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Numerous protests have taken place locally in the past few weeks. The bad guys who provoke these protests are obviously working overtime to arouse such dissatisfaction in the American people.
First, there was the hiring by our local paper, the Inky (Officially the Philadelphia Inquirer), of torture attorney John Yoo. PhillyIMC recently published a related piece on torture photos.
Then, there was the trial of the members of "Heeding God's Call," an interfaith religious group that took action against a local gun shop. They were acquitted.
Then there was a rally in support of HR 676, a bill that would provide Single-Payer Health Care to all Americans.
And then Dr George Tiller was murdered in an act of politically-motivated violence.
A few words on two of the pieces: A person wrote to the Inky to complain that the news media in general were paying much more attention to the murder of Dr Tiller than to the equally politically-motivated murder of a military recruiter. I wrote a letter in response and my answer to that is as follows:
After several days in which people have been earnestly searching the Internet for hostile speeches made towards military recruiters, no one can find any instances where any liberal spokespeople have so much as hinted that they'd like these soldiers punished by more than peaceful protest.
Yes, there is a difference between the two murders. One is an isolated incident that can be blamed only on one individual. The other is clearly the result of a very public campaign of vilification. The difference in news media coverage is entirely justified.
John Yoo's position at the Inky as a member of the writing staff has been defended on freedom of speech / First Amendment grounds. I don't think that quite responds to the left's critique of his being a member of the Inky writing staff. The website Media Matters, along with many bloggers, has been voicing concern about two frequent guests on TV news shows. Newt Gingrich and Liz Cheney have both been very frequent guests on the news talk shows and have been endlessly quoted. It's really not at all clear why.
The question asked about all three people is "Why have they been given such high-profile platforms?" The left is concerned with getting Yoo fired, but the concern in all three cases is not so much that these people be silenced as it is that the left is questioning why they're featured as writer/commentators in such a high-profile manner. It's not at all clear that any of these people is a particularly good or original or insightful writer/speaker. People of my acquaintance have pointed out that as Mumia Abu-Jamal was denied a final chance to prove his innocence and as Yoo has not yet been brought to trial (Over 100 people died in the torture system that Yoo assisted in designing), they occupy a roughly equal position in the American justice system, so hey, why not give Abu-Jamal a column too? They both write a lot and both publish columns on current affairs. They're both exercising freedom of speech, but for some odd reason, Yoo's columns get published in a large-circulation daily newspaper whereas Abu-Jamal has to content himself with small websites. It's far from clear why these two writers are treated so unequally.
