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Politics : Just the Facts, Ma'am: A Compendium of Liberal Fiction -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: FJB who wrote (84678)	1/4/2012 2:13:51 PM
From: joseffy	1 Recommendation Respond to of 90947

CAIR TV Show Pushes muslim Line All-American Muslim’s Very Special Tribute to 9/11 1-4-12 by Daniel Greenfield frontpagemag.com Empathy is the essence of tragedy. To be able to mourn for others we have to feel their loss and make it our own. Most Americans never lost anyone on September 11. Most never knew anyone who died that day in the planes above or the buildings below. And yet we as a nation felt that blow. Their pain was our pain. And that response was not limited to the United States as millions of people beyond these shores reached out and took in the full weight of that tragedy and grief. All-American Muslim: The Day the World Changed, an episode of the reality series that has the cast interacting emotionally with the attacks of September 11, is less about those who were murdered on that day than about the cast’s feelings and exploitation of that day. It may be unfair to criticize the cast of a reality television show for being self-centered. An obsessive focus on one’s own feelings and needs to the exclusion of all else seems to be a standard prerequisite for appearing on one of these shows. The perfect reality show performer must be a sociopath or capable of playing one on television. And yet this self-centered reaction to the attacks of September 11 is disturbingly common among Muslim leaders and activists in the United States. Perhaps the most odious aspect of this is the incorporation of the Islamophobia theme into a day of remembrance for the dead, until the very act of remembrance becomes tarred with accusations of bigotry. Every commemoration of the day by Muslim leaders seems determined to not only foist the Islamophobia myth on us, but to also associate it with some national overreaction to that day. Like the family of a cop killer arriving at a memorial determined to make their own sense of victimization the center of attention, the need by some Muslims to turn their own sense of victimization into the focus of September 11 is inappropriate and flies on the face of what should be basic decency. That sense of grievance is rarely if ever directed at Al-Qaeda and those Muslims who carry out terrorist attacks against Americans; instead it is directed at Americans who woke up to a day of fire and terror, and tried to understand what was going on. The All-American Muslim cast follows the political line of groups like CAIR by indicting Americans for their reaction to a terrorist attack carried out by Muslims, rather than engaging in some soul-searching about the violent roots of their own religion. When cast members insist that the terrorists were not Muslims, or not truly Muslims, their denial echoes the collective denial of Muslim communities and leaders in America who have never come to terms with the problem because they are too busy misrepresenting themselves as the victims. They are too busy feeling sorry for themselves to understand the pain of so many Americans on the anniversary of that awful day. But All-American Muslim’s denial that the September 11 hijackers were Muslims acting in the name of Islam, because Muslims are incapable of terrorism is blatantly dishonest. Especially when the series featured two Imams who support terrorists, Imam Abdul Latif Berry, who is quite a fan of the Ayatollah Khomeini, and Husham Al-Husainy, who supports Hezbollah. The appearance of these two men on a series which pretends to show us the peaceful nature of the real All-American Muslim demonstrates how difficult it is to detach the religious violence in Islam from the Muslim community. When Al-Husainy signed a document which read in part, “We remind our sons to get ready to carry out their duty in Holy Jihad and continue the path which our young valiant men in Hezbollah began in Southern Lebanon” and which invoked a “Islamic nation which extends to all parts of the world”; how was this any different than a bulletin from Osama bin Laden? The “All-American Muslims” of All-American Muslim may be entirely sincere when they claim that Bin Laden is not a Muslim. After all they are Shiites and he’s a Sunni. Al-Qaeda has targeted Shiites in its massacres. The Shiite view of Sunnis and the Wahhabi view of Shiites tend to be equally ugly. And Shiites and Sunnis often persecute each other in Muslim countries. The problem is that while the All-American Shiites may reject Bin Laden, they don’t reject the Ayatollah Khomeini and Hassan Nasrallah of Hezbollah. If they did then Abdul Latif Berry and Husham Al-Husainy wouldn’t have a place to promote themselves on All-American Muslim. Most Muslims reject some form of terrorism, but not that many Muslims reject all forms of terrorism. There are always exceptions and exemptions. Whether it’s Shiites who want to give Hezbollah a pass or Sunnis who think that Al-Qaeda goes too far but that Hamas is just right, what is lacking in the Muslim community is a wholesale rejection of all forms of violent Jihad. It’s not enough to reject Bin Laden in order to participate in commemorating September 11. Not when a Shiite Bin Laden like Hassan Nasrallah or the Ayatollah Khomeini are still okay. And even those Muslims who do reject terrorism in all its forms must still address the widespread affinity for terrorism in the Muslim community. An affinity so widespread that even a television series like All-American Muslim whose entire reason for being is to present a positive non-terrorist image of Islam is still unwilling or unable to keep Imams like Husainy and Berry off the stage. An honest admission that their community has a problem combined with sincere mourning for the dead without any of the self-serving victimization that characterizes episodes like The Day the World Changed would go a long way toward easing the minds of Americans. It would also change the dialogue from dishonest platitudes and denial to a meaningful exchange of feelings and ideas. September 11 is first and foremost a day to remember the horrors inflicted on this country and the grief of those who were lost amidst the flames. Truly All-American Muslims would use that day to join the national grieving, rather than bringing to it their own victimization agendas. Above all else it is unseemly for a community where a man like Husham Al-Hussainy remains a respected figure to present itself as the real victims of an ignorant backlash when it has clearly not even come to terms with the conflicting demands of American values and its own religion.

To: FJB who wrote (84678)	1/4/2012 2:49:23 PM
From: joseffy	3 Recommendations Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 90947

Obama on Presidential Signing Statements (video flashback) http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Eci77PJACCs In 2008, Obama promised he would never use signing statements.

To: FJB who wrote (84678)	1/4/2012 2:53:22 PM
From: joseffy	1 Recommendation Respond to of 90947

Univision Wages Political War On Latino Conservatives 01/03/2012 news.investors.com Bias: A giant TV network has effectively admitted to blackmailing Florida's GOP Sen. Marco Rubio over his immigration stance. It's Exhibit A of the kind of sludge being hurled at Latino leaders who won't toe the open-borders line. Bigfoot Spanish-language television network Univision unwittingly revealed it's got a mafia-style hit-equivalent out there waiting for any conservative leader of Hispanic descent who won't tout their open-borders line on immigration. So much for reporting the news. Univision's top honchos behind this are all about politics — and are running their news organization like a cult mafia leader wielding power based on groupthink and fear. Last October, the Miami Herald broke news that Univision executive Isaac Lee threatened to make public a story about the arrest of Rubio's brother-in-law 24 years ago — that is, unless, in an offer he couldn't refuse, Rubio agreed to go on Univision's Jorge Ramos show, presumably to be savaged by the TV host, known as a loud advocate of open borders. Univision denied the Herald story, though the paper had multiple witnesses — but then spilled the beans to the New Yorker, admitting to writer Ken Auletta that it had indeed offered the popular Florida senator "three Univision options" to soften or spike their nasty "investigation" if Rubio did the Ramos show. Univision figured it could demolish Rubio politically with the offer, which is why it pulled out all stops and violated all standards of journalistic ethics. But things didn't go as planned: Rubio refused to be blackmailed and told them no. Univision then ran the scurrilous piece attempting to link Rubio to drugs, which was so baseless even the mainstream media wouldn't pick it up. Subscribe to the IBD Editorials Podcast The Miami Herald's Marc Caputo reported a whole string of disgraceful pressure tactics Univision pulled to put the heat on Rubio. Those ranged from adding the words #rubio and #drugs to advertise their show on their Twitter feed and create a false link, to sending a huge TV truck to the doorstep of Rubio's sister, to attract embarrassing attention. Caputo reported that the Univision shakedown also included trying to get Florida Gov. Rick Scott to call for Rubio's resignation. Caputo said the ploy appalled Univision's reputable journalists, who called him up to describe the egregious violation of ethics. What does this say about Univision and its line? That there's a creepy network determined to stamp out any dissent in the Hispanic community and force all leaders to toe a party line — or else face media ruin. Univision Chairman Haim Saban made that clear in an email to the Herald, declaring Rubio "anti-Hispanic" because of his views on immigration, as if Saban has some edge over Rubio, the son of Cuban exiles, when it comes to being Hispanic. Here are the facts: Rubio is popular among Hispanics and represents a massive threat to the Democrats' grip on the pivotal Hispanic vote, which may be up for grabs, given the Obama administration's economic failures. Saban is a big-time billionaire bankroller of the Democratic Party and seems willing to turn his TV network into a Democrat mouthpiece. This is no small matter. Saban's network — which says it reaches 75% of Latino households and frequently tops the Big Three networks in viewership — seems to think it has a monopoly on the news and that it can make or break any Hispanic leader. Heck, it seems to think it can even arbitrate who's Hispanic. Univision's Isaac Lee, who made the "options" offer, had the nerve to gleefully retweet a report that Latinos respect Univision more than the Catholic Church or military — a power politics statement if there ever was one, given he did it the day Auletta's piece came out. In doing this, Univision is sadly showing that it isn't about news, but rather about raw politics. And because it's corrupting the news, its monopoly won't likely last. Indeed, that Rubio remains popular despite the attacks suggests that Latinos are no longer a group that can be dictated to by Univision. And Rubio's brave refusal to be blackmailed over his immigration views is as much a threat to Univision as it is to the Democrats.