100 new militia groups since Obama elected; watchdog alarmed.
Some 100 new militia groups have formed since the election of President Barack Obama, says the Southern Poverty Law Center.
In a re-run of the phenomenon seen when President Bill Clinton tookoffice, gun-rights advocates, libertarians, survivalists and others areforming militias as a symbol of their resistance to what they see as anadministration that threatens to restrict their right to bear arms andexpand government control over the lives of private citizens.
“The truth is that these groups are popping up like mushrooms aftera spring rain,” said Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center, asocial-justice group that has been tracking the rise of militias overthe past year.
Note: We have to wonder how many of these “groups” are actually one or two individuals with a web site. And out of those, how many have ip addressesthat originate in an SPLC facility or affiliate?
Potok’s group put out a report earlier this year raising the alarm about the resurgence of armedmilitias. Since then, he told CNN, the group has counted about 100 newgroups formed across the country.
“There really is this terrible fear mixed with fury about the ideathat President Obama is somehow leading a socialistic takeover ofAmerica,” Potok said.
A CNN news crew that visited the Southeast Michigan VolunteerMilitia found a group that sees itself as a “deterrent” to any attemptsto restrict gun use, and otherwise sees itself as a place to learnsurvival skills.
“Just the simple fact that we are out here and we are doing this,will give somebody pause, will make them think twice,” said militiamember Michael Lackomar, who added that he thought Obama “could bedangerous for the nation.”
“Anytime we get a Democratic president in the office, people becomeconcerned, including myself, and we get a resurgence out here,” saidone militia member, identified only as Brian.
But CNN’s Jim Acosta points out that gun control “is unrealistic inmany ways, because the Obama administration and the Democrats know thatit would be political suicide for them to go after gun controlmeasures. Even the attorney general has indicated he won’t go back tothe assault weapons ban enacted in the Clinton administration.”
In its reportfrom August, the Southern Poverty Law Center pointed out that the mostrecent wave of militia groups differs slightly from the wave seen underPresident Clinton in one respect.
“A key difference this time is that the federal government — theentity that almost the entire radical right views as its primary enemy— is headed by a black man,” the report states. “That, coupled withhigh levels of non-white immigration and a decline in the percentage ofwhites overall in America, has helped to racialize the Patriotmovement, which in the past was not primarily motivated by race hate.”
This video is from CNN’s American Morning, broadcast Nov. 16, 2009.