"Islam vs. Islamists": the latest PBS controversy

Published by Real Clear Politics - July 11, 2007
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Recently we learned that PBS had refused to air an anti-Islamist documentary "Islam vs. Islamists", which they themselves had commissioned, in its intended form because it was, in their view, too alarmist. For me, this was the last straw. It's time for this particular viewer to bid a final sad farewell to a dear old friend: PBS. Why? Because their increasingly pervasive multicultural bias has made it virtually impossible for them to air any informative and objective programming without investing it with some form of liberal propaganda.

Times, however, are changing and the stakes are becoming higher. I can no longer hide behind that gentlemanly expedient of just agreeing to disagree with my liberal friends. Their relentless obstructionist multiculturalism is putting my life -- indeed, all of our lives -- in jeopardy.

Every time the PBS left wins a battle, we come closer to losing the war. Every time the ACLU wins a lawsuit that impedes our ability to monitor a possible terrorist plot, every time an Immigration Attorney blocks a community's attempts to control their illegal immigrant problems, every time Amnesty International or the International Red Cross lays claim to the purported moral high ground and subsequently makes it more difficult for us to effectively interview a captured enemy combatant in order to get information on a current terrorist cell or a planned attack, such as those recently thwarted in London and Glasgow, we lose vital ground to the enemy.

And, to be fair, it's not just the anti-Bush PBS liberals who are to blame for this increasingly dangerous national 'head in the sand' state of denial.

Immediately following the 9/11 attacks statements from our own government were often confusing and contradictory. President Bush informed us forcefully -- if somewhat ambiguously -- that we had been attacked by a group of 19 Middle Eastern terrorists, 17 of whom had come from Saudi Arabia -- a nation which was, nevertheless, to be regarded as one of our staunchest allies in the region. We were further informed that although all of the terrorists were Muslims, we were definitely not at war with Islam, which he described as a 'religion of peace'. Then -- in one of the most remarkable misreading of public sentiment ever made by an American President -- we were admonished not to consider launching some Twenty-First Century American-style "Kristallnacht" against those peaceful Muslims living amongst us.

Finally, and incomprehensibly, we were advised that the best thing that we could do to fight this new "War on Terror" was to go about our business as usual and continue going out to dinner and shopping at our malls -- because to change our "way of life" in any way would somehow constitute a "victory for the terrorists". Imagine FDR giving this advice to his beleaguered radio audience in one of those "fireside chats", in 1942.

Unfortunately, in the years since 9/11, President Bush has made, and continues to make, many such inscrutable statements.

Given these often confusing messages, together with the relentless attacks against the current administration from the internationalist left, it's no wonder that half of this country finds it so hard to believe that we're in a righteous war -- and, of course, this national ambiguity is one of our enemy's most valuable weapons.