MEM(o)RI(es)
Juan Cole criticised MEMRI, and for his trouble copped a threatening letter. His employer was also threatened. Somebody else posted his personal information online, and encouraged others to hassle him. Whether it’s a big issue like Israel/Palestine, or a small issue like Pandagate, the tactics of the Right are always the same.
Rob:
The slander and libel stuff was bullshit – obviously not a lawyer (who’d have thunk) – and the general tone of the MEMRI bloke’s letter was hysterical…
But… Cole did screw up by not mentioning the organisation’s more positive work re moderate Arab voices don’t you think?
I’m no expert on Cole’s work – just my 2c worth.
Well, no. As he said in his first response to the letter:
The trouble with the project they trumpet is that it simply amplifies people who share their own prejudices. A worthy goal, perhaps, but not if you’re trying to cast yourself as non-partisan.
Abu Aardvark has this to say:
Fair enough.
I note that a popular web-site like LGF has become full-on hysterical, despite the fact that – for example – President Bush himself wants a Palestinian state. George wasn’t a bleeding-heart leftie last time I looked.
The other day Charles Johnson had a post titled “Iranian Child Sacrifice.” (Ramadan over-enthusiasm ended tragically). Later, he had the temerity to head a post something like “Stupid Headline of the Day” (the one from The Australian alleging that the young Marine in Falluja had committed “Cold Blooded Murder” ).
There followed a thread discussion in which Australians were called dingos and skippies by several of Charles’s moronic readers. So much for the Coalition. I was going to post a comment saying we were the best friends America had but what’s the point?
This whole area is becoming more and more confusing and I, for one, no longer understand it. Chris Sheil called the Israeli-Palestinian issue poison and wouldn’t blog about it. I sort of understand why.
I wouldn’t treat Little Green Footballs as typical. It’s always been a disgustingly racist site, where Charles blows his dogwhistle and his minions go to work. (Sadly, Tim Blair’s commenters are taking on similar traits once the threads go into triple digits.)
Speaking of the Blair/LGF axis, I couldn’t help being amused by LGF’s recent hysterical reaction to a French newspaper photo caption accusing Brits of having bad teeth. This was just a couple of weeks after Tim Blair organized a hate-mail campaign against the Guardian for having encouraged *its* readers to voice their feelings about the U.S. election; one of the favorite themes of the anti-Guardian letter-writers was, well, that Brits have bad teeth.
Of course, any resemblance between MEMRI’s letter to Juan Cole, and the Democratic National Committee’s letter threatening legal action against any TV station that played the Swift Boat Vets’ ads is purely coincidental.
As is any resemblance between the publication of Juan Cole’s personal details, and the publication of the home addresses and phone numbers of 3,000 delegates to the Republican National Convention by the Left.
The tactics of the Left are always the same.
Serves the prick right for making false claims – typical leftie. The Left needs a reality check. Simple way to avoid this – don’t make accusations that you can’t back up.
I guess MEMRI will reveal their funding levels, then?
“False claims… reality check.. Don’t make accusations that you can’t back up..”
Mmmmm, takes a short memory to try that line.
wubble you emmmm deee
Wanders off, humming quietly to self, carrying scalp.
Hang on Robert MEMRI,Tim.B and LGF has as much obligation to be ‘balanced’ as you do.
Are we confusing balance and civilisation? Robert has no obligation to be “balanced” – we all know what this blog represents and where he stands. Exactly where I like him to be, which is why I enjoy the place.
But Rob is pretty good at being civilised, and not gratuitously nasty or racist. That can’t be said of the crowd around LGF and Tim B.
Memri is very different. Much as we would like to be important, we ain’t. MEMRI gets a lot of money to push a line. If the line is to secure what I would see as a just peace in the Middle East, then a distorted impression of the Islamic side won’t help. If the line is to secure ultimate victory for an expanded Israel, then they are on song.
I don’t believe that victory is possible but that is another question. Those Palestinians just won’t go away.
Well David, I haven’t looked at LGF’s comments for a long time. But to insinuate that the Tim.B’s “crowd” is racist IS in the same league as saying “all aboriginals are drunks” or “all Muslims a terrorist”. Easy conclusions for the detractors but not much else.
“If the line is to secure what I would see as a just peace in the Middle East, then a distorted impression of the Islamic side won’t help.”
If it is a distored view of Islam or the Middle East is what you are looking for then just read a Left Wing website like this one. Then again it’s probbly why you “enjoy the place”.
Are we trying to believe that we don’t find gratuitous nastiness or racism around The Blair pit? Of course the host is not responsible for the individual comments – teehee for instance is sitting right here, who suggests I have a distorted view of Islam or the Middle East, which is a pretty fantastic generalisation from my previous remarks – but you would have to accept that sites develop a community whose tone is tolerated and fed.
Which site would you say was closer to reason, sanity and respect for dissent – Corrville or the Blair pit?
Do you think teehee was just being snarky or really trying to convince us? If snarky, perhaps s/he would like to explain how those remarks increase the chance either of a just peace in the Middle East or even the removal of the Palestinian people as an effective group? Which I suspect our friend thinks is a “just peace”.
There followed a thread discussion in which Australians were called dingos and skippies by several of Charles’s moronic readers.
One reader mentioned the word dingo, and no mention of the word “skippies”.
Now there’s a lawsuit trying to stop Hirsi Ali from making Submission 2.
But hey, I heard it from a “disgustingly racist site”, and I bet you know who the real victim of repression is.