A Good Man Stood in the Gap

Stephen Johns saved a lot of lives. He was the rent-a-cop who confronted a sick old bigot in the doorway of the National Holocaust Museum and paid for his act of dedication with his life.

James von Brunn is 88 years-old. This relic of a segregated past is not crazy. Instead, he is a calculating radical thinker who put an antique rifle in his car and headed into the nation's capital with visions of going out in a hateful blaze of glory.

Instead of emptying a few clips into students. tourists and other unsuspecting victims, he got off one round and claimed the life of a father, son and brother who put himself in harms way so others would survive. I hear and read a lot about terrorism.

This was not just a hate crime targeting visitors to a vivid symbol of inhumanity and the survival of a victimized people. This was also an act of terror.

Human rights activist Morris Dees on told me that the reason he tracked hate groups was because "all trails begin somewhere." Mo spoke the truth.