Hal Turner was indeed an FBI snitch.
I can’t say, and this is probably to my credit, that I’ve been hanging onto every new and scintillating detail of the news regarding Hal Turner all that closely. I’ve seen the headlines, but haven’t read (Incidentally, that “I’ve seen the headlines” can be seen as a demonstration of what the Internet has over a batch of newspapers — though the presence of the “Hal Turner” headlines is not what accounts for the Print News’s downfall, except maybe in a narrow niche casting sense.)
Hal Turner is a neo nazi White Nationalist Short Wave and Internet Radio Host. He was a frequent and favorite guest of Sean Hannity when he was broadcasting locally in New York, dumped and washed away from his memory when Hannity neared a national syndication deal. I gather Turner served as the right flank for Hannity, and then subsequently moved further out of the mainstream in hatching his own platform, into the Neo-Nazi fringe, spouting off incidenary spiels bordering on Death Threats. Well, except for the fact that he was widely suspected in those corners of being an FBI Plant — which, you don’t have to look too far into the fringes to see is a pretty standard paranoid stance. (And not without its reasons — any “Direct Action” person will tell you to always beware the new recruit who’s a bit more eager and earnest for blurring the law of the land.)
Hal Turner finally did cross that line, and the Feds finally dumped charges on him for recent comments about wanting to see some Federal Officials dead. At which point, it has come out — he is an FBI Informant indeed. He’s been sending the FBI information picked up from his followerers, while all the while the FBI has been suggesting that he’s been going a little bit too far with his rhetoric, which Turner has responded to by not changing a thing. And finally he did go too far, and currently is in Court, with a Gag Rule on him.
I’m having a bit of a hard time wrapping my head around this story. In an interview just before his Gag Rule, he said that his radio performance is not him. And considering that he’s basically had a job to do for the FBI, that does strike me as a pretty compelling defense he’s prepping before his Grand Jury. To a degree, that is: it a bit hard to imagine how anyone can sustain such bile for a decade’s stretch, which makes me think the FBI has essentially given Hal Turner an allowance to stroke his hateful ID in a bit of a contradictorily mind of fulfilling DUTY to country while blasting away the N-loving Homo Jewish Commie New Worlders underming the country.
But I don’t really understand what use the government has in sponsoring Turner. I would think whatever asset Turner makes in passing off information is more than offset by the inciting to violent causes to his warrior audience —Hal Turner was never dangerous per se; his audience on the other hand… It looks all very counter-productive.
December 4th, 2009 at 9:43 am
There has been no evidence that Turner even had much of an “audience,” much less that they were neo-nazis, etc. All that has come out is that Turner was a shill for the FBI. I had listened to Turner’s show once and all I heard was a few callers (probably fellow-FBI informants) supporting assassinations and murders. Turner even had stated that his webcast had “no support.”
December 4th, 2009 at 10:30 am
I’m not entirely sure what your bone of contention of is — you posted nothing disagreeable thus far. No, his audience isn’t particularly large, and as the case is with these things probably/practically would be composed of as many “fringe watchers” as true blue “White Nationalists”.