For a long time the radical environmental movement, Earth First! in particular, figured that if it ignored Barry Clausen, he╒d go away. The movement was wrong. In fact, this professional snitch has been (and I hate to give him any cause for self-satisfaction) almost single-handedly responsible for the bad press Earth First! has gotten in the past couple years. So, it is time for us to deal with him.
Until recently, he╒s been merely an irritant, and often a source of amusement, falling all over himself to paint us as baby-eating terrorists to wide-eyed Wise-Users, making up stories and spelling our names wrong. Since Theodore Kaczynski was arrested on suspicion of being the Unabomber, though, things have changed. EF! has had to counter an avalanche of innuendo about our ╥connection╙ to the Unabomber and Clausen is the main source of this mis-information. People are being threatened╤called murderers and so on╤just as we approach a new season of unprecedented public lands destruction and the subsequent upsurge in direct action protests all over the country. We can╒t continue to have nonviolent activists placed at risk because of Clausen╒s damned lies.
An Informer╒s History
Barry Clausen admits in his book, Walking on the Edge, that his love affair with law enforcement began when he was busted for grand theft auto at the age of sixteen. From there he spent much of his time doing coke in Montana, working an assortment of jobs and trying to get close to movie stars. He turned to narcing after a cocaine smuggling deal in Texas went sour, sending him running to the DEA.
The DEA wouldn╒t believe his tale, but Barry was apparently so thrilled by all the leather and guns that he ran straight to the sheriffs of Park and Madison counties in Montana and offered himself as a stool pigeon. The sheriffs set him up with body wires but only a couple of busts came down as a result. The cops later testified that they thought Clausen ╥unreliable╙ and ╥working both sides,╙ so Barry╒s career as an undercover drug agent came to an end.
Meanwhile, Barry was working as a seasonal Forest Service employee. It was also during this time that he stole an automatic rifle and was charged with felony theft. Clausen later retaliated with a lawsuit targeting just about every law enforcement agency and individual he ever worked with, thus producing some interesting depositions. Barry doesn╒t seem to realize how pathetic these things make him look, so he describes them thoroughly in his book.
In 1989, Barry Clausen was introduced to Bruce Vincent, founder of the Wise Use group Communities for a Great Northwest. According to Barry, this was when he first heard of Earth First!.
In Deep Cover
Under contract from some unnamed group (Communities for a Great Northwest, I imagine), Clausen went to work ╥infiltrating╙ Earth First!. He visited the Montana EF! contingent and weirded them out, telling different cover stories to activists in Bozeman and Missoula, and generally getting himself classified as a wingnut.
He never really figured EF! out, so he still refers to one EF!er as ╥the head of Montana Earth First!╙ and another as the ╥publisher of Live Wild or Die and former head of Earth First! Washington.╙ His account engages in some stylin╒ libel such as a photo caption which reads: ╥This helicopter was torched by Earth First! terrorists in Montana.╙
Since he couldn╒t actually get any Montana EF!ers to do any copter-burning, or other crimes, Barry went off to Seattle to work for the Washington Contract Loggers Association as a private eye (despite the fact that neither he nor his company, North American Research, were ever licensed to operate in Washington State; he has lately restyled himself as a ╥consultant,╙ possibly as a result of inquiries into his PI status).
In Seattle, and up and down the coast (he went to Redwood Summer), Clausen continued his ╥investigation╙ and continually harassed Forest Service law enforcement with information on EF! terrorism and plots, which they were clearly uninterested in. Again and again they refused to work with him, citing his past record. In one example, FBI agent Horace H. Mewborn gave sworn testimony that, ╥...we did some other agency checks, and they said he [Clausen] was not reliable.╙
Barry even tried private companies. He badgered McDonald╒s about ╥animal rights terrorism╙ following Jeremy Rifkin╒s ╥Beyond Beef╙ campaign until they demanded that he cease bothering restaurant employees about vandalism. Security officers at MacMillan Bloedel blew their stack when they found out Clausen had contacted some of the largest MacBlo customers. Barry got the addresses from the November, 1994, Earth First! Journal announcing a boycott of the huge corporation for its role in the destruction of Clayoquot Sound. He warned MacBlo╒s customers about potential terrorist attacks, and may well have increased the publicity and success of the campaign.
Barry Discovers the Media
In 1994, the Province, a Vancouver tabloid, printed some of Barry╒s allegations verbatim. The success of this story in attracting attention, spin-off stories and cashola encouraged him to shift his focus from private investigations to public relations. The press often has no standards of proof other than titillation and scandal, and his employers in the timber industry want only to smear their enemies. Clausen╒s work meets both conditions.
Later in 1994, Walking on the Edge: How I Infiltrated Earth First!, by Barry Clausen with Dana Rae Pomeroy was published by Clausen╒s employer, the Washington Contract Loggers Association (2421 Pacific Avenue, Olympia, WA 98507-2168; (800) 422-0074 or (206) 352-5033). The book number is registered to Ron Arnold at the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise. Later that year he got another story out over the wire services, this time claiming that the Native Forest Network (NFN) conference, held in November, 1994, in Missoula, was to feature a who╒s who in ecoterrorism.
This nonsense has resurfaced in the latest Clausen-inspired round of eco-bashing. He claims that Ted Kaczynski attended the NFN conference. But he won╒t show anyone any proof. Clausen used the Unabomber to good effect last year too, when Gilbert Murray of the California Forestry Association was killed.
Clausen put out a pamphlet called ╥Report on Terrorism: The Real Truth╙ which describes Earth First! as a terrorist organization and blames us for all the acts of terrorism in the US for the past five years. He also includes copies of his correspondence with timber-industry-pocket-Senators Slade Gorton (R-WA) and Conrad Burns (R-MT) in which he convinces them to ask for a Justice Department investigation of Earth First! There are rumors that such an investigation may happen this spring, thrusting us into the headlines again.
Enter Lyndon LaRouche
Clausen╒s latest project has been a newsletter called Ecoterrorism Watch which he co-edits with Lyndon LaRouche follower Rogelio Maduro. The newsletter is published by the LaRouche organization at their headquarters in Virginia [POB 214, Leesburg, VA 22075; (703) 779-0121. Forget about subscribing, it costs $145 a year for photocopied articles from the EF!J]. This cult-like organization believes in a bizarre conspiracy theory that considers the entire environmental movement to be controlled by banking and corporate consortiums which in turn are controlled in turn by the World Wildlife Fund and headed by Prince Philip of England. I╒m not kidding about this. They think His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh, personally hand-picked Jake Kreilick to run the Native Forest Network eco-terrorist front.
Clausen is also featured in LaRouche╒s publication, Executive Intelligence Report. Among other strange things, it states that Dave Foreman was hired by the Wilderness Society and Sierra Club to found Earth First! to make them look better and toughen mainstream positions. Supposedly, Foreman was guaranteed funding and a ten-year contract limit. (Actually, considering how Foreman╒s been opposing Zero Cut at the Sierra Club and calling us all ╥True Believers╙ a la Eric Hoffer, this doesn╒t seem so far fetched.)
Spreading Fear╤for Fun and Profit
Since 1993, Clausen has regularly spoken to Wise Use groups all over the West. His speeches aim to frighten people into believing Earth First! terrorists are coming to get them and destroy their communities. Clausen pushes ╥security╙ services with some Soldier of Fortune-type macho dudes that he claims are ex-Navy Seals or Airborne Rangers or some damn thing.
At these talks he repeats the Judi Bari-and-Darryl Cherney-blew-themselves-up story despite the fact that he has admitted he knows it isn╒t true. He also targets a Seattle EF!er who has worked for both Greenpeace and the Native Forest Network, and therefore is clearly a linchpin of the big green conspiracy. He attributes right-wing bombings to EF!, and labels the 1989 Dixon, California livestock auction barn-burning as an EF! action, despite it╒s being well known now as an insurance scam, etc. His best story is that Earth First! intends to poison water supplies all over the country with virulent E. Coli bacteria as per instructions in Dave Foreman╒s book Ecodefense., and in fact we have done so already in Portland, Oregon. Of course, Ecodefense says no such thing. He says he knows who shot some cattle in Utah and who sabbed the powerlines in Santa Cruz in 1990, but for some reason his information has never been acted upon by law enforcement. Oh, and Mike Roselle is the leader of the whole terrorist kit and kaboodle. What a hoot!
Clausen has been trying to get this Unabomber thing to stick for several years now. When Kaczynski╒s arrest came down he was all too prepared with the ╥real╙ story. The press, in frenzy mode, was willing to swallow it whole. It╒s all too easy, really. He╒ll be back when circumstances arise that make ╥ecoterrorism╙ a top story he can peddle. So, we have to be ready. If you hear that Clausen has a speaking engagement in your area, attend it. Call the Journal for a Barry Clausen fact sheet to hand out or give to the press if there is going to be a Clausen-inspired media attack in your area. Clausen himself can be reached at POB 65298, Port Ludlow, WA 98365; (360) 437-0453, fax (360) 437-9101. Call and give him hell, nonviolently, of course.
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