All right. So, normally I rely on my friend, Danno, to take down the abomination that is Morning Joe. But Danno has fallen down on the job (like he has a life or something like that) and so it falls to me to sort through this.
I watched roughly 12 seconds of Morning Joe this morning. This is not an exaggeration. Twelve seconds made me crazy. Mika and Joe were interviewing an editor from Time Magazine named Richard Stengel who was there to tout their cover story about Nidal Hasan: Terroristcakes. Oh goody!
Let's check in with out principles. First Joe:
You have people who say we still shouldn't talk about he's a Muslim!
Mika thinks Joe is missing the point. It's not about how he's a Muslim. The real story is how the press coverage of the event didn't talk enough about how he's a Muslim. I think this is because if you work on TV News, there is nothing to see past your own navel. Here's Mika:
I want to know your thoughts on the coverage because there was one place where we kind of cut through the BS and said this looks like it's politically motivated... there is nothing saying mental illness, nothing here saying PTSD, and that was right here and we were very much alone in this.
Joe, what do you think about that?
Everybody was afraid to talk about it. Jack Jacobs on the ground said 'This was politically motivated' and everyone around here sort of gasped.
Mika? Mika found a way to gasp sarcastically. I have to admit I was pretty impressed by how much derision she could put into one fake gasp. And then demanded of Stengel:
Bottom Line!
Golly, I don't know if he'll be able to talk above all the awesomeness and balls, but let's see if Richard Stengel can call out the real enemy here:
There's a lot of political correctness here.
Ooooh! Mika and Joe totally kicked political correctness in the nuts.
Of course, I'm a dirty fucking hippie and so I hear things differently than Real Americans (TM) like Joe and Mika. When I hear the phrase "political correctness" it makes me think someone has said something jerky and pre-emptively disregarded any criticism because only hypersensitive types would be offended. Or, in my dirty fucking hippie world, if you say you are politically incorrect, I'm going to guess that you're probably an asshole; the worst kind of asshole: the asshole who is proud of being an asshole.
Let's examine another quote or two:
Nov. 9th, Dave Gaubatz, author of Muslim Mafia: "Now is the time for a professional and legal backlash against the Muslim community and their leaders."
Nov 10th, Bill O'Reilly: "As a soldier, we can't kill all the Muslims."
Nov 10th, Sean Hannity: "there is a chance our government knew all about this guy Hasan and did nothing because nobody wanted to be called an Islamophobe."
Nov. 7th, Philip Sherwell and Alex Spillius in Telegraph UK: "Major Nidal Malik Hasan worshipped at a mosque led by a radical imam said to be a "spiritual adviser" to three of the hijackers who attacked America on Sept 11, 2001." (this, by the way, is entirely untrue)
Nov. 11, blogger Jim Hoft: "Today there are more reported hate crimes against Christians in the United States than Muslims." I'll let Media Matters expose how absolutely fucking retarded that analysis is.
In short, Mika and Joe, you aren't nearly as alone as you think you are. There are spineless bullies in every corner of the media who are thrilled to puff up their chests and their careers with facile analysis that results in Muslim=Terrorist. And, in the end, if their bitter and suggestible audience ends up grabbing pitchforks and torches and heading for the nearest mosque, we can all take great comfort in knowing that Mika and Joe will be nowhere near.
