POLITICAL INTIMIDATION ON CAMPUS

From the Massachusetts Standard-Times courtesy of the Daily Kos:

Agents' visit chills UMass Dartmouth senior

A senior at UMass Dartmouth was visited by federal agents two months ago, after he requested a copy of Mao Tse-Tung's tome on Communism called "The Little Red Book."

Two history professors at UMass Dartmouth, Brian Glyn Williams and Robert Pontbriand, said the student told them he requested the book through the UMass Dartmouth library's interlibrary loan program.

The student, who was completing a research paper on Communism for Professor Pontbriand's class on fascism and totalitarianism, filled out a form for the request, leaving his name, address, phone number and Social Security number. He was later visited at his parents' home in New Bedford by two agents of the Department of Homeland Security, the professors said.

The professors said the student was told by the agents that the book is on a "watch list," and that his background, which included significant time abroad, triggered them to investigate the student further.

"I tell my students to go to the direct source, and so he asked for the official Peking version of the book," Professor Pontbriand said. "Apparently, the Department of Homeland Security is monitoring inter-library loans, because that's what triggered the visit, as I understand it."

Click here for the rest.

And from the Progressive:

Muslim-American Running Back
off the Team at New Mexico State

“Coach Mumme questioned Mr. Ali repeatedly about Islam and specifically, its ties to Al-Qaeda,” the letter states. This made Mr. Ali uncomfortable, it says.

And then, after the team’s first game, “despite being the star tailback for several years, Mr. Ali was relegated to fifth string and not even permitted to travel with the team,” the letter says.

There were only two other Muslim players on the team, and they were also released, it says. The letter adds that the coach “regularly has players recite the Lord’s Prayer after each practice and before each game.”

Ali’s father, Mustafa Ali, says the trouble started at a practice over the summer when the coach told the players to pray.

“My son and two other players who were Muslim, they were praying in a different manner, and the coach asked them, ‘What are you doing?’ They said, ‘We’re Muslims. This is how we pray.’ That had a lot to do with how things went south.”

Click here for the rest.

I don't know which is more frightening, government agents monitoring students' reading materials and showing up to harass them at home, or lone right-wing fundamentalist nuts in positions of power screwing over people because of their religious beliefs. Either way, it's totally unacceptable and anti-American. I know that the political tide has changed to a great extent in this country recently--the days of mass hyper-patriotiotic hysteria appear to be over; hell, I've even considered bringing up some of my favorite political topics with my right-wing family this Christmas. But the weirdo white trash is still out there, making life hell for random individuals stuck in the wrong place at the wrong time. Something tells me this kind of crap is still going to be around for some time to come. I expect the lunatic fringe to become all the more active as the Bush administration becomes further discredited: like a cornered and wounded beast, they'll fight to their last breath, and, sadly, they may even strike out at average ordinary people like you and me.

Fucking Nazis.

UPDATE: The first story was a hoax. Click here for more.

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