| By Richard Hatch and Sara Diamond
September 25, 1991
Introduction
During the build-up, prosecution, and aftermath of the Persian Gulf war,
a previously obscure right-wing conspiracy theorist named Craig Hulet became
a West Coast celebrity, largely via appearances on community radio stations,
including: KPFA in Berkeley, KPFK in Los Angeles, KUSP in Santa Cruz, KVMR
in Nevada City, and KBOO in Portland. KPFA made Hulet tapes a fundraising
premium. Pacifica Archives in Los Angeles sold a high volume of Hulet tapes.
There is no reason to believe that radio programmers were aware of the
facts in this report when they began featuring Hulet, and we have no
intention of damaging the reputations of the stations involved.
Research into Hulet's impressive-sounding biography and thematic claims
has revealed a pattern of misrepresentation and distortion. In addition,
his claimed personal connections indicate that he is engaged in a far-right
political recruitment project. The accompanying article by Chip Berlet
lends further credence to this hypothesis.
The Craig Hulet case study is a classic example of how the far-right,
through rhetoric and deception, seeks to confuse progressives and build
a mass following based on ignorance and anti-elite resentments.
Methodology
This report and attached exhibits document the known facts about the problematic
aspects of Craig Hulet's background and political presentations. Our sources
include the following:
- Craig Hulet lecture video tape, Portland, April 12, 1991
- Craig Hulet lecture video tape, San Francisco, July 10, 1991
- Craig Hulet lecture video tape, Santa Cruz, July 11, 1991
- Craig Hulet interview tapes, KUSP in Santa Cruz July and Aug.1991
- independent fact-checking and reporting by Chip Berlet
- independent fact-checking by Sara Diamond
Organization
We have organized the following pages into four categories of criticism:
1. "Facts" about Hulet's claimed background that don't appear valid.
2. Areas of Hulet's biography which cannot be independently verified.
3. Elements of Hulet's presentation which are factually untrue, or simply
ridiculous.
4. Hulet's statements about other political activists. Some of these
statements are false and have the effect of "covering" for far-right
and racist political activists, while subtly encouraging listeners to
subscribe to their theories and writings.
Evidence and Discussion
1) Discrepancies in Hulet's claimed background and associations
* In his KC & Associates brochure [Exhibit B] Hulet claims he worked
13 years as "corporate director under the name Pen and Quill." In a slightly
different brochure he claims he was "President and CEO of Pen and Quill;
Houston and Los Angeles."
In order to be a corporate director, there must be a corporation to
head. Pen and Quill was a legally registered corporation in Texas from
1980 to 1984. On February 20, 1984, Pen and Quill was dissolved by the
State of Texas for non-payment of taxes. [See Exhibit C] The authorities
in Texas could provide no additional information on what sort of business
Pen and Quill was. Hulet could not have been President and CEO for thirteen
years. Pen and Quill was never registered in the State of California,
according to the Secretary of State's office in Sacramento.
* "Published columnist and political cartoonist. Articles frequently
appear in national publications...Reprints of Hulet's articles appear
in a host of news digests." [See Exhibit B]
See Chip Berlet's article "Right-wing conspiracists make inroads into
left" [The Guardian, September 11, 1991, page 3] regarding Hulet's misrepresentation
of published articles.
* In his brochure, Hulet claims articles in International Combat Arms.
International Combat Arms, published by Petersen Publishing in Los Angeles,
ceased publication in 1989.
On August 8, 1991, Sara Diamond spoke with numerous people at Petersen
Publishing to see if any had heard of Mr. Hulet, including the payroll
secretary who checked her records; no one had. Several days later, Diamond
spoke with Joan Carroll, secretary to Tom Siatos, former publisher of
International Combat Arms and current publisher of Guns and Ammo. Carroll
had checked around her office and was unable to find any International
Combat Arms articles by Craig Hulet.
* Institute for World Research [See below for Hulet's role in this claim]
Hulet claims to have assembled an advisory board for the Institute for
World Research (IWR). The list appeared in "The Gnomes of Zurich." [Exhibit
D]
On September 12, 1991, Sara Diamond telephoned two of Hulet's supposed
advisory board members: Lewellyn Rockwell, head of the Ludwig von Mises
Institute in Alabama; and former Congressman Ron Paul in Lake Jackson,
Texas. Both are leaders of the libertarian movement; Paul ran for President
in 1988. Both Rockwell and Paul said they knew of Craig Hulet. Both said
emphatically that they had never even heard of the IWR, let alone had
they served on its board. Both said that they never worked with Hulet
and could not recall talking with him except casually on the phone.
* Hulet claims that his mail drop is guarded by big, tough Libyans who
protect him from "beady-eyed crackers" who seek him out. [San Francisco,
July 10, 1991]
==="I have a drop box run by Libyans, a great bunch of guys. They're
my security when I do public speaking lectures in that red-neck country...So
when you go looking for me as KC dePass in Seattle, you're not going
to find KC dePass. You're going to find a six-foot six, two hundred forty
pound Libyan, that all he says, when you say 'I'd like to speak to Mr.
KC dePass'--he goes 'put in box'. And there's always like six or eight
Muslims sitting in the back room talking to him...So, like, you come
looking for me, you're gonna find a little army there."
Chip Berlet found no "army"--only a commercial mail drop. Berlet also
had no difficulty finding Hulet's wife Kathy. Kathy's public exposure
at her frame shop The Artful Nuance would make her an easy target for
the "beady-eyed crackers" Hulet fears. She is his "exclusive press agent" because
she is his wife.
2.Areas of Hulet's personal biography which cannot be independently
verified
Hulet has made a variety of biographical claims that cannot be validated
without further documentation. Hulet has provided no such documentation,
nor independently verifiable facts on the following:
* Hulet claims he worked for the National Security Council for three
years, on "domestic" operations.
Hulet has never offered any concrete evidence that he has worked for
the NSC. In the materials we have reviewed, Hulet has never specified
which three years he was employed by the NSC, whom he reported to, in
which city he performed these duties, whether or not he held a security
clearance, nor any other specific information.
* Former publisher and Editor "The Brief" [Exhibit B]
A literature search for periodicals titled "The Brief" was made through
the Melvyl computerized catalogue of the nine-campus University of California
library system. The catalogue also includes the California State Library,
California Research Library and the Stanford University Library system.
While records of periodicals called "The Brief" were found in the catalogue,
none of these periodicals were published by the IWR. The Reference Desk
librarian at the University of California at Berkeley could find no current
record of any newsletter or similar periodical titled "The Brief". This
publication appears to have been too ephemeral to have been catalogued
by any public body.
* Former editor of the newsletter "Caveat" of the IWR [Exhibit B]
A computerized search for periodicals titled "Caveat" was performed
as described for ""The Brief"". No publications by the IWR were found
in this case, either. The Reference Desk at the University of California
at Berkeley could find no current record of any newsletter or similar
periodical titled "Caveat."
* "Articles frequently appear in national publications: 'Financial Security
Digest'..." [Exhibit B]
As for "Caveat" and "The Brief"," no trace of "Financial Security Digest" could
be found, so articles probably cannot appear in this publication either.
* Former Public Affairs Radio Host KGRZ [Exhibit B]
The current manager of KGRZ, who joined this 1000 watt Montana-based
station in 1986, told Chip Berlet that Hulet was not a public affairs
host since he arrived. It is possible that Hulet worked at KGRZ prior
to 1986.
* KC & Associates "A network of professional political researchers
and consultants..." [Exhibit B]
No other associates have ever been heard from. No one besides the Hulets
and their legal agent were listed in Pen and Quill's corporation papers.
There is nothing wrong with starting a business with yourself and calling
it "Associates." However, a "network" of professional political researchers
should have some verifiable existence.
* "Former Director: Institute for World Research"
=== "I spent five years as a director of a small privately
funded, private institute for world research." [KUSP tape, August 23,
1991]
Hulet claims he was the IWR director for five years. The only known physical
trace of the IWR is a piece of stationary obtained by a colleague. The
Institute had a mailing address in Missoula, Montana. Sara Diamond called
the Montana Secretary of State's office in Helena on August 8, 1991 and
was told that an "Institute for World Research" was never incorporated
in the state.
In the tapes we have studied, Hulet has disclosed virtually nothing about
the IWR. He has named Antony Sutton as a member of the board of advisors, and
has referred to a "Doctor Ioffe" as another board member. As discussed above,
two of the "advisory board members" listed in Exhibit D, Lewellyn Rockwell
and Ron Paul, both say emphatically that they never served on the board and
never heard of the IWR. Both Rockwell and Paul are long-time activists on the
Right and are very familiar with public and private policy analysis groups.
3. Elements of Hulet's presentations that are inaccurate or simply ridiculous
See also Chip Berlet's article, Exhibit A
* In reference to a book on the Bay of Pigs operation [San Francisco talk
July 10, 1991], Hulet said:
=== "There are some things in there that you can't argue with. The
Bay of Pigs wasn't called the Bay of Pigs. Its original operational name was
the Zapata plan. The freighters used to transport the anti-Castro Cubans, one
was called the Houston, one was called the Zapata, and one was called the the
Barbara J. Now all of this could be called coincidence...They went into the
Zapata swamps in Cuba, it was later called the Bay of Pigs because it was a
slaughter."
Hulet is correct that the Bay of Pigs invaders landed at the Zapata swamps and
that two of the ships were the Barbara J. and the Houston. In several books about
the Bay of Pigs, including one which Hulet apparently cites, no mention of the
Zapata could be found. It should be pointed out that Barbara Bush, the apparent
subject of a Hulet conspiracy theory about the ships, goes by the name Barbara
Pierce Bush. Her maiden name was Barbara Pierce and she apparently has no middle
name. What does the "J." stand
for in Hulet's theory? As to whether it was "later called the Bay of Pigs because
it was a slaughter", the Baha de Cochinos has been called that
since Columbus "discovered" the Bay was home to wild pigs; furthermore, the actual
landing zone is called Playa Giron by the Cubans.
* Also in San Francisco [San Francisco talk July 10, 1991], Hulet said:
=== "That's what has been so hard, getting documents on it. It isn't
just CIA, this is NSC memoranda. You can't get them. The Senators, nobody can
get them. That's why they're never gonna nail George Bush for anything. The
guy's been CIA since the late 50s and early 60s. And if my hunch is right and
Stockwell's right, this guy was always a major player, and that means he also
knew that Kennedy was assassinated by the CIA or why would Hoover have debriefed
him about the Cubans in Miami?"
NSC memoranda are no harder to get than any other classified materials. For example,
the so-called "PROF" notes from the NSC were prominently featured in the investigation
into the Iran-Contra affair and many have been publicly
released. In that case, "the Senators" did get them. Many NSC memoranda from
other administrations have been declassified and are publicly available.
Here Hulet asserts that Bush has been CIA since the late 1950s. But in other
discussion of the memo, published in part by the "Nation," on a "George Bush" of
the CIA, Hulet admits that no one has been able to validate the memo vis the
President. Hulet is playing fast and loose.
* Again in San Francisco, Hulet said:
=== "Now with all that being true...Here's the first thing John Kennedy
did... He went upstairs to the Oval Office, and he signed an executive order...He
abolished the OCB. That was his first act as President. That's why the front
page of the New York Times and you'll hear Jim Garrison quote it, he writes
it in his book. John Kennedy was quoted that 'I'm gonna tear the CIA in a thousand
pieces.' That wasn't an idle threat, he did it. I have an NSC committee document
from the Jackson Committee, Scoop Jackson's committee on the NSC. In it they
explain how John Kennedy ceased all CIA functions all over the world. He didn't
say he was going to tear the CIA apart and bring it under control, he did it."
Standard sources on the intelligence community verify that President Kennedy
did abolish the Operations Coordinating Board (OCB) and the President's Board
of Consultants on Foreign Intelligence Activities. But Kennedy did so because
he "considered them useless, impediments, bureaucratic obstructions to a vigorous,
activist foreign policy." [See "The Man Who Kept the Secrets" by Thomas Powell,
Pocket Books, New York, 1979, page 169] Kennedy sought to more tightly control
covert operations, not to eliminate them.
Declassified documents show that in early 1963, at least 550 covert operations
were underway. A June 30, 1961 memorandum for the President from Arthur Schlesinger,
Jr. discusses in detail the problems with the CIA and a potential reorganization
of the CIA into two arms which would each get a "blameless title" like the "National
Information Service." One of these agencies would continue "covert political
operations" and "paramilitary activities." Clearly, Kennedy did not "tear the
CIA apart." The CIA continued to function on an incredible number of projects
up to the end of the Kennedy administration.
* In Santa Cruz [KUSP tapes July 11, 1991], Hulet said regarding a published
US government report on intelligence activities:
=== "You have to go to the Federal Depository library, get an original
and copy it, because it was never published because they didn't sign it. It
was never available to the public. You'll have to get it yourself. .. they
went after the John Birch Society, the Black panthers, racist groups, Identity
groups, liberal groups, communists, Jane Fonda, everybody, they went after
everybody."
Here Hulet refers to the reports of the US Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental
Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, popularly known as the Church
Committee Report. These documents were published as committee prints, number
94-755. Like many committee prints, they quickly went out of print. There is
little mysterious about this. A 48 page excerpt of the committee's conclusions
was published in "The Intelligence Community:
History, Organization and Issues." [Tyrus Fain, editor, R.R. Bowker Company,
New York 1977.]
Hulet seriously distorts the contents of the Committee findings. While the
CIA and other agencies may have surveilled and infiltrated a wide range of
groups, the main targets of their covert operations were the Black liberation
movement and the anti-war movement. These movements and the left in general
were subjected to vicious attacks. Liberal organizations were frequently supported
by the CIA, as in the case of the National Student Association.
* Hulet's conspiracy theory, laid out in Santa Cruz [KUSP tapes July 11, 1991]:
=== "And this goes back to a theory, which I think is a true theory,
and it was told to me that it was quite true for the three years that I worked
for the Group, that only 5,000 white American males run the US and have any
power whatever. Anybody else who looks they are part of the system, are just
pencil pushers for the other 5,000, no matter how powerful you may think those
people are. If you're not locked into something like the Bohemian Grove, Skull
and Bones, Wolf's Head, some of the other fraternities at Yale, Columbia, Princeton,
Harvard. If you're not locked into this system, and I do call it what they
call it, I don't call it that because I'm a radical. They refer to it as the
group, as a brotherhood. And if you're not part of it, you're not a player,
period. You're simply a useful idiot that gets used, and that includes whether
you're rightwing or leftwing, because they also have their people placed on
the left, the far left, progressive movement, environmentalist, they have their
people everywhere."
Hulet thinks that 5,000 well-connected white men run the United States and that
they "have their people everywhere." He claims that he was told that this theory
was true while working for the "Group", i.e. the National Security Council. Who
told him this? What evidence does he have for the
number 5,000? How do "their people" know what to do, how do they coordinate their
actions?
4. Hulet's statements about other political activists. These statements are
often false and have the effect of "covering" for far-right and racist political
activists, such as Antony Sutton, while subtly encouraging listeners to subscribe
to their theories and writings.
For example, with regard to an author's reference to a "CIA-Yale" group, Hulet
said:
=== "Now I got the impression that he was trying very hard not to
mention that all of the individuals surrounding the Kennedy assassination belonged
to a Yale fraternity called Skull and Bones...Only 15 per year are allowed
to join and they have to be seniors. About six years ago somebody at Yale set
a large packet of documents on this organization called Russell Trust, called
Skull and Bones or the Order, they sent it to Tony Sutton, Antony Sutton, myself
and a flakey character in Houston, I won't use his name because I think he's
an FBI agent....and it was the membership list for this organization... But
what I'm saying, and this is a letter, I got a letter from Tony Sutton some
years ago cause Tony's on my board of advisors of the Institute and Tony sent
a letter out to me and some other researchers when we were working together
quietly behind the scenes.
=== "Every time you turn around the CIA director, deputy director, people
in the NSC, leading embassy personnel... [are former Skull and Bones] and
Tony said we have a problem here. He's not a conspiracy theorist but this
one shook him. He's got a bad reputation because when he did a lot of his
research the John Birch Society adopted his books as gospel, so a lot of
people on the left thought Tony was a Bircher, so they attacked Tony rather
than realizing the John Birch Society also sells Holly Sklar's book Trilateralism.
So does the neo-Nazi group that publishes Spotlight newspaper, Noontide
press publishes one of Fletcher Prouty's book. So now this notion that
if you're even in the same room with a Bircher, somehow it rubs off on
you, that's leftist paranoia, and we need to grow up about this, OK?. Tony
Sutton's one of the most credible researchers and I've known him for 12
years. He's credible, he's honest, and the man is intensive in his research.
[San Francisco talk, July 10, 1991]
=== "And there is a little organization, that has gotten a lot of strange
press, because the researcher was accused of being a Bircher, which he
was not. His name is Antony Sutton, A-N-T-O-N-Y, Tony Sutton, he's from
England. A lot of his books were adopted by the John Birch Society's American
Opinion bookstores, so a lot of people on the left made the assumption,
and it's a wrong assumption that therefore Sutton was a Bircher. Tony Sutton
and I have known each other 12 years. He was on my board of advisors. No,
he's not a Bircher, and no he's not a conspiracy theorist. He's very up
front about all of it. He did a lot of work on the Trilateral Commission,
Council on Foreign Relations, and especially on the banking industry and
the multinational corporate connections to a lot of these things. " [KUSP
tapes July 11, 1991]
According to Chip Berlet [See Exhibit A], Hulet says he cites Sutton's work in
support of his theories because it was a choice between Sutton and Holly Sklar.
Hulet rejects Sklar because she's a "Marxist." But the above quotes make it clear
that Hulet used Sutton because he's a friend
and collaborator.
Sklar's compilation "Trilateralism: The Trilateral Commission and Elite Planning
for World Management" contains a footnote criticizing Sutton for his belief
that the New Deal constituted a plot by a "fascist-socialist government that
would eliminate competition." In fact, Sutton proposes a number of bizarre
conspiracy theories which range from "possible advanced alien technology" recovered
by the US government to Illuminati infiltration into the educational system,
which is controlled by the Order. [See Berlet article, Exhibit A]
Even in one of Sutton's more conventional books, "The Diamond Connection," he
slips in the following proposal:
=== "…but in no sense do South Africans understand the full globalist
intent of the American 'aristocracy.' If the U.S. elite wants to control South
Africa diamonds, then it can do so indirectly, simply by allowing a Marxist
takeover of South Africa and then trading advanced U.S. technology--in brief,
a Soviet military takeover behind a Cuban screen with tacit approval of the
U.S. elite."
This is consistent with Sutton's other works, in which he proposes that the United
States elites have secretly promoted Marxist regimes around
the world.
(Hulet also addressed the subject of South Africa in his "Gnomes of Zurich." He
bemoaned the establishment of a US ban on loans to South Africa and complained
about the unwarranted bad publicity the apartheid regime was getting in the
US press.)
Sutton's book "How the Order Controls Education," spins a wild web of conspiracy
ranging from the look-say reading instruction method to the Illuminati. He
tempts us with "a forthcoming volume" on the "infiltration of the Illuminati
into New England."
Aside from Hulet, Sutton does have his supporters. Gary North, a Reconstructionist
Christian, dedicates his book "Conspiracy" to Sutton. Sutton's work is dealt
with at length in "Conspiracy" as a sterling example of conspiracy theory.
The introduction to Sutton's book "Energy, The Created Crisis" was written
by another supporter, Senator Steven Symms (R-Idaho) who blasted "the socialistic
legislation flowing through Congress." Symms continued to rant that the energy
crisis of the 1970s was "a contrived scheme to greatly increase government
control and to further the cause of an egalitarian feudalistic society."
In another example of covering for far-right ideologues and activists, Hulet
claims to have been in touch with former John Birch Society leader Congressman
Larry McDonald:
=== "This has gotten me in trouble, some guys on the far left, well
you know... I've only said one thing about Larry McDonald and it's very simple.
Before he got on the plane, the KAL 007 flight, he got on the phone and he
called a whole bunch of people, researchers, analysts, people of all shapes
and sizes, stripes and colors. I happened to get a phone call from him when
I was in Montana and he debriefed me for 90 minutes. Everything about the de-briefing
told me he knew he was a dead man. Larry McDonald had a food taster, he had
personal private security, not because he thought the communists were gonna
kill him. Because he was attacking these men. Yes he was to the right, there's
no question. But he was dead on target about the men I'm describing, who they
are, how they operate, and why they are doing it, he was right on target. And
by the way this garbage about how he was the head of the John Birch Society
is not true. He was asked to be the head of the John Birch Society. He never
even got that far. He died in the KAL flight. And what he told me in that debriefing,
that if he ever did become the head of the John Birch Society, his first act
was gonna clean house, gonna end the red-necked cracker, racist, Jew-hating,
BS conspiracy theories. He was also producing a series of movies for cable
TV about this subject. No, I didn't agree with every view he had, what I am
telling you he was to the right and our government assassinated him." [Santa
Cruz lecture, July 11, 1991]
Hulet denies that Larry McDonald was the head of the John Birch Society. According
to "Shootdown" by R.W. Johnson [Viking, New York, 1986 pgs 2 and 124], Larry
McDonald was "head of the John Birch Society" and "the most right-wing man
in Congress." Break-ins, Death Threats and the FBI, by Ross Gelbspan [South
End Press], identified McDonald as "the Chairman of the John Birch Society." Hulet
is wrong about McDonald's status.
But Hulet's endorsement of McDonald's political analysis is the most troubling
aspect of this quote. According to "Peddlers of Crisis" by Jerry Sanders [1983,
South End Press], McDonald was "a member of the John Birch Society" who attacked
the liberal Center for Defense Information as a front for Moscow. This is a
typical example of McDonald's political tactics.
McDonald was also a founder of Western Goals. In its statement of purpose,
McDonald wrote:
=== "In the field of Marxists, terrorism and subversion, Western
Goals has the most experienced advisors and staff in the United States...The
Foundation has begun the computerization of thousands of documents relating
to the internal security of our country and the protection of government and
institutions from Communist-controlled penetration and subversion." [See Break-ins,
Death Threats and the FBI, by Ross Gelbspan, South End Press, p. 77]
Western Goals would become involved in a scheme in which Los Angeles Police
Department intelligence files which had been ordered destroyed were transferred
to a Western Goals computer system. Eventually the LAPD paid $1.8 million
in a suit brought by the subjects of the files. Apparently Hulet has no problem
with McDonald's spying on the left. [Gelbspan, pp. 170-72]
The board of Western Goals was composed of many extreme right political activists.
The most famous of these was General John Singlaub, who helped with the Reagan
administration's war on Nicaragua. Singlaub also worked with death squad elements
through his leadership of the World Anti-Communist League. Hulet's endorsement
of Larry McDonald as being "right on target" is reprehensible.
* In San Francisco, Hulet distorted facts about Fletcher Prouty:
=== "So does the neo-Nazi group that publishes Spotlight newspaper,
Noontide Press publishes one of Fletcher Prouty's book. So now this notion
that if you're even in the same room with a Bircher, somehow it rubs off on
you, that's leftist paranoia, and we need to grow up about this, OK?. Tony
Sutton's one of the most credible researchers and I've known him for 12 years.
He's credible, he's honest, and the man is intensive in his research." [San
Francisco talk July 10, 1991]
Hulet clearly is implying that Fletcher Prouty is not a right-winger and that
the fact that his book is published by Noontide Press is some sort of coincidence.
In fact, Prouty is a member of the Liberty Lobby's Populist Action Committee.
Noontide Press is a publishing affiliate of the Liberty Lobby, the largest
neo-nazi organization in the United States. Prouty is an activist for Liberty
Lobby and frequently appears at events with anti-Semitic activists.
* On the Federal Reserve System, Hulet told his Santa Cruz audience:
=== "For some reason the Left has tended to ignore one of the most
significant areas of research that can be done in the United States, and that
is the Federal Reserve system. The rightwing, because its always had a populist
strain and a anti-banking mentality, going back to the 1800s, they've done
research into it. But because it's rightwing research the Left has said well,
then they're crazy, they're talking about Jews, and we're not going to listen
to them and we're not going to look at it. Wrong, they should be looking at
it because much of what they said is true, if you can get past the looney tune
anti-Semitic stuff. The Jews own the federal reserve system, the Jews run the
international banks, the Jews run all banks. Ok, that's, of course, horse manure.
But the Federal Reserve system is the most significant institution in the world
right now." [KUSP tapes July 11, 1991]
Here Hulet urges people to consume anti-Semitic propaganda, even though he
admits that the authors are full of "looney tune" ideas. He claims that one
must explore this distasteful material because there are no other sources.
The computerized catalog system for the University of California lists 255
books on the subject of the Federal Reserve System; 197 of these are at the
University of California at Berkeley. Several books on the Federal Reserve
system are also available at the Berkeley Public Library. Clearly there is
no need to read vile anti-Semitic tracts in order to learn about the Federal
Reserve System.
In study groups formed to discuss Hulet's theories, Eustace Mullins has been
promoted as an expert writer on the Federal Reserve System. Mullins' book "The
Biological Jew" is an eighty-five page diatribe about Jewish "parasites" filled
with statements such as the following: "we must remember that there is no Jewish
crime per se, since the existence of the Jewish parasite upon the host is a
crime against nature" and "the Jew has always functioned best as a panderer,
a pornographer, a master of prostitution." Hulet's unwillingness to condemn
such material outright can lead his audience to tolerate it.
* The Posse Comitatus
In his Santa Cruz and Portland, Oregon talks, Hulet brought up the Posse Comitatus:
=== "One of my jobs years ago, I took a contract to investigate a
group in Montana, to see if they were a genuine threat to the international
global community. It's called the Posse Comitatus, they're not the same as
the Aryans Nations in Hayden Lake. They were a North Dakota, Wisconsin, Montana
based tax-protest system. They had an interesting belief system that it was
Jews that were running the IRS. And they based this on the Congressional Directory
by seeing how many names were Smith. You know, Jews change their names. And
they of course owned semi-automatic weapons. They had AK-47s, semi-automatics
HK 93s, 91s, Uzis, nine millimeters, MAC-10s, they had a lot of weapons…In
any one group, in isolated areas there would be 34-35 of these characters.
=== "Their goal in life was to lynch Federal judges that try to issue IRS
decrees on their group...My MOS in the military was 45J-20, I was weapons
expert, everything from Vulcan cannons on gunships to .45 automatics. These
guys were buying AK-47s and HK93s and trying to sight them using screwdrivers.
You see there's these little tools that come to adjust the sights...These
guys couldn't hit bull in the ass with a banjo. These guys are no threat,
they're kooks with rifles, so what they're not the enemy. You don't have
to go around and disarm the entire country because a half-dozen racist looney
tunes in Montana are packing weapons...
=== "If you're not about that and you got a problem that those cowboys in
Montana are packing guns and have targeted Jews, if that's what you're concerned
with, or you're afraid that some idiot some sniper is going to off your kid,
then you have already become a slave up here."
Hulet gives the impression that the Posse Comitatus is a laughable collection
of rural kooks. In fact, the Posse is an underground organization of violent
racists and anti-Semites. Shoot-outs between Posse members and law enforcement
officers have led to deaths on both sides. Posse member Gordon Kahl killed
two U.S. marshals; Kahl shot one of them point-blank in the head as he lay
wounded. Contrary to what Hulet admits, Posse membership spans 23 states.
Wisconsin Posse leader James Wickstrom won 16,000 votes in a 1980 run for
US Senate. Posse membership and ideology also overlap closely with the Aryan
Nations and Identity Christianity. [See "Armed and Dangerous," by James Coates,
Hill and Wang, New York, 1987, "The Silent Brotherhood," by Kevin Lynn and
Gary Gerhardt, The Free Press, New York, 1989 and "Bitter Harvest," by James
Corcoran, Penguin Books, 1990]
* Connection to neo-nazis
The September 8, 1986 edition of the Spotlight newspaper carried an advertisement
[exhibit E] for a seminar and banquet organized by the "Anglo-European Fellowship" on
the "Political, Economic, and Moral problems" facing "western civilization." Craig
Hulet was listed as a speaker, along with Lawrence Patterson, Ivor Benson,
David Irving, Lt. Col. Arch Roberts, and Eric Butler. Benson is a South African
writer "whose fanatical support for apartheid goes beyond that of most Afrikaners." [See
Derrick Knight, "Beyond the Pale: The Christian Political Fringe," 1982, CARAF
Publications, Lancashire, England pg 153]
Eric Butler ran the Australian League of Rights and has been regarded "as
a mentor by active racists and anti-Semites throughout the English-speaking
world." [Beyond the Pale, pg 23] Archibald Roberts directs the Fort Collins,
Colorado-based Committee to Restore the Constitution, a long-time fixture on
the racist Right. Its membership includes veteran conspiracists Eustace Mullins,
Don Bell, Revilo P. Oliver, and, until recently, Antony Sutton [See Exhibit
F]. David Irving is a "historical revisionist" whose theory that the Holocaust
never occurred has made him popular with the Liberty Lobby. Patterson is a
financial "expert" who currently sits on the Liberty Lobby's Populist Action
Committee.
If Hulet claims that he somehow accidentally fell in with this crowd, he should
have a very detailed explanation of how that happened.
Conclusion
All of the above establishes the dubious credibility and political integrity
of Craig Hulet. Clearly, progressive media outlets have an ethical obligation
to protect their audiences from exploitation by such persons. This is true even
if large numbers of ill-informed people are willing to purchase tapes or other
products.
As Chip Berlet reports in the "Guardian," progressive media outlets are not
the only vehicles through which the far-right has begun to recruit from among
left-wing government critics.
We do feel, however, that alternative media professionals bear a particular
responsibility in informing people of the Right's strategies, tactics, and
objectives. The first step is for community activists and progressive journalists
to become better informed ourselves.
For more information
"
Right Woos Left: Populist Party, LaRouchian & Other Neo-fascist Overtures
to Progressives and Why They Must be Rejected" by Chip Berlet of Political Research
Associates. Send $4 to PRA, 678 Massachusetts Ave., Suite 205, Cambridge, MA
02139
Coalition for Human Dignity, P.O. Box 40344, Portland, OR 97240, (503) 335-0207.
CHD is preparing its own report on Craig Hulet, Bo Gritz, and disruptive far-right
activity in Oregon.
People Against Racist Terror (PART), P.O. Box 1990, Burbank, CA 91507, (818)
509-3435, produces an excellent newsletter, "Turning the Tide", on racist activity
in southern California. PART is researching the efforts of Bo Gritz and the
Populist Party to recruit in the Los Angeles area.
Center for Democratic Renewal, P.O. Box 50469, Atlanta, GA 30302, (404) 221-0025.
National clearinghouse on far-right movement activity. CDR produces "The Monitor" newsletter
and has topical reports available on the Populist Party, Identity Christianity,
the far-right's homophobic agenda, and LaRouchian and Moonie disruption of
the African-American community.
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