From: Rich Graves <llurch@networking.stanford.edu>

E. Allen Smith actually might have written:

...

I've seen various quotes from Randy Weaver in various publications, including Time and other non-right-wing ones. None of them indicated him as an actual neo-Nazi or racist

BWAHAHAHA!!!

I assume that you are thinking I'm incorrect? Incidentally, I classify a racist as someone who says "this race is evil and should be killed/enslaved/tortured/whatever." Someone who says that different races shouldn't live together is a separatist; it's only when they start having seperate but equal being anything but equal (e.g., apartheid) that it crosses the line into racism. Thus, I don't regard Charles Murray or Richard Herrnstein as racist, for instance.

Here's a URL for a *highly sympathetic* piece on Weaver that complains that, "I will be happier when the press stops demonizing Weaver -- in subtle and not so subtle ways -- in news stories and editorials. He is referred to so consistently as "White Separatist Randall Weaver" that one would be forgiven for assuming that his parents gave him the first name "White," while "Separatist" was some old family name handed down from his maternal aunt":

http://www.omnet.com/What-I-Think/col.09-01-95B.html

Yes, it doesn't give any information to call him a racist... it gives information to call him a separatist. I don't support either, but I call the former more evil than the latter. If you thought I had claimed that Weaver wasn't a separatist, you've misread me.

Here are some *highly sympathetic* URLs that mention that Weaver was a white separatist/Aryan Nations wacko:

http://www.scimitar.com/revolution/by_topic/firearms/enforce/rubyridge/setup... http://eagle.tamu.edu/~carlp/Liberty/Weaver.Case.AR.html

They both, yes, state that he was a white separatist. They don't state that he was an Aryan Nations member... just that the FBI was trying to use him to infiltrate the Aryan Nations. One doesn't have to be a member of something before recruitment by an undercover (or intelligence) operation to be useful for infiltrating it - you just have to be someone that that organization would accept. As a known white separatist, Weaver becoming an out-and-out racist would be more believable than, say, you or me becoming an out-and-out racist. Often, those who are already members of such an organization will be more resistant to turning - more emotional committment, more watchfullness for attempts to frame/entrap, etcetera.

A slightly more balanced piece from the New York Times:

http://eagle.tamu.edu/~carlp/Liberty/Weaver.Case.NYT.html

Which, again, doesn't give any evidence that he was an actual racist, as opposed to a white separatist.

FWIW, the Anti-Defamation League, which I am *well aware* has said sily things about militias and skinheads in the past, mentions Weaver in this report:

http://www.almanac.bc.ca/cgi-bin/ftp.pl?people/w/weaver.randy/aryan-nations

I'm glad you mentioned their unreliability; otherwise I would have had to. This one I haven't been able to check (connection refused), but I wouldn't believe them in any case if they did claim he was a racist.

I have also heard Weaver cited quite favorably on the Stormfront list, which has repudiated Timothy McVeigh because his friend Terry Nichols has a Filipino wife. This makes McVeigh a Race Traitor by association, of course.

Well, yes, a martyr is quite helpful to most movements. Of course he's going to be cited favorably, so long as they can't find any ideological problems such as the one you mention with regards to Terry Nichols and Timothy McVeigh. Thank you, you've done my research for me. -Allen