Alabama terror Web site angers activists

[zgrams at zgrams.zundelsite.org]

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Look at what's happening here!  Homeland Security yielding to public pressure!

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Alabama terror Web site angers activists

By BOB JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer / May 27, 2007

MONTGOMERY, Ala. - The Alabama Department of Homeland Security has 
taken down a Web site it operated that included gay rights and 
anti-war organizations in a list of groups that could include 
terrorists.

The Web site identified different types of terrorists, and included a 
list of groups it believed could spawn terrorists. The list also 
included environmentalists, animal rights advocates and abortion 
opponents.

The director of the department, Jim Walker, said his agency received 
a number of calls and e-mails from people who said they felt the site 
unfairly targeted certain people just because of their beliefs. He 
said he plans to put the Web site back on the Internet, but will no 
longer identify specific types of groups.

Howard Bayliss, chairman of the gay and lesbian advocacy group 
Equality Alabama, said he doesn't understand why gay rights advocates 
would be on the list.

"Our group has only had peaceful demonstrations. I'm deeply concerned 
we've been profiled in this discriminatory matter," Bayliss said.

The site included the groups under a description of what it called 
"single-issue" terrorists. That group includes people who feel they 
are trying to create a better world, the Web site said. It said that 
in some communities, law enforcement officers consider certain single 
issue groups to be a threat.

"Single-issue extremists often focus on issues that are important to 
all of us. However, they have no problem crossing the line between 
legal protest and ... illegal acts, to include even murder, to 
succeed in their goals," it read.

Walker said the site had been up since spring 2004, and had gotten a 
relatively small number of hits until it recently became the subject 
of blogs, he said.

Birmingham attorney Eric Johnston, president of the Alabama Pro Life 
Coalition, said he was concerned about any list that described people 
doing social justice work as terrorists.

"Our group's main mission is educational. The thought that we would 
somehow be harboring terrorists escapes me," he said.