the prison, which had lots of cable TV stations ("so many movies, so little time") ,  and fussed over what negative things the media might say about him, that would mar his image.  

  When Terry Nichols was brought into the prison, he cheerfully informs the journalist, like a businessman talking about one of his associates ("Oh,  Terry Nichols arrived today.").  In short,  anyone who imagined a dark, brooding, half-insane character,  can let go of that illusion altogether.  

Indeed, this is a young man who went to his death,  by all reports,  happily.  He had the personality of a soldier, with the congenial aloofness and business-like attitude to "what had to be done".  He clucked over the media making so much of "The Turner Diaries", and to all intents and purposes,  it is difficult to find anything -  other than his crime  -  which is in any way "off"  about him.  

On the Delaware Criminal Justice Council Terrorism Research page,  it is stated clearly that "terrorism is not an irrational act....it is a political act, with political targets, and the terrorist is not acting from personal desires or ambitions".  This ought to be clear to anyone who really probes terrorism.  It is an act of war.  

However, it differs greatly from traditional warfare,  because those who are killed do not matter, in the sense of being enemies.  Their must be casualties in order to make known the power and the determination of the terrorist.  

Anti-Immigration reform rally in downtown LA sparks clashes, arrests

Image via Wikipedia

White Supremacist Group rallying against illegal immigration clashes with counter-protesters in downtown Los Angeles

In downtown Los Angeles Saturday  hundreds of counter-protesters gathered to shout  down a white supremacist group which was rallying against illegal immigration,  and resulted in a chaos which led to police in riot gear making several arrests.  It was reported that rocks were also thrown in the clashes.  

On the south lawn of Los Angeles' City Hall, where some 50 members of the National Socialist Movement waved American flags and swastika banners for about an hour,  police had to stand between the group and the counter-group which shouted protests.

The white supremacists, many of them wearing flack helmets and black military fatigue uniforms, shouted "Sieg Heil" before each of their speakers took the podium to taunt counter-protesters with racial, anti-Semitic and misogynistic epithets.

"We will meet you head on," one of the white supremacists, whose name could not be made out over the fuzzy public address system, warned the crowd from behind several phalanxes of police in riot gear.

Source: google.com

Fearing Obama and Amnesty 

This sort of incident may be viewed by some as in keeping with the reports -  by the Southern Poverty Law Center, and the Department of Homeland Security  -  of the rise of right wing extremist groups and protests which may spark acts of domestic terrorism.   Indeed, the FBI has been on heightened alert for such incidents or catalysts for them in recent months. 

Some right wing groups have a considerable fear of Obama's alleged plans for immigration reform. 

The Supremacist group is reported to be  Detroit-based,  and picked downtown LA  for their rally because of its notorious and expansive immigrant population. Accusations of jobs theft and illegal activities were aimed at the immigrants.   The National Socialist movement also said they are alarmed at the call for amnesty for illegal immigrants,  which they see as increasing under the Obama administration.  

Regional director Jeffrey Russell Hall announced that the group plans to back only those political candidates who agree with their anti-immigrant ideology.  

But much of the white supremacists' words were drowned out by such chants as "Hey hey, ho ho, Nazi scum have got to go" from the larger crowd of about 500 counter-protesters who held signs that read "Nazis: Get Out of Los Angeles" and "Racists Are Ignorant."

Source: google.com

National Lawyers Guild executive director James Lafferty attended both as a legal observer and counter-protester, and reported to the Associated Press that  he witnessed members of the throng begin to fight a man when they saw his Nazi tattoos.  Some NSP members attempted to jump-start a stalled vehicle, and had to shield themselves as counter-demonstrators hurled rocks and debris toward them. One shirtless man was reported to be bleeding as he was led away. 

Police say it items were hurled at the NSP members by the counter-protesters.