Virgil Goode

Earlier this year at the Conservative Political Action Conference the group Youth for Western Civilization hosted a panel on immigration with Congressman Lou Barletta (R-PA), former Congressmen Tom Tancredo (R-CO) and Virgil Goode (R-VA), and political activist Bay Buchanan. The panel featured inflammatory and biting anti-immigrant rhetoric, along with warnings about the imminent destruction of America.

But the most startling question was why a sitting Republican congressman, Rep. Barletta, would meet with a far-right group of Confederate sympathizers with White Nationalist ties?

The head of YWC's Liberty University chapter proudly took part in an anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim conference with Neo-Fascist European groups:

In the march though the streets of Cologne, despite threats, attacks and futile attempts by radical German anarchists, socialists and communists, YWC, Pro-Cologne, Vlaams Belang, the Freedom Party of Austria, Die Republikaner and Bloc Identitaire of France marched in solidarity with other European patriots from Italy and against the Islaminization of Europe and for the support of freedom of speech.

A recent MSNBC report also looked into its ties to white nationalism, and said that Germany’s National Democratic Party also participated in the rally.

While these groups may be unknown to an American audience, they are far-right Neo-Fascist organizations:

• Die Republikaner, or The Republicans, is a German political party founded by a former Waffen-SS officer Franz Schönhuber that trumpets “right-wing extremism.” According to the Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism, the party’s “main agitation is directed against foreigners and against what they refer to as the africanization and islamization of German society.”

• The National Democratic Party was founded by former members of the Neo-Nazi Socialist Reich Party and uses the “practice of mobilizing skinheads and neo-Nazis.” The party also has close ties to Neo-Nazi groups in America and Europe and Holocaust-deniers. After President Obama’s election, the group said his victory represents “the American alliance of Jews and Negroes,” “a declaration of war,” and an “African tropical disease” under a statement entitled “Africa conquers the White House.”

• Vlaams Belang, or Flemish Interest, is a Belgian separatist party which The Economist says “holds extreme right wing positions on many political issues.” In fact, it is the immediate successor of Vlaams Blok, which was shut down by authorities for violating the country’s Anti-Racism law.

• The Freedom Party of Austria as founded by Joerg Haider, a group with such a deep anti-Semitic past that when it entered government Austria faced sanctions from the European Union. The Anti-Defamation League found that Haider “has consistently parried accusations of anti-Semitism” has a history of “utilizing Holocaust terminology and legitimizing Nazi policy and activities.”

• Bloc Identitaire, or Identity Block, is considered a “neo-fascist organisation” that is best known for its opposition to miscegenation and including pork in soup for the poor to exclude Muslims.

• Pro-Cologne has been “watched with suspicion by the domestic intelligence agency” for its links to Neo-Nazis, according to Der Spiegel. The party was based on its opposition to the construction of mosques and is staunchly anti-Muslim.

While Rep. Bartetta is an anti-immigrant leader in his own right, should he really be working with a group that is in a coalition with Neo-Fascist political parties?

The far-right student group Youth for Western Civilization, which hosted a panel at CPAC on immigration featuring Rep. Lou Barletta (R-PA) and former Reps. Tom Tancredo and Virgil Goode, is now promoting the Confederacy’s 150th Anniversary and “Anglo-Celtic” pride. William L. Houston of YWC attended a ceremony commemorating Jefferson Davis’s inauguration, and discussed the need for ethnic and historical pride among the “native Anglo-Celtic population of the American South.” He went on to say that the federal government both under Lincoln and Obama are rightly “perceived as being out of control, hostile toward, and oppressive of the people of the states,” and concludes that the “common soldier of the Union Army could have only seen what has become of the Union in our own times, quite assuredly he would have laid down his arms and deserted to the other side.” Houston writes:

As far as heritage and ethnic pride events tend to go, they don't come more politically incorrect than the Southern Rights parade held by the Sons of Confederate Veterans in Montgomery on Saturday.

Before a cheering throng of hundreds of Anglo-Celtic Southerners, an actor portraying Jefferson Davis was sworn in as President of the Confederate States of America on the grounds of the Alabama State Capitol.

Confederate flags flapped in the Southern breeze. Dixie was played. Cannons were fired. There were speeches of defiance and rebellion - about events both historical and modern.

The purpose of this event was to remember and celebrate the birth of the Confederacy a hundred and fifty years ago. Yet everyone who gathered there left with the sense that there was more to the story.

This was a direct assault on the double standard of multiculturalism by "the wrong sort" of people - the only people in the United States who are denied a sense of pride and identity in their heritage - the native Anglo-Celtic population of the American South - who are told that every group in the world can come to the South and celebrate their heritage but the people who were born and raised here.

"What is it in a man that would cause him to deny his fellow man the pride and dignity of his heritage," said Chuck Rand, an adjutant in chief of the Sons of Confederate Veterans.

…

The crowd in attendence [sic] in Montgomery didn't hesitate to draw parallels between the Confederacy and contemporary America. Then as now, the federal government was perceived as being out of control, hostile toward, and oppressive of the people of the states.

In 1861, it was Southerners who felt this way. In 2011, it is the majority of Americans who live in the South, West, and Midwest.

In their worst nightmare scenarios, even the secessionists couldn't have imagined anything like the President of the United States attacking the State of Arizona for defending itself from a Mexican invasion, celebrating Kwanzaa and Cinco de Mayo in the White House, Obamacare, affirmative action, abortion, gay marriage, or Barack Obama's $3.7 trillion dollar proposed federal budget.

Even Abraham Lincoln would be flabbergasted at his modern heirs who have declared war on traditional marriage and Christmas celebrations. Nothing is more pointless than arguing over the causes of the Civil War.

If the common soldier of the Union Army could have only seen what has become of the Union in our own times, quite assuredly he would have laid down his arms and deserted to the other side.

If there is one message to take away from CPAC’s panel on immigration, it’s that White America is in serious jeopardy and may soon succumb to immigration, multiculturalism, and socialism. The panel “Will Immigration Kill the GOP?” featured former congressmen Tom Tancredo (R-CO) and Virgil Goode (R-VA), Bay Buchanan of Team America PAC, and special guest Rep. Lou Barletta (R-PA). The group Youth for Western Civilization sponsored the panel, and its head Kevin DeAnna was also a panelist. Youth for Western Civilization is a far-right group that regularly criticizes affinity groups on college campuses, especially those that represent black, Hispanic, LGBT, Native American, and Muslim students.

Tancredo, a star among anti-immigrant activists, started the event by claiming that he wasn’t bigoted against Latinos and that the majority of Hispanic Americans support him and favor Arizona’s draconian SB-1070 law. “I have a lot of people who have Hispanic last names who support me,” Tancredo told the jam-packed room, “I speak for most Americans.” The former congressman, who in 2010 received just 37% of the vote in his bid for governor of Colorado, claimed that the GOP should embrace his nativist politics because immigration is the “ultimate economic issue,” and even claimed that Hispanics supported him over his Democratic opponent, Governor John Hickenlooper.

Responding to a questioner who believed that Democrats would drop their support of immigration reform if immigrants were stripped of their right to vote, Tancredo said that even immigrants without voting rights still pose a grave danger to the country.

“No more of this multiculturalism garbage,” Tancredo said, adding that “the cult of multiculturalism has captured the world” and is “the dagger in the heart” of civilization.

Not to be out done, Goode maintained that immigration in general “will not only kill the GOP but will kill the United States of America.” He went on to say that Democratic politicians support undocumented immigration only in order to introduce “socialized medicine” and gain future voters. The Virginia firebrand maintained that the majority of Americans favor his fervently anti-immigrant views, and wanted every state to emulate Arizona’s SB-1070. He asked, “Who could really be against doing away with birthright citizenship?”

Both Tancredo and Goode agreed that U.S. citizens are now being treated unfairly as undocumented immigrants reap all the benefits of American society.

Tancredo claimed that undocumented immigrants “get better health care in detention centers than some of my constituents,” and Goode argued that “today, being a citizen means you’re second class.”

Later, Bay Buchanan said that Tancredo and his dogmatic Nativism represent a model increasingly followed by Republican politicians, including Sen. John McCain, once an advocate of reform, who she said became a “Tancredo disciple when he ran for reelection.” Buchanan also pointed to Arizona Governor Jan Brewer’s reelection to demonstrate that anti-immigrant politics can lead to Republican success at the polls, and said that every state should have a governor like Brewer.

DeAnna of Youth for Western Civilization gave a much darker outlook on the success of the Republican Party, and the country as a whole. He said that the “system is stacked against” the anti-immigrant movement, maintaining that an alliance of corporate and Republican elites is preventing the party from moving farther to the right on the issue of immigration. He warned of the rising tide of multiculturalism, especially among young people. “The Left gets power from multiculturalism,” DeAnna said, and “when you lose the culture you lose the policy too.”

He also argued that the GOP is “dead” in California because of the rising population of Latinos, and said that the Democratic Party and their allies in organized labor want further immigration to strengthen their electoral clout.

Rep. Lou Barletta was the final speaker before questions, and he discussed how he saved the city of Hazleton as mayor by cracking down on employers and landlords who do business with undocumented immigrants. “I stood up for the rule of law,” Barletta said, even though his anti-immigrant ordinance was declared unconstitutional. The congressman has a long history of partnering with Nativist groups, and he asked the audience to support him as he pledged to take his case to the Supreme Court.

But while many panelists like Tancredo and Buchanan began their speeches by saying that they were absolutely not bigoted or racist in any way, participants at the event asked many racially-tinged questions.

A questioner asked Goode how to “control immigration from the Islamic and Arab world,” and said that unless that happens there could be “more Keith Ellisons.” Ellison is a Democratic congressman from Minnesota who converted to Islam as an adult, and is not an immigrant, but Goode did write a letter to his constituents saying, “The Muslim Representative from Minnesota was elected by the voters of that district and if American citizens don't wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration, there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran.”

Another questioner discussed how astounded he was that “in the northeast, majority-Caucasian communities” tend to back “support ‘amnesty,’” or at least pro-reform politicians. He asked the panelists how he could turn more “Caucasian communities” against amnesty, and Buchanan assured him that even voters in Massachusetts oppose reform efforts like the DREAM Act.

One member of the audience wondered if Congress could “defund the National Council of La Raza,” a Latino civil rights group, which he said was “just like the Ku Klux Klan.” Goode appeared to agree, and demanded that Congress end the organization’s funding. Asking if “it’s possible that [American] society devolves into South Africa,” one questioner discussed the declining population rate of “European Americans” and floated the idea of ethnic groups living separately. While he directed the question towards Barletta, the congressman ignored the question.

Evidently, while the panel’s speakers see unrepentant Nativism and immigrant-bashing as the way for the GOP’s electoral success, it mainly appealed to the CPAC attendees who feared the demise of White America and the emergence of a more diverse population. All four panelists agreed that unless the Republican Party embraces their hard line anti-immigrant stance, the GOP will become inextricably weakened and the country will dissolve into multicultural dystopia.

Although the panelists all said that it wasn’t about race, it’s easy to see why many audience members thought it was.

• The Eagle Forum is no longer calling judges "judicial activists": they are now "judicial reconstructionists."
• Former Virginia Congressman Virgil Goode has reportedly joined the Constitution Party.
• The AFA's Bryan Fischer claims that the fact that the White House didn't use the phrase "year of our Lord" in a proclamation declaring Jewish Heritage Month proves that the US is a Christian nation.
• The Susan B. Anthony List launched a $30,000 radio ad campaign targeting Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-WV) "on his retreat from his pro-life stance in the final hours of the healthcare debate."
• They may call them "love offerings," but the government calls it "tax evasion."
• Finally, the right-wing campaign against Kevin Jennings continues, leading to this dowright bizarre press release from Citizens for Community Values.

For years, whenever the Religious Right felt it was being under appreciated by the Republican Party, leaders would start hinting, and even sometimes openly threatening, that the socially conservative grassroots voters would utterly abandon the GOP for a third party during the next election cycle. 

Of course, that never happened and every time an election came around, the Right did what it could to mobilize in support of the Republican Party, despite all its earlier threats and whining. 

The one exception that I am aware of what back in 1996 when James Dobson cast a "protest vote" against the Bob Dole, the GOP's nominee, by voting for  Howard Phillips, the nominee of the U.S. Taxpayer’s Party (now known as the Constitution Party).

Since the Religious Right is always threatening to leave the GOP for a third party , it only makes sense that the Constitution Party would try to capitalize on the current discontent and start trying to woo disaffected "values voters" into its camp:

The fastest-growing third party in America, the Constitution Party, will discuss a nationwide effort to encourage Christians to vote "like their faith depended on it." The CP will host a number of notable values-oriented speakers at its Spring National Committee meeting June 12th and 13th at the Renaissance Newark Airport Hotel . The party will gather to discuss its unprecedented growth which coincides with widespread voter dissatisfaction with the Republican and Democratic parties. The Constitution Party, the only political party in America which is 100% pro-life is challenging all Believers to put an end to the "lesser of two evils" approach to voting.

"Christians must vote their values and leave the results to God," noted Constitution Party National Committee Chairman Jim Clymer adding, "Our country was founded on Biblical principles, that's why it was so blessed. Without returning to God's law, we cannot expect America to change for the better."

Outside of former Congressman/crackpot Virgil Goode, and professional conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi, the event doesn't have any big name draws to speak of. 

Nonetheless, it'll be interesting to see if the Constitution Party's efforts to win over Christian voters will pay off, especially in light of the on-going tension between the GOP and its right-wing base.

According to a (subscriber’s-only) article in Insight, the sensationalist newsweekly put out by the right-wing Washington Times, “both Democratic and Republican” members of Congress, unnamed in the story, “have been worried” that Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minnesota) “would become the strongest advocate of extreme Islam in Congress.”

"He is a pleasant man, but his advocacy of the Saudi agenda is very worrisome," a senior House aide said. "This feeling represents numerous Democrats."

Ellison, the first Muslim in Congress, has been a target of the far Right since his election last November. Talk show host Dennis Prager said he “should not be allowed” to pose with Koran after his swearing in, a sentiment echoed by self-described “defender of religious freedom” Jay Sekulow, and former Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore—who was removed from the bench for refusing an order to move a two-ton Ten Commandments monument from his courthouse—wrote that Muslims like Ellison are not fit for office. Rep. Virgil Goode (R-Virginia) warned his constituents that “if American citizens don’t wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran.” Meanwhile, other right-wing commentators have attempted to link Ellison to American Muslim groups they purport to be somehow associated with terrorism.

Insight, citing anonymous “congressional sources,” claims that “no Democrat has gone public in fear of a Saudi-financed Muslim backlash, particularly by Ellison's biggest supporter, the Council on American-Islamic Relations.”

As an example of Ellison’s supposed “close ties to Islamic fundamentalists,” the Insight article refers to a visit by Ellison and other members of Congress to Iraq, during which he met with U.S. military leaders and Iraqi leaders seeking his help in “countering al-Qaeda's vision of Islam.”  USA Today noted that Ellison was “already helping a State Department outreach effort aimed at improving the image of the U.S. in the Muslim world.” In Insight’s telling, those details get lost and the trip takes a menacing aspect:

Ellison's close ties to Islamic fundamentalists have sparked greater concern. In late July, Ellison toured Iraq and met Sunni clerics in Ramadi who sought his help in improving Islam's image in the United States. Ramadi has been regarded as being heavily influenced by al Qaeda.

"They were very upset and concerned that al Qaeda is misrepresenting Islam," Ellison said on July 30. "And they were talking to me about what I can possibly do to work with them to give a clearer, more accurate picture of what Islam is all about."

Echoing the sentiments of religious-right activists who last month decried a Hindu guest chaplain giving the opening prayer in the Senate, Rep. Bill Sali (R-Idaho) warned that “the protective hand of God” could be lifted. Sali also cited the threat of his Muslim colleague, Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minnesota), but unlike comments last December by Rep. Virgil Goode (R-Virginia) linking Ellison to immigration and 9/11, Sali warned that Ellison’s presence, like the Hindu prayer, would displease both America’s founders and God.

"We have not only a Hindu prayer being offered in the Senate, we have a Muslim member of the House of Representatives now, Keith Ellison from Minnesota. Those are changes -- and they are not what was envisioned by the Founding Fathers," asserts Sali.

Sali says America was built on Christian principles that were derived from scripture. He also says the only way the United States has been allowed to exist in a world that is so hostile to Christian principles is through "the protective hand of God."

"You know, the Lord can cause the rain to fall on the just and the unjust alike," says the Idaho Republican.

According to Congressman Sali, the only way the U.S. can continue to survive is under that protective hand of God. He states when a Hindu prayer is offered, "that's a different god" and that it "creates problems for the longevity of this country."

Sali, with the backing of the Club for Growth and a following of social conservatives, won a divisive Republican primary in his GOP district last year, despite warnings from fellow Republicans that Sali was “an absolute idiot.”

Protesters associated with Operation Save America/Operation Rescue disrupted the prayer by Rajan Zed on July 12, attempting to shout the Hindu chaplain down.  Other religious-right activists rushed to their defense and attacked the prayer as “idolatry.” Janet Folger said the protestors “are heroes” and “may be what spares us from the judgment of God.” Jan Markell of Olive Tree Ministries warned that “When Israel went straying and worshiping other gods, very, very serious consequences came down upon her,” adding “America is at a turning point” and can expect a “major” terrorist act this summer.

And back in December, as some on the far Right were asserting that newly-elected Rep. Ellison should not be able to pose for a photo op after his swearing-in holding the Koran – or even to serve at all – Rep. Goode joined in, warning his constituents that “if American citizens don’t wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran.” Goode later expanded on his commentary, explaining that “we were not attacked by a nation on 9/11; we were attacked by extremists who acted in the name of the Islamic religion.” Pat Robertson warned in March that Muslim politicians like Ellison want to “take over” and “institute Sharia.”

Echoing other anti-immigrant politicians and activists, Pat Buchanan claims the most recent delay to Senate passage of comprehensive immigration reform is “one of the great uprisings of modern politics” in which “Middle America rose up and body-slammed the national establishment.” But he warns, in true Buchanan style, that the bill’s “authors and backers will never quit” because their real motive is the establishment of a U.S.-Mexico-Canada sovereign entity controlled by “global corporation[s] and the transnational elite” and leading, ultimately, “the death of the American republic.”

For this legislation is part of a larger agenda of a large slice of America's economic and political elite.

What is that agenda?

They have a vision of a world where not only capital and goods but people move freely across borders. Indeed, borders disappear. It is a vision of a "deep integration" of the United States, Canada and Mexico in a North American Union, modeled on the European Union and tied together by superhighways and railroads, where crossing from Mexico into the United States would be as easy as crossing from Virginia into Maryland. It is about the merger of nations into larger transnational entitles and, ultimately, global governance.

Previously, Rep. Virgil Goode (R-Virginia) made the connection between the current immigration bill and the mythical “North American Union” plot. Howard Phillips –  chairman of the Conservative Caucus and at one time an influential activist on the Right – also declared the bill part of such a “dastardly scheme.” Eagle Forum founder Phyllis Schlafly has similarly tried to tie the bill to the "North American Union."

On the web site of the American Center for Law and Justice, the Pat Robertson-founded legal group where Jay Sekulow serves as chief counsel, Sekulow describes himself as a “nationally recognized and respected defender of religious freedom.” On last night’s “Hannity & Colmes” on Fox News, Sekulow perhaps elaborated on what he means by “religious freedom” when he said that a freshman Muslim lawmaker “should have just abstained from” using the Koran in a ceremonial photo op following his official swearing in as a member of Congress. Sekulow, although aware of the constitutional prohibition of religious tests for office, insisted that such a use of the Koran represented a "danger" to the country and its "Judeo-Christian tradition."

Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minnesota) has been a target of some on the Right since an article by radio talker Dennis Prager wrote that he “should not be allowed” to be photographed with the Koran, calling the use of the Bible “essential to the continuity of a civilization.” Rep. Virgil Goode (R-Virginia) pushed the “controversy” into the headlines when he wrote a letter to his constituents warning that, “if American citizens don’t wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran.” Goode later invoked the terrorists attacks of September 11 as justification for his concerns about immigrants.

Apart from Goode’s tirade against immigrants, Sekulow is the most prominent figure to embrace this attack on religious liberty. Sekulow has made a name for himself as a right-wing superlawyer, defending violent anti-abortion activists before the Supreme Court and advising the president on judicial nominees, all while pulling down an impressive salary.

While Sekulow was clearly aware of the ban on religious tests – he told Sean Hannity that Ellison didn’t have to actually hold the Bible – he insisted that Ellison’s use of the Koran (the copy once owned by Thomas Jefferson, architect of religious liberty) represented a “danger” to the country.

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Jay Sekulow on Hannity and Colmes, 1/8/07

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