Geiger writes:
That's right Phil you can sleep better now that all the evil millitia have been distroyed. I'm sure you woun't mind when the Constitution is gone too. Nothing to worry about after all you have Bill Clinton and his buddies to make sure your safe. They said they would and they would never lie.
Well I supose there is the possibility your lot might see sense and ask to be readmitted to the British Empire but its by no means clear you would be re-admitted. And there would have to be reparitions for all that confiscated British property being used without compensation...
I'm sure if you were in Germany during the 30's that you would have thought the "Jewish Solution" was a good thing after all the government said it was.
McVeigh is the racist extreemist who has committed mass murder in this case, not the government. While I would welcome it if you joined me in condeming US sponsored terorism during the cold war I don't think you are willing to do so.
That's ok Phil 1 little white boy will fry in the electric chair. But just maybe your children will never have to know what it's like to live under a Hitler or a Stalin because there are some in this country who are willing to standup to the STATEST in DC who if given the chance will enslave us all.
But this threat does not come from the state, it comes from those like McVeigh who will murder children to further their agenda. The militias have not rejected the concept of a state, far from it they claim ownership of it, they claim that they have the right to dispense law, they claim the right to murder those who disagree with them. Their ideology is at root that of Musollini's fascists. It is surprising to find that you are so willing to be an open appologist for McVeigh's crime but in answer to your point: No children are going to grow up in a better world because of McVeigh or any of his followers, many will not grow up at all because he murdered them. Phill
Phill writes:
McVeigh is the racist extreemist who has committed mass murder in this case, not the government. While I would welcome it if you joined me in condeming US sponsored terorism during the cold war I don't think you are willing to do so.
No government can afford to behave in a way that outrages large numbers of citizen-units, and provokes action on the part of the less mentally stable ones. Janet Reno sealed the fate of the federal building on the day that she took action which resulted in numerous children being incinerated, just so she could win a dicksizing contest with a religious extremist.
But this threat does not come from the state, it comes from those like McVeigh who will murder children to further their agenda.
I worry a lot more about the behavior of the United States, the nation that never apologizes, the arms merchant to the world, five percent of the population of the world that thinks it has the Manifest Destiny to dictate to the other ninety five percent, than I worry about whether such behavior inspired little Timmy McVeigh and others of his ilk to set off a truck bomb. I think the odds are about 50/50 between McVeigh being the bomber, and McVeigh being the first anti-government extremist sap the Feds tripped over after their precious building blew up. It's not as if we have the ability to make that distinction given coerced testimony from friends, planned leaks, and invented testimony from the FBI crime lab, all of which could have been easily manufactured for an arbitrary suspect. Maybe McVeigh blew up the building, and maybe he didn't. Like the Kennedy assassination, the official version of the facts is now all that exists.
It is surprising to find that you are so willing to be an open appologist for McVeigh's crime but in answer to your point: No children are going to grow up in a better world because of McVeigh or any of his followers, many will not grow up at all because he murdered them.
Along with many Vietnamese children, Granadian children, Panamanian children, and Quadaffi's baby. At least in Oklahoma city, we didn't have marines bulldozing the bodies of dead civilians into trenches to make everything neat and tidy before the press arrived. Yes, Oklahoma city was unfortunate. It was not remarkable or unexpected. If the government deliberately kills Tim Mcveigh, it will not bring back a single dead person. It will just demonstrate that we have a government that deliberately kills people. But then, we knew that already, didn't we? -- Mike Duvos $ PGP 2.6 Public Key available $ mpd@netcom.com $ via Finger. $
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- At 05:56 PM 6/3/97 -0400, Hallam-Baker wrote:
It is surprising to find that you are so willing to be an open appologist for McVeigh's crime but in answer to your point: No children are going to grow up in a better world because of McVeigh or any of his followers, many will not grow up at all because he murdered them.
Give us a break. Governments murdered 170megs of people this century. Tim was a piker. The Federales murdered over 300 at Wounded Knee alone. Sure Tim was not too bright and had some unfortunate ideas but he didn't do anything that the U.S. government didn't do all the time. DCF -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 5.0 beta Charset: noconv iQCVAwUBM5TgFIVO4r4sgSPhAQEQaQP/ViBFOeYYPosJ5h1C3GszUcwz/CHwGLWC ce2AcalxAtvPBsX0LEouQMVibxHl33wEhCdyQCySNCIswqna7bLgFbumN54WH1XN o4XEFcSE8kJBX/G7XQUVCIfh+kheaOd+Oiknlpe7L9MdcQ0vNPzPldMvNmdM76rT dGdlh4AHw5U= =3dSU -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- At 05:56 PM 6/3/97 -0400, Hallam-Baker wrote:
It is surprising to find that you are so willing to be an open appologist for McVeigh's crime but in answer to your point: No children are going to grow up in a better world because of McVeigh or any of his followers, many will not grow up at all because he murdered them.
Circa 1974, I was sitting in my law school lounge watching "The Charge of the Light Brigade" starring Errol Flynn on TV. There was a group of other students there. Then came the line from the film: "Men, we're going to show these Turks that you can't murder innocent women and children and live to boast about it (a British garrison had been attacked, which led to the Charge). I immediately piped up, "That's funny, George McGovern did!" McGovern, George -- Bomber pilot in WWII, "peace" candidate for President of the United States in 1972. Lots of baby killers out there in the strangest places. As to the Children of OKC, people who turn the care of their children over to government employees or contractors do not place too high a value on those children. DCF -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 5.0 beta Charset: noconv iQCVAwUBM5TkgIVO4r4sgSPhAQHyvgP6AgE7S5qzos7kJa4E61MNP8KEhH4PD7jC IW0aNPVVclLEx1638uhSzICzzoEM0w/6debi2FBjDcSN3mtu7JLVhaC5pHvJiDei r6rBJqeMdSZ8YVj3v0+wzD5ZJf4g40k9rvSoUBtGtCzlEFio4HR3R4L9OQ9JiG34 EdhtSiYxNWQ= =ARIV -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
frissell@panix.com writes:
Circa 1974, I was sitting in my law school lounge watching "The Charge of the Light Brigade" starring Errol Flynn on TV. There was a group of other students there. Then came the line from the film: "Men, we're going to show these Turks that you can't murder innocent women and children and live to boast about it (a British garrison had been attacked, which led to the Charge). I immediately piped up, "That's funny, George McGovern did!"
I haven't seen the movie, but my recollection is that in real life the British were attacking the Russians. See, the Turks were killing Xians in the Balkans, and the Russians foolishly tried to protect them, and the British stepped in to protect the Turks. Maybe they changed it all in the movie version (can't expect U.S. moviegoers to follow 19th century politics). --- Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps
Mike Duvos wrote:
No government can afford to behave in a way that outrages large numbers of citizen-units, and provokes action on the part of the less mentally stable ones. Janet Reno sealed the fate of the federal building on the day that she took action which resulted in numerous children being incinerated, just so she could win a dicksizing contest with a religious extremist.
Crap. The kids were murdered by Koresh who had the compound set alight. I've gone over the videos we made live off CNN. There is absolutely no doubt that the fire started in multiple places. If you are going to mouth off conspiracy theories at least make them credible. If a group of people shoot anyone approaching them for any reason whatsoever the police have an absolute need to investigate. There was nothing else the authorities could have done except prevent Koresh from accumulating the arms in the first place. The FBI bungled the seige baddly but thats why Freeh is currently in charge of the FBI. Phill
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
The kids were murdered by Koresh who had the compound set alight. I've gone over the videos we made live off CNN. There is absolutely no doubt that the fire started in multiple places.
Spoken like a man who *hasn't* seen the FLIRT (Forward Looking InfraRed Television) tapes that show the characteristic signatures of ingoing automatic weapons fire. Even the Washington Post was "troubled." Spoken like a man who thinks that if some Federal Government somewhere tries to knock buildings down with tanks and releases massive quantities of tear gas (admitted by the Federales), it has absolutely no responsibility whatsoever for whatever follows. It was just an innocent bystander. All this after an armed assault on a private dwelling. I'll have to try that some time with the Jacob K. Javits Federal Office building in lower Manhatten. I know I can count on you to defend me by saying that even though I hit the place with 20 or 30 heavily-armed troopies and then knocked a few walls down with tanks and filled the building with tear gas, nothing that happened there was my fault. Gee! Too bad about those Jews. They accidently wandered out into the middle of Poland and committed suicide all 6 million of them. Religious fanaticism can be dangerous.
If a group of people shoot anyone approaching them for any reason whatsoever the police have an absolute need to investigate.
So who did they shoot in advance of the BATF attack?
There was nothing else the authorities could have done except prevent Koresh from accumulating the arms in the first place.
There are currently hundreds of "compounds" (probably thousands) in America that have more firearms and people than existed at Mt. Carmel (80 people. One gun per person). There are millions of households in America (some on this list) that have *many* more guns per person (20x) than the residents of Koresh's religious community had. The Feds could have done in 1993 what they've done since (Koresh wasn't the only one who got burned there) and LEAVE PEACEFUL PEOPLE ALONE. We pay them to be PEACE officers not WAR officers. WAR officers we reserve for foreigners (and Hispanic teenagers herding their goats on their own land and plinking with DANGEROUS .22 assault rifles too near the Mexican border). DCF -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 5.0 beta Charset: noconv iQCVAwUBM5XW9IVO4r4sgSPhAQFBVAP+LdVs5CHD5WPlvd8PNg3LLMjmQkJ2Ad+c 3pS6KqKj/KWF+j3EqjzqgGXlL6SqndrdaSEXJv52ZXo0Rm6qm2xB55U/b7CvG4oV 4f/uvSKZZcWV8+gNqQ0Vm35U4JuGtWhDqP1puO3EdlHmQfEyCbZ8Tnb4mTrz7Kwx HGXBlmCsJbQ= =uvqY -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
Spoken like a man who thinks that if some Federal Government somewhere tries to knock buildings down with tanks and releases massive quantities of tear gas (admitted by the Federales), it has absolutely no responsibility whatsoever for whatever follows. It was just an innocent bystander. All this after an armed assault on a private dwelling.
Give it a rest. The people inside had already murdered several BATF agents. They had every opportunity to release the children and allow them to get to safety. They had every opportunity to surrender. Since you clearly intend from your earlier posts for "whatever follows" to mean McVeighs murder of 167 people in Oaklahoma clearly it does not. The US police may be incompetent and corrupt but that does not excuse the Oaklahoma bombing nor does it in any way lessen the responsibility of McVeigh and those who encouraged him.
I'll have to try that some time with the Jacob K. Javits Federal Office building in lower Manhatten. I know I can count on you to defend me by saying that even though I hit the place with 20 or 30 heavily-armed troopies and then knocked a few walls down with tanks and filled the building with tear gas, nothing that happened there was my fault.
If you have a duly authorised warrant from a court, the inhabitants have shot at people from inside the building and you give them two months to surrender, sure go for it. Only I think that the SAS is probably better experienced.
The Feds could have done in 1993 what they've done since (Koresh wasn't the only one who got burned there) and LEAVE PEACEFUL PEOPLE ALONE.
yeah peacefull types whose response to a visit from the police was to lie in ambush and shoot at them with automatic weapons. So are you suggesting that the police ignore the complaints of illegal ownership of firearms and child abuse? And in any case the point is that Waco does not absolve McVeigh and the militias for the blame for Oaklahoma. Phill
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- In <199706042113.RAA15819@muesli.ai.mit.edu>, on 06/04/97 at 05:13 PM, Hallam-Baker <hallam@ai.mit.edu> said:
Spoken like a man who thinks that if some Federal Government somewhere tries to knock buildings down with tanks and releases massive quantities of tear gas (admitted by the Federales), it has absolutely no responsibility whatsoever for whatever follows. It was just an innocent bystander. All this after an armed assault on a private dwelling.
Give it a rest. The people inside had already murdered several BATF agents. They had every opportunity to release the children and allow them to get to safety. They had every opportunity to surrender.
Since you clearly intend from your earlier posts for "whatever follows" to mean McVeighs murder of 167 people in Oaklahoma clearly it does not.
The US police may be incompetent and corrupt but that does not excuse the Oaklahoma bombing nor does it in any way lessen the responsibility of McVeigh and those who encouraged him.
I'll have to try that some time with the Jacob K. Javits Federal Office building in lower Manhatten. I know I can count on you to defend me by saying that even though I hit the place with 20 or 30 heavily-armed troopies and then knocked a few walls down with tanks and filled the building with tear gas, nothing that happened there was my fault.
If you have a duly authorised warrant from a court, the inhabitants have shot at people from inside the building and you give them two months to surrender, sure go for it.
Only I think that the SAS is probably better experienced.
The Feds could have done in 1993 what they've done since (Koresh wasn't the only one who got burned there) and LEAVE PEACEFUL PEOPLE ALONE.
yeah peacefull types whose response to a visit from the police was to lie in ambush and shoot at them with automatic weapons.
So are you suggesting that the police ignore the complaints of illegal ownership of firearms and child abuse?
And in any case the point is that Waco does not absolve McVeigh and the militias for the blame for Oaklahoma.
Phill
- -- - --------------------------------------------------------------- William H. Geiger III http://www.amaranth.com/~whgiii Geiger Consulting Cooking With Warp 4.0 Author of E-Secure - PGP Front End for MR/2 Ice PGP & MR/2 the only way for secure e-mail. OS/2 PGP 2.6.3a at: http://www.amaranth.com/~whgiii/pgpmr2.html - --------------------------------------------------------------- -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3a Charset: cp850 Comment: Registered_User_E-Secure_v1.1b1_ES000000 iQCVAwUBM5XoMo9Co1n+aLhhAQEkJgP+N2qUEjScW4G47KitMdrLWSU2Ta0bKmwE mD+lovhykc0V6wh+2di53QZZb4M5gaNuKXgzg/x//gunb1Wwbtk6UO0cianKteNJ egHHQ/DwBrJ7OqaAtqOidhYQ0yOLhIneMOcotLsMV2Yv/OYSawqAzq+jYKZ9oWRD lf7OIKcrZNA= =M1d1 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- In <199706042113.RAA15819@muesli.ai.mit.edu>, on 06/04/97 at 05:13 PM, Hallam-Baker <hallam@ai.mit.edu> said:
The Feds could have done in 1993 what they've done since (Koresh wasn't the only one who got burned there) and LEAVE PEACEFUL PEOPLE ALONE.
yeah peacefull types whose response to a visit from the police was to lie in ambush and shoot at them with automatic weapons.
First off they did not lie in wait for anyone. They were in their home not bothering anyone. You make it seem like they were in the bushes on the side of the road and ambushed a peasefull group of BATF agents on their way to a sunday picnic. The local police had been out to the Waco compound several times without incedent. There was no reason to suspect that another vist would have gone any different. Instead the BATF went in there like an invading army with guns blazing and rightfully got their asses handed to them.
So are you suggesting that the police ignore the complaints of illegal ownership of firearms and child abuse?
Last time I looked (horror of horrors) guns are still *LEGAL* in this country. As far as child abuse there was no evidence of this other than the word of 1 disgruntaled former member of their group. Even if the *local* police felt that this complaint warented investigation all that was called for was a vist by a Human Services Case Worker not a military invasion. All this aside I guess you feel that the Feds should be able to wage military campains against its citizens just on unsbstantiated rummors. Gee where did I put that quarter? Perhaps I should call the BATF and give them YOUR address. It would be intresting to see how much you love their gestopo tatics when it's your house being riddled with bullets. - -- - --------------------------------------------------------------- William H. Geiger III http://www.amaranth.com/~whgiii Geiger Consulting Cooking With Warp 4.0 Author of E-Secure - PGP Front End for MR/2 Ice PGP & MR/2 the only way for secure e-mail. OS/2 PGP 2.6.3a at: http://www.amaranth.com/~whgiii/pgpmr2.html - --------------------------------------------------------------- -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.3a Charset: cp850 Comment: Registered_User_E-Secure_v1.1b1_ES000000 iQCVAwUBM5XrMo9Co1n+aLhhAQEafwP/SOu/2I3Ut/LVyUd4gorkxWi/Rs0HtUCB T8hTUq2GmI4TSkFVSUu4MtkwQr3Um0GvX/nGHCiQe6rEdqTUzEvX+mwQtVHe2ESz risBlq9vTg2cnvxyRLXmvPVRK4B1VUv7PaELZBFfCxwDpA4F8hrv940ZdFxSEIpm UMXmAzOUzR4= =UIg8 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
On Wed, 4 Jun 1997, Hallam-Baker wrote:
Give it a rest. The people inside had already murdered several BATF agents. They had every opportunity to release the children and allow them to get to safety. They had every opportunity to surrender.
Surrender to whom? To those that had fired upon their church when first approaching? Remember, the ATF fired *first*. [The ATF claimed they opened fire when they were shot at through the wooden front door from inside the church. The front door was made of solid steel. After burning all the worshippers inside, the ATF removed the front door and stored it in an evidence room. The door is listed on the evidence log. That's the last time anyone other than the feds has seen the door. When the survivers wanted to present the door in court to prove that the only bullet holes were from shots fired from the outside (the ATF), the door had vanished into thin air. To this day, the steel door can not be found.]
Since its clear that the McVeigh appologists are simply repeating arguments from alt.conspiracy I don't think theres much point continuing the thread. There is absolutely nothing that anyone did that justified McVeigh's murder of the kids in the daycare center or anyone else. Frissel, Gieger and co are simply trying to distract attention from that fact. Hell, if we were to take them seriously they would have to all be FBI agents attempting to entrap the unwary... Phill PS: Could the FBI agent monitoring the list tell us where to send in evidence in connection with the Bell case?
Hallam-Baker <hallam@ai.mit.edu> writes:
Only I think that the SAS is probably better experienced.
The Feds could have done in 1993 what they've done since (Koresh wasn't the only one who got burned there) and LEAVE PEACEFUL PEOPLE ALONE.
yeah peacefull types whose response to a visit from the police was to lie in ambush and shoot at them with automatic weapons.
So are you suggesting that the police ignore the complaints of illegal ownership of firearms and child abuse?
Tens of highly armed ninjas running at ones property does not constitute a "visit." More like an "attack." If the ATF agents had been neighbors of the Davidains, then the Davidians would have been well within thier rights to shoot them down. The proper thing to do would be to walk up and knock on the door. The local sherrif suggested that percise action. However, the unassailable feds in their ivory towers couldn't be bothered to ask any local officials before the raid. HTH, Jer "standing on top of the world/ never knew how you never could/ never knew why you never could live/ innocent life that everyone did" -Wormhole
(I didn't start this Koresh/Waco thread...I'm just renaming it from "McVeigh" to something more germane to the points.) At 6:39 PM -0700 6/4/97, Jeremiah A Blatz wrote:
The proper thing to do would be to walk up and knock on the door. The local sherrif suggested that percise action. However, the unassailable feds in their ivory towers couldn't be bothered to ask any local officials before the raid.
As is well known, the Sheriff also said that Koresh had been pleasant to him on a couple of other visits (of the knock on the door type, not the Nomex-clad ninjas sneaking up on all sides with asault rifles at the ready). The Sheriff also said Koresh could have been picked up on any of his trips into Waco, or on any of his morning jogs around the property and nearby roads. For this honesty, the Sheriff elected to resign. Oh, and the reason the Davidians knew about the raiders planning an assault was because some local reporters were talking about it, and someone who overheard them called Koresh to warn him that something big was about to happen. You see, the media and their cameras had been called in to film this propaganda event, this public relations shot in the arm for the beleagured BATF. Shot in the arm indeed. And in the head, And in the kidney. And shot by their own side, from all indications once the "commence fire" command was given. I don't know whether Koresh started the fire, or the tanks started the fire, or the tear gas grenades started the fire, or the automatic weapons fire started the fire. What I know is that a paramilitary assault, complete with tanks and Blackhawk choppers was launched against a private residence for the alleged crimes of having too many weapons (in Texas? gimme a break) and of an allegation of child abuse. That Koresh was not picked up under the circumstances described above, and that the media was invited in to help film the recruting film, tells us that the affair was not about what the BATF and FBI claim it was about. Why is it so radical to ask that a criminal trial be held for those responsible, and all participants, and that the appropriate penalties be meted out if any of those charged are found guilty? Texas is very liberal with the lethal injections, so what's the big deal about having a trial and giving the needle to a dozen or so of the BATF leaders? I imagine that some of those brought to trial might receive lesser sentences, maybe even no punishment at all if they could convince their jury they were "just following orders." I can also imagine some might receive fairly light prison terms, of a few years or less. (Of course, some of them might then face another fate in prison.) But the level of criminality and malfeasance show suggest to me that at least 4 of the Waco raiders and their bosses, maybe 5, would get the death penalty. Sounds fair to me. --Tim May There's something wrong when I'm a felon under an increasing number of laws. Only one response to the key grabbers is warranted: "Death to Tyrants!" ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^1398269 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."
Tim May wrote:
Why is it so radical to ask that a criminal trial be held for those responsible, and all participants, and that the appropriate penalties be meted out if any of those charged are found guilty? Texas is very liberal with the lethal injections, so what's the big deal about having a trial and giving the needle to a dozen or so of the BATF leaders?
You're forgetting that guilt is decided by the DA when he brings the case, not by the jury. After all, if the accused wasn't guilty, he wouldn't have been charged, right? -- What is appropriate for the master is not appropriate| Tom Weinstein for the novice. You must understand Tao before | tomw@netscape.com transcending structure. -- The Tao of Programming |
Give it a rest. The people inside had already murdered several BATF agents. They had every opportunity to release the children and allow them to get to safety. They had every opportunity to surrender.
The acts were not of murder, the compound inhabitants were simply acting in response to the BATF agents actions of trespass, of course they had opportunity to surrender, so did the jews in nazi Germany.
The US police may be incompetent and corrupt but that does not excuse the Oaklahoma bombing nor does it in any way lessen the responsibility of McVeigh and those who encouraged him.
For once I agree, but on a trivial and unimportant point. Further those who encouraged him may be responsible, but are not guilty of any crime.
If you have a duly authorised warrant from a court, the inhabitants have shot at people from inside the building and you give them two months to surrender, sure go for it.
If the people they shot at were trespassing on their land they have done nothing wrong. If I come to your front door and give you 2 months to surrender your house to me, I think I can predict your reaction.
yeah peacefull types whose response to a visit from the police was to lie in ambush and shoot at them with automatic weapons.
Quite so, the police are agressors by trespassing on their land they commited an initiation of agression. Don`t give me this "reasonable force" bullshit either.
So are you suggesting that the police ignore the complaints of illegal ownership of firearms and child abuse?
Yes, illegal ownership of firearms is an oxymoron, no weapons should be illegal. As for the child abuse, that is a thornier subject, but the police had no right to be there.
And in any case the point is that Waco does not absolve McVeigh and the militias for the blame for Oaklahoma.
No, but it doesn`t change the fact that no-one is supporting McVeighs agressive act against the children in that building. There are many sides to this case, it is not just a black and white case, there are a lot of angles one can analyse and judge it from. Datacomms Technologies data security Paul Bradley, Paul@fatmans.demon.co.uk Paul@crypto.uk.eu.org, Paul@cryptography.uk.eu.org Http://www.cryptography.home.ml.org/ Email for PGP public key, ID: FC76DA85 "Don`t forget to mount a scratch monkey"
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Phil, Look, I know you're somewhat anti-private guns and somewhat anti-Right Wing Nuts. I can understand all that. I'm somewhat anti-government guns and somewhat anti-Left Wing Nuts myself. So don't take the word of right wing nuts on WACO. Pay attention to former Attorney General Ramsey Clark as he sues the Feds on behalf of the survivors. Or read the review of the new documentary WACO: THE RULES OF ENGAGEMENT which premiered at Sundance. http://www.waco93.com/ http://www.waco93.com/sfbgreview.htm San Francisco Bay Guardian March 12, 1997 (SF's Alternative Weekly) Rewinding Waco New doc Waco turns heads, hearts. By Susan Gerhard "I've always voted Democrat," William Gazecki, director of crowd-displeaser Waco: The Rules of Engagement, told me over the phone last week. "But at this point, all the lines are crossing in my mind." Ours, too. One of the most achingly sad documentaries I can remember, Gazecki's film sounds, on paper, more like a morning with Rush Limbaugh than like an evening screening at the Roxie (where it got its first theatrical run, last week). In Waco's world the gun "nuts" are sane, the conservatives are honest, the liberals are pigs, the children are in danger. The doc left even slackers in Roxie's rep house stunned, their ideologies scrambled and their consciences scarred by a slow-motion,two-hour-plus replay of the slaughter of a peaceful sect. How can a jury look at the Rodney King videotape and not see a police beating? The same way the American people can look at the Waco inferno and see a mass suicide. A radical reframing suited up in pin-striped documentary garb, The Rules of Engagement mixes footage that's already been heavily digested by interested parties: Waco in flames, forward- looking infrared (FLIR) imagery seen by Congress, CSPAN's coverage of the Waco hearings, David Koresh's pleas, Janet Reno's testimony. But this film adds to that tabloid mix some desperate 911 calls by Branch Davidians, sections of the negotiation tapes that offer a dismal perspective on FBI attempts to come to a truce, the Davidians' footage and that of the FBI agents (a SWAT teamster jokes about being "honed to kill," while Davidians inside calmly express fear for their lives). Most crucially, the soundtrack lays new emotional cues over old footage (a Third Reichian drumbeat as federal agents approach, heavy-metal guitar tangle as tanks crash into the building). And in case anyone's sympathy for the Davidians was lagging, the film also has witnesses noting that armed federal agents killed their Alaskan malamute. ********** Showing at THE COOLIDGE CORNER Brookline, MA Showing daily June 27 - July 4 DCF -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 5.0 beta Charset: noconv iQCVAwUBM5YjGIVO4r4sgSPhAQH15wP/fdj32x21ap/1kAJPmB1VqFVY+UmWTApC o9YMRDhyPjHAWQjEynYN5xphasFJqHJfiJbNgPMDNz8j3vbFBwXVeSJGVQMcJAKp 06kgBSd3h8Wenja68vhRvA4XGUQBe4MeRL37U1wyBLhBmT3tA4gGhOW/3g7u6vbX kGOpUGY3T0s= =zGAN -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
At 05:13 PM 6/4/97 -0400, you wrote:
Give it a rest. The people inside had already murdered several BATF agents. They had every opportunity to release the children and allow them to get to safety. They had every opportunity to surrender.
Phill, I'm really appalled at this posting of yours. When a bunch of armed marked people storm your house with assault rifles and grenades, without warning you to come out first, and you shoot back at them, that's not murder. That's self-defense. It may be stupid - there's a lot to be said for lying on the floor with your hands over your head, which will make the armed assault force feel slightly guilty if they shoot you in the back - but it's not murder, and it's not anything resembling murder. If the BATF killed any of the Davidians in the incident, _that_ would have been murder. [If, as some people contend, some of the four dead assailants were actually killed by friendly fire, that wouldn't have been murder either, that would have been an accident. And since the leader of the attack force knew he'd probably lost the element of surprise, he was clearly negligent in protecting his men.] Even if the Davidians knew, and they apparently did, that an armed gang was about to storm their house without warning, that's still self-defense, not murder. Waving a white flag out the window before the attackers have a chance to sneak up and storm you would probably embarass or confuse them, but the Davidians had no reason to trust that the assault force would respect it and not just shoot them anyway -- and besides, while the Davidians had fewer guns per person than the average Texan, they were paranoid wackos, and surrendering before being attacked isn't the kind of thing you expect paranoid wackos to think of at dawn after being warned by a phone call.
The US police may be incompetent and corrupt but that does not excuse the Oaklahoma bombing nor does it in any way lessen the responsibility of McVeigh and those who encouraged him.
I didn't say the people who disagreed with you on this list weren't engaging in macho flash rhetoric here :-)
Only I think that the SAS is probably better experienced.
Not just the SAS - even the FBI said after the first wave of attacks that, unlike the BATF, they really try not to lead armed assaults when there are women and children in the way. By a couple of months later, the political pressure had become strong enough that they decided to do it anyway, but at least at first they were embarassed about the situation their colleagues had gotten them into. The US military has better-trained people also, but there's a very strong tradition against using the US military for domestic incidents - our so-called Civil War has really soured us on that. But whether you're looking at the SAS, Marines, BATF, Delta Force, or FBI Hostage Rescue Team, the mission wasn't something a military assault force is right for - that sort of thing is fine for rescuing hostages from terrorists, or killing terrorists before they set off bombs or shoot the neighbors. But the legal objective of the police should have been to inform the Davidians that the police want to search their house, or that they were wanted in court, or maybe even to arrest them if there was enough evidence to convince a judge to sign an arrest warrant. What can a military do? Shoot the adults for refusing to surrender, while trying not to shoot the kids too? Militias can do things like keep the Davidians from running away when the police knock on their door, but there probably wasn't enough evidence of a crime to justify an arrest, certainly not of anyone but Koresh, and if everybody _did_ run away, that would make searching their house to get evidence of contraband possession easier.
The Feds could have done in 1993 what they've done since (Koresh wasn't the only one who got burned there) and LEAVE PEACEFUL PEOPLE ALONE. yeah peacefull types whose response to a visit from the police was to lie in ambush and shoot at them with automatic weapons. So are you suggesting that the police ignore the complaints of illegal ownership of firearms and child abuse?
Again, the Davidian's response was stupid, but this wasn't a "visit from the police", this was an assault force that shot first while they were storming the house at dawn. The local sheriff had visited the house the previous year to respond to allegations of potential child abuse. Came up, knocked on the door, they let him in, everybody talked, he decided there was no evidence of criminal child abuse, just weird religious and personality-cult. No problem. If he'd wanted to do the same again, he could have, and he could have done something similar for the weapons charge. If they _had_ checked, they'd have found that one of the residents was a licensed firearm dealer, and could have checked his records, which he's legally required to keep and present. No need to storm somebody's house just because you're worried that they might flush a couple of pieces of metal down the toilet when they see you coming - it's not like it's DOPE or something. Also, if he'd wanted to arrest Koresh, he could have done it in town, or when the guy was out jogging, which was daily.
And in any case the point is that Waco does not absolve McVeigh and the militias for the blame for Oaklahoma.
The militias?? Phill, the only militia that McVeigh was part of was the US Army. Sure, they're one of the world's leading terrorist organizations, and they probably should have noticed that he was a wacko and kicked him out, like the Michigan Militia had the sense to do, rather than training him to be a gung-ho killer, but sometimes you don't realize what somebody's like or what Army training will do to them. And besides, I've had friends who were Army recruiters, and when you've got a quota to make, you'll take anybody who can write "X" and knows how to make a fist. As far as blame for Waco goes, Janet Reno has said it's all hers. [NOW FOR A FLAME] Janet Reno, who started the wave of minority church burnings in the South, just had the GALL to make a speech talking about all the good things she's been doing to stop that sort of thing. Not about how she's personally responsible and has been trying to rehabilitate herself, but about how other people are evil and need to be stopped. <expletive deleted>! Hypocrite. I don't know if 1-888-ATF-FIRE is still running, but y'all are free to call up and rat on her. # Thanks; Bill # Bill Stewart, +1-415-442-2215 stewarts@ix.netcom.com # You can get PGP outside the US at ftp.ox.ac.uk/pub/crypto/pgp # (If this is a mailing list or news, please Cc: me on replies. Thanks.)
participants (12)
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Bill Stewart -
dlv＠bwalk.dm.com -
Duncan Frissell -
frissell＠panix.com
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Hallam-Baker -
Jeremiah A Blatz -
Lucky Green -
mpd＠netcom.com -
Paul Bradley -
Tim May -
Tom Weinstein -
William H. Geiger III