Move over Limbaugh, GOP has a new spiritual leader: James Wenneker von Brunne

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-06-10-shooter_N.htm


Hess, 64, describes von Brunn as "very angry about society and the Jewish influence at the Federal Reserve." Von Brunn, he says, alluded to violence but never spoke specifically about a target.

Anti-hate organizations have been monitoring von Brunn. In 2008, the Southern Poverty Law Center listedholywesternempire.org as a hate site run by von Brunn, said the center's blog, Hatewatch. The center says he has "a long history of associations with prominent neo-Nazis and Holocaust deniers."

He also has a criminal history. According to court records, von Brunn entered the Federal Reserve Building in Washington in 1981 with a .38-caliber revolver in his coat, a sawed-off shotgun strapped to his leg and a knife and sheath on his belt. He passed one security guard, went upstairs, approached a second guard, aimed his revolver at the guard and demanded to be taken to then-chairman Paul Volcker's office. The guard refused to let him in, took von Brunn's gun and arrested him.


The 1982 indictment said von Brunn planned to kidnap members of the Reserve Board so he could air his views on television. He was convicted on multiple counts and served more than five years in federal prison in Ray Brook, N.Y.