Noam Chomsky doesn’t like corporations, but the only one He doesn’t seem interested in exposing is al Qaeda. Since its inception, al Qaeda and its recently expired figurehead, Osama bin Laden, have essentially operated as a multinational importer-exporter of murder, fear, hatred, nihilism, and racism. They’ve had a hand in some of the most significant acts of degradation since the end of the Cold War, and have done so via a byzantine financial network of front companies, false charities, and squandered inheritance (see, for instance, the fine research of Rohan Gunaratna on this). But to read Chomsky these days, one is forced to overlook all this capitalist malfeasance and conclude the following:

1. There was little or no evidence that Osama bin Laden was involved in 9/11 when we first invaded Afghanistan; moreover, there’s still little or no evidence.

2. Morally, George W. Bush is worse than Osama bin Laden (or, presumably, whoever was actually responsible for 9/11).

3. Since we killed Osama bin Laden, we must admit that it would be OK for someone to kill Bush or President Obama.

4. The United States is racist and imperialist.

These are the main points of Chomsky’s Official Reaction to the recent raid in Abbottabad, Pakistan, which took out bin Laden. It wasn’t enough for Chomsky to criticize the U.S. for not giving him a “fair trial.” No, to lodge that complaint only would be to consent to the moral parameters of the argument as put forward by Washington—that bin Laden was responsible for 9/11 and deserved some form of retribution. The extremist impulse to destroy and rebuild another world is evident in the way Chomsky wants the entire perspective redefined. Whereas before He might have been content to criticize bin Laden as the product of American foreign policy, now He apparently feels even doing that might be an indulgence of the imperialist narrative.

Thus we had no evidence of bin Laden’s involvement in 9/11 when we routed the Taliban, and “nothing serious has been provided since.” So what about, for instance, certain videos of bin Laden that seem to implicate him? Chomsky, like any good socialist, is not buying those goods: “There is much talk of bin Laden’s ‘confession,’ but that is rather like my confession that I won the Boston Marathon. He boasted of what he regarded as a great achievement.”

Not all your time is wasted on reading such glib callousness. Chomsky’s latest croak signifies something in which we can all rejoice: that the doyen of the radical Left has begun a final descent into incoherence. As a critic of U.S. foreign policy, Chomsky’s standards of evidence are low; usually it’s enough for Him merely to glance at a mainstream news article to begin building the palace of speculation. But radicals are notoriously unfazed by the banalities of the obvious; for the real criminals and mass murderers, the standards of evidence suddenly and sharply rise. It is this aspect of the radical mind that is its final source of rot and decline. Chomsky might not be sure now that bin Laden bore any responsibility for 9/11, but He was sure enough to appoint Himself the interpreter of Muslim grievances after the Towers fell. Lower Manhattan was still a festering open wound when Chomsky first lectured us about the attacks:

“It is generally assumed, plausibly, that their origin is the Middle East region, and that the attacks probably trace back to the Osama Bin Laden network, a widespread and complex organization, doubtless inspired by Bin Laden but not necessarily acting under his control.” [italics mine]

Further:

“Bin Laden despises the US for its support of these regimes [i.e. Saudi Arabia]. Like others in the region, he is also outraged by long-standing US support for Israel’s brutal military occupation, now in its 35th year: Washington’s decisive diplomatic, military, and economic intervention in support of the killings, the harsh and destructive siege over many years, the daily humiliation to which Palestinians are subjected, the expanding settlements designed to break the occupied territories into Bantustan-like cantons and take control of the resources, the gross violation of the Geneva Conventions, and other actions that are recognized as crimes throughout most of the world, apart from the US, which has prime responsibility for them. And like others, he contrasts Washington’s dedicated support for these crimes with the decade-long US-British assault against the civilian population of Iraq, which has devastated the society and caused hundreds of thousands of deaths while strengthening Saddam Hussein — who was a favored friend and ally of the US and Britain right through his worst atrocities, including the gassing of the Kurds, as people of the region also remember well, even if Westerners prefer to forget the facts. These sentiments are very widely shared. The _Wall Street Journal_ (Sept. 14) published a survey of opinions of wealthy and privileged Muslims in the Gulf region (bankers, professionals, businessmen with close links to the U.S.). They expressed much the same views: resentment of the U.S. policies of supporting Israeli crimes and blocking the international consensus on a diplomatic settlement for many years while devastating Iraqi civilian society, supporting harsh and repressive anti-democratic regimes throughout the region, and imposing barriers against economic development by ‘propping up oppressive regimes.’ Among the great majority of people suffering deep poverty and oppression, similar sentiments are far more bitter, and are the source of the fury and despair that has led to suicide bombings, as commonly understood by those who are interested in the facts.”

Bin Laden was someone against whom we had no credible evidence, although Chomsky had an entire dissertation prepared the week after the attacks.

It must be difficult to be a radical nowadays—always having to decide whether to rehabilitate terrorists or simply declare they were never terrorists to begin with. It’s a tough choice, one not to be made on an empty stomach. But what’s saddest is that the term “public intellectual” is squandered on the producer of something that could have been peeled off of Alex Jones’s website. Anyone, especially the LaRouchies, could have written Chomsky’s piece for Him. The obvious and extreme logic, the almost sociopathic confidence in the conclusions, the clunky diction and syntax, the desperate seeking of moral equivalence—what does it mean to be a “public intellectual” if any blogger in the country could write your stuff and not miss a beat?

There’s some more filth to be mopped up here. Not one to miss out on any demagogy, even the lowest and most obviously self-discrediting, Chomsky has signed on to the idea that the name Operation Geronimo signifies an “imperial mentality” that is “so profound” in Western society; indeed, our minds are so racked with false consciousness we don’t even realize we are “glorifying bin Laden by identifying him with courageous resistance against genocidal invaders.”

On to that other genocidal invader, George W. Bush, the American Pol Pot (well, Noam’s jury was out a while on that one, too). Chomsky assures us:

“Uncontroversially, his crimes vastly exceed bin Laden’s, and he is not a ‘suspect’ but uncontroversially the ‘decider’…”

Uncontroversially, Chomsky is now America’s most boring public intellectual. One needs to think back to the earliest days of the War on Terror to come up with slogans as crass as “Bush = bin Laden.” You can all do better than this, I assure you. It might be amusing to play a little game: Every time a major foreign-policy event occurs, pretend you’re Noam Chomsky and get to work producing an Official Reaction. Then compare it to what He actually writes. You’ll notice how neatly it lines up. You’ll also notice how mindless and easy a task it all was, like pulling the lever on a rigged slot machine. Welcome to Chomsky’s world.

Take their homepage from the other day:

Looking at the screen shot, one would think that they would present proof that Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Andrew Breitbart are being disingenuous about their “birther” positions. But when you open up to the items inside it becomes reminiscent of that old song from Sesame Street,

One of these things is not like the others,
One of these things just doesn’t belong,
Can you tell which thing is not like the others
By the time I finish my song?

In the article teased by the cover story Hannity is mentioned 18x, Limbaugh is mentioned 20x and Andrew Breitbart is mentioned….wait let me count…ah zero times. Breitbart is showcased in the picture, right there over headline, but he isn’t part of the story about flip-flopping about the “birther” issue.

Giving MMFA the benefit of the doubt (something they don’t practice) I considered the possibility that the author of the article forgot to put in the Breitbart quotes, leading me to check Breitbart’s websites for “birther” content.

Doing a search of Brietbart’s “Big” sites you don’t see the word ”birther,” used often. There is  not one mention of it in an article written by the “Big’s” cheese. Where the term is used by other writers, it’s  used to cast adherents of the theory in a bad light, to criticize progressives for  falsely accusing  others of being “birthers,”  or to explain why “birthers” are not necessarily racists. In the interests of full disclosure six of the stories that mention “birthers” were written by me.

MMFA put the picture of Breitbart on its home page for one reason only, an attempted smear of the internet entrepreneur as being less than truthful.  Obviously some of the stories he has been running have upset their benefactor Mr. Soros but they had no real facts to disprove them (either that or they are angry about not being included in the forward of his new book; after all they gave him so much content).

Breitbart was smeared without using any of his words to back up their charges, Hannity and Limbaugh had the “joy” of having their words used.

Take a look at the “quotes they used for Hannity”

• On March 24, Hannity asked: “What’s the deal? Produce the birth certificate, it’s over, done with.” During the segment, he also said that Obama “did talk in his book about how he went and prayers and he went to a Muslim school, and he did talk about all this. And he studied the Quran, and prayers at sunset were some of the most beautiful things he saw in life. So he spent a lot of years of his youth in Indonesia … And show the birth certificate.” [Fox News, Hannity, 3/24/11]

• On March 23, Hannity asked, “What do you think about this birth certificate issue? I mean, it has not been my main issue, but it kind of does get a little odd here after a while. Can’t they just produce it and we move on?” [Fox News, Hannity, 3/23/11]

• On March 25, Hannity stated, “Donald Trump brought up the issue of the birth certificate, and it’s getting huge buzz around the country,” and later asked, “Why can’t they just release the birth certificate, you know, and just move on?” [Fox News, Hannity, 3/25/11]

• Later on the March 25 show, Hannity stated: “Do I think he was [born in America]? Yes. Do I think this is odd that they won’t produce the birth certificate? It’s beginning to get odd to me.” Hannity later stated that it’s “not true” that Obama has shown his birth certificate. [Fox News, Hannity, 3/25/11]

• On April 5, Hannity said that Obama was born in the United States but demanded that he “show the stupid birth certificate and move on.” [Fox News, Hannity, 4/5/11]

Not once did Hannity say he believed Obama was born outside the U.S. What he was calling for is for Obama to show the long form birth certificate to shut up the “birthers.” In three of the five quotes used, Hannity calls for Obama to show the birth certificate and move on. Like many on the conservative side, Hannity realized that Obama was holding back on the “long form”  because it was a winning issue for him, or rather it was a losing one for his opposition (at least until Trump came along.)  It destroyed the credibility of anyone who talked about it.

As far as the Limbaugh quotes, it is impossible to evaluate them out of context, which undoubtedly is the reason they presented them that way. Anybody who listens to Rush all the time (and MMFA has at least one person assigned to that task) knows that half of what he says is satire or sarcasm.  Without listening to him make those comments, there is no way to tell what he means.

Truth and context do not really matter when MMFA is making charges against a conservative. That is simply the modus operandi of the Soros machine and the progressive movement. Just look at what they said about the Paul Ryan budget plan, it was if they were trying to tell the public that conservatives only want to put old people out on to the streets and eat babies.  In the case of Media Matters for America, they try to confer slanders through photographic association, ignore context, or just plain pull a false  charge out of their collective arses in their attempt to avoid discussing substantive issues by libeling people with whom they disagree.

Just when you think that they can’t come up with anything else, the global warming hoaxers unveil something new in their attempt to scare the public into believing their global redistribution of income scheme.

The latest claim is those horrible, massive tornadoes which caused over two-hundred deaths in America this week were spurred by global warming (a claim that was quickly refuted by both FEMA and the NOAA Storm Prediction Center among others).

Yesterday, Peter H. Gleick, President of the Pacific Institute wrote in the Huffington Post about the connection between the tornadoes and climate change. When his words are examined carefully it is clear that his article was simply meant to frighten not to explain. He begins:

Violent tornadoes throughout the southeastern U.S. must be a front-page reminder that no matter how successful climate deniers are in confusing the public or delaying action on climate change in Congress or globally, the science is clear: Our climate is worsening.

On first glance he is saying that there is a connection between the warming hoax and the tragic weather; that’s what he intends for the reader to think. But look again at the carefully-scripted paragraph. He argues that the weather should remind you that the climate is getting worse. Well… that and the fact that people who don’t buy into the scheme are horrible people.

He continues:

More extreme and violent climate is a direct consequence of human-caused climate change (whether or not we can determine if these particular tornado outbreaks were caused or worsened by climate change). There is a reason it isn’t called global warming anymore. Higher temperatures are only one — and not the most worrisome — of the consequences of a changing climate.

He says that more extreme weather is the result of “human-caused” climate change (but not necessarily these tornadoes.) Gleick’s Orwellian double-speak is trying to get the reader to make the weather-climate change association, without making the weather-climate change association. Which is a good thing because scientists have come out and said that there is no relationship between climate change and this week’s tornadoes.

USA Today used two studies from 2007 to make the link:

As with any major weather disaster these days — from floods and hurricanes to wildfires and this week’s tornado outbreak in the South — people ask questions about its relation to the huge elephant that’s lurking in the corner, global climate change.

Two separate studies in 2007 reported that global warming could bring a dramatic increase in the frequency of weather conditions that feed severe thunderstorms and tornadoes by the end of the 21st century.

Both studies make the same mistake in their predictions, as a matter of fact most of the warming/climate change hysteria comes from the same source. They use computer models.  Computer models are a great tool but are only as good as the data entered into the model; you need to have some observational data. It is the equivalent of a weather forecaster who makes his prediction of sunshine based totally on what the forecast computer says, but never bothers to stick his head outside where he would find out it’s raining.

Think Progress, the progressive blog funded by George Soros’ Center for American Progress was more direct;

“Given that global warming is unequivocal,” climate scientist Kevin Trenberth cautioned the American Meteorological Society in January of this year, “the null hypothesis should be that all weather events are affected by global warming rather than the inane statements along the lines of ‘of course we cannot attribute any particular weather event to global warming.”

The congressional delegations of these states — Alabama, Tennessee, Mississippi, Georgia, Virginia, and Kentucky — overwhelmingly voted to reject the science that polluting the climate is dangerous. They are deliberately ignoring the warnings from scientists.

Actually the charge that the tornadoes had anything to do with global warming or man-made climate change is deliberately ignoring the scientists. Fox News reported:

Greg Carbin, the warning coordination meteorologist at NOAA’s Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma, said warming trends do create more of the fuel that tornadoes require, such as moisture, but that they also deprive tornadoes of another essential ingredient: wind shear.

“We know we have a warming going on,” Carbin told Fox News in an interview Thursday, but added: “There really is no scientific consensus or connection [between global warming and tornadic activity]….Jumping from a large-scale event like global warming to relatively small-scale events like tornadoes is a huge leap across a variety of scales.”

Asked if climate change should be “acquitted” in a jury trial where it stood charged with responsibility for tornadoes, Carbin replied: “I would say that is the right verdict, yes.” Because there is no direct connection as yet established between the two? “That’s correct,” Carbin replied.

According to Grady Dixon, assistant professor of meteorology and climatology at Mississippi State University:

“If you look at the past 60 years of data, the number of tornadoes is increasing significantly, but it’s agreed upon by the tornado community that it’s not a real increase,”he said .

“It’s having to do with better (weather tracking) technology, more population, the fact that the population is better educated and more aware. So we’re seeing them more often,” Dixon said.

But he said it would be “a terrible mistake” to relate the up-tick to climate change.

…Craig Fugate, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), also dismissed Thursday climate change as a factor in the deadly tornadoes: “Actually what we’re seeing is springtime,” he said.

“Many people think of Oklahoma as ‘Tornado Alley’ and forget that the southeast United States actually has a history of longer and more powerful tornadoes that stay on the ground longer.”

And there are lots more where that came from. So why are the progressive climate change hoaxers making the link between the tornadoes and their climate change theory?

Since the “climate-gate scandal” there has been a rash of peer-reviewed science proving that climate change has nothing to do with man and that it is a natural phenomenon that has happened many times before. There is a growing knowledge base blaming any heating on sunspot activity, normal change in ocean currents or, for those who remember the warning in the 1970, because we are approaching a new ice age.

Not being able to keep the scientists in-line any more, their new tactic is to keep the public in line with ridiculous scare tactics. During the past two years the left has blamed everything but Donald Trump’s hair and Barbara Boxer’s low I.Q. on global warming.

Take a look at the following. Each item is linked to a story claiming that something ridiculous was caused by global warming.

Incredible shrinking sheep, Invasion of jellyfish in the Mediterranean, Surge in fatal shark attack, Boy Scout tornado deaths, Global conflict, Beer tasting different, Suicide of farmers in Australia, Bigger tuna fish, longer days, shorter days, Collapse of gingerbread houses in Sweden, Cow infertility, UFO sightings in the UK, Rise in insurance premiums, Heroin addiction, Frigid Cold Winters in Great Britain, Cancer, Death from heart disease, diabetes, stroke, respiratory disease and even accidents, homicide, suicide, water -borne disease outbreaks, heavier, wetter snowstorms treacherous for travel and ambulation, Lyme disease, swarms of allergy-inducing, stinging insects, along with mosquitoes and devastating pine bark beetle infestations and the spread of forest and crop pests, 40,000 dead crabs , unrest in the Middle East. screwed-up love making and the Japanese earthquake-tsunami.

The fact is that the drive toward global warming legislation in the United States and indeed throughout the whole world has nothing to do with the environment. Those aren’t my words but those of Ottmar Edenhofer former co-chair of the IPCC’s Working Group III, and a lead author of the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report released in 2007 ( the IPCC is the UN’s Organization formed to push the climate change theory).

But one must say clearly that we redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy. Obviously, the owners of coal and oil will not be enthusiastic about this. One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. This has almost nothing to do with environmental policy anymore

As the White House deals a devastating blow to one Obama conspiracy theory, leave it to leftists to dig up another one to browbeat allegedly-bigoted conservatives with. At the Daily Beast, pseudo-feminist Michelle Goldberg “traces the far-right history of the claim” that something funny’s going on with Barack Obama’s academic background:

Claims about Obama’s educational history date back to September 2008, when The Wall Street Journal attacked him for not releasing his school records, writing in an editorial, “Some think his transcript, if released, would reveal Mr. Obama as a mediocre student who benefited from racial preference.” Since then, Orly Taitz, queen of the birthers, has developed elaborate theories about Obama’s college years. As Taitz argues, Obama himself acknowledged that he was directionless when he started college. How, then, did he get himself accepted into the Ivy League?

Despite purporting to refute the right-wing “fever swamps,” Goldberg won’t actually reference the WSJ piece again, so it’s worth mentioning that it makes substantive points, among them that the ambiguity of Obama’s college days doesn’t square with the prominence of his personal story in his claim to fame. And as Andy McCarthy points out, Obama has a habit of modifying details of his biography for different audiences. (Ace has more solid analysis of Obama’s college days here.)

But not a peep about any of this from Goldberg. Instead of addressing what serious Obama critics have said, she spends the next couple paragraphs shooting down the theories of Orly Taitz, an especially destructive Birther attorney, who speculates that Obama attended Columbia as a foreign exchange student, attended for a mere nine months instead of two years, and even that he got into Harvard Law thanks to the machinations of a Saudi prince.

Whatever the fact-to-crap ratio of Taitz’s allegations may be (the Saudi connection seems outlandish, but the explanation of the National Student Clearinghouse rep, who says Taitz got bad results from submitting queries to NSC’s database incorrectly, doesn’t seem adequate either), it’s ultimately a sideshow. The point is, Goldberg is making clowns like Orly Taitz the face of the opposition rather than McCarthy or the Wall Street Journal editorial board because she wants to delegitimize their argument without addressing it. Why? Why else—race-baiting:

It’s easy enough to see why this particular narrative has endured. Not only does it position the president as a Muslim Manchurian candidate with longtime ties to agents of the caliphate, but it also assures resentful whites that this seemingly brilliant black man isn’t so smart after all. In that sense, it’s of a piece with the right-wing obsession with Obama’s use of a teleprompter, and with the widespread suspicion that he didn’t really write the eloquent Dreams From My Father, a claim Trump recently made at a Tea Party rally. Obama, in this view, is both sinister and stupid, canny enough to perpetrate one of the biggest frauds in American history but still the ultimate affirmative-action baby.

Trump is clearly not as intelligent as Obama, but he’s not an idiot, either. When he blows this particular dog whistle, he knows exactly what the Republican base is hearing.

No, the Right’s desire to knock Obama’s brain down a peg is a reaction to the endless mainstream media narrative that conservatives and Republicans are morons, while Obama is a genius (indeed, look no further than Goldberg’s own unsupported claim that Donald Trump’s intellect “clearly” pales in comparison to The One’s). To demonstrate the absurdity of claiming this is about Obama’s race, let’s perform a little thought experiment.

Imagine for a moment that instead of black Democrat President Barack Obama, we currently have white Democrat President Barry Osborn, who, aside from his racial and ethnic background, is identical to Obama in every way—same handling of the economy, same healthcare plan, same treatment of Israel, and the same positions on abortion, guns, etc. Then take any of the claims listed above—the president isn’t that bright, he didn’t write his book, he’s helpless without a teleprompter. Regardless of their particular merits, simply ask yourself: do you really think we’d be treating Osborn any more favorably than Obama? Do you think we’d pull these punches against a white ideological opponent, or be more open to left-wing ideas just because they came from a white leftist?

Of course not. Leftists understood from the start that Obama’s skin color would make a potent weapon for smearing opponents instead of engaging their ideas, which is exactly what Michelle Goldberg has done here.

This popular post was originally published April 8, 2011.

In a stunning development, a clerical error in Wisconsin has transformed what many expected to be a long, ugly legal battle favoring the Left into an almost certain victory for the Right, outraging leftists like Michael Moore, to the point where the radical “documentarian” has stopped bothering to hide his disdain for the democratic process.

The intense Wisconsin Supreme Court race between the incumbent Republican, Justice David Prosser, and his Democrat challenger, state DNR enforcer JoAnn Kloppenburg, ended Wednesday with the latter declaring victory based on the Associated Press’s calculation of a 204-vote lead. Prosser didn’t budge, and most predicted an onslaught of recounts and vote fraud litigation to ensue.

But on Thursday evening we learned that Waukesha county clerk Kathy Nickolaus had erroneously passed on the county’s data to the AP without the numbers from the city of Brookfield, which shifted the lead to Prosser by more than 7,000 votes. Leftists are predictably outraged that hijacking the judiciary to thwart Governor Scott Walker’s public-sector union reforms won’t work after all, though none have topped the overreaction of Moore, who tweeted last night:

Republicans created the rule: “Whoever declares victory first, wins!” When will Obama Justice Dept impound ballots and stop the shenanigans?

Much has been said about the totalitarian impulse and anti-constitutionalism behind modern leftism, but rarely is it expressed so overtly by one of their own. Moore wants the federal government to forcibly prevent the certification of a state election and give the office to someone based strictly on her own, premature and entirely unofficial, declaration of victory?

Wow. I don’t think I even need to say anything more to explain how mind-blowingly horrendous his position is.

Moore’s man-of-the-people act has never quite rung true, but after this he can’t even pretend to value such niceties as democracy, the rule of law, or ensuring that every vote is counted. He has truly and irrevocably dropped the pretense of being anything other than a would-be tyrant.

As for Nickolaus and allegations of pro-Prosser funny business: yes, Nickolaus has been rightly criticized for blunders in the past, but the imaginative lefties crying foul right now are bound to be disappointed for several reasons.

In a stunning development, a clerical error in Wisconsin has transformed what many expected to be a long, ugly legal battle favoring the Left into an almost certain victory for the Right, outraging leftists like Michael Moore, to the point where the radical “documentarian” has stopped bothering to hide his disdain for the democratic process.

The intense Wisconsin Supreme Court race between the incumbent Republican, Justice David Prosser, and his Democrat challenger, state DNR enforcer JoAnn Kloppenburg, ended Wednesday with the latter declaring victory based on the Associated Press’s calculation of a 204-vote lead. Prosser didn’t budge, and most predicted an onslaught of recounts and vote fraud litigation to ensue.

But on Thursday evening we learned that Waukesha county clerk Kathy Nickolaus had erroneously passed on the county’s data to the AP without the numbers from the city of Brookfield, which shifted the lead to Prosser by more than 7,000 votes. Leftists are predictably outraged that hijacking the judiciary to thwart Governor Scott Walker’s public-sector union reforms won’t work after all, though none have topped the overreaction of Moore, who tweeted last night:

Republicans created the rule: “Whoever declares victory first, wins!” When will Obama Justice Dept impound ballots and stop the shenanigans?

Much has been said about the totalitarian impulse and anti-constitutionalism behind modern leftism, but rarely is it expressed so overtly by one of their own. Moore wants the federal government to forcibly prevent the certification of a state election and give the office to someone based strictly on her own, premature and entirely unofficial, declaration of victory?

Wow. I don’t think I even need to say anything more to explain how mind-blowingly horrendous his position is.

Moore’s man-of-the-people act has never quite rung true, but after this he can’t even pretend to value such niceties as democracy, the rule of law, or ensuring that every vote is counted. He has truly and irrevocably dropped the pretense of being anything other than a would-be tyrant.

As for Nickolaus and allegations of pro-Prosser funny business: yes, Nickolaus has been rightly criticized for blunders in the past, but the imaginative lefties crying foul right now are bound to be disappointed for several reasons.

In the wake of the Japan earthquake, and the resulting tsunami, members of the media, some scientists, and environmentalists have posited some … interesting theories as to the root cause of the earthquakes and aftershocks that devastated Japan.

The science behind earthquakes, like the science behind magnets, is a mystery to some. In 2010, Iranian Ayatollah Kazem Sedighi told his followers that “Many women who dress inappropriately […] cause youths to go astray, taint their chastity and incite extramarital sex in society, which increases earthquakes.”

While no link between tectonic activity and cleavage has been found by scientists, I imagine that the quest to prove or disprove this hypothesis got many young men interested in geology, at least for a short amount of time.

Before I go any further, I should explain what scientists know to be the cause of an earthquake. The earth below our feet may appear to be static, but in reality, the Earth is what geologists call “geologically active.” That is to say, the Earth is a planet which has an active, hot core, and tectonic plates which are always moving around—just so slowly that it’s imperceptible to the naked eye.

Because our planet’s innards are active and hot, the continental plates that make up the surface layer, or the lithosphere, slowly move around on a layer of molten rock called the athenosphere. At the places where the continents meets, they will move apart, push together, or slide orthogonally against each other. These points where continents meets are called “faults.”

Over time, the pressure from two faults hitting or rubbing against each other builds up, and is released explosively.

Japan, as well as all of Western Asia and the entire west coasts of North and South America, sits on what is called the Ring of Fire, which is a giant, circum-Pacific belt of earthquake fault lines. An estimated 90% of the world’s earthquakes are caused by North and South America’s slow westward collision with the plate beneath the Pacific Ocean, as well as Australia’s eastbound collision with the same plate. Japan is, tectonically speaking, part of North America, not Asia, and sits right on the fault line where North America is colliding with the Pacific Plate.

That is—by and far—the most likely reason that Japan suffered a massive earthquake—a naturally occurring release of built-up kinetic energy. But could global warming, and by extension, Western civilization, have been responsible for the Japanese earthquake? Let’s explore, in descending order of “completely off-the-wall crazy” to “it’s somewhat plausible,” some of the theories espoused by the Left.

Yes, I will keep HAARP-ing on this issue…

In the wake of the Japan earthquake, and the resulting tsunami, members of the media, some scientists, and environmentalists have posited some … interesting theories as to the root cause of the earthquakes and aftershocks that devastated Japan.

The science behind earthquakes, like the science behind magnets, is a mystery to some. In 2010, Iranian Ayatollah Kazem Sedighi told his followers that “Many women who dress inappropriately […] cause youths to go astray, taint their chastity and incite extramarital sex in society, which increases earthquakes.”

While no link between tectonic activity and cleavage has been found by scientists, I imagine that the quest to prove or disprove this hypothesis got many young men interested in geology, at least for a short amount of time.

Before I go any further, I should explain what scientists know to be the cause of an earthquake. The earth below our feet may appear to be static, but in reality, the Earth is what geologists call “geologically active.” That is to say, the Earth is a planet which has an active, hot core, and tectonic plates which are always moving around—just so slowly that it’s imperceptible to the naked eye.

Because our planet’s innards are active and hot, the continental plates that make up the surface layer, or the lithosphere, slowly move around on a layer of molten rock called the athenosphere. At the places where the continents meets, they will move apart, push together, or slide orthogonally against each other. These points where continents meets are called “faults.”

Over time, the pressure from two faults hitting or rubbing against each other builds up, and is released explosively.

Japan, as well as all of Western Asia and the entire west coasts of North and South America, sits on what is called the Ring of Fire, which is a giant, circum-Pacific belt of earthquake fault lines. An estimated 90% of the world’s earthquakes are caused by North and South America’s slow westward collision with the plate beneath the Pacific Ocean, as well as Australia’s eastbound collision with the same plate. Japan is, tectonically speaking, part of North America, not Asia, and sits right on the fault line where North America is colliding with the Pacific Plate.

That is—by and far—the most likely reason that Japan suffered a massive earthquake—a naturally occurring release of built-up kinetic energy. But could global warming, and by extension, Western civilization, have been responsible for the Japanese earthquake? Let’s explore, in descending order of “completely off-the-wall crazy” to “it’s somewhat plausible,” some of the theories espoused by the Left.

Yes, I will keep HAARP-ing on this issue…

Another day, another leftist lie. This time it is an attack on the financial system that left-wing policies crippled over time. The lie is that bankers are conspiring against innocent people and having them rounded up and put in jail. It is complete and utter hogwash motivated by an abiding hostility toward markets.

Unfortunately, from time to time conservatives need to be reminded that apart from its op-ed pages the Wall Street Journal is not a conservative newspaper. Not even close. Take this drivel by Jessica Silver-Greenberg whose virtually fact-free hit piece suggests that debtors’ prisons have returned to America. It might as well have been written by ACORN propagandist Jeff Ordower whose “new” ACORN successor group Missourians Organizing for Reform and Empowerment (MORE) is pushing similar propaganda in an effort to make the current financial crisis worse. (If banks can’t foreclose, they fail.)

Silver-Greenberg writes:

More than a third of all U.S. states allow borrowers who can’t or won’t pay to be jailed. Judges have signed off on more than 5,000 such warrants since the start of 2010 in nine counties with a total population of 13.6 million people, according to a tally by The Wall Street Journal of filings in those counties. Nationwide figures aren’t known because many courts don’t keep track of warrants by alleged offense. In interviews, 20 judges across the nation said the number of borrowers threatened with arrest in their courtrooms has surged since the financial crisis began.

Capitalism-hater Michael Moore himself couldn’t have written a more misleading paragraph. That’s because there is no such thing as imprisonment for debt in the United States. It simply does not happen and is not allowed by law. It is not a crime to owe money. Not ever.

Debtors can be imprisoned for failing to honor an order to appear in court or for a debtors’ examination or for some other legitimate legal purpose. Americans cannot be put in jail simply for owing money. There is no doubt that some creditors have abused the people who owe them money but this article is abject nonsense calculated to stip up anger against the banking system. (It is a pale imitation of a much better written but equally bizarre article by Greg Beato that ran in Reason in November.)

If someone doesn’t appear when a court orders him to appear and the person has been properly notified, he can go to jail. There is nothing unfair about it –and the capitalist system would collapse without such compulsory legal process– but left-wingers love using debtor sob stories to score points against the supposedly unfeeling, oppressive capitalist system.

Creditors have to be able to enforce contracts and collect debts. Debtors have every legal right to their day in court — but they have to actually show up when their day in court arrives! The Wall Street Journal and Reason articles defend these devil-may-care scofflaws who can’t even be bothered to show up in court to explain themselves. Ironically, many of the debtors would be able to obtain more favorable repayment terms if only they managed to spend an hour or so in court.  Judges typically don’t like foreclosing on people’s homes and try to help a homeowner to keep his home.

But the left’s narrative requires that bankers be vilified so we can expect more of this garbage as the Great Obama Depression continues.

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The left has finally debunked the myth of Islamic radicalization.

Salon’s Justin Elliott, an Islam apologist, wants to prove America has nothing to fear from Islam or its radical ideology that brings terror to the world. To make his bone-headed case,  Elliott interviewed Faiza Patel, co-director of the Liberty & National Security Program at the Brennan Center for Justice, asking her if Islamic radicalization is real or the invention of hypersensitive, overreacting Americans.  According to Patel, a human rights attorney, the notion that American Muslims are indoctrinating young men to commit terror is nothing more than:

a ‘religious conveyor belt’ theory that says there is a defined path toward terrorism: young Muslim men who are socially or politically alienated become progressively more religious; they come to embrace the use of violence; and eventually they commit a terrorist attack or support an attack in some way. What the NYPD has suggested—and I think the FBI has signed onto this as well—is that there are markers of each phase. These are primarily religious behaviors.  So if a young man stops smoking or stops drinking, maybe that’s a sign that he’s becoming radicalized and is on the path to terrorism. This is a very reductionist understanding of radicalization, and it’s simply not supported by the social science evidence. Last year the Defense Department did a report on Fort Hood that pointed out that violence is notoriously difficult to predict.

Patel’s whitewashing of facts is ludicrous.

First: the Koran calls for jihad against non-Muslims (infidels). Law enforcement is not oversimplifying real threats, rather examining Islamic fact—the movement intentionally radicalizes followers and terror is the outcome.

Second:  The Fort Hood Massacre was not only easy to predict, it had very strong warning signs from Major Nidal Hasan, who threatened senior Army physicians nearly two years before the attacks.  Hasan demanded the military let all Muslim soldiers become conscientious objectors to prevent them from fighting fellow Muslims overseas.  Hasan told Fort Hood if the military did not agree to this, the military would suffer “adverse events.”

Hasan is on record as lecturing Fort Hood psychologists every Wednesday about Islam, warning the military it would receive suicide bomb threats from American Muslim soldiers deployed to fight fellow Muslims in Islamic countries.  The Washington Post reports:

The title of Hasan’s PowerPoint presentation [to military psychologists] was ‘The Koranic World View As It Relates to Muslims in the U.S. Military.’  It consisted of 50 slides.  In one slide, Hasan described the  presentation’s objectives as identifying ‘what the Koran inculcates in the minds of Muslims and the potential implications this may have for the U.S. military.’

The Post article says Hasan’s lectures discussed “offensive jihad,”something Osama bin Laden demands. Also on his slides:

‘If Muslim groups can convince Muslims that they are fighting for God against injustices of the ‘infidels’; ie: enemies of Islam, then Muslims can become a potent adversary; ie: suicide bombing, etc.’ [sic],” and ‘We [Muslims] love death more then [sic] you love life!’

No warning signs?

The True Twit's idea of good election officials

Rachel Maddow’s Conspiracy of the Night on Thursday revealed a sinister play by Republicans to suppress Democrat voters.  Horrors!  Was it to stand outside the polls with weapons like this guy and yell at people?  Maybe it was to employ German shepherds like this prominent Democrat did?

Nope, it’s worse.  In order for Republicans to allow you to vote you must:

1. Prove who you are.
2. Register in time so election officials can prove that’s really who you are.
3. Not be a convicted felon.

Pass the smelling salts!  It’s practically a return to the days of the poll tax!  So why are Democrats so dead set on having people without identification vote?  Hmmmm?

Here’s Rachel laying out the conspiracy in True Twit form, with an air of know-it-all reasonableness…unless you have ever had anything to do with an actual election.  My reality checks are in bold parentheses.

MADDOW: You know who‘s a likely Democratic voter?  A poor voter.  A low-income voter.

You know what might make fewer low-income people vote?  If you don‘t allow people to register or to vote unless they show a kind of ID that poor people are less likely to have.   You know who else is a likely Democratic voter?  Minority voters.  You know what might make fewer of them vote?  If you force people to show a kind of ID that minorities are less likely to have.

(And just what kind of ID is that, Rache?  In every state that requires ID to vote, the state will issue one for free for that exact purpose.  However, it also requires ID to get welfare—and if it did not, that would be a whole other problem—so what ID do poor people and minorities not have access to?  Advocates of this argument are always vague about that.)

You know who else is a likely Democratic voter?  College students.  You see how this goes—say you that can‘t vote or you can‘t register unless you show ID that college students are less likely to have, and you can thereby reduce the number of college students who are voting.

(Seriously?  Have you ever met a college student who didn’t have picture ID?  No drivers license, student ID, something?  Just who are these anonymous students who float through the system in our universities?)

First-time voters are another constituency that‘s more likely to vote Democratic.  If you want to make sure that fewer of them vote, get rid of the ability to register and vote on the same day.  First-time voters love that.  So, stop doing that.

(First time voters “love that.”  Says who?  With motor voter, you actually have to tell Secretary of State workers that you do NOT want to register to vote.  Got any stats that show people showing up in droves hoping for same day voting?  I thought not.)

Here‘s another example:

9. The Council on American-Islamic Relations is trying to infiltrate Capitol Hill and spread jihad.

Author Dave Gaubatz alleges that the mainstream group is both connected to Islamist terrorists and international jihad and is working to infiltrate the American government by placing interns on Capitol Hill.
Proponents: Dave Gaubatz, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), Rep. Sue Myrick (R-N.C.), Joseph Farah.
Kernel of Truth? CAIR has tried to place interns on Capitol Hill, but as it points out, that's standard practice for advocacy groups of all types and allegiances. There's no proof of sinister motives or an effort to encourage international jihad.

Kernel of Truth? Kernel of Half-Truth is more like it. Newsweek does not see fit to mention that CAIR is an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas terror funding case -- so named by the Justice Department. It says nothing about how CAIR operatives have repeatedly refused to denounce Hamas and Hizballah as terrorist groups. Also mentioned is the fact that several former CAIR officials have been convicted of various crimes related to jihad terror, and that CAIR's cofounder and longtime Board chairman (Omar Ahmad), as well as its chief spokesman (Honest Ibe Hooper), have made Islamic supremacist statements.

It's all just a conspiracy theory, you see, you greasy Islamophobes. So I guess CAIR is not an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas funding case. And that it has condemned Hamas and Hizballah as terror groups. And that none of its formal officials have been convicted of terror activities. We can relax and go back to sleep, because Newsweek says that everything is A-OK.

Modern academia has become a welcome place for full-time anti-Israel propagandists. They churn out diatribes bashing Israel and misrepresent this as scholarship and research. Jennifer Loewenstein, an associate director of the Middle East Studies program at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, is just such a fulltime professional Israel basher – and an archetypal example of the erosion of academic standards.

Loewenstein’s professional field is actually supposed to be “business communications.” She came to the University of Wisconsin originally as a lecturer in business administration. Yet, she has never published a single academic article about “business communications” or business administration. Indeed, Lowenstein has no PhD at all, (which does not stop her from listing herself regularly as “Professor” and “Doctor”).

No less significant is that she has no training at all in Middle East studies. On the other hand, Loewenstein has published scores of anti-Israel articles in the radical Counterpunch web magazine. It is a reflection of the magazine’s political inclinations that it endorses anti-Semitic conspiracy “theories” and increasingly publishes Holocaust Denier columnists. Some of its columnists moonlight as writers for Neo-Nazi web sites and organizations.

Counterpunch is Loewenstein’s main forum for her political venting. She also publishes regularly in other extremist venues. These include “Global Research,” a web site run by Canadian Neo-Nazi Michel Chussudovsky, which claims that a Jewish cabal was really behind the 9/11 attacks on the US. Loewenstein is active in several anti-Israel organizations, and has promoted the pro-terror “International Solidarity Movement.”

That Loewenstein can often be found sharing editorial real estate with cranks and conspiracy theorists is no coincidence. Loewenstein herself rants about the Zionist bogeyman in “control” of the US. For instance, she has written that:

“Powerful pro-Israel organizations within the United States, including but not limited to the organized mainstream American Jewish community are allowed to prevail over our opinions with their increasingly vicious and racist propaganda against Arabs and Muslims.”

To underscore the point, Lowenstein embellishes one of her blog entries with a large Nazi swastika with Jewish stars carried on each of its arms. The Nazi analogy is a running theme of Loewenstein’s attacks on the Jewish state. To Loewenstein, Israel is a Nazi-like entity that perpetrates a genocidal “Holocaust” in Gaza. She cannot look at a passing Israeli soldier without seeing a Nazi storm trooper, someone she says “looks like the stereotype of a Nazi soldier.” In a quote that could easily have been printed by the Nazi newspaper Der Sturmer in the 1930s, she adds:

“The Neo-Jewish Masters and their allies in the United States… have no intention of making a just peace with the lower forms of life in their midst.”

In Loewenstein’s take on reality, Israel engages in state terror while operating a cabal that enslaves the American government and dictates its policies.

Loewenstein is Jewish-born, but she seems interested in her Jewish roots only to the extent that they can be used as a bludgeon against Israel and its supporters in the Jewish community. Even Yom Kippur for her is nothing more than an excuse to attack her two favorite targets.

John Perazzo has described her thus:

“Though Jewish, Loewenstein harbors a caustic hatred for Israel, a nation she views as an illegitimate entity with no right to exist. At the same time, she sees Palestinians as innocents, relentlessly oppressed and brutalized by violent, sadistic Jews.”

Loewenstein harbors a similarly bitter animus against America. Frequently denouncing what she calls American “imperialism,” she describes the war in Iraq in typically conspiratorial fashion:

“100,000 dead Iraqis so that we can control Iraqi oil….So that a few wealthy businessmen and women in the United States can continue to gain huge profits at the expense of the American people.”

Elsewhere, she describes the campaign in Iraq thus:

“Our war-mongering, rapacious actions have turned a chaotic, suffering region into an even greater hell.”

On what scholarly authority does Loewenstein render these judgments in the Middle East? Loewenstein claims to have “worked” in Beirut, Gaza and Jerusalem. She did spend a few months once at the al-Mezan Center “for human rights” in Gaza. But this is little more than a Hamas front group that churns out anti-Israel propaganda.

Loewenstein also claims to have spent some time as a “visiting research fellow” at the Oxford University Refugee Studies Center. The center’s claim to fame is that it publishes a magazine called Forced Migration Review. Representative of the magazine’s editorial perspective is its claim that there is a Jewish cabal to “police thought” about the Middle East on American campuses.

The one thing Loewenstein insists is beyond questioning or challenge is her insistence that Hamas has nothing at all to do with “terror,” a word Loewenstein invariably writes with scare-quotation marks. These same terrorists are labeled the resistance by her, a word she never writes with quotation marks. Hamas’ behavior also has nothing at all to do with provoking Israeli anti-terror reprisals, she insists. Indeed there is no such thing as Arab terrorism in Loewenstein’s universe. Every mass murder by Arab terrorists is resistance. When the Hezbollah fired thousands of rockets at Israeli civilians, some of which killed Israeli Arabs, that too was resistance, she insists.

Loewenstein insists that Hamas rockets do not “count” because they are “technologically primitive.” Writing in Counterpunch, Loewenstein insists that the Hamas is a harmless amusement, certainly nothing that could excuse Israel defending itself.  In her words,

“Meticulously and clinically thought through even before the first rocket from Gaza claimed a life inside Israel, the slaughter in Gaza today has nothing to do with rockets or with Hamas.”

Indeed, Loewenstein insists that the Hamas is actually nothing more than a peace movement, embracing a “two-state solution” in which Israel will survive – a solution which incidentally she opposes – and is simply working to nudge Israel back to its pre-1967 “Green Line” borders. Here she is, in Counterpunch, explaining why Palestinian terrorism is dandy, the most justified act since Lincoln freed the slaves:

“While they are being stomped, shot, beaten, demolished, assassinated, intimidated, robbed, despoiled, starved, uprooted, dispossessed, harassed, insulted and killed with bullets, missiles, armored bulldozers, tanks, helicopter gun-ships, cluster-bombs, fleshettes (sic), fighter-bombers, semi-automatic submachine guns, sonic booms, tear gas, electrified fences, blockades, closures and walls, they must renounce violence so that the hoodlums won’t get hurt. If they defend themselves they lose.”

When Israel builds a security fence to keep the terrorists from mass murdering its children, here is Loewenstein’s conclusion:

“This neo-fascist, Stalinist, gulag Guantanamo is there to keep you out, to keep you from even trying, from even wanting, to go in.”

Loewenstein cannot type more than a few words without accusing Israel of perpetrating “genocide” of Palestinians. Since the number of Palestinians has actually grown rapidly under Israeli “occupation,” John Perazzo has commented caustically, “Genocide does not typically lead to the tripling of a population.” Loewenstein also regularly insist that Israeli leaders take great pleasure in the murder of Jews by terrorists, since this allows Israel to pursue its inhuman policies.

That Loewenstein has joined the growing ranks of professional Jew baiters and Israel bashers in academia is perhaps unsurprising. That an otherwise serious institution like the University of Wisconsin should keep such a person employed on its Middle East Studies staff is nothing short of bewildering.

Articles in Frontpage’s Collaborators series:

Ian Lustick

Sarah Roy

Howard Zinn

Joel Beinin

Mark LeVine

Neve Gordon

Norman Finkelstein

Tony Judt

Michael Lerner

Marc H. Ellis

Hitler could never have become the ruler of Germany or have murdered six million European Jews without help. He needed like-minded supporters, he needed money, and he needed willing accomplices to obey orders. But far more than these, Hitler needed that without which no genocide can ever succeed, he needed by-standers, people of conscience whose moral outrage at the destruction of their neighbors was rivaled only by their reluctance to jeopardize self-interest in order to oppose the evil about them.

The road to the Holocaust was smoothed by people who excused Hitler’s anti-Semitism, who attenuated the significance of his threats, and who denied his continuously stated intention to rid Europe of its Jewish population.

On January 12, NewsReal Blog reported that Academy Award winning director, Oliver Stone, is directing a Discovery Chanel documentary series in which he plans to “place Hitler in Context.”

On January 25, while speaking to an audience in Bangkok about his revision of Hitler, Stone gave an obligatory nod to historical veracity:

“Hitler is a monster. There is no question. I have no empathy for Hitler at all. He was a crazy psychopath.”

Stating the obvious could only be a preamble for his promised exculpation of “the crazy psychopath:”

“But like Frankenstein was a monster, there was a Dr. Frankenstein. He is a product of his era.”

And who or what, precisely, constitutes Dr. Frankenstein for Stone?

“Adolf Hitler was aided in his rise to power by western bankers who appreciated his tough line on communist agitators and worker power.”

This is dangerously reminiscent of the “Jewish Banking Conspiracy Theories,” all of which propagate the myth that Hitler was financed with money from Jewish Zionists in America. This and similar plots are contained in the fraudulent “Protocols of Zion,” the writings of the “Historical Revisionists,” and radicalized Muslims.

Yehuda Bauer, speaking of Anne Frank, spoke these amazing words:

“Thou shalt not be a perpetrator. Thou shalt not be a victim. And thou shalt never, but never be a by-stander.”

Oliver Stone only retains credibility because he is unopposed. Who among his peers will stand up to him? Where is Steven Spielberg, who has dedicated his talent and resources to recording the testimony of Holocaust Survivors for posterity? What about Winona Ryder, whose Russian relatives perished in the Holocaust? What an effect it would have if Adrien Brody, who won his own first Academy Award for his portrayal of Wladyslaw Szpilman, a polish pianist whose entire family perished in Auschwitz, would speak out against Stone’s political agenda. Perhaps a lowly intern, hired to fetch coffee and extension cords will decide that participating in the rehabilitation of Hitler is too high a price to pay for the “privilege” of collaborating with Oliver Stone.

“Anti-Semitism chic” is on the rise. This consists of questioning the War and the Holocaust, including Hitler’s personal, rational choice of evil, and making insinuations concerning the role the Jewish people played in the war. Stone’s documentary is one example of this, and the complicity of the Discovery Chanel facilitates the social acceptability of this destructive trend.
Being well educated in the various forms under which “the new anti-Semitism” is packaged is the first step to actively fighting it, instead of looking away while this deadly prejudice becomes tolerable.

Related posts:

1. The Good, the Bad and Oliver Stone, Part 2: Hitler Was Only Following the Evil Capitalists’ Orders
2. The Good, the Bad, and Oliver Stone, Part 1: Natural Born Killers
3. Oliver Stone : A Series of Unfortunate Holocaust Denials

In its four years of existence,The Huffington Post (aka “HuffPost”) has grown from obscurity into the world’s most-visited blogsite, and one of America’s most popular news sites. It now has more monthly visitors than the Washington Post, and is supported by some of the largest advertisers in the world. Its representatives have been allowed to ask questions at presidential press conferences, and one was even given preferential treatment. It now enjoys access to, and influence over, the top levels of the U.S. government. Top members of the U.S. Senate are among HuffPost’s official bloggers, including John Kerry, Carl Levin, Chris Dodd, Barbara Boxer and others.

A significant reason for HuffPost’s success and “legitimization” are its claims that it is a nonpartisan “newspaper,” dedicated to “ferret(ing) out the truth,” and “debunking the left-right way of thinking.”

HuffPost also claims to be non-partisan in its moderation of user comments. Arianna Huffington, the site’s founder and Editor-In-Chief, claims HuffPost has “a zero tolerance policy” for hate speech, and that it acts vigilantly to keep its comment threads free of offensive content, 24-7.

Unfortunately, HuffPost consistently “frames” news stories in such a way that incites anti-Israel perceptions and hatred. Further, in violation of its own policies, it approves and tolerates user comments submitted in response to these stories that contain incendiary, hate-filled libels against Israelis and Jews, as well as links to anti-Semitic hate websites.

Given the fact that an estimated 135,000 of Huffington Post’s unique monthly visitors reside in Iran and Pakistan, there is great concern among informed observers that its incitement against Israel influences perceptions far outside the United States.

This report, the result of three years of observation, documents:

• Numerous examples of Huffington Post’s incitement of anti-Israel perceptions, and the defamatory user comments that have appeared on the site in response, with special focus on Israel’s recent Operation Cast Lead.

• The fact that many of the most egregious violators of Huffington Post’s stated policies, including some of its most prolific anti-Semitic propagandists, remain active users – some, with tens of thousands of comments in their archives.

• The fact that contrary to Huffington Post’s public statements, since at least March 2008, it has been pre-moderating all user comments, meaning that all of the hateful and defamatory comments that appear have been approved by its moderators.

All of the following anti-Semitic user comments were published after HuffPost announced, in March 2008, that the only comments that would appear on its site are those that a human moderator had reviewed, approved and made the decision to publish. Ms. Huffington confirmed this fact, several months later.

“Jews are evil. Israel runs the world. Lets kill ‘em all and give the land back to Islam; result-perpetual peace. Seig Heil.”
By “pedrothemigrant,” 5/23/08

“Funny how [Israelis] had NO problem with wiping the [Palestinians] off the face of the earth until they discovered they might actually be able to strike back in a meaningful way. proof that bullies like this are nothing but cowards.”
By “peacekitten,” 1/2/09

“There’s a reason they [Jews] have been the most problematic group for thousands of years.”
By “Amennyc,” 1/4/09

“[W]omen holding limp little bodies of children in their hands, crying, as an Israeli soldier aims an AK.-47 at her head. With each civilian casualty Israel gets closer to the regime in Germany that provided the impetus for the creation of Israel.”
By “SkepticHume,” 1/3/09

“Clowns to the left of me, Jokers to the right, Here I am, stuck in the middle with Jooooz [Jews]“
By “JamesR.,” 11/22/08

“They [Jews] all need to be rounded up and gassed.”
By “markoze,” 12/30/08

Perhaps more shockingly, all of these comments were posted by users whose accounts are still active (they have not been banned), some of whom HuffPost has allowed to post thousands of additional comments. This stands in stark contrast to the fact that HuffPost routinely bans other users who don’t violate its policies — some after as few as six comments — but dare to challenge or mock the radical leftists that the site attracts.

These comments are representative of thousands of others containing anti-Semitic and Israel-bashing libels, hate and propaganda that have been published on HuffPost in recent years. Columbia University professor Lincoln Mitchell recently claimed that on nearly every HuffPost news story concerning international affairs, regardless of the topic, he and his friends usually find that it takes no more than ten comments before its users are finding a way to blame Jews.

The most incendiary of these comments are usually submitted in response to “news” stories that HuffPost publishes regarding Israel, which it consistently “frames” in ways that incite inaccurate and unjustifiably negative perceptions of the Jewish state, and particularly its military. HuffPost does this primarily through the use of inflammatory, decontextualized headlines and headline imagery, and biased “news” sources. Examples of this incitement include:

• Its daily depiction of Israel’s incursion into Gaza in December 2008, in which it cast Israeli soldiers as thuggish villains, Palestinian civilians as their targets, and Hamas terrorists (often labeled as “security forces”) as victims. One example of this was its headline on 12/29/08 that featured a picture of a dead Muslim toddler, alongside text that claimed, “Israeli assault targets symbols of Hamas power.”

• Its headline story on 3/11/09 featured Charles Freeman’s claims that a Jewish conspiracy led him to withdraw his nomination to a national security post. HuffPost did not post any indication of the broad, bipartisan opposition to his nomination.

• It uncritically uses biased Arabic “news” sources – including the jihadist-celebrating al Jazeera (also a past HuffPost advertiser) – as single-sources for its headlines. One example was its 5/29/09 article that used a little-known Arabic “news” source’s account of what it described as an “activist” that was killed by the Israeli military. 24 hours earlier, the “activist” was identified by CNN as a suspect in several deadly terror attacks, and that the Israeli military had attempted to arrest him. Instead, he opened fire on them, and was killed. None of this was covered in HuffPost’s depiction of the incident.

• Its prominent positioning on 8/19/09 of a blood libel against Israel — that it murders Palestinians in order to harvest their organs — even though the “reporter” behind the story admitted in the article that he has “no idea… no clue” if the allegations are true or not. Soon thereafter, credible sources determined that these allegations were physically impossible, and further discredited the “reporter.” Yet HuffPost gave these stories little to no “play” (certainly nowhere near the prominence of the original blood libel).

Given the growing resurgence of anti-Semitism worldwide, HuffPost — like every other “legitimized,” advertiser-supported “newspaper” — is obliged to ensure that its “news” stories concerning Israel are fact-based and contextual. Further, HuffPost is obligated to enforce its nonpartisan comment moderation policy. In both of these regards, HuffPost is failing profoundly.

It is hoped that this detailed report will spur HuffPost to take corrective measures to ensure that it is living up to its self-proclaimed standards, particularly in regards to Israeli and Jewish affairs.

Click here to read the full report.

When President Obama made the Executive order to allow special privileges and immunity to the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol),  citizens were rightly concerned.  We tend to take our freedoms and national sovereignty rather seriously.  As in literally.

Andrew McCarthy of National Review, Newt Gingrich and Glenn Beck vocally spoke out.  But, now, according to Michael Isikoff in  Newsweek, there’s a new force Obama and the entire Interpol body must contend with: Chuck Norris.

In typical snarky form, Isikoff takes aim at Norris’ latest World Net Daily post:

Now Norris, famed for his expertise in the martial arts, attacks from a different direction. In a new column on World Net Daily, the right-wing Web site, he claims that Obama signed the executive order so that he can slyly, without anyone noticing, create a “secret vault” at Interpol’s New York office to conceal important records about the war on terror from the American public. (Emphasis mine.)

That little bit of information is important to note as Newsweek attempts to equate reasonable concern for our sovereignty over international agencies with extended speculation (read: conspiracy theories).  Not surprising.  Also not surprising is the final snipe at the National Rifle Association after the NRA attempted to dispel some of the myths surrounding the order:

What does it say about the state of political discourse when the NRA is the voice of reason?

Sure, Isikoff, because there is nothing less reasonable nor uncivil than an organization devoted to the defense of a constitutional right.

Newsweek’s frilly ideology is showing again, even in the face of sound argument from the NRA.  Not to mention taking on both the organization and Chuck Norris belies a sort of brazenly self-assured efficacy.  Don’t they know that Chuck Norris is the only person in the world who can actually email a roundhouse kick?

Related posts:

1. Bob Owens: Obama Surrenders U.S. Sovereignty
2. Could Obama Use INTERPOL to Evade Constitutional Law?
3. Author Chuck Klosterman Praises Unabomber

Ignore who Obama got his ideas from. To do otherwise is "redbaiting."

One of the best articles we’ve had at FrontPage in the past few weeks was John Perazzo’s “The Communists Behind Obama’s Healthcare Goals.”

I thought the piece was particularly important because it explained in important ways how Old Left communists had influenced today’s “progressive” leaders, the Democratic Party, and President Barack Obama himself. It demonstrated that to point out the neo-communist nature of the Left is not just some nasty, partisan slur. It’s a legitimate understanding based on indisputable facts.

So, silly me, I sent the article to my dear friend and regular “progressive” debating partner Pat, aka the Clergyman P-Ray. I’d hoped that it could show him why it’s necessary and fair to point this stuff out. It’s not “redbaiting” — a meaningless term he throws at me every time I speak of Marxism in a negative sense. Pat sent me this response back which he has given me permission to reprint and respond to here at NRB.

more redbaiting (sigh)…still no activism to help working people

Dave,

While you and your colleagues continue to obsess over Marxism and socialism, the Democratic Party has shifted to the Right of Nixon’s GOP as they pass shortsighted legislation that will mandate everyone buy a junk govt-mandated insurance policy with no competition or cost-controlling mechanism in place amidst soaring healthcare costs and record windfalls for the American health and pharmaceutical oligarchies.

I just don’t know why you must continue to peddle Communist conspiracy theories…apparently this is your job now as Horowitz is a Baby Boomer who has yet to move on from the Cold War era.

Millions of independent-minded progressives like myself are disenfranchised more than we’ve ever been and don’t feel we have a voice in our government despite our efforts to elect lawmakers who support reform and our activism at the grassroots level. With the latest bank bailouts, extension of the destructive era of corporate giveaways and police state natl. security apparatus Uncle Sam is now officially a wholly owned subsidiary of K-Street.

We are living through the greatest long-term economic decline since the Great Depression and are in dire need of another social movement to hold government accountable to citizens in an era where Wall Street corruption and excess is backstopped by the government while Main Street Americans endure mass lay-offs, are foreclosed upon and lose their way of life.

Please send me a link to a piece conservatives have run in support of shoring up our disappearing middle class. (The GOP has just become the party of “NO” with few ideas of their own. You say you & your colleagues support the middle class — so prove it.)

The proof’s in the pudding and I don’t see your side really contributing to anything that will help get our economy back on track or create good-paying jobs. All these reactionary ad-hominem attack posts do is give cover to a corrupt and broken status quo in Washington and on Wall Street.

Conspiracy theories about some academic or political adviser’s past don’t do much for me. What makes conservatives think they will gain power again without some ideas of their own on how to revive the middle class?

Happy Holidays,

Pat

See my response to the Clergyman later today at NewsReal.

UPDATED: Response now available here.

Related posts:

1. Saul Alinsky Shocks Us Like an Electric Eel, Targeted Middle Class
2. Letter to the Editor: What is Television's Ideology?
3. Rebuttal: My, what Overwhelming Faith you Have in Your Government…

Unfortunately, however, this is written by Salam al-Marayati of the Muslim Public Affairs Council (MPAC) -- a fact that immediately arouses suspicion. MPAC, for example, has trafficked in moral equivalence between jihadists and anti-jihadists regarding Israel. It was no surprise when the organization joined CAIR and other groups in 2004 in signing a "Joint Muslims/Arab-American Statement on Israel Violence in Gaza." The organizations echoed some of the most virulent rhetoric that jihadists employ in their offensives against the Jewish state, condemning "Israel's recent indiscriminate killings of innocent Palestinians, including many children," without even mentioning the targeting by Palestinian suicide bombers of Israeli citizens on buses and in restaurants, or the Israeli government's diametrically opposed policy of never targeting civilians.

Such extreme rhetoric was nothing new for MPAC. On the afternoon of September 11, 2001, on a Los Angeles radio show, al-Maryati added fuel to the wildest, most paranoid conspiracy theories about the attacks that had just unfolded: "If we're going to look at suspects we should look to the groups that benefit the most from these kinds of incidents, and I think we should put the state of Israel on the suspect list because I think this diverts attention from what's happening in the Palestinian territories so that they can go on with their aggression and occupation and apartheid policies."

This was not al-Maryati's only outburst of anti-Israeli malevolence. Daniel Pipes recounts a "February 1996 incident when a Palestinian named Muhammad Hamida shouted the fundamentalist war cry, Allahu Akbar (Allah is Great), as he drove his car intentionally into a crowded bus stop in Jerusalem, killing one Israeli and injuring 23 others. Before he could escape or hurt anyone else, Hamida was shot dead. Commenting on the affair, Mr. Al-Marayati said not a word about Hamida's murderous rampage but instead focused on Hamida's death, which he called 'a provocative act,' and demanded the extradition of his executors to America 'to be tried in a U.S. court' on terrorism charges."

Al-Maryati in 1996 equated violent jihadists with the Founding Fathers: "Most Islamic movements have been branded as terrorists as a result of the rising extremism from a handful of militants. American freedom fighters hundreds of years ago were also regarded as terrorists by the British."

"Repentance is the only option for the Fort Hood killer," by Salam al-Marayati in the Wall Street Journal, December 9 (thanks to all who sent this in):

[...] Maj. Hasan took an oath as a member of the U.S. military to defend our country. He also took a Hippocratic oath to protect his patients. The violation of these oaths is a violation of the Quranic principle which states that making a pledge to anyone is tantamount to making a pledge to God. The Quran states: "(Be not like those) who use their oaths as a means of deceiving one another" (16:92).

QED, eh? Salam al-Marayati would have us believe that it's very simple: the Qur'an says don't break your oaths, Hasan broke his oath, and so Hasan, despite appearances to the contrary, is a Muslim heretic, a Misunderstander of Islam.

Unfortunately, however, there are indications in the Hadith that oaths taken to Infidels don't have that unbreakable character. Muhammad, of course, said, "War is deceit." He also said, "By Allah, and Allah willing, if I take an oath and later find something else better than that, then I do what is better and expiate my oath."

Muhammad said this in the context of being able to do something better for his men than what he had promised to do, and so al-Marayati may argue that shooting up Fort Hood was in no way better than remaining loyal to the U.S. military, but from the jihadist point of view a jihad against Infidels is certainly better than submitting to those Infidels. After all, Muhammad also said, when asked what was the best deed, that jihad was best after professing faith in Islam. He also recommended to his followers that they break their oaths if they found a better course of action.

Those who would say that Qur'an trumps Hadith whenever there is a contradiction, and that therefore oaths are always and everywhere binding upon Muslims, must then explain why that has never been understood as such in the Islamic world. History is full of examples of Muslims breaking oaths and treaties with Infidels. Were they all misunderstanding Islam?

In any case, al-Marayati mentions none of this. And why not? He could have given a much more convincing and honest presentation if he had acknowledged the existence within Islamic tradition of justifications for oath-breaking, and explained -- if he could -- why they did not excuse Hasan's behavior. But he didn't.

His now infamous PowerPoint presentation is rife with distortions of the Quran. Entitled "The Koranic Worldview As It Relates to Muslims in the U.S. Military," it provides anything but a Quranic perspective. Maj. Hasan's critical fault in understanding the Quran was his failure to distinguish between two very important categories of verses: those tied to the specific context of seventh-century Arabia, and those that are absolute and permanent.

Here al-Marayati implies, without offering specifics, that the martial verses of the Qur'an that Hasan quoted are understood by mainstream Islamic theology to apply only to seventh-century Arabia. Unfortunately, the opposite is true. Very early in the history of Islam, Muslims noticed and began to grapple with how Muhammad's messages changed in character over the course of his prophetic career. Muhammad's earliest biographer, a pious Muslim named Ibn Ishaq, explains the progression of Qur'anic revelation about warfare. First, he explains, Allah allowed Muslims to wage defensive warfare. But that was not Allah's last word on the circumstances in which Muslims should fight. Ibn Ishaq explains offensive jihad by invoking a Qur'anic verse: "Then God sent down to him: 'Fight them so that there be no more seduction,' i.e. until no believer is seduced from his religion. 'And the religion is God's', i.e. Until God alone is worshipped."

The Qur'an verse Ibn Ishaq quotes here (2:193) commands much more than defensive warfare: Muslims must fight until "the religion is God's" - that is, until Allah alone is worshipped. Ibn Ishaq gives no hint that that command died with the seventh century.

Nor do all contemporary Islamic thinkers believe that that command is a relic of history. According to a 20th century Chief Justice of Saudi Arabia, Sheikh 'Abdullah bin Muhammad bin Humaid, "at first 'the fighting' was forbidden, then it was permitted and after that it was made obligatory." He also distinguishes two groups Muslims must fight: "(1) against them who start 'the fighting' against you (Muslims) . . . (2) and against all those who worship others along with Allah . . . as mentioned in Surat Al-Baqarah (II), Al-Imran (III) and At-Taubah (IX) . . . and other Surahs (Chapters of the Qur'an)." (The Roman numerals after the names of the chapters of the Qur'an are the numbers of the suras: Sheikh 'Abdullah is referring to Qur'anic verses such as 2:216, 3:157-158, 9:5, and 9:29.)

This understanding of the Qur'an isn't limited to the Wahhabi sect of Saudi Arabia, to which Sheikh 'Abdullah belongs, and which many Western analysts imagine to have originated Islamic doctrines of warfare against unbelievers. Jihad theorist Sayyid Qutb, who was not a Wahhabi, subscribes to the same view of the Qur'an. In his jihad manifesto Milestones, he quotes at length from the great medieval scholar Ibn Qayyim (1292-1350), who, says Qutb, "has summed up the nature of Islamic Jihaad." Ibn Qayyim outlines the stages of the Muhammad's prophetic career: "For thirteen years after the beginning of his Messengership, he called people to God through preaching, without fighting or Jizyah, and was commanded to restrain himself and to practice patience and forbearance. Then he was commanded to migrate, and later permission was given to fight. Then he was commanded to fight those who fought him, and to restrain himself from those who did not make war with him. Later he was commanded to fight the polytheists until God's religion was fully established."

Qutb summarizes the stages: "Thus, according to the explanation by Imam Ibn Qayyim, the Muslims were first restrained from fighting; then they were permitted to fight; then they were commanded to fight against the aggressors; and finally they were commanded to fight against all the polytheists." He further quotes Ibn Qayyim as emphasizing the need to wage war against and subjugate non-Muslims, particularly the Jewish and Christian "People of the Book": "After the command for Jihaad came, the non-believers were divided into three categories: one, those with whom there was peace; two, the people with whom the Muslims were at war; and three, the Dhimmies....It was also explained that war should be declared against those from among the 'People of the Book' who declare open enmity, until they agree to pay Jizyah or accept Islam. Concerning the polytheists and the hypocrites, it was commanded in this chapter that Jihaad be declared against them and that they be treated harshly." Qutb says that if someone rejects Islam, "then it is the duty of Islam to fight him until either he is killed or until he declares his submission."

In fact, some classical Islamic theologians are as far from thinking that the verses commanding jihad against Infidels no longer apply in our own age as you can get. Some assert that the Verse of the Sword (Qur'an 9:5, "Slay the idolaters wherever you find them") abrogates no less than 124 more peaceful and tolerant verses of the Qur'an. Tafsir al-Jalalayn, a commentary on the Qur'an by the respected imams Jalal al-Din Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Mahalli (1389-1459) and Jalal al-Din 'Abd al-Rahman ibn Abi Bakr al-Suyuti (1445-1505), asserts that the Qur'an's ninth sura "was sent down when security was removed by the sword." Another mainstream and respected Qur'an commentator, Ibn Kathir (1301-1372), declares that Qur'an 9:5 "abrogated every agreement of peace between the Prophet and any idolater, every treaty, and every term....No idolater had any more treaty or promise of safety ever since Surah Bara'ah [the ninth sura] was revealed." Ibn Juzayy (d. 1340), yet another Qur'an commentator whose works are still read in the Islamic world, agrees: the Verse of the Sword's purpose is "abrogating every peace treaty in the Qur'an."

None of them say that the Verse of the Sword applies only to the seventh century.

Ibn Kathir makes this clear in his commentary on another "tolerance verse": "And he [Muhammad] saith: O my Lord! Lo! these are a folk who believe not. Then bear with them, O Muhammad, and say: Peace. But they will come to know" (43:88-89). Ibn Kathir explains: "Say Salam (peace!) means, 'do not respond to them in the same evil manner in which they address you; but try to soften their hearts and forgive them in word and deed.'" However, that is not the end of the passage. Ibn Kathir then takes up the last part: "But they will come to know. This is a warning from Allah for them. His punishment, which cannot be warded off, struck them, and His religion and His word was supreme. Subsequently Jihad and striving were prescribed until the people entered the religion of Allah in crowds, and Islam spread throughout the east and the west."

And so today. The Saudi Sheikh Muhammad Saalih al-Munajid (1962-), whose lectures and Islamic rulings (fatawa) circulate widely throughout the Islamic world, demonstrates this in a discussion of whether Muslims should force others to accept Islam. In considering Qur'an 2:256 ("There is no compulsion in religion,") the Sheikh quotes Qur'an 9:29, as well as 8:39 ("And fight them until there is no more Fitnah (disbelief and polytheism, i.e. worshipping others besides Allaah), and the religion (worship) will all be for Allaah Alone [in the whole of the world]"), and the Verse of the Sword. Of the latter, Sheikh Muhammad says simply: "This verse is known as Ayat al-Sayf (the verse of the sword). These and similar verses abrogate the verses which say that there is no compulsion to become Muslim."

Underscoring the fact that none of this is merely of historical interest is another Shafi'i manual of Islamic law that in 1991 was certified by the highest authority in Sunni Islam, Cairo's Al-Azhar University, as conforming "to the practice and faith of the orthodox Sunni community." This manual, 'Umdat al-Salik (available in English as Reliance of the Traveller), spends a considerable amount of time explaining jihad as "war against non-Muslims." It spells out the nature of this warfare in quite specific terms: "the caliph makes war upon Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians . . . until they become Muslim or pay the non-Muslim poll tax." It adds a comment by a Jordanian jurist that corresponds to Muhammad's instructions to call the unbelievers to Islam before fighting them: the caliph wages this war only "provided that he has first invited [Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians] to enter Islam in faith and practice, and if they will not, then invited them to enter the social order of Islam by paying the non-Muslim poll tax (jizya) . . . while remaining in their ancestral religions."

Also, if there is no caliph, Muslims must still wage jihad. In any case, the desire to restore the caliphate ultimately highlights the expansionist, imperialist, totalitarian, globalist aims of the jihad movement, even as today it presents itself as a defensive action against Western evils. That expansionism is based on Qur'anic passages such as 9:29 and the life and teachings of Muhammad. The Pakistani Brigadier S. K. Malik's 1979 book The Qur'anic Concept of War (a book that carried a glowing endorsement from Pakistan's then-future President Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, who said that it explained "the ONLY pattern of war" that a Muslim country could legitimately wage) delineates the same stages in the Qur'anic teaching about jihad: "The Muslim migration to Medina brought in its wake events and decisions of far-reaching significance and consequence for them. While in Mecca, they had neither been proclaimed an Ummah [community] nor were they granted the permission to take up arms against their oppressors. In Medina, a divine revelation proclaimed them an 'Ummah' and granted them the permission to take up arms against their oppressors. The permission was soon afterwards converted into a divine command making war a religious obligation for the faithful."

Imran Ahsan Khan Nyazee, Assistant Professor on the Faculty of Shari'ah and Law of the International Islamic University in Islamabad, in a 1994 book on Islamic law quotes the twelfth century Maliki jurist Abu al-Walid Muhammad ibn Ahmad Ibn Rushd. Ibn Rushd reports on a consensus (ijma) among Muslim scholars on jihad warfare - and in traditional Islamic legal terms a consensus among scholars, once reached, cannot be modified. "Why wage war?" asks Ibn Rushd, and then he answers his own question: "Muslim jurists agreed that the purpose of fighting with the People of the Book...is one of two things: it is either their conversion to Islam or the payment of jizyah." Nyazee concludes: "This leaves no doubt that the primary goal of the Muslim community, in the eyes of its jurists, is to spread the word of Allah through jihad, and the option of poll-tax [jizya] is to be exercised only after subjugation" of non-Muslims.

But if this is so, why hasn't the worldwide Islamic community been waging jihad on a large scale up until relatively recently? Nyazee says it is only because they have not been able to do so: "the Muslim community may be considered to be passing through a period of truce. In its present state of weakness, there is nothing much it can do about it."

Al-Marayati could, here again, have assuaged doubts by discussing Islam's martial teachings and explained -- if he could -- why Hasan was not appropriating them properly. But he didn't.

He ignores the Quranic mandates, for example, to stand for justice even if it is against your own interest, and to avoid transgression in the pursuit of justice. Yet the most troubling part of his presentation are his conclusions. One of them is: "Muslims are moderate (compromising) but God is not." There are two critical flaws in this one sentence.

First, to make any kind of declaration about God being unforgiving violates Islam's central teachings of mercy and compassion. The Quran makes it clear that human beings are meant to embody God's generous spirit. To argue otherwise is to violate God's will and Islam's goal of peacemaking.

Second, being moderate is about upholding religious values while working with other members of society for the greater good. Extremists believe they are compromising their Islamic values when living in the West. This is not true. And Muslim-haters oblige them with the converse, when they argue that the West should not tolerate Muslims. This is not just.

Maj. Hasan's hodgepodge of verses from the Quran and quotes from extremists left out the most important Quranic verse in his section on enjoining peace and forgiveness: "God invites you into the abode of peace" (10:25). Nor did he include the admonition by the Prophet Muhammad never to harm the innocent and never to target noncombatants....

Here again, it all depends on how one defines "innocent."

New Rule: Birthers are not allowed to condemn Andrew Sullivan and others for their obsession with whether Sarah Palin was really Trig's mom.

I just posted an update on my post defending Sarah Palin from the Left’s attack on her as a birther:

Update 12/5/09, 4:25 PM EST: This post was mentioned and linked at Progressive Alaska and then reprinted at Andrew Sullivan’s blog. The Progressive Alaska blog had two lies about this post and one pathetic typo which was correct in the Daily Dish reprint:

David Horowitx, excoriating Sullivan, fails to mention Palin’s lie.

First, Horowitz didn’t write this post, I did. My byline is at the top and anyone who has ever read a Horowitz article would not mistake my writing for his. Second, as can be seen clearly above, I in no way “excoriated” Sullivan by predicting what has in fact happened. Palin has clarified her poorly chosen words to demonstrate conclusively that she is not a birther. She does not believe Obama is ineligible to be president and does not support the Birther Movement’s efforts. Yet Sullivan shoulders on with the Palin-is-a-Birther meme because he detests her so much.

Sorry, Progressive Alaska, for not “mentioning Palin’s lie.” I’m not really concerned with refuting the crackpot “Trig Birtherism” conspiracy theories. Just as leftists hope that the Birther conspiracy continues to exist to dog the Right, I fully endorse Sullivan’s efforts to keep Trig Birtherism alive. By all means, please continue to pursue this, Andrew.

Related posts:

1. Is Sarah Palin a Birther? No, But the Left Wishes She Was
2. Big News: Trig Palin Actually Born in Kenya
3. The Incredible Journey: Andrew Sullivan, from Unpredictable Conservative to Pedantic Liberal Mouthpiece

Sanchez will stand by anyone who agrees with him on immigration - even this guy.

I can’t figure out if CNN’s Rick Sanchez repeatedly gets his facts wrong because of a biased agenda or because he’s just an inept journalist.  I really think it is both.  His Leftism sometimes leads Sanchez to ignore seeking facts (think fake racist Rush quotes,) but sometimes he simply hides the facts to promote his own views.

This past week former professional wrestler and former Minnesota Governor Jesse “The Body” Ventura made the media rounds to promote a new television show he is hosting.  The show is about conspiracy theories and Ventura, who is a 9-11 Truther, was an obvious choice for host. Ventura, in an attempt to gain viewers, has made  loony left conspiracy claims on Afghanistan, 9-11, and immigration to any show that would listen.

One of the programs Ventura went on was The Opie and Anthony Show, a shock jock XM radio show.  YouTube clips of the interview went viral, because Ventura walked off the show after sparring with host Jim Norton.  As Ventura walked off, Norton really viciously laid into Ventura. Here’s Sanchez’s take on the incident:

Sanchez (conveniently) only shows a clip of the interview after Ventura decides to leave the show.  He offers no context to why Norton responds so angrily to Ventura.  He portrays Ventura as an innocent victim who is attacked by jerks for no real reason except ratings.

“Ventura is all but assailed on the radio…Jesse Ventura was invited to that show.  It’s like a pit-bull being poked with a stick isn’t it…they were hoping (the show would go viral) and it did.”

If Sanchez would have shown video before Ventura walked out then his CNN global audience would have had some helpful information. For example, earlier in the show Ventura threatened to leave the show during debate about Afghanistan.  Ventura thinks the US should pull out and Norton disagreed, because we were attacked on 9-11.  Instead of debating the point, Ventura dismisses Norton’s view and repeatedly slams him for not being a real American, because Norton was never in military service.

That information gives the viewer some context to why Norton gets so mad when Ventura slaps Norton on the shoulder and sarcastically thanks him for his service.  Is that an excuse for Norton?  No, but it does show that Ventura wasn’t some blindsided victim.

The main thing Sanchez conveniently ignores is the topic of discussion leading up to the big walk out. The subject was on the tactics used by police and border patrol to arrest illegal immigrants. Norton and Ventura went head to head on that topic.  (Watch for yourself: Here).

Ventura, like Sanchez, is vehemently against arresting people for being in this country illegally. It is a hot button for Sanchez.  Why would Sanchez leave that bit of information out? Clearly he wanted to support Ventura’s views and back the guy, but hide why he was doing it.  That way, the world would simply stand by Ventura in the debate without knowing the issue.

Sanchez is using the airwaves of CNN to push his own agenda.  If the facts get in the way then they must be ignored or conveniently left out.  If CNN is really going to portray itself as the hard news network of the big three cable stations, then it’s time to get rid of Sanchez. I’m sure MsNBC would take him back where he’d fit in perfectly.

Related posts:

1. Smarmy Sanchez, Part 1: Smearing Lincoln to Support Obama
2. Smarmy Sanchez Part 5: Desperate for Reasons to Attack SC Republicans
3. Smarmy Sanchez: Trying to Deflate Focus on Radical Islam By Focusing on Fred Phelps