Neo-Nazis whose self-importance and egos far out­strip their com­pe­tence patrolling the Ari­zona border?

What could pos­si­bly go wrong?

(Intense sar­casm.)

So how much of the vote might a neo-Nazi gar­ner in Ari­zona if he sud­denly switched par­ties from GOP and Demo­c­rat and ran for Sher­iff while prais­ing George Wal­lace and Jim Crow laws? We’ll find out!

Neo-Nazi Who Advo­cated Bor­der Land­mines Launches Run For Sher­iff in Ari­zona
Nick R. Mar­tin Jan­u­ary 24, 2012, 7:13 AM

Two years ago, he was call­ing for land­mines to be used to stop immi­grants from ille­gally cross­ing into the US from Mex­ico. Now, a well known Ari­zona neo-Nazi wants to be in charge of law enforce­ment in a vast swath of desert south of Phoenix.

...

Ready is a long­time Repub­li­can and one­time precinct leader in the Ari­zona GOP. But elec­tions records show he switched par­ties Jan. 13 and plans to run as a Democrat.

He told TPM on Mon­day that he respects the Demo­c­ra­tic Party’s his­tory, say­ing it was the party that brought about Jim Crow laws and Alabama’s seg­re­ga­tion­ist Gov. George Wallace. He said he also has a prob­lem with tough-talking Repub­li­can sher­iffs like Joe Arpaio and Babeu.

“All these, quote, bor­der hero sher­iffs — they sit there blam­ing the pres­i­dent while they’re not doing every­thing they can do,” Ready said.

Obama is “def­i­nitely not per­fect in my book,” he added, but the Demo­c­ra­tic pres­i­dent has sent more troops to the bor­der and deported more immi­grants than the sher­iffs could ever hope to.

Ready said he’s no longer a mem­ber of the National Social­ist Move­ment, the nation­wide neo-Nazi orga­ni­za­tion he belonged to for years, but he could not remem­ber exactly when he resigned his mem­ber­ship. He also said he can’t stand the term neo-Nazi, call­ing it “the other N-word,” and insisted he is seek­ing diverse sup­port for his campaign.

How­ever, Ready’s racist views remain on full dis­play on his cam­paign Face­book page, show­ing his ide­ol­ogy hasn’t changed even if his mem­ber­ship sta­tus in the NSM has.

The page is sprin­kled with quotes from Wal­lace. He also posted a photo of him­self stand­ing under a street sign that dis­played the name of Mal­colm X. Below the photo, he wrote that one of his pri­or­i­ties in office would be to get a street named after George Lin­coln Rock­well, the founder of the the Amer­i­can Nazi Party.

As the Phoenix New Times noted when it first reported on his can­di­dacy last week, Ready also lists his cam­paign chair­man as Harry Hughes, a long­time friend and doc­u­mented mem­ber of the National Social­ist Move­ment. Ready told TPM he is now liv­ing with Hughes in the Pinal County town of Maricopa.

“What Harry has is a big piece of prop­erty that we have turned into a com­pound,” Ready said, not­ing that they’ve sur­rounded it with sand bags and barbed wire. How­ever, he added: “It’s not a mili­tia or any­thing like that.”

Ready has been on the fringe of Ari­zona pol­i­tics since at least 2006, when he came in sec­ond place in an elec­tion for city coun­cil in the Phoenix sub­urb of Mesa. And before he made his racist beliefs pub­lic, he was also a men­tor of for­mer state Sen­ate Pres­i­dent Rus­sell Pearce, the pri­mary spon­sor of Arizona’s harsh immi­gra­tion law in 2010. Pearce has since dis­tanced him­self from Ready.

In early 2010, Ready attended a Tea Party rally that Pearce and Arpaio both spoke at. He min­gled in the crowd and passed out fliers for the National Social­ist Move­ment that called for land­mines to be placed along the US-Mexico border.

“We all should be actively advo­cat­ing daily to main­stream Amer­ica the most humane, non-racist, fair bor­der secu­rity plan avail­able,” the fliers said. “Namely, A MINEFIELD!”

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