'Terror' Against the Press?

July 29th, 2004
Village Voice (New York) Mondo Boston
by James Ridgeway


BOSTON-It looks like the FBI's Boston field office faked a threat of
domestic terrorism just before the start of the Democratic National
Convention by leaking "unconfirmed" reports of white supremacist groups
readying an attack against media vehicles in Boston. Fox News, for one,
reportedly was wildly trying to disguise its trucks by covering up its
logos.

The effect of this probably was to make the press even more suspicious of
anti-war demonstrators than it already is-to even view them as possible
terrorists, and if not actual terrorists, then a crowd within which
terrorists could operate.

All of this is taking place in an atmosphere of fear and tension whipped up
by the Bush administration, with its reports of Al Qaeda "sleeping cells"
preparing to strike against America in the midst of the presidential
campaign. (See my July 16 article on a chilling Election Day scenario.)

The white supremacists on the far right have never shown any great interest
in the war on terror, and they usually try to use the press, not attack it.
Mark Potok, editor of the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence Report,
which tracks the far right, told Glynn Wilson of the serious-minded
Southerner Daily News blog, "We have had no indication whatsoever, not an
inkling, that there is any kind of violent action planned by the radical
right in Boston. We follow these groups quite closely."

ABC News said last week (basing its report on anonymous sources) that, just
before the convention opened on July 23, statements by a domestic group of
college-age people in the Midwest triggered the FBI warning, according to
Wilson. The ABC report said the group's members had not gone to Boston,
Wilson noted. Other warnings of "a very real concern" about impending
"violent action by white supremacists" emanated from the Secret Service, the
Boston Joint Terrorism Task Force, and Boston police, Wilson said.

CNN reported July 23 that "authorities fear that some protesters are
preparing to target the media" and that the "Boston Joint Terrorism Task
Force is investigating." According to the CNN story, the FBI's Boston office
issued a statement saying it had "unconfirmed information" that, as CNN put
it, "a domestic group plans to attack media vehicles, possibly with
'explosives or incendiary devices.' "

Special Agent Gail A. Marcinkiewicz, the public affairs coordinator for the
Boston FBI office, told the Southerner that the report of a "radical
domestic terrorist group" planning an attack on media trucks in Boston was
"unconfirmed."

Wilson noted that Boston authorities, according to ABC, were worried about
two right-wing white supremacist groups in particular: Volksfront and White
Revolution. Potok told Wilson that some members of Volksfront pleaded guilty
last year in the beating death of a homeless black man, and the Volksfront
online bulletin board recently carried a posting urging members to go to
Boston and "rally."

"But there was no suggestion whatsoever of any violence," Potok told Wilson,
"let alone violence against media trucks. . . . I find it extremely
difficult to believe that White Revolution or Volksfront would be involved
in an action like this."

Overall, the racist far-right would just love to get some publicity from the
war on terror, but these people are stuck in the Stone Age when it comes to
weaponry and ideas, and they are definitely not into suicide bombings. Such
groups have always tried to manipulate the press, not attack it-except for
such rare cases as the neo-Nazis' murder of Denver talk-radio host Alan Berg
in 1984.