Council of Concerned Citizens Story May Have Another Side

Tolbert has a story he got from Blue Dog on prominent Republican John Casteel and his "ties" to a "white supremacist group."

I have not talked to Casteel, but I have crossed paths with the CCC about a decade ago. Let me tell you something, they are sneaky. Based on what I know about them, I could very easily believe that Casteel "attended a board meeting" and "bought an ad in their newsletter" without knowing about their racist agenda.

Back when I was trying to get the Constitution Party some traction, I heard about this group "Council of Concerned Citizens." They invited me to attend one of their "board meetings." I think there are very few of them. Maybe they are all on "the board" and every meeting is a "board meeting."

Anyway, I went there and made my case. They took my picture shaking hands with them like I was a big shot or somebody. Now I see that they were just trying to get as many people as they could tarred by association with them. Looks like Casteel got tarred. But the thing is, they gave no hint of their racist leanings. They passed themselves off as a "conservative group."

Later on I asked specifically about their issues and what they are concerned about. They gave me this video about some sort of school or institute in Europe. In the whole video, something like an hour long, there was only one sentence in it about race. That sentence stuck out like a sore thumb. It did not fit at all with the rest of the production. It was something like "This policy is a threat to the white race." This was not an exact quote but it was along those lines. That was the first indication I had that these guys might be racists. And again, I had to ask them and watch their rather dull hour long video to get that hint. They were not up front with it. Even after the video, it was kind of like "I need to ask them about this because they may not know there is a sentence in this material that seems racist."


Anyway, it was a while before I got around to seeing them again, and I can't even remember if that question was on my mind, but I got the answer. Billy Roper and a few of his openly White Supremacist buddies showed up. They started with the racist stuff and we got into a civil but pointed debate about race. The "board" of the CCC just sat there grinning like possums. I remember being upset that they did not take sides, but their body language suggested to me that they like some of the stuff they were hearing, whereas my folks were alarmed and off-put by it.

That was the last time I met with the those "Concerned Citizens", but I think you get my point. They don't tell you who they are before they draw you into a politically embarrassing situation. If Roper and the skinheads had not shown up at that meeting, they might have come up with some story and still not presented themselves as who they were. I can easily seen how Casteel could have been drawn in, and it does not mean that he is a racist. It just means that those guys are sneaky.