Sunday, April 29, 2007

No, Brian, don't thank me, I'm just trying to help.


Recall that, recently, I introduced you to Blogging Tory Brian Lemon and his ambitious plan to expose that nefarious mainstream media bias. (In case you've forgotten, that would be the same Brian Lemon who promised to remove an atrociously dishonest post if it was proven to be nonsense but, sadly, hasn't quite gotten around to it, what with his being busy exposing that nefarious mainstream media bias and all.)

In any event, I'm sure exposing that nefarious mainstream media bias is a tough job, so I thought we could all help him out -- make it a group effort, as it were. So I figured I could start things off here, where The Politic's George Freeman is just all gushy over the Western Standard's resident screeching, religious street person Ted Byfield:

Byfield cites a good exchange—a succinct comparison—in a recent radio interview:

[As compared to the odd shooting of an abortionist, there is] the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, the nightclub in Bali, the theatre in Moscow, the school in Chechnya, the slaughter in Nigeria over a beauty contest—one death against thousands.


Now, what strikes you as a bit odd about the above? Give it time, it'll come to you.

Why, yes, there it is. First, Byfield downplays the murder of abortion providers ("the odd shooting of an abortionist"), but then goes on to quantify that number as "one." Now, I may not have the entire collection of slain abortion doctor action figure playing cards, but I'm fairly sure it's more than one. In fact, I can pretty well guarantee that it's at least three. I'm hoping that Brian will agree here that, when it comes to bias, even right-wing whackjobs should agree that one doesn't equal three. But it doesn't end there.

One wonders why Byfield sees fit to not mention Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, who openly admitted in an interview with Time magazine that, while he wasn't a regular churchgoer, he was still somewhat religious (168 killed, just in case you're keeping score). And who among us could forget Eric Rudolph (emphasis added):

... an American anti-abortion extremist and domestic terrorist who committed a series of bombings across the southern United States, which killed three people and injured at least 150 others...

Rudolph was "connected with the Christian Identity movement, a militant, racist, and anti-Semitic organization."; today, he self-identifies as a Catholic.

Correct me if I'm wrong but, so far, that strikes me as more than "one."

So there you have it, Brian -- some serious media bias over at the Western Standard, and I'm assuming you'll be all over that like Steve Janke on Cindy Sheehan's laundry hamper.

And my regular readers are invited to help Brian out as well, except that he doesn't list an email address to get hold of him, which means that, sadly, he really doesn't give a fuck what you think but just send those tidbits to me and I'll try to keep Brian up to date as best I can.

It's the least we can do since Brian is obviously a crazy busy guy and, if we do the legwork for him, he might someday get the time to go back and, you know, correct the record.

We can always hope.

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