Many on the left, including the Center for Media and Democracy, are now challenging the veracity of Christian Hartsock and my separate but damning video selections taken at the Van Vones/Common Cause/Code Pink “Uncloak the Kochs” rally in Rancho Mirage, California, on January 30, 2011:
In a peaceful rally of more than 1,000 people, a crew of videographers who have worked with Breitbart egged a few into making outrageous, bigoted remarks on camera, then presented them as representative of the entire crowd and the rally sponsors. None of the interviewees was identified, and some looked to be wearing wigs or disguises. Given Breitbart’s history of promoting staged videos, it is difficult to have any confidence in the authenticity of the clips.
For two years the left has tried desperately to find video evidence of Tea Party participants to damn the whole. They have failed so miserably that it became necessary for the creation of the group, CrashTheTeaParty.org, which called for opponents of the Tea Party to dress up as Nazis or in other offensive uniforms, or to carry troubling signs, all in the hopes of getting the mainstream media to falsely portray the fake Tea Party protesters as authentic and representative of the whole.
Well, Christian and I needn’t instigate fake people dressing and acting foolishly, in a racist fashion, or threatening violence. Those at the Rancho Mirage anti-Koch rally (against capitalism, free markets, and gummy bears) have been more than forthright in their extremism. (And now look at what we found in Madison, Wisconsin!)
Since Lisa Graves and the Center for Media and Democracy has now challenged the authenticity of the videos we took, we feel it’s appropriate to isolate those who made the hateful remarks by name.
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The first is self-identified “Roger Fraser from Chicago, and happy to be here!”
I found him yelling “revolution now!” as I was rollerblading amongst the anti-capitalism H8 chanters.
“This is what we need more of here in America. This kind of street heat brought against those kind of folks [the participants at the Koch conference] to win this country back.”
I asked him, “What do you mean by ‘revolution’?”
Fraser answered, “Revolution! You know what I mean. What’s happening now in Egypt. Same thing needs to happen here.”
In 1994, a revolutionary named Roger Fraser from the Chicago area was listed on a “Membership, Subscription and Mailing List” for the Chicago Committees of Correspondence, an offshoot of the Communist Party USA, though maybe that was a different Communist-leaning “Roger Fraser from Chicago.”
The second is Bonnie Reiss, the owner of an erotic-ware shop in Palm Springs, “Sensuality, A Store for Her.”
Hartsock’s video showed Reiss reacting to his question, “After we impeach Clarence Thomas, what do we do with him?”
Reiss responded, “String him up… and his wife too…”
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When local Palm Springs station KPSP Local 2 News caught up with Reiss, she denied she was invoking “lynching” and responded, “Lynching? I’m saying handcuffs and to jail! He should be handcuffed and brought to trial for his tax evasions.”
I called Reiss at work in her erotic-ware shop and she asked why I wasn’t in Wisconsin. I told her I was in fact in Wisconsin, and told her we caught doctors on tape giving fake notes to teachers so they could be paid during their teacher walkout.
Reiss responded, “You are evil.”
She then hung up.
Reiss is no stranger to the news. In 2008, her store was robbed. Reiss told a local CBS station, “He cleaned me out of my Hustler line, all my crotchless panties, g-strings, corsets, and bustiers and costumes.”
The third shows Don Wallace, who animatedly describes the nasty things he’d like to do to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas (“he’s a dumbshit scumbag… put him back in the fields”), Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito (“he should go back to Sicily”), and Roger Ailes (“Roger Ailes should be strung up and… kill the bastard”).
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Wallace is a former Los Angeles City Fire Department Captain and former president of the United Firefighters of Los Angeles union. After he retired from the LAFD he became a field deputy for an LA County Supervisor and failed in a bid for his retiring boss’s seat. He currently lives in Calabasas.
When called and asked if he had any regrets about what he said on camera last month, Wallace responded, “I regret that you called me.”
He then hung up.
If readers see any other familiar faces in Christian or my videos, please send us their names and any identifying information.
The Center for Media and Democracy depends on it!
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