Conservative Maine News Site Fires White Nationalist Writer
When the conservative Maine Heritage Policy Center launched its political blog last month, newly hired chief executive Lance Dutson predicted in an editorial that 鈥渨e鈥檒l no doubt have kinks to work out along the way.鈥
Well, a big kink developed this week when other Maine bloggers pointed out that one of the center鈥檚 newly hired writers, Leif Parsell, has a long history of espousing white superiority and may even have ties to neo-Nazi organizations.
Those revelations led to Parsell鈥檚 firing on Tuesday, Dutson confirmed today to Hatewatch. 鈥淭hough these comments were made prior to his employment with our organization, the rift between our value system and those expressed in this pattern of online behavior is significant enough to require an end to our employment of this individual,鈥 Dutson said in a statement.
Dutson likely is kicking himself for not doing a simple, pre-employment search on Parsell, whose racist leanings are easily spotted on the Internet.
鈥淐ultural diversity combines with our increasing racial and ethnic diversity to degrade our society,鈥 Parsell recently wrote, recommending a video with white supremacist themes. In the video, 鈥淚s Diversity a Strength?鈥 white nationalist Jared Taylor says diversity 鈥渋s not just dangerous but unfortunate to whites, the people who built and established this nation.鈥 Elsewhere, Taylor has written, 鈥淲hen blacks are left entirely to their own devices, Western civilization 鈥 any kind of civilization 鈥 disappears.鈥
Parsell also is tied to a Facebook group that claims the United States needs a dictator like Rome鈥檚 first emperior, Augustus, to protect 鈥淎merican and the rest of Western Civilization鈥 from ethnic decline. 鈥淓uropeans and European Americans must unite in an effort to survive falling birthrates, heavy immigration and a tide of multiculturalism which seeks to end political and cultural diversity,鈥 the group鈥檚 Facebook page says.
鈥淚t鈥檚 about survival as a culture and a society,鈥 Parsell wrote, saying racist aviator Charles Lindbergh was right. 鈥淚'd rather have a country that had fallen behind India or China, then one that sold its soul to non-European immigrants and lost its culture, just to keep its GDP [Gross National Product] rising.鈥
Parsell鈥檚 comments were divulged this week on another new blog, 鈥淭he State of Maine,鈥 and also by blogger Mike Tipping, who works for the Maine People鈥檚 Alliance and writes 鈥淭he Tipping Point鈥 blog.
鈥淧arsell's name and college e-mail also appear in a database recently released by an offshoot of the hacker collective Anonymous called 鈥楴azi Leaks鈥 or 鈥極peration Blitzkreig,鈥 which hacked a series of neo-nazi affiliated sites to retrieve their membership rolls,鈥 Tipping wrote Tuesday in a blog posting. Parsell's information also appears on a list of individuals who purchased clothing or apparel from a German retailer with neo-Nazi ties, Tipping wrote.
Parsell, who has declined comment to other media outlets, couldn鈥檛 be reached.
Asked his reaction to Parsell鈥檚 firing, Tipping today said: 鈥淚 think Parsell's statements are abhorrent and far outside the bounds of normal political discourse.聽 I'm glad that the conservative group that hired him acted quickly to end his employment, but it's important to note that they wouldn't have been in the situation in the first place if they had been hiring a reporter based on their skills and vetted journalistic background rather than ideological disposition.鈥