I printed out the FBI "Megiddo" report, and just finished reading it. I would have to say, upon reflection, that there may be some kind of tenuous continuity between what I would consider right-wing, and groups like Aryan Nation, Posse Comitatus, and Christian Identity.
My husband and I attended the inauguration ceremonies for Republican Governor of Virginia Jim Gilmore in 1998. I talked my husband into attending the prayer breakfast with me because I usually find them interesting. I have posted before, on several occasions, that I believe that religion and government should be kept separate. Of course, many don't believe that, and it's usually amusing to see the pieties marshalled on behalf of an imagined nexus between church and state. This time I was more appalled than amused. I don't have the name of the fellow, and I've looked in my Inauguration Ceremony booklet, and he's not listed, but he is a preacher, or minister, and he talked about how America is an experiment by God to demonstrate the efficacy of His ideas about government. I am paraphrasing, from a faulty memory, here. That America is better than the rest of the world because America was chosen by God, and the rest of the world wasn't. That the Founding Fathers wanted this to be a Christian Nation, and that the government should be on Christian principles. That type of thing. Us versus them. Christian versus non-Christian. Condemnation of People for the American Way, and condemnation of secular humanism in general.
Well, I am not dumb. I know code when I hear it. It's just a hop, skip and a jump to John Birch, and from there just a stone's throw from Christian Identity, and all that. The belief shades without any effort into white versus non-white, and demonization of Jews and other "mud people", rejection of the United Nations and the New World Order, the Bilderburgers and the Trilateral Commission. So, even though they aren't what I would term right-wing, they share things in common with the right-wing.
The belief that government is, or can be, the enemy. Hatred for environmental laws that prohibit property owners from doing what they want with their property. Fear that government will abolish the Christian religion. Stuff like that.
I should point out that Gilmore, himself, is not a racist. I don't think he actually enjoyed the speech, really, either. The church that he and his wife attend in Richmond is majority black, with a black preacher, and after the minister spoke, the choir, mostly black, from that church sang, and Gilmore did seem to enjoy that quite a bit. |
