Time for the Media’s Edward R. Murrow Moment

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The latest attack upon U.S. citizens of the Muslim faith is an extension of the conservative right's attack upon president Obama as a "foreign born secret Muslim" — it is an attempt to delegitimize their very American-ness and to cast doubt and suspicion upon their loyalty to America.

It is McCarthyism, a new "red scare" dressed up in ancient garbs of religious bigotry. This offends the very idea of America which was founded upon religious freedom and tolerance for all faiths. If anyone is behaving "un-American," it is the conservative right.

In particular, that most vile creature who poisons thoughtful political discourse with his hateful demagoguery — Newt Gingrich.

Former House speaker and possible 2012 GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich compared the people behind the proposed mosque, whom he referred to as "radical Islamists," to "Nazis" during an appearance on Fox News (but of course). Newt Gingrich compares 'Ground Zero mosque' backers to Nazis.

Gingrich has a history of labeling people with whom he disagrees politically. In a recently published book, the former congressman called President Obama and congressional Democrats "secular socialists" who represented "as great a threat to America as Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union once did."

As I have said before, any civilized society would shun this vile creature. But the mainstream media in this country continue to give Newt a seat in front of the cameras to spew his bile and hatred. Some commentators have described this vile creature as an "intellectual" and "thoughtful" conservative. Newt is neither. He is a practitioner of the black arts of fear mongering and demagoguery.

The mainstream media fancy themselves the "gate keepers" of what is newsworthy. But the media also has an obligation to speak out and to defend the Constitution and long-cherished American principles and values. The media has such an obligation, as Keith Olbermann stated in the closing remarks of his "special comment" Monday night, Olbermann: There is no ‘Ground Zero Mosque’:

"Because this is America damnit!

And in America, when somebody comes for your neighbor, or his bible, or his torah, or his Atheists' Manifesto, or his Koran, you and I do what our fathers did, and our grandmothers did, and our founders did, and you speak up."

It is long past time for the spineless cowards in the mainstream media to confront Newt and to label him for what he is, and then to deny him further access to the cameras. It is time for a civilized society to shame him and shun him.

As Edward R. Murrow said of Senator Joseph McCarthy in 1954:

"We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. We must remember always that accusation is not proof, and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law. We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men — not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate and to defend causes that were, for the moment, unpopular."

It is time for the media's Edward R. Murrow moment.

UPDATE: Think Progress has more, Gingrich, Bolton, Breitbart Team Up With Far-Right Muslim-Basher Geert Wilders For 9/11 Rally:

The right-wing group Stop Islamization of America (SIOA) has announced that it will be hosting a rally against the proposed Cordoba House Islamic community center on September 11.

The confirmed list of speakers includes former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton, Andrew Breitbart, and, notably, the far-right Dutch Parliamentarian Geert Wilders. “Islam is not a religion, it’s an ideology,” Wilders told the Guardian in 2009, “the ideology of a retarded culture.”

In the past, Wilders’ extremism has been condemned by conservatives such as Bill Kristol, Charles Krauthammer, and even Glenn Beck, who called Wilders “fascist.” It’s a clear sign of how far the Republicans have shifted to the right and embraced Islamophobia as a political tool that movement figures like Gingrich, Bolton, and Breitbart now have no problem sharing a stage with Wilders.