Green to the extreme

Dallas Morning News: Last week's federal indictments of 11 people on terrorism charges related to acts of violence and sabotage draw attention to a threat often overlooked amid the war on Islamic terror: ecoterrorism.
The 65-count indictment accuses the defendants, all of whom are affiliated with either the Earth Liberation Front or the Animal Liberation Front, with a series of arson crimes in five Western states. Government officials say the threat from ecoterrorist radicals is greater than that posed by neo-Nazi groups and right-wing militias, which are usually the focus of domestic terrorism concerns.
The material damage from these attacks is substantial. In 1998, the Earth Liberation Front -- described by the FBI as the nation's top terrorist group -- claimed responsibility for a $12 million arson attack on a Colorado ski resort. Environmentalist and animal-rights extremists have also sacked or burned car dealerships, lumber mills and research labs.
They have given up on democracy and reason as a way to change minds and laws, believing the righteousness of their cause justifies fascist tactics. As Steven Best, a University of Texas-El Paso philosophy professor, told an animal-rights gathering in England last year, "Our power is not in the right to vote, but the power to stop production. We will break the law and destroy property until we win."
Sanctioning murder
More worrying was the blithe declaration on "60 Minutes" last fall made by California surgeon Dr. Jerry Vlasak, a Best cohort who said that stopping animal torture by any means necessary -- even homicide -- is just.
It must be said that ecoterrorists no more represent mainstream environmentalists and animal welfare activists than abortion clinic bombers exemplify pro-life campaigners. Nevertheless, just as clinic bombers and abortion-doctor assassins compel pro-life leaders to distance themselves publicly from these terrorists, environmentalists and animal welfare groups should publicly and unequivocally condemn the ELF and ALF.