Possibly more than any other writer on the Web, right-wing blogger Michelle Malkin constantly refers to all the hate mail and threats she receives. In the eyes of her followers, this has enhanced her reputation and made her into a sort of right-wing hero for the truth, in her ongoing battle against liberals.
The latest round of Malkin's claims of hate speech and threats began recently when Fox News' Bill O'Reilly compared the liberal Daily Kos to the Nazi Party and the Ku Klux Klan.
O'Reilly based his tirade on a tiny, cherry-picked handful of anonymous comments left on Daily Kos (a site with millions of daily visitors, all of whom are free to post comments).
Blogger Glenn Greenwald, among others, responded to O'Reilly's lunacy, pointing out that if you go to the site of Malkin (a frequent guest host on O'Reilly's program) you'll encounter loads of vile hate speech in her comments section. In Malkin's case, however, this really shouldn't be surprising. After all, as Greenwald notes, Malkin once wrote a book "defending the ethnicity-based imprisonment of innocent American citizens in internment camps."
In response to Greenwald's charges, Malkin has fallen back on a tactic that she's used before: she trots out the claim that she herself has been the victim of all kinds of terrible, violent hate speech and threats.
As she wrote in a July 26 piece:
"If you're going to get into it, the qualitative difference between blog comments on liberal blogs and my blogs is Grand Canyon-wide. A reminder: "Let's sexually torture, rape, murder and dismember the Malkin family."
I really don't believe anything that Malkin writes and frankly I have doubts about her claims of getting inundated with hate speech and threats.
Am I saying that Malkin and other right-wing bloggers basically make up anonymous comments to try to make liberals look bad?
Well, not necessarily. But I wouldn't put it past any right-wing site. And I simply don't believe that liberals are posting hate speech, or violent threats, on right-wing sites.
The fact is, we liberals don't do hate speech. We don't do racism. In fact, we're not big on threats or violence in general.
Hell, we're from the party of Jimmy Carter, who won the Nobel Peace Prize, for God's sake. It's hard to imagine George W. Bush ever winning a Nobel Peace Prize.
I know a lot of liberal Democrats. And I know a lot of conservative Republicans.
And frankly, in countless conversations I've had over the years, I've never heard a liberal make any kind of serious threat of violence against anyone, period. Violence is not our thing, after all.
The creator of the progressive site, BeggarsCanBeChoosers.com, Marc McDonald is an award-winning journalist who worked for 15 years for several Texas newspapers, including the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, before he quit his day job and set up shop in cyberspace in 1995. McDonald's articles have appeared in a number of popular progressive Web sites, including OpEdNews.com, BuzzFlash.com, Crooks and Liars, Salon.com, Progressive Daily Beacon, The Neil Rogers Show and The Raw Story. McDonald's Web articles have also been featured and reviewed by various national and international media, including CNN Headline News, the BBC, the Washington Post, USA Today and many more.
Hey lets not get to stuck on ourselves here. I will admit that I hear more from the right than from the left but I have heard some pretty nasty comments from the left too. The left is made up of people some good some in between and yes some bad. To put yoursleves of this pedestal is as bad and the neo's saying they can only claim god. Rember pride goes before the fall.
by
mike (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 90 comments)
on Monday, July 30, 2007 at 4:04:10 PM
I have to agree with the author, and also the previous comment. I've seen and heard a few self-proclaimed liberals advocate violence and violent revolution, and some of the less mature desxcribing things they'd like to do to the neocons --- but I tend to blow such comments off as immature and self-gratifying. I will state unequivocably that in my experience close to 99% of threats and personal attacks have come from right-wing neocons, but we liberals are not without our flaws.
For the truth of the matter, look at the upcoming elections. While Edwards, Clinton, Obama, Gravel, Biden and Kucinich try to focus on issues that matter to the people of this country, the other side has their focus on haircuts and clevage. So, in general terms, who is more likely to be insulting, threatening and harassing? The answer is obvious.
But to those liberals who are inclined to use threats, insults and grade-school childishness, I suggest you stop giving our political opponents ammunition to use against us. You're undermining our efforts to make this country a decent place to live.
by
Eric Newcomb (2 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 12 comments)
on Tuesday, July 31, 2007 at 10:01:14 AM
False, false, false. Ted Rall, Mike Malloy, Randi Rhodes, Sam Seder, Greg Palast, Ward Churchill, Tony Hendra, Democratic Underground, Indymedia, Huffington Post,...the list goes on and on and on. Actually, Michelle Malkin's book "Unhinged" does a fabulous job of documenting left-wing hate speech. Her book is a must-read.
by
Scott (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 489 comments)
on Tuesday, July 31, 2007 at 11:46:49 PM
3 comments
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