NOTES — Think Progress: Former Bush officials rip Tea Parties: They/re “outrageous,” based on “fear and hatred,” bad for GOP. on CNN, Larry King discussed the growth of the Tea Parties and their effect on the Republican Party. While Nancy Pfotenhauer, a Republican strategist who has worked in the past for David Koch, the oil billionaire funding the top groups organizing the Tea Parties, praised the development as “phenomenal,” other Republicans were doubtful. David Frum, a speech writer in the Bush White House, and Scott McClellan, the former press secretary to Bush, decried the Tea Parties for their extreme views, like seeking to abolish Social Security. McClellan explained that the Tea Parties have “limited appeal” because they are simply a “divisive protest movement” that “plays too much to people’s fears and hatred.” [ READ MORE ]

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In God’s Country: The Patriot Movement and the Pacific Northwest ~ By: David A. Neiwert, a fourth-generation Idahoan who now lives in Seattle. A veteran, award-winning journalist, he has worked at newspapers in Idaho, Montana and Washington since 1977. He currently works as a writer-producer for MSNBC on the Internet. His work has appeared in Salon magazine, the Intelligence Report (SPLC), Montana Law Review, the Freedom Writer, and a host of regional and international publications. Editorial Reviews: Rather than simply demonizing or directing outrage at self-proclaimed “Patriot” and militia organizations — which is often the approach of those who oppose them — David Neiwert allows Patriot extremists to speak for themselves and largely on their own terms. His critical journalistic dialogue, placed in the context of the Northwest’s regional milieu, allows us to better understand the socioeconomic and philosophical/religious complexities of how and why these otherwise ordinary citizens have come to think the way they do. There is little question that strains of racism and paranoia characterize many of these people’s beliefs and behavior, but the Patriots — often blue-collar people, economically and socially challenged by changing times — are desperately responding to feelings of having been marginalized, and disenfranchised, from the American Dream. The saga of the Montana Freemen, explored here in detail for the first time, provides a framework for exploring the larger phenomenon of the movement throughout the four states — Montana, Idaho, Washington and Oregon — that comprise the Pacific Northwest. In presenting a broad overview of the movement and its history, Neiwert presents a case for maintaining a dialogue with Patriot believers, particularly the average people next door who so often are its recruits — and for meeting the challenge the movement presents by addressing the root issues of rural decay. [ Read ALL Reviews ]

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   Columnist – John Sammon
Racists believe that God is a white man who looks like John Wayne.

But is he?

Is God white? In all the art over the centuries, including his representation on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, he is portrayed as white, in the case of Michelangelo’s masterpiece, a grey-bearded, fierce-looking giant floating on a cloud.

If God is truly a Caucasian, then racists and Southern Confederate fundamentalist Christians can take delusional heart thinking that they were created in God’s image, and thus are better than people of color. If you look like God and somebody else doesn’t, you must be better. Feeling better than someone else is important to a racist. Very important.

But is God white?

Adam was white according again to representational art. God created Adam. It follows logic that God would create the first man patterned on what God himself looked like. If God is white, and if God is a man.

It begs the question. If God is white and a man and created Adam in his own image, why did he (God) branch out and create so many other people who look very different ie. Africans, Indians, Eskimos, and so on? There are only two possible possibilities. Either God wanted to create non-God-looking people for his creation so Adam’s descendants could feel superior to them (you don’t look like God, I do). In other words, to promote racism. Or, he was dissatisfied with his look-alike doll, and created other types of people in a desperate attempt to find the right mold.

In that case, people of color could feel superior to whites. God didn’t like you. I’m Plan B.

All of this of course ignores the fact that science has proven that the first walking-upright ape-like creatures originated in the gorges of East Africa eons ago in pre-history. It’s always entertaining to see the reaction of religious zealot fundamentalists to the possibility that God looks like this first ape-like hominid.

That begs another question. Does God have to look like Charlton Heston? Very few people questioned would say that he in fact looks like Tiger Woods. Very few would disagree that God has to look impressive, and powerful. And white. No one has ever portrayed God looking like Woody Allen.

But what about women?

They got a bad rap. First of all, God created Eve for Adam, and then kicked them out of the garden because Eve listened to a snake and picked an apple. I mean, I need to eat something big guy. Excuse me for living.

God made a woman the same color as Adam. No one has ever suggested God created Adam and then gave him a black Eve, a mixed-race union. Adam swinging with a black chick? That would have been way too liberal and progressive for the Old Testament.

If, according to the New Testament, Jesus is the son of God, then God must be a man who looks something like Jesus, according once again to artwork, a pale-skinned, bearded Jewish man of the First Century who must have carried an ad-mixture of black blood in his veins. The Levant-area of that time was a polyglot meeting place of cultures and a mixture bowl of races through tribal interbreeding, trade route swaps and other contacts (exchanging your daughter for a prize goat).

This fact has always been a distinct disappointment to pink-skinned Nazis and Klansmen. To them, God looks better like John Wayne. Somebody you can either be impressed with, or afraid of.

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AP: BRANDENBURG, Ky. – A Kentucky-based Ku Klux Klan group was ordered on Friday to pay $2.5 million in damages in a judgment that civil rights attorneys hope will bankrupt the chapter.

The Southern Poverty Law Center sued the nation’s second-largest Klan outfit on behalf of a Latino teen severely beaten in 2006 by two Klan members. The Klansmen were convicted and served two years in prison.

A jury on Friday ordered Imperial Klans of America grand wizard Ron Edwards and two former lieutenants to pay 19-year-old Jordan Gruver $1.5 million for lost wages and medical expenses and Edwards to pay $1 million in punitive damages.

“I’m overwhelmed. I’m victorious,” Gruver said. “And, I’m also sad. I’m sad because those guys are still going to be the same way that they were. That will never change.”

Morris Dees, the lead attorney for the center, said after the verdict he plans to seize Edwards’ property in Dawson Springs that serves as Klan headquarters along with any other assets that can be found. It wasn’t clear what the property is worth.

Click PICS To Enlarge THE VICTIM Jordan Gruver KKK Criminal Andrew Watkins KKK Criminal Jarred Hensley Imperial Klans T-Shirt The GRAND WIZARD — KKK Criminal Ron Edwards

Earlier, in his closing statement, Dees told jurors that a substantial financial award would stop the Kentucky-based group in its tracks.

“It’s all about the money. It’s all about the money,” said Morris Dees. “If you stop the money, you’ll cut the organization off.”

The heavily tattooed Edwards plans to appeal the verdict. Despite the judgment, Edwards said the KKK will remain active.

“We’re not going away,” Edwards said.

Dees had argued during the civil trial that Edwards’ group incited violence against minorities with racist speeches and “hate metal,” leading to the attack on Gruver. Edwards, who represented himself during the trial, denied the charge and said his group’s not generally violent.

The case was similar to nearly a dozen others brought by the center against hate groups. A similar lawsuit bankrupted the white supremacist group Aryan Nations in Idaho in 1999.

The trial centered on a beating Gruver suffered at the hands of former Klan lieutenants Jarred Hensley and Andrew Watkins. Gruver suffered a broken jaw, bruised ribs and permanent nerve damage to his left arm.

The jury ordered Edwards to pay 20 percent of the compensatory damages, while splitting the remaining 80 percent evenly between Hensley and Watkins. The jury laid the $1 million in punitive damages solely on Edwards. Hensley, who had also represented himself, left the courthouse without commenting.

Watkins reached a confidential settlement with Gruver before the trial that will account for his share of Friday’s judgment.

Jurors deliberated for nearly six-and-a-half hours after a three-day trial at the Meade County Courthouse. As Meade Circuit Judge Bruce Butler read the verdicts, several skinheads in the courtroom shook their heads and looked down.

The judgment against Edwards and Hensley is active for 15 years, giving Gruver and the center time to pursue assets, Dees said.

“No matter what he gets, we’ll get a piece of it,” Dees said.

Gruver, who testified earlier Friday about having nightmares and the extent of his injuries, celebrated the verdict by hugging his mother, Cindy. He then joined his family and left the courthouse under heavy security into a cold rain.

References:

1. CNN: Jury awards $2.5 million to teen beaten by Klan members