Current: Reporter Suspended for Criticizing
Arabs
Note: If you have been directed here from another site (a forum, for example) this damned page got too long, so I split it into a main page and a series of jump pages. If the items above aren't your destination, the title links below (and at the bottom) will get you to the item you're looking for. LL Archived:
(NOTE: "OMED" is an acronym for "Oregon Magazine Editorial Director.") Jan 03, 2003
A Tallahassee Democrat reporter was suspended Thursday for using strong language in an e-mail criticizing Arab nations for the way they've reacted to Israel. Political writer and columnist Bill Cotterell, in an e-mail exchange, wrote "Except for Jordan and Egypt, no Arab nation has a peace treaty with Israel. They've had 54 years to get over it. They choose not to." OMED: Mr. Cotterell's statement was true. That is why he was suspended. The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations sent an alert to its members calling the remarks anti-Muslim and anti-Arab. Council spokesman Ibrahim Hooper said the e-mail's recipient had previously complained about a political cartoon that briefly appeared on the newspaper's Web site, asking "What would Mohammed drive?" and depicting a Ryder truck carrying a missile. The cartoon was not published in the paper. OMED: Mohammed's first major action as a religious leader was to lead his followers to Mecca, and in battle take that holiest of ancient Arab tribal religious shrines. Mecca, at the time, was multiculturalist in nature. Religiously tolerant. It was the custom at Mecca (a major trading center) to accept as equally valid all the various deities followed by the many visitors to the city. Once Mohammed had possession of Mecca, he destroyed the symbols and artifacts of other beliefs in a vicious act of religious bigotry and intolerance. It is odd that the politically correct today condemn identical Spanish (conquistador) destruction of ancient beliefs and symbols in Mexico, and early Christian repression of tribal beliefs in North America, yet give Mohammed a pass for doing exactly the same thing. This is based either in hypocrisy (at which the Left excells) or ignorance of historical fact (at which the Left excells). The complaint started an exchange with Cotterell, who also wrote, "I don't give a damn if Israel kills a few in collateral damage while defending itself. So be it." OMED: Islam after its founding became the fastest growing religion in history because it expanded via conquest. Islam was the religion of the sword. From those days to these, the killing of innocent civilians is a hobby for Moslems around the globe. From athletes in Olympic villages to embassy workers in Africa, from partygoers in Bali to children on a bus in Tel Aviv, the evidence is clear. Saudi oil princes and Syrian bureaucrats, the mullahs of Yemen and the thugs of Somalia -- practitioners of no other major religion presently support (or even tolerate) such behavior. Tell the families of the dead members of the Indian parliament that Islam is a tolerant religion. A religion of peace. Tell the women of Afghanistan who were publicly executed for the crime of adultery that Islam is a tolerant religion. A religion of peace. Tell the families of those killed in the World Trade Center that islam is a tolerant religion. A religion of peace. Israel has had to defend itself against the religious intolerance, bigotry and total disregard of civilian casualties of her Islamic neighbors for more than half a century. It is quite reasonable that some would come to not give a damn about Moslem casualties after all that. The morons of the American media Left seemed quite ready to blame the Catholic church for sexual abuse by its clergy, yet are totally against blaming Islam for the mass death and destruction of property propagated by its clergy? Using one of my favorite comparative metaphors, the level of hypocrisy thus demonstrated by the morons of the American media Left shrinks the Titanic to a disaster the size of a dockside rowboat with damp seats. Cotterell was suspended a week without pay. Democrat Executive Editor John Winn Miller apologized for the remarks. "They absolutely do not represent the views and sensitivities of this newspaper. Worse, they run counter to many of the values we hold dearest, among them tolerance, diversity and inclusiveness," Miller said in a written statement issued by the newspaper and carried in a story for Friday editions telling of Cotterell's suspension. OMED: Mr. Miller doesn't know what the term "values" means. Nor does he understand the positive qualities of intolerance. America's founding fathers had intolerance for inequal justice. Abolitionists had intolerance for slavery. All Americans developed an intolerance for Nazis and the Imperial court of Japan in 1941. Intolerance for injustice is at the very heart of American constitutional belief. How Mr. Miller can be credited with having the intelligence to run a newspaper is hard to understand. Newspapers are supposed to be the American wellspring of freedom of speech. The actions taken by Mr. Miller here are completely opposed to that American constitutional tradition. His newspaper could now flourish on a typical American university campus, where non-politically-correct speech is also banned, these days. The cartoon was drawn by Doug Marlette, who draws from his home in Hillsborough, N.C. Miller said Cotterell immediately regretted the remarks after sending the message on his company e-mail account and apologized to his colleagues "for the hurt and embarrassment he knows he caused." "I was wrong and I am sorry," Cotterell said. "My remarks were grossly inappropriate and do not reflect my views toward Muslim people." OMED: Cotterell's mimicry of Trent Lott should now generate sympathy. A working member of the press, he has just rejected freedom of speech. If American Moslems are "hurt and embarrassed" by such commentary, they should review the reasons why it happens. Another look at the collapsing towers of 911 might help. Hooper said the punishment was fair. "It will send a positive message to the Muslim community in Florida that this kind of bigotry will not be tolerated and I appreciate the swift action of the Tallahassee Democrat in resolving this issue," he said. "We don't want to be vindictive in this. We just want to make sure bigoted views don't color the news related to Muslim and American-Arab issues." OMED: The bigots in this debate are the Moslems and the American Left. The intolerance is theirs, as well. In this case, the bigots have won. They have cowed an American journalist. He has now apologized for saying what he thought. After one suspends the ability to make a living due to the free expression of speech, all that is left is the suspension of life, itself. Both the Moslems and the Left are historically quite good at suspension of freedom of speech. Both are also historically quite good at suspension of life. The Gulag and the reason why the Empire of Islam happened so quickly are proof of that. What stimulates my curiosity is why Americans take it. Trent Lott makes a generic compliment to an ancient segregationist on his 100th birthday and is removed from the most powerful office in the Senate within days. Patty Murray describes as a saint one Osama bin Laden, a present-day Islamic butchering bigot who planned and financed the slaughter of more Americans than died at Pearl Harbor, and she is given a pass. Now, a journalist in Florida speaks his mind about those same butchers, those same theocratic tyrants, those same Jew-hating bigots, those same Sudanese slavers and Christian killers, those same Iraqis who gassed the Kurds, those same Africans who dragged U.S. Marines through the streets --- and he is required to apologize or lose his job? In my opinion the wrong people are apologizing here. I would have given the man a salary increase for finally speaking the truth. (LL)
PBS Seven Days, Friday, December 13,
2002
The crew was perfect. Even Washington Week in Review can’t stack a stage with more liberals per square foot than this! Colin Fogarty, of OPB (Oregon Public Bolshoi) who missed his time by 70 years and his place by 10,000 miles. David Steves, General Party Secretary of the Eugene Register Guard. Steve Law of the Salem Statesperson Journal. James Mayer of the Oregonian, who bears a remarkable physical similarity to Lenin. I have never before seen the moderator, who was not Stephanie Fowler. We learned that the state unions can and will sue if legislators attempt to mess with their PERS. (Public Employee Retirement System) We learned that school funding (which is being eaten alive by PERS) is too low. We learned that each school district negotiates with PERS separately. (Employees in some districts do not get 135% of their salary when they retire.) Did you know that there are 868 entities, including government agencies, in the PERS pot? This present financial problem is due to the stock market, they said. If it goes up, we shouldn’t have to do anything. If you cap the individual retirement portfolio gain at 8%, instead of making that a bottom line minimum, maybe that's legal and maybe it isn’t. There’s something odd here. The way they explained this implies that when the market went down, the PERS recipient’s accounts were protected from dropping with the market. Did you understand? If you made a killing on a stock in your PERS folder, when it went down for everybody else, it didn’t go down for you. (It sounded like they said that if you retired and sold that stock, Oregon taxpayers would make up the difference between the high that stock reached and the currently lower price per share. Did they say that?) I know that PERS recipients are guaranteed at least an 8% annual gain, no matter what happens to the investments in their retirement folder, but this is different. This means that if the PERS employee’s share of General Motors goes up to a hundreds bucks, then falls back down to ten bucks, the PERS employee is guaranteed to get the hundred buck high when he sells! Did the taxpayers of Oregon guarantee that the stock in a PERS portfolio only goes up? That can’t be right. Only an outright pack of criminals would set up a deal like that, and only an outright pack of natural born suckers would sign the agreement. Unless, I suppose, they were people who would benefit from this approach, and who had the power to sign the contract for taxpayers who weren’t there at the time. (Now there's a new take on power of attorney!) Nah! Not even an Oregon politician would do a thing like that. I misheard the pundits. Anyway, they said we should broaden the tax base in Oregon. (That is liberal-speak for raising tax rates on people who still have food in the refrigerator.) The upper limit to these pundits is just about everything you make. They greatly admire the Swedish system which produces really good looking blondes and forbids men to go to the bathroom standing up. The Swedes are proof socialism works. The collapse of the Soviet Union was due to improper application of socialist principles and unfair military competition from evil imperialist capitalists who get all their money by stealing it from the proletariat. Of particular interest are the bourgeoise, or what you think of as the “middle classes.” The misguided, self-indulgent, property-owning you. Your teacher never told you, but socialist economics involve a two, not a three class system. It’s identical to a medieval monarchy in that the King and his court own everything, and you own nothing. They eliminate the middle man, so to speak (quite often in the Sicilian sense), and just have a few very well off party officials and a gigantic, flat broke poverty class. Law of the SSJ just said our new governor, Ted Kulongoski, told the business community that he is on their side. HaHaHaHaHa! Former governor John Taxhaber's hand-picked liberal clone is pro-business. I love humor. Comrade Fogarty says 1300 people run Oregon, and you can get them all in one room. I wonder which one? I bet it's called the Hall of the Heroic Workers. Mayer just explained that government is part of the economy. (I agree. It’s the worst part.) Steves said getting an Intel a month to move in with tax breaks won’t work. You don’t get any taxes until the factory is built. People need the tax-funded services now. (Translation: Giving tax breaks to corporations is an inefficient idea. Let’s just raise taxes on everybody who has a company or a job in Oregon, now, and redistribute the income.) Yessir. Oregon Public Broadcasting. Seven Days. The cream of the Oregon press. Curdles one’s heart to hear them. Even in a warm Oregon winter cabin on the East Fork, one feels a Siberian chill. The wolves of the Gulag are making snuffling sounds at the door. If you don’t give them all you have, and thank them for taking it, they will have you clearing brush on Sakhalin island during the day, and singing songs of adulation to the magnificent leader, Big Brother, after evening gruel. LL
In the Wake of a National Addict Wednesday, November 20, 2002 – Al Gore and Tipper on Charlie Rose (PBS) talking about their new literary project, titled “Joined at the Heart.” It’s all about their views on what’s important to the American family. It is our suggestion that Mr. Gore’s entire life has actually been dedicated to the destruction of the American family, not its strengthening. Everything his father stood for and everything he has stood for has eaten like a cancer at the American hearth. Anyone who was alive in the Fifties knows that to be true. During the political careers of Al Gore and his father, the divorce rate has shot up like a rocket, the number of welfare families has shot up like a rocket and the number of illegitimate births has shot up like a rocket. In case you don’t know the latter figures, from 17% to 75% in urban areas. In 1955, a household could be supported by one adult because the total tax burden was so low that you finished paying all your taxes by the middle of January. Today, both parents must work because that same household finishes paying their taxes by the middle of June. That is the real result of women's liberation, my friends. They once worked as a matter of choice. (I was there. I saw it.) Now they must work or go under. The stress on the modern American family, the pressure that drives the divorce rate, is financial in nature. The money required to fund the Democrat social welfare state is the cause. The time spanning the senate careers of Al Gore and his father, and the vice presidency of the son, has encompassed the virtual destruction of the traditional American family for another reason, as well. The liberal "morality" in the name of tolerance has redefined the cover of the Thanksgiving Saturday Evening Post to where it now would have to be illustrated by Dante instead of Norman Rockwell. The only stage the Democrats have left is to issue marriage certificates for human-animal liasons. The Gore family’s book about families, written by a man who, with his father, and their Democratic Party, personally supervised the creation of the mess we have today, is thus a lie. After a hard day's night of gassing Jews, he stokes the ovens then goes on camera to express his affection for the Torah. Or, there is another possibility. It may be that Al Gore didn’t notice any of the facts listed above. I reject that, because I cannot accept that he is that dense. The final possibility is the most likely. Rationalization. He is in denial. His new book is what alcoholics call “magical thinking.” I have heard the phrase “drunk on power.” Perhaps Al Gore has an addiction gene for power. Those of you who have had friends or family who have become addicted to alcohol or hard drugs are well aware of what they leave in their wake. Exactly what Al Gore and his father left in their wakes. An American family disaster. (LL)
What’s the point? October 02, 2002 The moron, Margaret Warner of PBS’ News
Hour is a good The topic was the possible loss of the senate by the Democrats in the coming election. You should get a copy of the text from that session. If you didn't know how it actually happened, and just went by what these clowns had to say, the Democrats won back the senate in a voting booth! What actually happened was that Jeffords disenfranchised the voters of Vermont. After marking a ballot for a Republican they discovered that they hadn't. Every voter who selected his name, believing that doing so would help the Republicans keep control of the senate, was cheated. After Jeffords had the win, he changed his party to Independent and gave the Senate to the Democrats. The similarity between that, and what's going on in New Jersey is comparable to genetic cloning. The ability of liberal “journalists” to leave out the central question is titanic. Jean Carnahan (D. Missouri) won her senate seat by defeating the evil John Ashcroft. That's what you're left with after Warner gets through ignoring the facts. The truth is that Ashcroft refused to be so rude as to say anything critical of a recently-widowed woman who had stepped into her dead husband’s campaign for the senate. And, after Ashcroft handed her the seat, the first thing the ungrateful bitch did was to vote against his appointment as Attorney General! He gave her the senate, and in return she stabbed him in the back. When discussing that one, Warner forgot to mention the last part. Not that liberals can't turn on their own kind. Torricelli (D., New Jersey) didn't quit out of a noble sense of love for his country or his party. Somebody told him to get out or get hammered. Aware from the polls that his campaign was going down the tubes, and their grasp of the senate with it, somebody way up in the party told him to take a walk or face a Democrat committee in the senate, and be ground into hamburger on charges of corruption. Quit or find his pension rejected and any hope of future appointment to office gone, gone, gone. Next, the same Democrats who to this day complain that the U.S. Supreme Court “stole the White House from Al Gore,” by disenfranchising Florida's voters, disenfranchised New Jersey's voters by getting a friendly liberal state supreme court to allow them to switch horses in mid-stream -- replace a losing candidate the voters had selected in the primary with another politician who they didn't select in the primary. One who may have a better chance of winning. (And who Rush Limbaugh on Oct. 3 said will resign in February so the Democrat governor of N.J. can appoint a younger future incumbent.) You may assume that Miss Warner didn't mention anything about Democrats disenfranchising New Jersey voters. Tonight, Miss Warner also talked about ENRON. During the setup, as usual, the politicians featured on tape said, “We’re going to dish out some jail time here, and see that these people do not keep their ill-gotten gains. They will be jailed, and fined, severely.” Here’s my question. Why didn’t Miss Warner ask where that penalty money is going to go? Do you, the reader, assume that the fines and reclaimed booty will go to help the victims of the ENRON retirement plan dissolution? I don’t. This isn’t an opinion generated by a total, one-sided sympathy for the retirees. They are partly to blame for their situation. Those who had all their eggs in one basket do not have my sympathy. And, anybody who expects a guaranteed return any time they choose to cash in any stock market investment is a fool, and a fool and his money are soon parted. No, my point here is that if the central problem is a lot of people who lost a lot of money due to the fraudulent activities of a few corporate executives, and if the thing the government is going to do about it is to one way or another get that money back, what is going to be done with it after that? The question is so obvious to a real journalist that her failure to ask it means she should not be included under that designation. But, it must be said that she is not an anomaly in today’s mainstream media. Good journalism has nothing to do with what they are paid to do. In case you're curious about the answer to my question, the Democrats will disenfranchise their most ardent supporters. They will throw a few crumbs to the ENRON workers, and blame the tiny amounts handed out on Republican tax cuts for the rich The bulk of the money will feed the bureaucracy. It'll go into the general fund, just like their favorite source of invisible spending money for decades -- every dime you ever paid into Social Security. Talk about disenfranchisement. Every voter who ever backed the Democrats on that one issue has been raped. Had that money been thrown on the floor of a warehouse all these years instead of being spent by the six decades of Democrat-controlled congresses, the system would be rolling in dough. It would be the largest cash reserve in the history of the world. A number in the trillions. Bill Gates' fortune would be pocket change in comparison. Had they simply allowed you to put it in a local, government-guaranteed bank at 2%, those of you who are sixty would have between a hundred thousand and a quarter of a million dollar nestegg waiting for you. Yes, friends, you have been raped. That's something else you never heard from Margaret Warner. Not once in all the dozens of segments she's done on the subject. So, what's the point? Don't give her network, or your local PBS station, any money. If your state or federal politicians do, fire them. LL
May02MediaMoments
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example. During her early October segment about the Torricelli campaign
dropout disaster, talking to a fellow named Batz from the Washington Post,
and a narrow-faced liberal from some other location, something important
didn’t come up. Jim Jeffords.