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February 8, 2003
I visited Ernst today in Blount County Jail where he is being held.
Persistence won the day.
Here is what happened:
I had called several times to find out when I could visit, and via
many runarounds and yet more runarounds I finally figured out that
visiting hours are scheduled according to which floor an "inmate" is
assigned. I was first told I could come today, at 11 a.m. When I
called to make double-sure, I was told no, Ernst's visiting hour was
Monday at 1 p.m., but my husband would have to indicate he really
wanted to see me by signing a visitor sheet.
Perhaps someone ought to inform him?
Well, did I not know it was a weekend - and people had gone home?
I put some extra steel in my voice and threw in my doctor's title for good measure. I told the person on the phone in charge of
procedures that word had come to me that Ernst would be shipped
"elsewhere" - and was there any way to make an exception? I simply
HAD to see him.
A very curt "Sorry!" Next Saturday.
I said that really WAS strange - I had been told if not today, then Monday.
Well, sorry, Ma'am! Next Saturday.
Serendipity intervened at that point. A friend who is a minister
volunteered his own visiting slot over to me.
I called again and asked: could I come? I KNEW there was a slot.
The answer was: "No, only Monday." All slots had since been filled.
I said it was odd - I knew for a fact a visiting slot had just opened.
Well, I was not on the visiting list.
I said to double-check. PLEASE double-check.
No doing. Back and forth. Back and forth. And yet more back and forth.
With gritted teeth I managed to get to some supervisor who, after hearing my story of woe of the Royal Runaround, allowed me to come
in at 12:45 - and he gave me his word he would make sure I would be on the all-important list.
I drove there two hours early, expecting more trouble. Guess what? I was not on anyone's list.
I said I had been promised.
Sorry. The supervisor who had promised me had left.
Yet more to-do - and all this time I was just speaking - and, frankly, zee accent getting pretty zick - a list was found, Eureka!
it even had my name.
Another problem next arose. Where to find Mr. Zundel?
He wasn't here. He wasn't there. Dr. Seuss comes to mind - doesn't he?
Sit DOWN, Mrs. Zundel - and WAIT!
To make a very complicated story short, somehow a miracle occurred, and I was buzzed upstairs.
As far as I can tell, this business with the musical chairs, shifting Ernst from floor to floor, was nothing but harassment. It
was meant to prevent me, and probably others, from seeing and talking to him.
Those are the times that make you thankful for your ancestors' genes that instruct you exactly just how deep to dig in your heels.
=====
So there was my dear love, behind a glass partition - just like in the movies. And for what?
[START]
AP World Politics
U.S. immigration agents arrest Canadian neo-Nazi on visa problems
Fri Feb 7,10:06 PM ET
By DUNCAN MANSFIELD, Associated Press Writer
KNOXVILLE, Tennessee - A man notorious for neo-Nazi writings and for
running a white supremacist publishing house in Toronto has been arrested for having an expired visa, immigration authorities said.
Immigration and Naturalization Service agents arrested Ernst Zundel,
63, on Wednesday without resistance. "He has not been removed from the country, but I can tell you he is in
our custody," Sarah Mouw, a spokeswoman for the INS in New Orleans, said Friday.
Zundel had been living in the foothills of eastern Tennessee's Great
Smoky Mountains for about two years. No one answered the phone at Zundel's home in Sevierville Friday.
"I don't know what his immigration status is but he is a bad boy,"
said Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League. "He is an anti-Semite, a Holocaust denier. He is somebody America
could do without."
[END]
Ernst and I talked for an hour, and I managed to tell him most of what he needed to know. Is he well? Yes, to all appearances. He
isn't treated badly.
"But everything," he told me, "is unpleasant."
The food is a disgrace, and very small portions are given. He shares a cell with only one other person who gets moved back and
forth as well. One night he had to spend with a howling and utterly deranged schizophrenic. Now he has a "roommate" who seems
to be all right. If he wants pen and paper, he has to put in a request for it on Monday - and maybe he'll get it on Thursday. He
said his "roommate" had given him a few sheets of paper, on which he is writing his February Power letter for his worldwide
supporters. If he can get it mailed out, I will type it, format it, have it translated, and ship it out next week.
I won't pretend this is a lark that Ernst can take in stride. During the three years we have been together as a married couple
committed to each other, I have become keenly aware of how beauty-responsive and esthetically sensitive Ernst is. A sunset, a
spring blossom can make his entire being just radiate with joy. He is an artist, through and through - his soul just hungers for
beauty. It must be very hard on him to know that from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. he is allowed to share in the company of whatever else is
locked up in that place - and if he chooses not to partake in inanities, he cannot go back to his cell. Not before 9 p.m., that
is!
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I believe there is a good chance Ernst will be moved back and forth across America to avoid any meaningful strategy of freeing him in a
concerted effort. There is a name for this treatment - I have forgotten what it's called. Another possibility, of course, is that
he will be shipped to Germany so fast that all we'll see is dust
clouds.
Our best chance is delay - and supporter involvement and outrage!
Many of you have asked what you can do, and I have stalled with an answer because I wanted to talk to him first. Ernst feels you
should use as many avenues as you can think of to spread the word and tell his story - but, please, always with class and discernment!
Don't get vile. Don't get abusive. Never forget who we are. Let's leave the filth and violence to our enemies -
we have nothing but nothing in common with them!
I will tell you more tomorrow about our plans and how we can band together and free this freedom-loving man who has already given 40
years of his life to this struggle. I am too tired tonight to do a good job, but I will have strategies ready tomorrow.
=====
You need an upbeat ending - and I have that for you:
Media-wise, it's been a mad-house! The story of the Zundel arrest is truly all over the globe! I have had news from as odd a place as
Malta! Huge! Simply huge exposure! It is wry fun to let our enemies do our publicity for us!
Briefly, this morning, the Zundelsite was down. Guess why?
We manage to resurrect it. My volunteer webmaster tells me:
So far in Feb, we have had 670,661 visitors, which looked at 2.3 million different pages on the
Zundelsite!!!
By the end of Feb, maybe we can hit 6 million pages viewed!
Go take a look - and send others there. The homepage is re-done - I think it looks very effective.
www.zundelsite.org
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You guys hang in there, and I will, too. Tomorrow, I'll rise like a phoenix from the ashes. I must admit that this prison visit - my
very first ever! - has done a good number on me. But the line in the sand has been drawn.
With many, many thanks for your wonderful letters and also promised support, I say we are in this together - and we'll win!
Ingrid
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