FREEPERS: Just who are they? [Opposition Research]
by Edwin Johnston, November 27, 2000
by Edwin Johnston, November 27, 2000
Posted to the Houston Fair Vote Discussion List
"We are grassroots and they are Astroturf." - Longtime Houston activist Ray Hill
While it should be our main project to focus on having a full and fair account of the votes and "Keeping Our Eyes on the Prize," it is important to explore the organizations that are in open opposition to our organizing efforts. At this point, a group known as Freepers, centered around a website at http://www.freerepublic.com, has worked hard to complicate our organizing and has counter-demonstrated against us at two separate protests.
This letter will probe into the Houston Freepers' campaign against our organization and will lay out a history of the Freepers group as it relates to this election crisis.
This letter will probe into the Houston Freepers' campaign against our organization and will lay out a history of the Freepers group as it relates to this election crisis.
Report on Freeper activity against Houston Fair Vote group
In response to voter irregularities in Florida local Houston organizers facilitated by the national website for a fair vote, CounterCoup.org, held a relatively large protest in Market Square on November 11th.
The sustained nature of the election crisis created the opportunity for Houston fair vote protestors to rally again the following Saturday, November 18th, at Tranquility Park. Protest information for this event was published on the CounterCoup.org website as well as the newly developed Houston fair vote organizing website (http://www.hal-pc.org/~edi/houston.html) and its related local discussion board (http://www.egroups.com/group/trustthepeople-houston).
The unprecedented success of the national protest organizing efforts through CounterCoup.org led far right wing Pro-Bush supporters to steal and copy the fair vote protest locations for November 18th in order to develop a national campaign of counter-demonstrations to the various local fair vote groups. The website featuring the stolen protest lists is: http://www.loudcitizen.com
As a result, Houston Freepers planned to counter-demonstrate against us on November 18th and began monitoring our website and discussion board. At the November 18th protest, Freepers showed up in nearly equal numbers to ours, which caused the media to erroneously report that the event was a protest between Bush and Gore supporters, when in fact our group is non-partisan. Later that day, Bush supporters began a spam campaign on our discussion board.
Our group planned another protest for November 26th against media bias. Due to the monitoring of our discussion list by Freepers and continued spam, the Freepers openly began planning to counter-demonstrate against us once again. As moderator of the discussion list I eventually took the step of limiting posting access to the list to prevent the spamming from continuing, however I left the message board able to be read by the public.
In anticipation of the media bias protest, our group sent out a press release to various local media outlets to inform them of the event. This was followed up by a press advisory concerning the nature of the counter-demonstrating Freepers who were expected to show up. Meanwhile, on the FreeRepublic.com discussion lists related to Houston, there was frenzied discussion about our organization and the need to have Freepers come out to counter our event. Many of the Freeper posts were very critical of our organization, calling us socialists, using veiled threats to violence and focusing on individuals like me who have posted on the Houston discussion list.
A bit of karmic irony affected the Freepers plans to counter-demonstrate on November 26th. Some Freepers called for a large demonstration on Saturday November 25th, due to the LoudCitizen.com website's old protest list of CounterCoup.org protest locations from November 18th. Many of them were expecting our group (or liberals in general) to show up at Tranquility Park once again. On November 25th, hundreds of pro-Bush supporters showed up in the Tranquility park area only to find no fair vote demonstrators. After a while they packed up their gear and moved over to the Galleria to continue to protest in favor of Bush. It was my personal prediction that the conflicting nature of their scheduled protests would limit their numbers at our November 26th protest. The prediction turned out to be true.
On November 26th, we held our protest against pro-Bush media bias at Channel 13. We were very well prepared for the event having previously sent out press releases and advisories, coming prepared with copies of our group statement on media bias and having knowledgeable and eloquent spokespersons on hand. An adequate number of our members showed up with picket signs calling attention to the need for a fair vote and for fair coverage of the issues at the heart of the election crisis. Our group was largely disciplined in not responding to the taunts of the Freeper counter-demonstrators, focusing solely on engaging the media personnel on hand to our concerns. In contrast, the Freepers at the demonstration came relatively unprepared to address what they claimed were pro-liberal and pro-Gore biases in the media, even though they had many discussions about needing to meet our statement with one of their own. Freeper activity at the demonstration amounted to the equivalent of a "rah-rah-rah, sis-boom-bah" football team rally in favor of Bush and in opposition to Gore, attempting to paint us as a pro-Gore opposition. The media picked this up, most notably Channel 13 (the target of our protest) who gave us superb coverage. Unhappy Freepers have spent much of November 27th trying to get Channel 13 to correct their report.
In conclusion to this section, it is apparent that Freepers are not very well organized. They are politically naive and unsophisticated. Although they can attract large numbers in Houston, their foundational structure is paper thin. As I have written before, there are members of this group who are a potential violent threat to people in our organization. We need not fear them, but we must be prepared for their challenges. It is my intent in writing this letter to begin to raise people's awareness of the Freepers in order to assure the smooth functioning of our organization.
Having covered local Freep action in opposition to us locally, let's now turn to the history of the Freeper organization nationally and in our region.
In response to voter irregularities in Florida local Houston organizers facilitated by the national website for a fair vote, CounterCoup.org, held a relatively large protest in Market Square on November 11th.
The sustained nature of the election crisis created the opportunity for Houston fair vote protestors to rally again the following Saturday, November 18th, at Tranquility Park. Protest information for this event was published on the CounterCoup.org website as well as the newly developed Houston fair vote organizing website (http://www.hal-pc.org/~edi/houston.html) and its related local discussion board (http://www.egroups.com/group/trustthepeople-houston).
The unprecedented success of the national protest organizing efforts through CounterCoup.org led far right wing Pro-Bush supporters to steal and copy the fair vote protest locations for November 18th in order to develop a national campaign of counter-demonstrations to the various local fair vote groups. The website featuring the stolen protest lists is: http://www.loudcitizen.com
As a result, Houston Freepers planned to counter-demonstrate against us on November 18th and began monitoring our website and discussion board. At the November 18th protest, Freepers showed up in nearly equal numbers to ours, which caused the media to erroneously report that the event was a protest between Bush and Gore supporters, when in fact our group is non-partisan. Later that day, Bush supporters began a spam campaign on our discussion board.
Our group planned another protest for November 26th against media bias. Due to the monitoring of our discussion list by Freepers and continued spam, the Freepers openly began planning to counter-demonstrate against us once again. As moderator of the discussion list I eventually took the step of limiting posting access to the list to prevent the spamming from continuing, however I left the message board able to be read by the public.
In anticipation of the media bias protest, our group sent out a press release to various local media outlets to inform them of the event. This was followed up by a press advisory concerning the nature of the counter-demonstrating Freepers who were expected to show up. Meanwhile, on the FreeRepublic.com discussion lists related to Houston, there was frenzied discussion about our organization and the need to have Freepers come out to counter our event. Many of the Freeper posts were very critical of our organization, calling us socialists, using veiled threats to violence and focusing on individuals like me who have posted on the Houston discussion list.
A bit of karmic irony affected the Freepers plans to counter-demonstrate on November 26th. Some Freepers called for a large demonstration on Saturday November 25th, due to the LoudCitizen.com website's old protest list of CounterCoup.org protest locations from November 18th. Many of them were expecting our group (or liberals in general) to show up at Tranquility Park once again. On November 25th, hundreds of pro-Bush supporters showed up in the Tranquility park area only to find no fair vote demonstrators. After a while they packed up their gear and moved over to the Galleria to continue to protest in favor of Bush. It was my personal prediction that the conflicting nature of their scheduled protests would limit their numbers at our November 26th protest. The prediction turned out to be true.
On November 26th, we held our protest against pro-Bush media bias at Channel 13. We were very well prepared for the event having previously sent out press releases and advisories, coming prepared with copies of our group statement on media bias and having knowledgeable and eloquent spokespersons on hand. An adequate number of our members showed up with picket signs calling attention to the need for a fair vote and for fair coverage of the issues at the heart of the election crisis. Our group was largely disciplined in not responding to the taunts of the Freeper counter-demonstrators, focusing solely on engaging the media personnel on hand to our concerns. In contrast, the Freepers at the demonstration came relatively unprepared to address what they claimed were pro-liberal and pro-Gore biases in the media, even though they had many discussions about needing to meet our statement with one of their own. Freeper activity at the demonstration amounted to the equivalent of a "rah-rah-rah, sis-boom-bah" football team rally in favor of Bush and in opposition to Gore, attempting to paint us as a pro-Gore opposition. The media picked this up, most notably Channel 13 (the target of our protest) who gave us superb coverage. Unhappy Freepers have spent much of November 27th trying to get Channel 13 to correct their report.
In conclusion to this section, it is apparent that Freepers are not very well organized. They are politically naive and unsophisticated. Although they can attract large numbers in Houston, their foundational structure is paper thin. As I have written before, there are members of this group who are a potential violent threat to people in our organization. We need not fear them, but we must be prepared for their challenges. It is my intent in writing this letter to begin to raise people's awareness of the Freepers in order to assure the smooth functioning of our organization.
Having covered local Freep action in opposition to us locally, let's now turn to the history of the Freeper organization nationally and in our region.
History of FreeRepublic.com
The history that I will lay out is based on a cursory examination of various web based reports and research, additional supporting sources and first hand accounts.
The Freepers first gained prominence during the Starr investigation and the failed Clinton impeachment. At one point, Lucianne Goldberg (who directed Linda Tripp to secretly tape Monica Lewinsky's conversations) and Matt Drudge became members and promoted their website. So at base, Freepers are Clinton haters. After the impeachment charade they quickly receded from view. There was then a rift in the organization after Freep founder, John Robinson, began letting far right wingers post extremist messages on their discussion boards. Posts promoting Y2K paranoia, gun fanaticism, anti-Semitism, and death threats to public personalities eventually scared away the likes of Goldberg (whose husband is Jewish) and Drudge. Chip Berlet's organization, which monitors dangerous right wing groups refers to the Freepers as Anti-Clinton right wing populists.
Just how far right wing they are is illustrated by a post one Freeper (or at least a pro-Bush spammer) put on our discussion list. In a message titled "florida voter fraud" (http://www.egroups.com/message/trustthepeople-houston/85) the poster focused on a statement by Montana Governor Mark Racicot, who falsely accused the Gore campaign of voter fraud in Florida by tampering with ballots, refusing overseas military ballots and counting the votes of convicted felons. People on the Freeper discussion board seem to love Racicot and hope he becomes the Vice-President under a Bush administration, should Cheney be unable to serve due to health prolems. This is revealing in that Racicot is extremely right wing with ties to militias and other violent extremists. Bush is also very close to Racicot, which helps point to the general far right agenda behind the push to have Bush coronated regardless of the will of the American voters.
One question I have that is unanswered so far is why the Freepers are so intent in supporting Bush. During their rift, as the election contest loomed (previous to the current crisis,) many Freepers were critical of Bush because of the Iran/Contra CIA drug running revelations. They were critical of him due to his father's involvement, who was Vice-President at the time. Perhaps Freepers have thrown their support to Bush because of the potential for an authoritarian administration supported by the same forces who tried to remove Clinton.
As a final note, the FreeRepublic.com website now has a profile list of their subscribers. The largest number of profiles are from subscribers based in Texas, with California, long a haven for the far right wing, a distant second.
Missing from my analysis at this point is the relation (if one exists) between Freepers and other far right wing forces, like anti-Castro Cubans or the role of the media in all of this, etc. Any further research on this group and the issues raised in connection to them by members of our organization is welcome and encouraged as well as feedback on what I have written.
The history that I will lay out is based on a cursory examination of various web based reports and research, additional supporting sources and first hand accounts.
The Freepers first gained prominence during the Starr investigation and the failed Clinton impeachment. At one point, Lucianne Goldberg (who directed Linda Tripp to secretly tape Monica Lewinsky's conversations) and Matt Drudge became members and promoted their website. So at base, Freepers are Clinton haters. After the impeachment charade they quickly receded from view. There was then a rift in the organization after Freep founder, John Robinson, began letting far right wingers post extremist messages on their discussion boards. Posts promoting Y2K paranoia, gun fanaticism, anti-Semitism, and death threats to public personalities eventually scared away the likes of Goldberg (whose husband is Jewish) and Drudge. Chip Berlet's organization, which monitors dangerous right wing groups refers to the Freepers as Anti-Clinton right wing populists.
Just how far right wing they are is illustrated by a post one Freeper (or at least a pro-Bush spammer) put on our discussion list. In a message titled "florida voter fraud" (http://www.egroups.com/message/trustthepeople-houston/85) the poster focused on a statement by Montana Governor Mark Racicot, who falsely accused the Gore campaign of voter fraud in Florida by tampering with ballots, refusing overseas military ballots and counting the votes of convicted felons. People on the Freeper discussion board seem to love Racicot and hope he becomes the Vice-President under a Bush administration, should Cheney be unable to serve due to health prolems. This is revealing in that Racicot is extremely right wing with ties to militias and other violent extremists. Bush is also very close to Racicot, which helps point to the general far right agenda behind the push to have Bush coronated regardless of the will of the American voters.
One question I have that is unanswered so far is why the Freepers are so intent in supporting Bush. During their rift, as the election contest loomed (previous to the current crisis,) many Freepers were critical of Bush because of the Iran/Contra CIA drug running revelations. They were critical of him due to his father's involvement, who was Vice-President at the time. Perhaps Freepers have thrown their support to Bush because of the potential for an authoritarian administration supported by the same forces who tried to remove Clinton.
As a final note, the FreeRepublic.com website now has a profile list of their subscribers. The largest number of profiles are from subscribers based in Texas, with California, long a haven for the far right wing, a distant second.
Missing from my analysis at this point is the relation (if one exists) between Freepers and other far right wing forces, like anti-Castro Cubans or the role of the media in all of this, etc. Any further research on this group and the issues raised in connection to them by members of our organization is welcome and encouraged as well as feedback on what I have written.
Links to some of the sources I have used:
Links to Web Sites
Spreading Anti-democratic & Right Wing Agendas
http://www.publiceye.org/lnk_rit.html
(freerepublic.com - Anti-Clinton, right wing populist)
Spreading Anti-democratic & Right Wing Agendas
http://www.publiceye.org/lnk_rit.html
(freerepublic.com - Anti-Clinton, right wing populist)
Conservative and Libertarian Right
http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/por/usbase.views.htm
http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/por/usbase.views.htm
Free-for-all at Free Republic
http://www.salonmag.com/news/feature/1999/07/13/free/
http://www.salonmag.com/news/feature/1999/07/13/free/
Fight the Right
http://www.cjnetworks.com/~cubsfan/fight_primary.html
http://www.cjnetworks.com/~cubsfan/fight_primary.html
DeathThreat.com
Free Republic Death Threats Against Hillary
http://www.american-politics.com/070699deaththreat.html
Free Republic Death Threats Against Hillary
http://www.american-politics.com/070699deaththreat.html
Freepers Creepers
http://www.thenewrepublic.com/archive/1198/112398/lizza112398.html
http://www.thenewrepublic.com/archive/1198/112398/lizza112398.html
Bush campaign spokesman Governor Marc Racicot tied to extreme-right forces
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2000/nov2000/raci-n27.shtml
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2000/nov2000/raci-n27.shtml
From impeachment to a tainted election: The conspiracy against democratic rights continues
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2000/nov2000/elec-n10.shtml
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2000/nov2000/elec-n10.shtml
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