Thank you, Radman, for this post. I would never have expected it from you. radman wrote: > Mercy for a Terrorist? > > <http://www.frontpagemag.com/dh/1999/dh08-02-99.htm> > > by David Horowitz > 08/02/99 > > WHO IN AMERICA TODAY could be associated with a gang that carried out an > execution-style murder of a prominent public official, and the murder of a > pregnant woman during a bank hold-up, and then, when finally arrested, be > championed as an "idealist" by church officials, Democratic Party > legislators, columnists, and local activist groups? > The answer: a progressive activist who has remained faithful to her leftist > faith. > Twenty-five years ago, Kathleen Soliah went underground as a fugitive. She > was wanted by police as a suspect in the planting of pipe bombs under two > randomly selected police cars that would have killed the occupants had they > not failed to explode. > During this and other episodes, Soliah was a member of the Symbionese > Liberation Army (SLA), a group led by ex-convict Donald DeFreeze in the > early seventies, whose defining slogan was "Death to the fascist insect > that preys on the life of the people." > After DeFreeze and five other SLA members were killed in a shootout with > police in Los Angeles, Soliah led a rally for the "victims" in Berkeley's > "Ho Chi Minh Park," claiming that the six outlaws were "viciously attacked > and murdered by 500 pigs in L.A." > Soliah singled out her best friend Angela Atwood, one of the dead SLA > members, saying: "I know she lived happy and she died happy. And in that > sense, I'm so very proud of her." Soliah was finally apprehended in St. > Paul, Minnesota on June 16 , where she was living under a pseudonym, "Sara > Jane Olson," with her doctor husband Fred G. Peterson. Soliah has > subsequently been released on $1 million bail raised within a week by 250 > sympathizers and friends. > The Minneapolis Star-Tribune describes the attitude of the liberal > community in St. Paul after learning of her past in these terms: "In the > days since her June 16 arrest, Olson [Soliah] has been almost canonized: > reader of newspapers for the blind, volunteer among victims of torture, > organizer of soup kitchens. The office manager of the Minnehaha United > Methodist Church, where she is a member of the congregation, called on its > members to build a "contingent of support." Twenty of them were said to > have been in court in California on the day she was arraigned. > Soliah's brother-in-law, Michael Bortin, was a Berkeley radical and with > his wife Josephine (who is Soliah's sister) was also an SLA member. > Recently, Bortin attempted to explain to the press the relationship between > the radical gangster Soliah and the St. Paul housewife "Sara Jane Olson," > who was such an upstanding member of the progressive community: "There's > not this dichotomy between what Kathy was and what she is now. She was > doing the same things in the early Seventies." > Bortin claimed that it was the assassinations of the Kennedys and Martin > Luther King, the presidency of Richard Nixon, and the war in Vietnam that > changed their attitudes to make them SLA members. "We lost our faith in the > country, in due process. In law and justice." > Maybe so. Back then, I was one of the editors of Ramparts, the largest > publication of the New Left. Like Bortin and Soliah, I would have described > myself then as a "revolutionary" who had "lost faith in my country." But > along with many other leftists at the time (and unlike Bortin and Soliah), > I hadn't lost my mind or sense of decency as well. I wrote an editorial for > Ramparts condemning the SLA as a criminal organization. It was the first > editorial I wrote that I didn't sign. I was concerned enough that the SLA > might come and kill me. > The SLA had announced itself to the world on November 6, 1973, in a > terrible deed which has gone all but unmentioned in the current reportage > on Soliah's case. Without warning, three of its "soldiers" ambushed and > gunned down the first African American superintendent of schools in > Oakland. Dr. Marcus Foster had no warning when he was met with a hail of > bullets in a parking lot behind the Oakland School District office. The > bullets had been tipped with cyanide, just so he would have no chance to > survive the attack. > His crime, according to the SLA's official death warrant, was that he > followed a school board directive to issue ID cards to students, to protect > them from drug dealers and gang members wandering onto their campuses > intending to do them harm. > The Foster killing revolted me, as it did many, but not all, members of the > radical community. Thus Ramparts received many letters like the one by > Yippee leader Stew Albert, accusing us of "giving a green light" to the > police to hunt down and "murder" the SLA warriors. > Leonard Weinglass, the famed lawyer for Tom Hayden, Abbie Hoffman, and the > Chicago Sevenand now counsel for Black Panther and cop-killer Mumia Abu > Jamalthen represented the families of the dead SLA members who sought > monetary restitution from the city of Los Angeles for denying justice to > their offspring. > In my view, however, justice had been done. If anything, the SLA killers > hadn't been punished enough. > In fairness to Soliah, it is not clear that she was aware of the SLA's > intentions before the murder of Marcus Foster, although she certainly > embraced them afterwards. According to Patty Hearst, who was kidnapped by > the SLA and then converted to their political agenda, Soliah participated > in a 1975 bank robbery the SLA committed in a Sacramento suburb. > An innocent bystander, Myrna Lee Opshal, who was pregnant and had come to > the bank to deposit church funds, was accidentally shot and killed by SLA > member Emily Harris. Later Harris dismissed the killing to her comrades > saying the victim was "a pig," explaining "she was married to a doctor." > (Ironically, Soliah today is herself married to a doctor.) > These were the deeds, and this was the mentality of the gang to which > Kathleen Soliah dedicated her radical political life. Now she is once again > being defended by progressives, who blame the Vietnam War and Richard Nixon > even for the evils they themselves have committed. > If Kathleen Soliah's crimes are excused by Nixon, why would not Nixon's be > excused by the crimes his Communist enemies committed? Soliah's attorney > Stuart Hanlon is a graduate of the William KunstlerLeonard Weinglass school > of radical alibis, who recently helped win the release from prison of > convicted murderer and former Black Panther Geronimo Pratt by claiming the > FBI and police had conspired to frame Pratt because of his passion for > "social justice." > The radical fantasy that turned the Soliahs into paranoid conspirators is > very much alive today in the rhetoric of the left, which is unrelenting in > its insane picture of America as a repressive, racist, sexist, imperialist, > empire. It is kept alive in part by the radical rewriting of the history of > the Sixties in which "noble idealists" like Soliah declared war on > government "fascists," and whatever they did were always the hapless > victims of the greater evil of their adversaries. > There is a whole library of memoirs and histories by aging new leftists and > "progressive" academics dealing with the rebellions of the 1960s, but > hardly a page in any of them has the basic decency or honesty to say, "Yes, > we supported these murderers and those spies, and the agents of an evil > empire." > I'd like to hear even one of these advocates of "justice" acknowledge that > "we greatly exaggerated the evils of this system and underestimated its > decencies and virtues, and we're sorry." I'd like to hear that from Soliah > and her apologists. I'd like to hear them pay a moment's tribute to Marcus > Foster and to Myrna Opshal, and to the brave policemen and FBI agents who > risked their lives to protect other Americans, including progressives, from > the harm they intended. > I'd like to hear them say, just once, "I'm sorry."
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