If the current administration wants to be able to say they are out to get all the terrorists, then they are going to have to go after the KKK and root them out as well. Any group with a history of viscious racism and violence fills the bill perfectly. As far as I’m concerned some of the Neo-Nazi groups qualify for prosecution as well.
I’m pretty sure that there is a segment of conservative voters whose ballots will be lost if the republicans go after the KKK. I’m curious if the current administration has the ostiones to do this.
An argument could certainly be made that the KKK was edging toward becoming a terrorist group in the early 1960s. (And I would say that the earlier version of the KKK from 1867? - 1872 was certainly a terrorist outfit.) The general description of the KKK from the 1910s through the 1960s, however, would be that of a group closely allied to power that used intimidation to enforce the (perceived) will of the majority. That does not match any good definition of terrorism. (It is evil, but it is not terrorism.)
Since the 1960s, the sporadic acts of violence that have been linked to the KKK have been widely separated incidents with no link to central planning or for a single purpose, usually involving a bunch of drunks who may have had their hatreds reinforced by their Klan association, but who were not actually plotting violence under the auspices of the Klan.
Until the Reagan era, the Klan would certainly not have been considered part of the general Republican electorate. Since the Reagan era, they may be found to have voted for more Republican than Democrat presidential candidates, but at the state and local levels, they are no more “Republican” than any other group. And, I’m afraid that their numbers are now so diminished that the idea that Republicans might withhold any action “in order to hold onto votes” is simply not realistic. Were I a Republican, I would certainly find the sufggestion insulting. As I am not a Republican, I simply find the notion wrong.
If the KKK was actively pursuing a campaign of terror in this country, I am quite sure that Reagan, Bush, Bush, and even Helms would support efforts to suppress it.
Maybe the difference is that the KKK are not anti-gvmnt, while the Islamic terrorists are anti-US. The KKK are against certain races and religions, which tend to be minorities in the USA. The terrorists are against ALL Americans.
Also, I don’t think the KKK publicly murders or harms anyone, or encourages murder. That only happens when their people are too extreme. Mainly, they demonstrate, protest affirmative action laws, and are peaceful, right? The terrorists encourage death and violence.
I see Zenster’s point, though. The KKK has actively killed people. Sure, they can say it was by renegade members who don’t represent the views of their group. But then that’s what the Islamic terrorist groups can say, also.
The Klan is not currently a terrorist group, since they don’t seem to commit many crimes. The Klan “leadership” takes great pains to insulate themselves from the violent racists.
And anyway, half of all Klan members are really FBI infiltrators. The Klan is pretty much impotent. Even racists look down on the Klan nowadays. There are some active hate groups out there who are still dangerous, but the Klan is simply a joke nowadays.
So, if the KKK is really so gutted as it seems, let’s move onto the Neo-Nazi movement.
How about them? They seem to espouse a murderous agenda. I know that their higher-ups also take pains to maintain plausible deniability when it comes to the violent actions of underlings. However, recent legal decisions were handed down against some of the white power groups finding them liable for violent acts by members of their organization who were not necessarily under immediate direction.
The instigation of violence that is carried out by others seems to be a hallmark of terrorist organizations. I fail to see any great distinction between the Neo-Nazis and other terror groups. Although there are free speech protections, advocacy of violence usually tends to nullify any legal protection for such organizations.
Well, we were working on the Aryan Brotherhood and a few of the other, similar outfits, but we ran into Randy Weaver’s family and the Feds have pretty well taken a much softer stance, since then. (Waco’s legacy figures into that, as well.)
With various Constitutional freedoms/rights (speech, assembly, bearing arms), we’ve got a bit of a hassle simply going in and busting them up.
The groups that have actively pursued violence have been targeted by the Feds. So far, however, the violence has amounted to bank and armored truck robberies and securities fraud. When they’ve been identified, they have been sought out (I don’t remember how successful the FBI has been).
As long as they are talking and not bombing, we are not likely to attack them. If bin Laden was all talk and no action, we wouldn’t be going after him, either (although that didn’t stop Reagan from going after Gaddhafi).
As much as I’d like to wish that our political parties have left racism behind them, Bush’s campaign speech at segregationist Bob Jones University puts the lie to that myth. Here are some excerpts from an article about the school;
"Bob Jones Sr. wrote that he believes in keeping the races separate because “God is the author of segregation.”
It was Bob Jones Jr. who compared Catholicism to a satanic cult. And it was the current president, Bob Jones III, who called then-Vice President George Bush “the devil.”
Only after 1975 court orders did the school admit nonwhite students. In 1983, a U.S. Supreme Court ruling stripped the school of its tax-exempt status, citing its discriminatory practices…
…Two years ago, the school made news when it informed a university graduate, now an ordained minister who had publicly acknowledged being gay, that he would be arrested for trespassing if he returned to campus."
Bush was a bit less than vocal about states removing the flag of the confederates from some of their state flags as well. For this reason, I have a difficult time believing that the Republican party has cleaned up its act to the degree that you insist they have.
My comment was specifically directed to the idea of the GOP avoiding offense by leaving the KKK alone. I had not intended any generalization to the idea that there was not a strong element of racism in the Republican Party. (However, you can find a lot of similar racism and homophobia among the rank and file of the AFL-CIO and other unions–that would generally be considered Democrat–whatever the higher-ups in the unions or the party might say or wish.)
If the KKK was out bombing churches again, I would be astonished if any Republican leader tried to protect them. It would be considered unseemly to use violence when the appropriate laws would suffice to keep undesirable people in their place.