I posted
earlier on the conspiracy theory conference that Dylan Avery announced he is attending this weekend, in the wake of cancelling from the 9/11 Accountability Conference because of the presence of one or more Holocaust deniers. In addition other 9/11 denial notables such as Kevin Barrett, Steven Jones, and Webster
Tarpley are listed as speakers. I mentioned at the time that the conference was sponsored by a rather interesting group called the Freedom Law School, which seems to be dedicated to avoiding income taxes. I am afraid I underestimated just how extreme they are.
Upon further research it appears they are not just some fringe group, like a bunch of tax accountants on steroids, they are even on a list of "active patriot groups" compiled by the civil rights organization, the
Southern Poverty Law Center (
SPLC).
The
SPLC has even done news reports on their previous conferences. Let's just say they have some interesting friends:
IRVINE, Calif. -- Peymon Mottahedeh adjusted the knot of his Statue of Liberty tie and smiled broadly as he surveyed the cacophonous conference room inside the Atrium Hotel. More than 200 attendees swarmed vendors' tables as they waited for the seventh annual "Health and Freedom" tax-protesters conference to begin last March. Peymon -- who is known in tax-protest circles by his first name only, like Madonna or Prince -- had good reason to smile. At $50 a head, "Health and Freedom" in 2006 represented another substantial payday for the organizer and emcee of the annual gathering of tax protesters, which in recent years has attracted a variety of extremist speakers including Hutton Gibson, actor Mel Gibson's father, and Holocaust denier Willis Carto, founder of the Institute for Historical Review.
Slick brochures for this year's conference promised to show attendees how to "Wipe the IRS off of Americans' lives!" and provide answers to burning questions like "Is the One-World Government Coming?" and "Are The FBI & CIA Harming Americans?"
Ahh, the usual mix of Holocaust deniers and anti-NWO paranoids. The neo-Nazis at the American Free Press appear to be quite well represented, from the same source:
The real action of the weekend took place during breaks between speakers, when eager crowds formed at nearly every vendor's table, transforming the conference into a virtual swap meet of extremist and conspiracy-theory wares. Willis Carto's American Free Press needed two display tables for its revisionist history books and back copies of the Holocaust-denial magazine Barnes Review, another Carto creation. Both tables were nearly emptied by Sunday afternoon.
This association with the
AFP, which we have discussed plenty of times
before, is obviously continuing, as who is one of their speakers this year?
WHAT DID THE MEDIA NOT TELL YOU?
Mark Anderson
Reporter with the American Free Press, the largest independent weekly paper in America will share the major News/Events of the Year that the Major Media did not tell you! /www.americanfreepress.net
In fact, on the
brochure advertising this conference, the
AFP is listed as a co-sponsor.
The connection between the Freedom Law Center and Holocaust deniers is more than just incidental, last year the head of the organization,
Peymon Mottahedeh, spoke at a
conference year which was co-sponsored by none other than the American Free Press and the Barnes Review, the Holocaust denying publication which, as you may recall, published an article saying that Hitler should have won a
Nobel Peace Prize.
The
SPLC is not the only civil rights group that considers them extremists, this very event is on a list of extremist events compiled by the
Anti-Defamation League:
Friday, March 09, 2007 - Sunday, March 11, 2007
Irvine, California
"2007 Justice and Freedom Conference"
Conference focusing on government conspiracies, sponsored by the Freedom Law School, a tax protest group
So Dylan, are you going to stand by your previous policy of not associating with Holocaust deniers and anti-Semites, or is the pay too good for this event?
Labels: American Free Press, Dylan Avery, Freedom Law School, Kevin Barrett, Steven Jones