For the hard right, recent news about the 1993 raid on Davidian headquarters in Waco, Texas, is seen as a sign that the mainstream is finally waking up to the truth. This has not had a calming effect, PNS commentator Justin Raimondo writes, and may spread and intensify discontent. Raimondo is the author of "Reclaiming the American Right" (CLS Press, 1993), and the forthcoming "An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard." He is the editorial director of Antiwar.com.

The Daily Oklahoman newspaper quoted Bob Ricks, the FBI's spokesman in 1993, as saying to Janet Reno, "You probably don't realize it, but in the Midwest Waco is still an extremely big deal out here, and it's the subject of much conversation." Reno's reply, according to Ricks, "I don't think the American people care about Waco anymore."

Reno's spokesman denies this, but Ricks' account is all too believable. Until new evidence surfaced, those who questioned the Davidians' fate were alleged to be "right-wing extremists" and "conspiracy theorists." Now, amid a growing public outcry, government officials are scrambling for cover, pointing at each other, and even raiding each other's offices for evidence. Even liberals are beginning to ask questions. Now does anyone think "the American people don't care about Waco"?

Watching that orange ball of flame illuminate the Texas sky, as tanks advanced on the victims and the victors planted their flag in the ruins, people of my generation could not help but think of Vietnam. Growing evidence of direct U.S. military involvement confirms we were at war. But with whom?

The Waco massacre did not occur in a vacuum. The Brady bill signaled the beginning of an accelerated campaign to effectively repeal the Second Amendment, and the tactics of the BATF (Bureau of Alcohol Tax and Firearms) had already drawn plenty of vocal criticism -- far below establishment media radar, a melange of "constitutionalists," secessionists, tax protesters, and proto-libertarians emerged with no real national center.

United around opposition to gun control, fear of federal encroachment, and contempt for the new Clinton Administration, this mass of discontent was galvanized by the events of April 19, 1993. They saw it as a murderous assault on harmless outsiders -- and they were right. They said that "investigations" by various government agencies were a cover-up -- and they were right. Now they say the latest investigation will come to nothing because powerful forces stand in the way.

Are they right, again? According to the "Drudge Report," a government informant is telling congressional investigators he has first-hand knowledge of direct military involvement in the massacre. Matt Drudge, a hero in these circles, headlines "Government Informant in Waco Case Given Protection; Says Feds Threatened Him, Son" confirming rightist suspicions.

One remark posted on Freerepublic.com, a popular conservative website, sums up the rightists' worst fears, asking: "Are we becoming some kind of banana republic?" For conservatives, who all see themselves as patriots, Waco is the end of innocence. Revolted by an administration that seems to embody moral corruption, they are ready to believe Clinton and his cabal are capable of anything -- as are millions of Americans far outside the ranks of the organized right.

As the California Militia put it, "When the executive branch of government turns to murdering the citizens, what redress do the citizens have? Who will arrest and try a murderous general, and who will arrest and try a murderous attorney general?" Militias were mocked for suggesting that Americans need to be armed, against their own government, but new revelations of military involvement make this seem less like paranoia and more like hard-headed realism.

Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., president of the Ludwig von Mises Institute and a leading intellectual of the Hard Right, writes, "And they wonder whatever happened to the civic pride of the good old days? The answer: it went up in flames at Waco."

The media accepted the government's story for six years. It took two crusading investigators, Mike McNulty, an independent film-maker, and David Hardy, an Arizona lawyer to uncover the truth. And that truth, says Rockwell, is that "Waco teaches us something important about the nature of government. It hates dissent, and it doesn't hesitate to kill its opponents."

This realization is radicalizing not only conservatives, but also ordinary Americans, as the extent of the crime -- and the cover-up -- comes out.

The key question of just who gave the orders to execute the Branch Davidians is still unanswered. Joseph Farah, editor of WorldNetDaily.com, speculates about a "Little Rock connection."

The anger in the rightist response is not far below the surface: "Officers Stacey Koon and Laurence Powell were sent to prison for violating the civil rights of ex-felon Rodney King ," writes conservative columnist Linda Bowles, but now that the truth about Waco is coming out "why isn't Janet Reno in jail?" Not belonging to an approved victim group can have deadly consequences in the America of the new millennium. It will take more than the jailing of Reno to quell the thunder on the right -- but that, at least, is a beginning.