Conservatives must stand up against this tidal wave of liberal ignorance. Earlier this week James von Brunn shoots up the D.C. Holocaust Memorial Museum and immediately every major media outlet in the nation labels him a “right-wing extremist.”
You see, only people on the far right hate Jews (Rev. Jeremiah Wright excluded). I should note that Wright only dislikes Zionist Jews (whatever that means). Paul Krugman at the New York Times blames the shooting on the “right-wing extremism” that is “being systematically fed by the conservative media and political establishment.” This is typical “progressive” ignorance.
The fact is that von Brunn wasn’t a member of the “extreme-right”. Jonah Goldberg at the The National Review connects the dots:
Never mind that von Brunn isn’t a member of the far right. Nor is he a member of the far left, as some on the right are claiming. He’s not a member of anything other than the crazy caucus. Von Brunn’s True North is conspiratorial anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism. He’s not a member of the Christian Right. In fact, he denounces Christianity — just as Hitler did — as a Jewish plot against paganism and Western vigor. Nor is he a capitalist. Again, just as Hitler did, he hails socialism as the solution to the West’s problems.
Still, if we are going to play this game where we take the words of politicians and pundits, compare them to the words of murderers and psychopaths, and then assign blame accordingly, then let’s blame the New York Times, Chris Matthews, left-wing blogs everywhere, and the academics who penned The Israel Lobby (which blames a fifth column of Israel loyalists for our troubles).
I don’t really care if leftist blogs like the Daily Kos can’t see the forest for the trees. Those are outlets that kneel at the altar of Left. The problem is that mainstream news outlets are stuck using outdated templates.
The first story I read about this shooting on CNN had already labeled the psycho as a member of the extreme-right. Liberals have been successful at painting the “far right” as offshoots of Hitler for far too long when the truth is a lot more complicated. The political spectrum is certainly a lot more diverse that far right and far left. I won’t hold my breath waiting for educated news because the press is invested in this narrative.
Putting aside other objections to that nomenclature, if von Brunn is a member of the far right, then it would be helpful and journalistically responsible if the press would start calling Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, Sean Hannity, et al., moderates and centrists. That won’t happen, because the whole point of these exercises is to paint the Right as an undifferentiated blob of evil.
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