The Newspaper Guild (I'll say it again, unions in 2005 are worthless...they're merelty arms of the Democratic Party only interested in raising as much money for the brass as possible- unions hardly do a thing for workers in the 21st Century), the union that represents media workers, is attacking what they call "bile [from] right wing extremists" due to the buzz on the net over comments from the Guild's President.
The Newspaper Guild's President, Linda Foley, at a press conference back in May said the following, as reported by World Net Daily:
According to a tape of her remarks, Foley said: "Journalists, by the way, are not just being targeted verbally or … ah, or … ah, politically. They are also being targeted for real, um … in places like Iraq. What outrages me as a representative of journalists is that there’s not more outrage about the number, and the brutality, and the cavalier nature of the U.S. military toward the killing of journalists in Iraq."Foley continued, "They target and kill journalists … uh, from other countries, particularly Arab countries like Al -, like Arab news services like al-Jazeera, for example. They actually target them and blow up their studios with impunity."
She was echoing the same sort of comments made by former CNN executive Eason Jordan- his claims of US military targeting reporters lead to his forced resignation. Without any evidence of this outrageous claim, Foley had no problem making it and slandering the US military in the process. Attacks on the military are chic in Foley's mind, that much is obvious, and she has refused to back down from her remarks, no matter the fact that they're not supported by any evidence and they're completely anti-American.
The Guild, sticking by its own, lashes out at Foley detractors as being "right-wing extremists" out to destroy her rights.
This tirade by the Guild includes some harsh words for anyone who disagrees with Foley's outrageous and unsubstantiated claims:
There’s more at work here, in other words, than just anger at a union leader for trying to defend her members. For the looniest fringe of the right wing, an independent press and its "journalists" are the problem. The irony is that such extremists are trying to prompt the mass media into attacking . . . the media.
So, in the eye's of the Newspaper Guild, those who condemn Foley's attacks on the US military are part of "the looniest fringe of the right wing"? Is this organization TRYING to PROVE that they're a wholly owned subsidary of the Democratic fringe or what? Foley's comments were insane at best, and at worst- heck, I've no idea. They were just off the charts. So, The Guild finds it suitable to attack any Foley detractors as "the looniest fringe" and "right-wing extremists."
The article attacks these so called loonys for attacking Foley and not the issue at hand. They bring up the Rathergate debacle, yet claim that no one was debating the issue of whether or not Bush actually fulfilled his guard duties or not. Of course, that's an absurd claim as well- since the only "evidence" suggesting that Bush didn't fulfill his guard obligations were falsified memos that were created by those who hated Bush and wanted to attack him any way they could. So, in the absence of any other evidence, and the fact that we have testimony from guard officials who saw Bush at the time he was in Texas, why should his guard duty even be at question? That's not the way an argument works...you can't accuse someone of something without a shred of evidence of wrondoing then demand that THEY prove their case to YOU! It's rather creepy that such an argument comes from the union that represents so many in the media!! You have to have some piece of evidence that someone did something wrong, and then YOU have to work to prove your case. To say that the nation is guilty of some sort of crime for not debating an issue that was ONLY an issue due to fake memos is ridiculous, and The Guild knows it.
They also go on to talk about Ward Churchill, actually seeming to give the man their own brand of support:
The attempt to obscure discomfiting truths with a smokescreen of allegations about the truth purveyor—challenging his or her motives, techniques or basic character—is not new, but in recent years the volume has been ratcheted way up. For Paul Waldman of Media Matters for America, a progressive research and information center that tracks conservative disinformation campaigns, the poster child for such tactics is Ward Churchill, a much vilified University of Colorado professor.This past January, the extreme right wing stumbled across an essay Churchill had written—more than three years earlier—in which he argued that the money changers at the World Trade Center had suffered the consequences of U.S. military aggression and unjust foreign policies. The result was a blizzard of right-wing outrage, flogged relentlessly by shouting heads like Bill O’Reilly. “Were some people offended by what Churchill had to say? Yes,” Waldman says. “Was he worth hundreds and hundreds of stories? Obviously not.”
But Churchill, Waldman adds, was simply one in a series of cases that the right has leveraged to advance its crabbed view of liberalism. Finding anecdotes that it can pump up to outsized dimensions in an echo chamber of right-wing commentators, talk shows, editorial pages and web blogs, the right transforms the specific into the general. “Linda’s case is one of those they’d like to make into a cause celebre, that the media hate the military, that they’re unpatriotic, blah-blah,” Waldman charges.
You have got to be kidding me! So, now Churchill's detractors should feel guilty because they "vilified" him (tho, in truth, he vilified himself!), and the claim is that it was the "extreme right wing" that went after Churhill and that it was a "blizzard of right-wing outrage [that] flogged [Churchill] relentlessly" over his deplorabe statements?!?!
Churchill is merely a case "the right has leveraged to advance its crabbed view of liberalism"?!
You have to wonder- is The Newspaper Guild nuttier than even Churchill? Aren't they proving their left-wing ideology when they attack anyone who condemns Churchill, and in doing so they quote a "progressive" (read left-wing) reaearch group to prove their case that it was only "the right" that went after Churchill? It's safe to assume from the reaction of Churchill's statements in his essay and his remarks when visiting other colleges (the Univ of Hawaii greeted him with open arms, adoring him as a hero) that most Americans PERIOD did not agree with his statements and they found them highly offensive. When you justify the murder of 3, 000 people, it's a fair bet that few Americans will agree with you or support you, yet The Guild claims the right wingers were the only ones attacking Churchill. Doesn't say all we need to know about The Guild?
The Guild accuses the "right" of attacking Foley and it all being a bunch of "bile"- let's try getting the brass at The Guild (along with the writer of this piece) to look in the mirror. THEN we'll know where the true "bile" lies.
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