Saw this mind-boggling bit of news in today's Morning Call (Allentown,
PA). Thought it might cause the list a bit of time-warp.
Ted
Communists didn't fund protests, say
critics of raid
09/11/00
"It's McCarthyite. It's tarring people," David Kairys,
a law
professor at Temple University, told The Philadelphia
Inquirer.
"It's reminiscent of the worst of the '50s."
The allegations of communist money were only a small
part of
the affidavits supporting search warrants for three
vehicles and
the warehouse. The affidavits, first made public
Wednesday,
relied most heavily on the direct observations of
undercover
troopers who infiltrated the warehouse.
Police called the warehouse a center of illegal
activity, while
activists say it was a workshop in which they made
dozens of
puppets and a large satirical float.
The affidavits stated that the allegations of
communist funding
came from the little-known Maldon Institute.
The Maldon Institute, which is based in Baltimore and
has a
mailing address in Washington, is funded, at least in
part, by
Richard Mellon Scaife -- the conservative Pittsburgh
political
philanthropist. Financial forms for Scaife's Carthage
Foundation
show it provided Maldon with $250,000 in 1998, the
newspaper reported.
The institute's officials did not return repeated
telephone calls
seeking comment.
Chip Berlet, who studies conservative and far-right
groups, said
state police erred in using the institute as a basis
for police
action.
"It issues monographs and monitors cults and terrorist
groups
and left-wing groups," said Berlet, senior analyst
with the
left-leaning Political Research Associates, based in
Massachusetts. "It does so from an old-fashioned
counter-subversion perspective that is obsessed with
finding
reds under every bed."
-- Ted Morgan Department of Political Science Lehigh University Maginnes Hall #9 Bethlehem, PA 18015 Phone: (610) 758-3345 Fax: (610) 758-6554
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Sep 11 2000 - 22:41:14 CUT