CODOH Strikes on Campuses from New York City to Sacramento
Harvey Taylor, ex-U S. Navy pilot and a retired commercial pilot for United Airlines, is a friend of CODOH and a well-known Sacramento-area revisionist activist. Harvey had been a little annoyed back in March when The Hornet agreed to run our ad announcing the Internet address of CODOHWeb, then reneged on its contract. Last week Harvey called to report that the conspiracy to promote open debate on the Holocaust controversy struck at California State University at Sacramento on 14, 15 and 20 May.
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Harvey had a sign professionally painted on poster board (let’s do it right, eh?) replicating what has become the CODOH trademark advertisement (see insert), then set himself up for business in front of the campus library. He hung his sign, which was really a big advertisement for CODOHWeb, from the limb of a nearby tree so that he was free to move around and pass out our leaflet, “The Holocaust Controversy: the Case for Open Debate.”
“What was the first question I was asked?” Harvey recounted. “You’re not one of those fellows who says the Holocaust didn’t happen, are you?
“Not me, I said. I look at the big picture. All of Central Europe reduced to rubble. Entire cities destroyed. Two huge invading armies converging on it, shooting at everything and anything, looting and killing. When you see the big picture, the concentration camp photos look like small potatoes. Who would want to pretend that the camps were of great importance? You figure it out—the victors.”
I said: “This sounds like something college kids should hear.”
“Of course it is. Their professors aren’t going to give them the big picture. Not about this subject. All in all, it was a productive three days. I handed out dozens of the flyer. One young fellow asked me if I was a Nazi. The students have been taught that anyone who deviates from the Holocaust line is a Nazi. You can’t blame the kids. When a student asks me that one I answer real sincere, like I’m kind of shocked: Why, no. I’m not a Nazi. Are you?
“Another fellow ambled up and allowed as how his grandfather had been shot at Auschwitz! But are you sure he was shot?, I asked. How do you know? How do you know he wasn't gassed? Have you seen his death certificate? What was his name? His number, his home address? His date of death?”
“Ah. Harvey. Those questions make people tense.”
“He didn’t want to talk about it. I have a sneaking suspicion some of these people are, shall we say, mistaken about the fate of their relatives. I don’t doubt their honesty, not for a minute, but if they’re going to use these stories, I want to know the details.
“A young lady was curious about the sign. I tried to fill her in, saying that the Holocaust controversy needs to be discussed freely. I said our position is spelled out in detail in the CODOH pamphlet. She took three of them. She gave one to a professor who was passing by just then. I found out later the professor teaches the Holocaust.”
I said: “That professor may have gone to our Website. That leaflet has our Website address on it. She may be a revisionist by now.”
“I don’t think so. The professors studiously avoided even looking at my sign. Students would look at it, but not the professors. I wonder what these students will be saying about these professors thirty years from now? Anyway, the young lady I was telling you about—I hate to have to tell you this—but she looked Jewish to me, and she started telling me that all the people in the Aryan Nations, the KKK and all Nazi types should be gassed.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothing’s wrong with that. I allowed as how it was a good idea. I said she should have the honor of dumping the Zyklon crystals on them.”
That was the caring thing to say.”
I was interviewed by a reporter from The Hornet, the student newspaper. I was photographed by his sidekick, but no story was published. I guess the Holocaust controversy isn't news at Cal State.”
It's news all right. It's what’s called suppressed news. The Campus Project is becoming something of a tradition on American campuses. The program is very simple. We place small advertisements in student newspapers announcing the Internet address for CODOHWeb (see the ad on page one). We urge students and faculty to ignore the Thought Police, go to CODOHWeb, take a look at the evidence, and judge it for themselves. No polemics. No complaining. Just hundreds of thousands of words laying out revisionist theory and the consequences of allowing the continued exploitation of the establishment story.
This academic year we began running the ads in November, one time each week, beginning with The Signal at Georgia State (25,000+ students and faculty—henceforth, S&F) in Atlanta. I followed up in The Red and Black at University of Georgia at Athens (30,500+ S&F), and The Technique at Georgia Institute of Technology, also in Atlanta (13,000+ S&F).
Through February and March I ran the ad in student papers at Hofstra University on Long Island (11,000+ S&F); Oklahoma State at Stillwater (20,000+ S&F); Iowa State at Ames (24,500+ S&F); Florida State at Tallahassee (30,000+ S&F); University of Texas at Austin (52,000+ S&F).
Some papers refused to run the ad, some ignored me, and those at George Mason University (Fairfax, VA) and University of Colorado (Boulder) said they would but changed their minds. Three papers, The Tartan at Carnegie Mellon (Pittsburgh), The Technique at Georgia Tech and The Daily Reveille at Louisiana State (Baton Rouge) ran the ad one time, then folded under pressure—I wonder from whom?
At Penn State The Daily Collegian refused to run the ad because the editor determined that CODOHWeb is “offensive” on the face of it. Karl Streidieck, an ex-U.S. Navy pilot and alumnus of the university, went to the campus and stationed himself in front of The Daily's offices with a sign lettered “Censorship at PSU: Read what the Collegian censor doesn’t want you to see,” and passed out my flyer “The Holocaust Controversy.” A reporter for The Collegian interviewed Streidieck and the story appeared in the paper and on The Collegian’s Internet edition as well.
Campus Hillel and the Anti-Defamation League of course were at work behind the scenes. For two months I had no proof of what I knew, from past experience, was going on. Then on 17 February the Los Angeles Times ran a story quoting ADL regional director of Southern California David Lehrer: “People who claim the Holocaust never happened … have placed ads espousing their messages in college newspapers.”
I couldn't deny that.
We learned that at The Signal at Georgia State two Jewish groups, one on-campus and one from off-campus, approached the paper to suppress the ads and warned that “pressure” would be applied in all the right places until the ad was suppressed. The Signal continued to run the ad and is still running it.
A friend of CODOH relayed two confidential messages sent over the Internet from Campus Hillel and the AntiDefamation League “warning” their members that CODOH was running revisionist ads in student newspapers and that something had to be done. There were extended messages in a private code attached to the regular text that we were unable to get into. Who knows what was burning up the wires.
After Hillel and ADL moved their campaign halfway into the open to shut down the ads, I placed ads at The Daily at University of Michigan at Ann Arbor (39,500 S&F), The Tech at North Carolina State at Greensboro (12,000+ S&F), and in The Washington Square News at New York University in Manhattan (37,600+ S&F). I was pleased to be able to place the ad in the special graduation issue of the WSN. That’s the issue that is most likely to be taken home to mom and dad and shown to the relatives. It must be working.
Thanks to David Thomas we have a sophisticated counting program installed to monitor the traffic accessing and moving around through, and we see that CODOH documents are being accessed more than 1,300 times every 24 hours. This projects out to half a million documents accessed over a 12 month period. That’s without factoring in any future growth whatever.
This is a very solid, long term project. We’re following the time-honored practices of the Viet Cong and General Motors, two very successful organizations. We’re thinking ten, fifteen years out. We’re going to win the minds and hearts of independent and sensible people all over the world. The Holocaust Lobby was no overnight success itself. It wasn’t until the early 1970s, 25 years after the end of WWII, that its mythos reached critical mass with media and academia.
The outlook for revisionism has never been better. We have the Internet, the World Wide Web, and a growing number of researchers, translators, technicians, and supporters of every kind We haven't yet found a way to fund the project the way it needs to be funded. That’s the one area where I am still failing to find an answer. I don’t know what to do about it. Meanwhile, we have to go on, making the sacrifices we have to make.
Bibliographic information about this document: Smith's Report, no. 44, June 1997, pp. 1, 3f.
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