This morning on MSNBC, they had a news story about the proposed building of a mosque near the site of what used to be the World Trade Center. It was a typical example of the false "even-handedness" that passes for journalism and commentary these days ("opinions differ as to whether Earth is round or flat"; here to present the Flat Earth argument is...").
Or is it? I rather doubt that any reputable news outlet would spend this much time on a dispute when there really isn't a dispute: If someone owns a piece of real estate they can build whatever kind of place of worship tickles their fancy unless there are zoning laws (for example, residential-only zones) to the contrary. Even then, religious buildings are typically given more leeway when it comes to zoning than a muffler shop or other businesses.
If say, Seventh-Day Adventists had bought a lot near the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City and proposed to build a church on the lot, would there be such hysteria? After all, Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols blew up the government building to avenge the Branch Davidians (a Seventh-Day Adventist off-shoot) who had been killed a year earlier. Or how about if a Jewish group had decided to build a synagogue near the office where Alex Odeh was murdered with a bomb planted by the Jewish Defense League? These "concerns" would be dismissed as at best cretinous and at worst motivated by religious bigotry. So why are baying mobs of bigots and morons being given such standing not only by right-wing mouth-breather outlets like Faux News, but by the "liberal" MSNBC?
I ask because earlier this morning, MSNBC invited a deranged bigot and blogger named Pamela Geller to give her reasons why a mosque should not be built near the site of the 9-11 attacks. How much of a whack-job is Geller? Let me give you a few samples of this woman’s lunacy. Here she is being "interviewed" by Chris Jansing:
MSNBC
Yep, she just called the aid ships bringing food and clothing to Gaza as the "Jihad genocidal flotilla". Apparently canned fruit is just like Zyklon-B. But this isn't the only racist and moronic thing this stupid and insane person has said or written. The stalwarts at LOONWATCH.COM have collected some real doozies from this deranged bigot:
- She's a birther who thinks Barack Obama is a crypto-Muslim out to destroy America. Where she differs from the more rational and (relatively speaking) level-headed Orly Taitz is that she also thinks Obama's real father was Malcom X and that his mother did porn.
- Pamela Gellar has a fondness for racist crackpots like the "Bloc Identitaire" a French fascist group well known for its hatred of immigrants, Jews and Muslims.
Bloc Identitaire is an ethnic nationalist French version of the KKK; they’re opposed to race-mixing, they hate Americans as much as they hate Jews and Muslims, and they’re allied with another one of Geller’s fascist associates, the Belgian Vlaams Belang.
There's more:
These "pork parties" are a long tradition on the French far right; back in the day they were targeted against Jews by the very same groups and people. And they’re still targeted against Jews as well as Muslims, but some of the fascists have learned that there are useful idiots like Geller out there who will believe their denials and help promote their hatred.
It’s old-style European racial/ethnic nastiness. Deliberate mean-spirited provocation. That’s what Pamela Geller is working hard to bring to America.
But it's not just political movements that say disgusting things about Muslims, for Pamela Geller also supports racist, religiously bigoted movements that act on their hatred and kill those they consider "inferior". Remember Radovan Karadžić?, the man behind the Srebrenica Massacre Geller sure does!
Radovan Karadžić, the former Bosnian Serb politician, is on trial (more like a sharia court) in the United Nations Detention Unit of Scheveningen, accused of "war crimes committed against Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats during the Siege of Sarajevo"
We can add Holocaust "revisionism" to the bill as well, since she also tried to pin the Holocaust on the Muslims! Funny, I thought Nazi Germany did it.
This is why even the right-wing nutters at Little Green Footballs refer to Geller as the "Poster Girl for Eurofascists".
I called MSNBC and left a message asking why such a demented racist lunatic was given air time.I have heard no response (not that I was expecting one). You can call, too:
(212) 664-4444
Funny isn't it, how Markos Moulistsas is not welcome to appear on MSNBC, but a crazed anti-Muslim bigot, racist and all-around miscreant is.