[Hon]

One of the reasons I thought I should post these excerpts is to counter the notion that the idea was not treated seriously--or that it was laughed off. It was not. It was considered very seriously and there were others who supported it.

[Hon]

"[A] lot of people were convinced that this was the way to do it."

This is not the way the media is now trying to spin it.

BTW, this is from John "Doc" Upton, who was and still is a major player in the VVAW.

[potlatch]

Ping

[GailA]

btt

[prairiebreeze]

What Camil sketched was so explosive that the coordinators feared lest government agents even hear of it. So they decamped to a church on the outskirts of town with the intention of debating the plan in complete privacy. When they got the church, however, they found that the government was already on to them; their "debugging expert" uncovered microphones hidden all over the place. An instantaneous decision was made to move again - to Common Ground, a Mennonite hall used by homeless vets as a "crash pad," on 77th Terrace.

Yes this certainly casts doubt on the "it was just one guys hare-brained idea and immediately hooted down" story the RATS are telling. And Randy Barnes has changed his story rather dramatically........

Reminder Ping!

[tpaine]

One of the reasons I thought I should post these excerpts is to counter the notion that the idea was not treated seriously--or that it was laughed off. It was not. It was considered very seriously and there were others who supported it.
1 -Hon-

______________________________________


The fact remains, you have failed to make the point that any government agency took this seriously enough to consider it to be a criminal act.

Hotheaded BS? -- , to be sure.. Some of those involved were obviously highly impressed by their own tough guy talk. -- Big Deal. -- Get a grip, 'hon' baby.

Take off your blue shades, and calm yourself.. FR doesn't need your brand of weird contra agit-prop, imo.

[Monti Cello]

The fact that the meeting location was moved twice on short notice amid extreme security concerns makes Kerry's claims of forgetfulness even more incredible.

[Ann Archy]

BTTT....VERY Interestin info for Supporters of Kerry to read.

[rwfromkansas]

bump

[Sabertooth]

[Terry DuBose] TDB: That was also where there was actually some discussion of assassinating some senators during the Christmas holidays. They were people who I knew from the organization with hotheaded rhetoric.

They had a list of six senators ... Helms, John Tower, and I can't remember the others, who they wanted to assassinate when they adjourned for Christmas. They were the ones voting to fund the war.

About Helms:

HELMS, Jesse, 1921-

---

Senate Years of Service: 1973-2003
Party: Republican

HELMS, Jesse, a Senator from North Carolina; born in Monroe, Union County, N.C., October 18, 1921; educated in the public schools of Monroe, Wingate Junior College, and Wake Forest College; served in the United States Navy 1942-1945; city editor, Raleigh Times; administrative assistant to United States Senators Willis Smith 1951-1953 and Alton Lennon 1953; executive director, North Carolina Bankers Association 1953-1960; television and radio executive 1960-1972; member, Raleigh City Council 1957-1961; elected as a Republican to the United States Senate in 1972 and reelected in 1978, 1984, 1990 and again in 1996, and served from January 3, 1973 to January 3, 2003; not a candidate for reelection in 2002; chair, Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry (1981-87), Committee on Foreign Relations (1995-January 3, 2001; January 20, 2001-June 6, 2001).
Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
1774 to Present

Helms was a radio and TV exec in 1971.

[mass55th]

Randy Barnes needs to get his stories straight. He's a Kerry supporter, and on The Big Story with John Gibson last night, he said that the Phoenix Project (he wouldn't say the word assassination), was the idea of only one guy and that everyone else ignored him because they didn't think he was serious. So why take a vote?

[WorkingClassFilth]

^

[An.American.Expatriate]

Thanks for a great recap -

what strikes me here is:
1. Both Barnes and Upton, altough exclude from the "final" debate, apparently knew quite a bit "first hand". ["When the Phoenix plan first came before the steering committee meeting, John Upton had been standing almost next to Camil,..."]
2. they actually approached a potential "assassin" [I would love to know the who, what, when, where etc... on that!!]
3. The suggestion from Camil is not the same as the one he discussed in his "Oral History Interview". There he described it as an alternative to Kerry's plan at dewey Canyon III.

All of this leads me to believe that the Executive Committee knew, long before the Emergency Meeting in KC, that Camil was entertaining such ideas and may have been actively recruiting -

I'd love to see some more background on this (dates, names, etc...) but it seems the data is hard to find.

[NYCVirago]

Thanks for posting this. On a related subject, the one copy of The New Soldier at the New York Public Library was due January 29, but it still has not been returned. Strange, huh?

[stockpirate]

You should know that the FBI files indicate that the idea was only tabled until the next meeting and most liked the idea.