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It is interesting to note that Barr's biography, as published in the official CPAC program, omitted his work for the ACLU. Instead, it highlighted his work with the ACU and NRA. But the bio on his own website (web site) admits it, saying that he "provides advice to several organizations, including consulting on privacy issues with the ACLU..."

The omission in his CPAC bio may suggest that Barr knows that he is associating with a group that is anathema to conservatives. The first President Bush made political gains by attacking his Democratic opponent, Michael Dukakis, as a card-carrying member of the ACLU. Among its controversial positions on domestic and social issues, the ACLU favors the legalization of the possession and distribution of child pornography, as well as the legalization of dangerous drugs. On foreign affairs, it is quick to go to the defense of suspected terrorists in U.S. custody who claim to have been mistreated.

Working with the ACLU might make some sense if Barr and his left-wing associates had come together to protest specific and documented cases of abuse of civil liberties by the administration. One such case, which AIM has written (web site) extensively about, is that of Steven Hatfill, the former U.S. government scientist whose career and life were ruined after being unfairly targeted as a "person of interest" in the FBI investigation of the post-9/11 anthrax murders, which are still officially unsolved. Hatfill has not been charged, and there is no evidence against him. But the FBI won't apologize or clear him. Hatfill has been forced to go to court against the Justice Department and the journalists who defamed him.

More than a year ago I provided Bob Barr extensive material about the case, thinking he would write about it for the Wall Street Journal in a column about the federal government and civil liberties. But his Journal article (web site) appeared without any mention of it.

I never expected that the ACLU would go to Hatfill's defense. He isn't the ACLU's kind of client because he is a patriot who believes in fighting the war on terrorism. The ACLU and the media tend to go to the defense of those with a left-wing or anti-American bent. It's inexplicable why Bob Barr and other conservatives in the Liberty Coalition have not rallied to Hatfill's defense, in a case where they could really make a difference for the better.

If they won't defend Hatfill's civil liberties, in a concrete example of federal abuse of power, then what is the point of their "Liberty Coalition" anyway? Like the case of CPAC, the Liberty Coalition looks like an exercise in which the left-wingers are taking conservatives for a ride. And it also looks like Al Gore's friend Ted Kennedy is the driver.

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Cliff Kincaid is Editor of the AIM Report.

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Note -- The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy of GOPUSA.

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