White's Web site closed by FBI: Overthrow.com has been off-line since federal officials seized compu

[maddezmom]

Source: The Roanoke Times - McClatchy-Tribune

White's Web site closed by FBI: Overthrow.com has been off-line since federal officials seized computer equipment.

Oct 17, 2008 (The Roanoke Times - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Federal agents have reportedly seized computer equipment from a Roanoke-based white supremacy group, at least temporarily shutting down a Web site used to spout racist rhetoric.
Overthrow.com, which is run by William White, the commander of the American National Socialist Workers Party, has been off-line since last weekend.

~snip~

Other postings have included calls to lynch six black teenagers charged with assault in a case that prompted a civil rights demonstration last year in Jena, La.

More recently, the Web site carried images of presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, his head in the cross hairs of a rifle sight fashioned into a swastika, along with the headline "Kill This N---?"

It was not clear this week whether the federal investigation of White includes the Obama material, which appears on the cover of an upcoming magazine to be published by ANSWP.

Scot Montrey, a spokesman for the U.S. Justice Department's civil rights division in Washington, said this week that an investigation of White is ongoing. Federal authorities first confirmed the investigation in September 2007, after Overthrow carried the headline "Lynch the Jena 6," along with what it said were the teens' home addresses and telephone numbers.



Read more: http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/news/Stock%20News/1951288/

[Miss Chybil]

1. Patriot Act nt

[roguevalley]

11. "commander" Don't you just love their delusion?

[KsStorm]

2. Hmmm

Looks like another one I've seen mentioned on other BBs as being very racist,"Stormfront" is also gone! YAY!

[CitizenPatriot]

3. keep on exposing yourselves -- we need to do a nice thourough cleaning:-)

just in time for our new president.

[Cheap_Trick]

4. but...but...how will McCain/Mooselini get their message out now?

[Dr.Phool]

10. They'll do "Josephine the Plumber" ads.

Since ole' Joe didn't work out so well.

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

5. Oh darn.

Another night of crying myself to sleep ahead. Drats.

Please note: I don't condone abrogations of freedoms of speech, as defined. That said, this story outlines a lot of stepping over of invisible lines.

[NinetySix]

6. "I hate Virginia Nazis."

American National Socialist Workers' Party? WTF?!?

[Diclotican]

9. NinetySix

NinetySix

At least this NS could manage to get new uniforms.. This is like the uniforms the nazis was doing in the 1930s-1940s.. I would guess that even the nazis ts, if they have been into power now, would have other uniforms.. More modern lockings..

But, it is good that the nazis ts are been closing down... That is the good news here

Diclotican

Sorry my bad english, not my native language

[sofa king]

23. I think that's a screenshot from The Blues Brothers.

You're right, though. The Hugo Boss company is still around and still designing fine suits.

Edit: I should add that I live fairly near Roanoke, and neither fine suits nor uniforms are in fashion around these parts. Hugo Boss wouldn't be supplying uniforms for these Nazis. But Wal-Mart would, particularly in the camo-and-orange coveralls section (and yes, it's close to hunting season, so there is an entire section of the store dedicated to hunting fashion).

[Doug 1973]

7. Count one for the good guys

[bluesmail]

8. Another October Surprise I can live with.

[machI]

12. Kick

[bean fidhleir]

13. So I'm the only one who finds this a scary assault on the First Amendment?

Sure, they're disgusting, but if the state can assault someone's constitutional rights because they're disgusting, there's nothing stopping them from re-defining *us* as disgusting, too.

Lines need to be clearly drawn. If the lines aren't bright enough to see with the naked eye, then we live under the rule of whim, not of law.

[bobd0]

14. Yep, you're the only one so far who considers threats of assassination and lynching protected speech

And I sincerely hope you remain the only one here with such a naive and dangerous view of The First Amendment.

Maybe you can get Michele Bachmann to investigate this on your behalf.

[MH1]

15. You very well might be.

I'm pretty sure incitement to violence, along with giving out addresses of the people the violence is being incited against, has never been and should not be covered under "freedom of speech". It seems like a pretty bright line to me.

[bean fidhleir]

16. "incitement to violence, along with giving out addresses"

I saw no mention of arrests, though, did you?

Either what those dirtbags are doing is illegal, as you believe (right?), in which case they should be arrested and charged, or it's not illegal and they shouldn't have been shut down. Shutting him down is punishment of non-criminal behavior. It's what totalitarian regimes do.

FDR did the same thing to Fr. Coughlin during WW2. Coughlin did nothing illegal, but some powerful people, including FDR to whom Coughlin was a political threat, wanted him silenced. So they decided to shut him up by, basically, administratively depriving him of some of his rights as a citizen. No arrests, no trial, no chance for him to defend himself. He was, to a degree, made a non-person the way that Stalin did to dissenters in the USSR.

Any time we go along with that kind of crap because we don't like the one they're doing it to, we make it a little bit easier for the thugs to do it to us, too.

[1Hippiechick]

18. "Any time we go along with that kind of crap because we don't like the one they're doing it to,

we make it a little bit easier for the thugs to do it to us, too."

AMEN! This is EXACTLY what we have to fight AGAINST!

[bean fidhleir]

21. This is exactly the kind of thing Niemöller was on about with his

"First they got rid of the Communists...."

Apparently many more people can repeat some version of his words than can understand what the words meant.

[LanternWaste]

48. And apparently many people can co-opt...

And apparently many people can co-opt his words for melodramatic effect without understanding what they truly mean...

[MH1]

24. Simplistic, much?

Murder is illegal and if the murderer is known they certainly should be arrested, charged, and tried. However if it is also known that the murderer is a member of an organized criminal entity and an investigation can lead to other criminals, I have NO problem with the FBI delaying the arrest of the known murderer in order to arrest more of the criminals.

I just have this odd thing against violence. :shrug:

Back to Stormfront et al, if they want to hold a rally in a park, I support their right to do so. However if they burn a cross on someone's lawn, that is not free speech, and I support the efforts of law enforcement to infiltrate the group and put a stop to that shit. If a website is CLEARLY inciting violence, then I think it has violated "free speech" and I am okay with it being shut down.

I only wish that the FBI would apply the same reasoning to hate speech on the radio. There's been a couple times I thought there was justification for pulling the plug on a station, or at least a particular show.

[bean fidhleir]

25. Sophistic much?

It really doesn't matter what you're okay with - you're not the measure of the law. If a crime has been committed, then arrests must be made and charges laid. Here, no arrests were made - but the guy's computer equipment was stolen. The information wasn't copied, the hardware was stolen under color of law. Punishment without crime.

Anyone who is okay with that is a fascist at heart, because punishment without crime is an essential feature of fascism. Nacht und Nebel. Gulag. Guantanamo. It's all the same when you strip away the rhetoric.

"Zuerst haben sie die Kommunisten beseitigten...."

[MH1]

26. I'm not a law expert, but the FBI delays arrests all the time for the purpose of investigation.

That's how they bring down mob kingpins. So, pardon me for assuming that it must be legal, since that is how it's been done for years. I have know idea what "measure of law" you think you are talking about. I also know that it's been legal for a long time for law enforcement to take the property of suspects for a variety of reasons, and if convicted the property is not returned. I'm not necessarily okay with that part but as you point out, it doesn't matter whether I'm okay with it, it's how the law works.

As far as me being a "fascist" at heart, sorry dude, you are wrong about that. But back at you: anyone who is okay with the racism, hate and violence promoted by groups like Stormfront - well there are no words that I can post here, but I can't help but hope you get a strong dose of your own medicine one day. Okay, really I hope you wake up and realize that hate and violence will only hurt you too in the end. But I suspect the strong dose of your own medicine is a more likely future.

[bean fidhleir]

28. You need to learn Phil Ochs's "Love Me, I'm a Liberal". He wrote it for you and those like you.

I cried when they shot Medgar Evers
Tears ran down my spine
I cried when they shot Mr. Kennedy
As though I'd lost a father of mine
But Malcolm X got what was coming
He got what he asked for this time
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

I go to civil rights rallies
And I put down the old D.A.R.
I love Harry and Sidney and Sammy
I hope every coloured boy becomes a star
But don't talk about revolution
That's going a little bit too far
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

I cheered when Humphrey was chosen
My faith in the system restored
I'm glad the commies were thrown out
of the AFL-CIO board
I love Puerto Ricans and Negros
as long as they don't move next door
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

The people of old Mississippi
Should all hang their heads in shame
I can't understand how their minds work
What's the matter don't they watch Les Crain?
But if you ask me to bus my children
I hope the cops take down your name
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

I read New Republic and Nation
I've learned to take every view
You know, I've memorized Lerner and Golden
I feel like I'm almost a Jew
But when it comes to times like Korea
There's no one more red, white and blue
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

I vote for the Democratic Party.
They want the U.N. to be strong
I go to all the Pete Seeger concerts
He sure gets me singing those songs
I'll send all the money you ask for
But don't ask me to come on along
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

Once I was young and impulsive
I wore every conceivable pin
Even went to the socialist meetings
Learned all the old union hymns
But I've grown older and wiser
And that's why I'm turning you in
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal

[MH1]

30. Um, no I don't.

I can explain it in one line of a song lyric: "there's no bloody revolution" - The Police, Spirits in the Material World.

(ooh, "The Police" - ya gotta love the irony, at least! ;) )

and if you don't get it let me spell it out: if it's bloody, it isn't a revolution, just more of the same shit but by different people.

And yeah if there was a racist living next door and he (or she) committed a violent, illegal act (like burning a cross on someone's lawn) and I could prove it, you are damn right I'll turn them in. If you or Phil Ochs wouldn't, then please take your racist asses somewhere else. (But I think Phil Ochs would have, actually. I think you're screwy if you think he was writing about letting racists get away with their terror tactics. But maybe I'm wrong, in which case I won't be looking to Phil Ochs for guidance.)

[bean fidhleir]

32. He was writing about self-defined "liberals", like you, who really don't

see anything wrong with denying Constitutional rights to people you don't like. You'd have felt right at home amid the outrage when the ACLU defended the Nazi jerkoffs' right to march in Skokie. How *dare* the ACLU defend the rights of scum!

To you, as to those "liberals" in Skokie, *your opinion* is more important than the guarantees embodied in the Constitution. Unless someone meets *your standards*, then they don't get no steenkin rights.

Well, "scum" is in the eye of the beholder. Tomorrow, YOU might be declared scum and unworthy of rights.

That's what Niemöller mourned til the end of his life: that he hadn't been smart enough to see that, in approving what the Nazis did to the Commies because the Commies were enemies of the church, he made the Nazis more powerful. And when the Nazis got powerful enough, they declared him a criminal and threw him into the camps, too. Niemöller had thought he was safe, because he was a decorated ex-U-Boot commander and the respected pastor of a politically powerful congregation in Berlin. But he found out he wasn't, and almost died of the knowledge.

[MH1]

35. Sorry, but you are totally misrepresenting my posts.

You are so full of self-righteousness that you can't even read what I wrote. I am talking about VIOLENCE, not marching. In fact I even stated that if they want to have a rally, they have that right. And I do appreciate the ACLU defending their right to do so.

SO, ONE MORE FUCKING TIME: I am talking about violence and threats of violence, WHICH ARE AGAINST THE LAW IN THIS COUNTRY AND IT HAS NOTHING THE FUCK WHATEVER TO DO WITH MY "OPINION" or whether they agree with it or not. And no the Constitution does NOT give you the right to incite violence against another person!

Hell if you go beat up on someone for disagreeing with some progressive opinion that you and I happen to agree on, or if you post a person's address and say "lynch this person who lives at 625 Main St Sometown USA" - in that case I WOULD TURN YOUR SORRY ASS IN, TOO. I don't care if you're going to beat up on the guy who posted the abortion doc's number on his website - that isn't your job. That's what the POLICE are for. IT IS CALLED THE RULE OF LAW. And it is necessary for a peaceful society. If you don't get that then you cannot help bring about a peaceful society in any way whatsoever - and if you think you can you are completely deluded.

Do you really not have a fucking clue about the difference between a rally or a march, and using a website to incite people to physically harm another person? I guess from your posts here, I have to assume that's the case. I am sorry for wasting both our time.

[bean fidhleir]

36. If the cops thought this guy had really broken the law, he'd be IN JAIL.

Or at best out on bail. What's so hard about that concept for you? People who are thought to have broken the law get ARRESTED AND CHARGED. That's how it works!

What they did to this guy shows that they have nothing to charge him with. All they could do to him is steal his stuff on a pretext. And they can do that because the Fourth Amendment has been kaputt ever since SCOTUS (I think Kennedy was the mouthpiece) smirkingly told the poor woman whose half-ownership in the family car was stolen by the cops that "it wasn't an expensive car".

So your opinion about this creep having broken the law is not supported by anything but your overactive imagination. If they charge him with something, that'll be different. Right now, he hasn't done anything illegal and no matter how many times you get red in the face and jump up and down saying YES HE DID! YES HE DID!, it won't change that reality.

[otherlander]

42. Cool song.

Am I allowed to like Malcom X, though? I mean, I do like him, but I usually don't say so, because I figured that if I said that I thought that Malcom X was right about most things in the world, all the cool people who believe in the things that he believed in would just think that I was being a pathetic suckup.

[Tigress DEM]

38. You are not legally allowed to yell FIRE in a theater just for grins.

By shutting down the Website they have effectively removed this person's ability to incite others to "kill this n-- " and are verifying there wasn't more to it like specific plans. It's called an investigation.

There are FCC laws that say you can't incite a mob to violence. Since the internet is a national and even world wide audience, there is your mob.

People who get carried away or overstep their boundries at political protests get arrested too. If you step over the line, you do the time.

[bean fidhleir]

46. You're reciting the fascist credo: "it's a crime if we say it's a crime"

I prefer the rule of law.

And the law says nothing about fire in theaters. That was merely one judge's example of how speech that has consequences for other people can have consequences for the speaker.

The reality of the law is that if there's a fire, you can yell "fire" even though it probably would be a stupid thing to do. And even if there isn't a fire, you can still yell "fire" and as long as nothing happens, you cannot be touched. There is NO LAW that criminalizes yelling "fire" in a theater whether crowded or empty.

[1Hippiechick]

17. No, This is very frightening to me. Can we say, "Police state"? n/t

[backscatter712]

19. Death threats, and incitations of violence are not protected speech.

This has been codified in case law for about as long as this country's been in existence.

Making threats against Obama, suggesting the Jena Six be lynched - those are crimes.

[1Hippiechick]

22. The FBI shuts down their website. Elsewhere peaceful protestors are being arrested as terrorists

what's next? This doesn't sound like a police state to you?

[Nevernose]

27. Did the FBI shut down their website?

Or did they seize the computers as evidence of a crime? There's a difference.

[bean fidhleir]

34. "Or did they seize the computers as evidence of a crime?"

The computer is not the evidence of a crime. The website would be evidence -IFF there's a crime, the information on the hard drive might be evidence, but the computer as a whole is not evidence of anything except computer ownership.

[Nevernose]

37. Is it reasonable that the FBI deconstruct the computer

When serving a search warrant? If, say, they'd arrested a guy for smuggling cocaine into the country in his automobile, would it make more sense to take just the empty seats or take the whole car?

I agree that it's still up in the air as to whether or not a crime occurred, but that's why the computers were seized -- they're still investigating.

[bean fidhleir]

47. If the article's description of the search warrant is accurate, then

they had the right only to take electronic files and other records "that may contain all evidence of the crime of threatening Hale Juror A." including "documents, photographs, or other information that shows an intent to intimidate or injure persons whose personal information has been posted in the same manor as Hale Juror A.

Records, not hardware. Unlike your car-and-drugs example, once a hard disk is removed there is no possibility of their being residue lying around in the corners of the case, monitor, keyboard, etc. that would justify taking the hardware. A case could be made that their search warrant didn't allow them to do more than copy the disk and leave him with a functioning computer that has the new disk in place of the original.

[Tigress DEM]

39. But peaceful protestors aren't asking for people to be killed.

2 different issues.

There are rules of conduct when you have a far reaching audience. Inciting to riot or violence is against the law.

Free speech is when someone doesn't like Obama and has whatever opinion of him they do. THAT is protected even when it's ignorant.

If WE here on DU were encouraging people to the same ends in regards to McCain or Palin, WE would be in the wrong and breaking the law.

YOUR rights end at the beginning of your neighbor's nose. You don't have the right to punch your neighbor in the nose or to stand somewhere and tell other people where to find your neighbor and that they should punch him in the nose.

TO PROTECT their website with their stated agenda is like protecting the Mafia ordering up a hit on someone.


Peaceful protestors being arrested as terrorists - YES police state. We had it here in MN for the DNC and the battle is still going on to get all the charges dropped. The ones that will probably stick are the few anarchists who had plans to do actual damage to property and were throwing urine and feces. Over the line kind of stuff. Not terrorism, but a bit over the top and not exactly legal.

[bean fidhleir]

20. Thank you!! Sometimes I feel so alone around here it's almost unbearable

How in hell people can call themselves "liberal" or "progressive" and at the same time approve of police-state tactics is just beyond me.

[Tigress DEM]

41. The thing is bean fidhleir, you are defending their rights beyond a legal measure.

When someone consistently does things under full public scrutiny that are illegal to a minor degree and potentially to a criminal degree, it is a reason for a warrant and a search to see if other more serious plans are documented as being in the works.

These people aren't just practicing free speech they are calling for action that is illegal. You don't put someone in your gun's site to draw a pretty picture of them, especially when the caption says the words "Kill the n---" below it. That is an imperitive statement, basically a command or an order.

Many of us here on DU wish many of the rethugs in power who are getting away with murder could be easily taken care of by someone with a bad attitude. But as law abiding citizens we don't promote it or condone it. We have the right to be upset and angry and express our frustration, but when it comes to calls for actions, we have the responsibility as citizens to stay within the law.

It isn't because these people are scums that they are being investigated and having their equipment seized and searched. It is because they have misused the power of their website and have not been responsible to the laws that are out there to protect people from being plotted against simply because people don't like them.

[bean fidhleir]

45. You, like others here yelling "crime", are trying to invent your own law

Do you REALLY THINK that all the DOJ lawyers can't figure out whether some act looks enough like a crime to warrant at least an arrest? Where'd you get *your* law degree? Where are *you* licensed to practice?

I take it for granted that they'd like to put this guy in jail, and that the fact they haven't done it is *strong* evidence that he has done nothing that's actually illegal. That he's still walking around loose says that a LOT of DOJ lawyers got together in a room, looked at what he's been doing, and said "no, he hasn't stepped over the line".

Don't invent stuff. See what's really there.

[Taverner]

29. Threatening to assasinate a Pres. candidate is against the law

Nothing to do with the 1st ammendment

[MH1]

31. Oh, but don't you know that law is "fascist"?

It's fascist to investigate threats to assassinate people. It's fascist to investigate the terrorizing of abortion doctors - after all people are only exercising free speech when they post names and addresses of "baby murderers" on the internet. Hell, it's fascist to do anything to stop the terrorizing of people that do something some group disagrees with. Let 'em fight, damn it! No gun control for anyone! Let the docs and the minorities buy guns and hire security and let 'em fight it out in the street, I say! Who needs cops anyway?

</ sarcastic rant>

Maybe I'd better add a few of these:

:sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm: :sarcasm:

:banghead:

[bean fidhleir]

33. Then why haven't they arrested him?

See, that's the difference between the rule of whim and the rule of law. The rule of law says there has to be probable cause. Actual evidence of an actual crime.

But the rule of whim is much more "flexible" - mere ignorant *opinion* like yours is enough. Dislike someone? Then you're justified in beating him up, robbing him, vilifying him in the press, throwing him into Guantanamo as an "enemy combatant", whatever you like. After all, who's going to defend him? He's scum, and nobody wants to be caught defending scum. Except people who care about the Constitution, of course, but maybe they need a beating too, eh?

[Tigress DEM]

40. It is called an investigation. There is enough evidence of inciting violence.

Rule of law presumes innocence so you don't arrest someone until you've examined the evidence.

The tip of the iceberg suggests his goal was to encourage others to follow through. But maybe he is legally walking the line. Maybe there are private messages inviting specific people to do specific things. Then he's crossed the line.

People who care about the Constitution are great, but even if this were a liberal website calling for McCain and Palin to be done in, there would be grounds to investigate and see if there is any actual plan in the making and therefore laws being broken.

The thing is the words and pictures these people are putting on the website would be terroristic threats if made face to face with an individual and reason enough to arrest someone because you can see by the face to face who exactly the intended victim is and that the person is an intended victim. Online it's a bit murky, so there is a higher burden of proof.

Still it is the people on the website that are choosing to promote violence. If it's just a little bit of venting and no real harm intended, it's like going 58mph in a 55mph zone. You see the cop at the underpass and slow back down to 55mph by taking your foot off the gas. If there is no cop there you might cruise through at 64mph. The law is technically being broken in either case, but when you're not observed or not ticketed because it's not a rash enough violation, you caught a break is all. Does not mean what you did was legal.

THIS scenario is a reminder to everyone about the difference between freedom of speech and inciting violence which is NOT protected by the Constitution so that no one gets to gather a lynch mob or vigilante squad and take the law into their own hands.

They can be scum and creeps all they want, but when it looks like they are gathering to deliver a beat down, THEY are the ones in the wrong.

[bean fidhleir]

44. How much examination does anyone have to do?

There's either plenty evidence of a crime, or plenty evidence of repulsive but protected speech. Either way, they have plenty evidence. The whole point is that it was happening in plain sight, on his website. They don't have to dig around. They have all they need.

That they haven't arrested him means that their lawyers have decided that, whatever else it is, it's *not* evidence of a crime.

So now they're apparently trying to jerk a grand jury around and get *them* to declare that it's evidence of a crime.

And meanwhile, they steal his stuff because even if they can't throw him in jail, they "know" he's guilty and therefore can feel all self-righteous when they make life miserable for him under color of law.

[ima_sinnic]

51. hopefully you noticed the post below about an arrest, so you can stop

yawping about the "right" of hate-mongers to call for or incite assassination, lynching, and violence.

[bean fidhleir]

52. No, I'll probably go on "yawping" about Constitutional rights, even when it displeases

people like you. The Constitution might not be anywhere near what it should be, but I trust it more than I trust you.

[RainDog]

43. when does the waterboarding start?

isn't that what Bush does to terrorists?

[maddezmom]

49. UPDATE: Neo-Nazi charged with posting data on Hale juror, arrested in VA & will be transferred to IL

Neo-Nazi charged with posting data on Hale juror
U.S. COURT | Urged harm against panelist in '04 white supremacy trial: feds
Recommend (4) Comments

October 19, 2008

BY NATASHA KORECKI Federal Courts Reporter [e-mail]
A neo-Nazi who long operated a hate Web site has been arrested for posting online the name and home address of a Chicago juror who served in the trial of white supremacist Matthew Hale.

William A. White was arrested Friday in Roanoke, Va., and is expected to appear in federal court in Virginia as early as today on civil rights charges. He will then be transferred to Chicago, sources told the Sun-Times.

White's Web site -- www.over throw.com, which authorities have shut down -- recently posted the headline "Kill This N-----?" next to a photo of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama.

In another post, the site called for the lynching of six black teenagers charged with assault in a civil rights case in Jena, La.

White, the self-proclaimed leader of the American National Socialist Workers Party, described by authorities as a hate group, is charged under a new law that was an outgrowth from the killings of two family members of a Chicago judge.

more:http://www.suntimes.com/news/24-7/1230220,CST-NWS-neo19.article

[bean fidhleir]

50. Good.

Though I notice they don't say *what* "civil-rights charges".