The MSM: Can’t Run, But They Sure Can Hide

 
William Tucker at The American Enterprise Institute — that den of warmongering corporatists — has an interesting idea for the brave MSM:

…the newspapers—they’re just incredible, huh? The New York Times has risked its neck by revealing that the Bush Administration has been monitoring overseas phone calls. Stogy old Commentary is comparing this to the isolationist Herald Tribune printing a story in 1942 telling the Japanese we had broken their code. Those neoconservative loonies think the Times ought to be prosecuted for divulging secrets in wartime! Well, it’s a different world, brother! Our press today will go to jail en masse rather than give up freedom of speech!

Mr. Tucker reminds us not to forget the brave and the bold in Hollywood, their daring controversial films, their leading edge confrontational approach. Yessir, a brave bunch, rushing in where angels fear to tread. Well, actually, they go places no angel would be caught dead in. Funny thing is, wherever they go, the place is packed with mirrors. Hollywood never goes anywhere that doesn’t permit it to see its own reflection, any more than the media would go to places where it can’t hear its own echo.

As Mr. Tucker, puts it: “Yes, there’s nothing our good old courageous media won’t tackle, is there?” You could see his rhetorical question just coming down the line, couldn’t you? Okay, here’s the set up and a modestly proposed solution to the quaking fear of the MSM:

... It turns out not a single TV network and only two newspapers—the New York Sun and the Philadelphia Inquirer—have dared publish the dozen Danish cartoons that have set off riots around the world. Even the New York Press, which once ran a whole column in which a writer described removing a boil from his scrotum, has chickened out. Four staff members quit in protest last week after the top brass backed down.

That guy with the boil? He just wanted you to know he actually has a scrotum, which is more than one can say for many of his confreres.

But here’s Mr. Tucker’s point about the sudden vast media modesty:

…everybody’s mumbling something about “respect for religion” and “not wanting to offend anybody,” but the real reason is transparent. They’re scared to death. Publishing portraits of rock stars posing as Jesus or putting naked movie stars on the cover of Vanity Fair—that’s all in a day's work. Only a bunch of hillbillies down in Arkansas will be offended. But publishing a cartoon of Mohammed with a bomb in his turban—now that’s serious. Somebody might start throwing rocks or set off a bomb in the office.

Then Mr. Tucker offers a sensible Gallic shrug. Why bother trying not to offend Muslims? Our very existence is offensive, and their raison d’être is war. Endless war: with us, with each other, with whatever moves. What other culture do you know that shows its exuberance by going out in the street and shooting firearms into the air? Besides Texans, I mean. So, says Mr. Tucker, get used to it, because there’s not a damn thing we can do to change matters when it comes to Muslim explosiveness:

Nothing we say or do will make Muslims like us any better. Islam has been beating down the door of Western Civilization since the time of Charlemagne. They conquered Spain, took Constantinople in 1453, besieged Vienna in 1529 and again in 1683. The Turks blew up the Parthenon in 1687 and fighting between Greeks and Turks continued into this century. The Balkans became the “powder keg of Europe” once the Turks invaded.

And it isn’t just us. Islam is at war with every civilization on its borders. They’re fighting with India, with China, with African tribes in Sudan. Nor do Muslims ever stop fighting among themselves. The whole history of Islam is a story of a group of dissidents going out into the desert, deciding the religion practiced by the elites was not the “true Islam,” and crashing back upon the cities to seize power. The word “assassins” comes from a Persian cult whose members drugged themselves with hashish before carrying out suicide attacks. The Muslim Brotherhood and al-Qaeda are just the latest of a long, long line.

Islam is a culture that has never learned to curb male violence. All it can do is export it.

This exporting of Muslim violence wouldn’t be so noticeable if the Europeans weren’t so flaccid and neutered. It’s much easier to explode in the middle of a city which gave up its manhood years ago.

However, Mr. Tucker things the multi-culti approach here is downright dangerous. And he figures there’s some safety in numbers. Here’s his solution:

In order to put some backbone in the press for the trials ahead, let’s pick a day—I nominate February 28th, two weeks from today—in which every newspaper in America and every TV news station in America will display the offending cartoons. For the faint-hearted there’ll be safety in numbers. It will inform the public and restore our self-respect. It certainly won’t ingratiate us with world of Islam, but what’s the difference? At least they’ll know they’re facing a united front.

And that makes all the difference in the world. Thugs respect courage; it makes them back off:

When the Germans overran Denmark during World War II, they immediately announced that all Jews must wear the yellow star. Instead of cowering in their homes, every man, woman and child in the country donned a yellow star, including the King of Denmark. It seems only fitting that we return the favor.

In order to make his suggestion more credible, he gives directions to his home, since he telecommutes to the office:

And if you’re planning to bomb The American Enterprise offices in retaliation for this column, please don’t bother. I hardly ever set foot in the place. I live at 430 4th Street in Brooklyn, right around the corner from the ice cream storeowner who was just sentenced to 18 years for smuggling $11 million to terrorists in the Middle East and two doors up from a fireman who was killed on September 11th. I’m home every day.

Now this is a great idea, but it doesn’t go far enough. Instead of just one day, the MSM ought to be printing, posting, or otherwise disseminating images of Mo in his various and hilarious disguises all year long. The devil hates ridicule (I gave up believing in devils in adolescence, when I gave up the God with the white beard. I still don’t believe in the latter, but Lordy, those Islamofascists sure do make you realize the deep truth of incarnate evil) but there’s nothing like a large, eternal dose of it to help the medicine go down. And the medicine is this:

We will not be cowed. As our famous war hero once (or twice) said: “Bring. It. On.” Let us make like Denmark and march out wearing our yellow stars, our crosses, carrying small statues of Buddha, and chanting “Om Mani Padme Hum.” Catchy little tune.

Let the newspapers carry a daily Mo cartoon, maybe right next to the weather. We could even assign a Muslim Mayhem prediction to the image: chance of explosions, thirty percent, let’s say.

If they need an image, here’s one from Disposable Wisdom (and apparently from the infamous Retecool.com) to start the stalwart press off on the right foot. Or the right hand and foot, depending on whether they’re standing tall or scooting away on all fours.

 

Hat tip: OS