Right-wing extremists seen as a threat

A Homeland Security report says right-wing groups are on the rise because of fears about Obama and the recession.

By Greg Miller
LA Times
April 16, 2009

Reporting from Washington — The economic downturn and the election of the nation's first black president are contributing to a resurgence of right-wing extremist groups, which had been on the wane since the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995, according to a U.S. intelligence assessment distributed to state and local authorities last week.

The report, produced by the Department of Homeland Security, has triggered a backlash among conservatives because it also raised the specter that disgruntled veterans returning from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan might "boost the capabilities of extremists . . . to carry out violence."

The assessment noted that domestic security officials had seen no evidence that such groups were planning attacks in the U.S.

But it is the first high-level U.S. intelligence report to call attention to an array of recent domestic developments as potential harbingers of terrorist violence.

(More here.)