Ok, yesterday I tweeted a story out of Chicago’s Tinley park about some diners in a restaurant who while dining were assaulted out of nowhere by a group of about 15 to 18 people, all dressed in black, wielding pipes and bats. Holy crap, right?

Well, a follow up to the story is posted today at the Chicago Sun Times:

A law enforcement source Sunday said the group beaten at a Tinley Park restaurant Saturday was made up of white supremacists, and those who assaulted them were protesters attacking their beliefs.

Police had five people in custody after the attack, which occurred at The Ashford House, 7959 W. 159th St. No charges had been filed yet, and the suspects did not appear in bond court Sunday.

Tinley Park Mayor Ed Zabrocki on Sunday said police do not know if the protesters had any connection to the NATO Summit in downtown Chicago.

He said police still have 35 to 40 people to interview, and charges could come Monday.

“The guys we have in the lockup are still not talking, at least not this morning,” Zabrocki said.

Beckie Williams was among the victims Saturday. Williams, who said she lives near the Quad Cities, said her group is called the European Heritage Group and they are not white supremacists.

So wait,  the article actually says “those who assaulted them were protesters attacking their beliefs.” That’s some old-fashioned cave-man belief attacking right there. Wow. Well, it gets worse. Other patrons were then assaulted:

Winston said the mob was wielding metal batons and hammers, wearing hooded jackets and obscuring their faces with scarves and other coverings.

“They came running in the door single file,” Winston said.

The attack wasn’t a random act of violence, police said. But the attack apparently spilled over to others in the restaurant.

“Once they attacked the table, they went and started hitting random people,” Winston said. “Four or five people got knocked over the head pretty good, enough to require stitches,” he said.

“To walk into a restaurant at 1 in the afternoon and start attacking people like that with bats and hammers, that’s intent to kill,” said Hiller, who lives across the street from the Ashford House. That’s definitely a scary thing.”

So, the claim is that these thugs came in, armed, to confront a group of alleged white supremacists but then stuck around to beat the other customers. So, we’ll smear the victims but this is all we really know about the attackers, other than they all deserve to rot in jail:

Surveillance cameras inside the restaurant captured the attack and footage was turned over to Tinley Park police, Winston said.

Winston said that during the attack most of the men’s face coverings were torn off.

“Most of these kids were white, and they all looked like they were between 18 and 25,” he said.

So in other words, the scene might have looked like this:

It will be interesting to see how the media continues t0 report this story given the white wash attempt now in progress on the occupiers who were planning to firebomb police stations, Rahm Emanuel’s home and Obama’s campaign headquarters. The press is calling them the  “NATO 3”, which has now become the “NATO 5” as there have been two more related arrests. Yes, I’m insinuating this pack of well armed cretins was related to Occupy and the G8 protests.  The timing, location, description and method of delivery are just too much to be coincidence.

If I’m wrong, I’ll post up a retraction, but for right now I’m calling it like what it looks like — just like the Sun Times story, only from the other side of the white washed fence.

UPDATE: A group called Anti-Racist Action Group has claimed responsibility.  Look at that, one hate group attacked another hate group. I wonder if the Anti-racist Action group sees the revolting irony of their group and their actions? Consider this a partial retraction to my earlier impression; I want to see the list of names of those arrested and associated with this incident.

Via the New Yorker:

From AntiRacistAction.org, the group stated the alleged motivation behind the incident:

On Saturday, May 19th a group of 30 anti-fascists descended upon Ashford House restaurant in the Chicago suburb of Tinley Park where the 5th annual White Nationalist Economic Summit and Illinois White Nationalist Meet-and-Greet was taking place. The White Nationalists were targeted inside the restaurant and physically attacked, causing several injuries and completely shutting down their meeting. The anti-fascist group was privy to anonymous inside information. This fascist event had been in secret planning for six months. The attendees have attempted to cover up the true intent of the event with mainstream media reports initially reporting the white nationalist conference as a wedding party and then as an Irish heritage meeting. The event was advertised on http://www.stormfront.org, an established white nationalist fascist internet forum.

You have GOT to read the “About” page for this group of what amounts to a some seriously disturbed, hypocritical vigilantes. The whole list of who they are and what they are about reads just like an Occupy mission statement, only it’s actually specific about who they are targeting. The very last section garnered a ‘doh!’ and a slap to my forehead:

What is fascism?

ARA recognizes a number of characteristics of fascist movements. Fascism is an ultra-nationalist ideology that mobilizes around and glorifies a national or perceived racial identity, valuing this identity above all other interests (for example gender or class). Fascism is marked by its hostility towards  reason and human solidarity, by its dehumanization and scapegoating of marginalized or oppressed groups, by its use of violence or threats of violence to impose its views on others, and by its rejection of  supposedly “effeminate” or “soft” values in favor of “manliness.” Anti-Semitism and racism are primary facets of National Socialism and most other varieties of fascism. Fascism aims at a militarized society, and organizes along military or quasi-military lines, usually with an authoritarian structure revolving around a single, charismatic leader. Fascist groups may have the facade of an efficient and dynamic organization, but in reality, power structures are arbitrary and ruthless. Fascists use anti-elitist rhetoric to appeal to the “common man,” coupled with internal elitism and willingness to accept support from existing elites. Fascism glorifies a mythologized past as justification for its present ideological stances, and as a basis for future organization of society.

What about free speech for fascists?

• ARA does not use the state to prevent anyone’s free speech. The right to free speech restricts the state from censoring ideas, it does not stop the public from opposing hateful ideas.
• The fact that people dislike what bigots have to say and want to make that known is not prohibited by the concept of free speech. If bigots actively go out of their way to tell people that 90% of the world’s population should be enslaved or that the best thing they can do is kill someone because of their skin color, religion, ethnic background, immigration status, sexual orientation, disability, etc., they can’t use “free speech” to silence opposition.
• Anti-racists and antifascists have an obligation to deny a platform to bigots so that they can’t spread their message and recruit. Concert venues, meeting halls, radio programs, and the like make choices about who to host on a regular basis. These choices have a very real impact on bigoted ideas taking root in one’s community.
• Responding to bigoted speech is important. We believe in being proactive when it comes to fascist violence, which means confronting fascist organizing before they have a chance to put their ideas into action, and taking fascist threats seriously.

So, let’s ignore this group is claiming to be anti-fascism but employs fascist tactics. Let’s also ignore they really don’t understand what fascism is other than what they cut and pasted from Wikipedia.  I have a reading suggestion for them. If you ignore those things, what remains is nothing more than a group of thugs deciding who has the right to express themselves and who doesn’t.  They don’t consider beating people with bats, pipes and batons to be a suppression of free speech, nor shouting down their targets at an event or venue. How are these people different than Occupy again?