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“Despicable Goals”: ISIS And The Far-Right Have The Same Enemies’ List

ISIS and certain American conservatives have something in common: They both hate the same Muslim Americans. This became apparent Wednesday when the new issue of ISIS’s magazine, Dabiq, was released.  (I downloaded it on my home computer—which likely means hello no-fly list.)

In this issue of Dabiq, ISIS identifies Muslim Americans they believe should be targeted for death because they have become apostates per ISIS’s own made up version of Islam. Did any of these Muslims actually leave the faith? No, but ISIS claims that if a Muslim American is involved in American society, and especially in U.S. politics, he or she has become an apostate—even if that person is an imam who has dedicated his life to Islam.

Not that this matters to ISIS, but there’s no death penalty called for in the Quran for a person leaving the faith. But ISIS would never let the principles of Islam get in the way of its political goals.

And ISIS targeting Muslims for death is nothing new. As I have pointed out time and time again, ISIS’s mantra is submit to ISIS or die. They don’t care if you are the most devout Muslim in the world, they will kill you if you don’t do exactly what ISIS demands. That’s why experts note that 90 percent plus of the victims of ISIS are Muslims.

Now here’s the interesting part. Every person ISIS wants targeted, without exception, has already been targeted by American conservatives. Granted, not for death; things aren’t that bad yet. But they have been the targets of sustained political attacks. It appears that ISIS and many on the right in American politics both view the same Muslim Americans as a threat, but for different reasons.

ISIS has marked a diverse group of Muslim Americans for death, from white converts who are now leading imams to an African-American member of Congress to leaders of Muslim American organizations. These people are all very visible Muslim Americans who have also trashed ISIS countless times in the media. I will only list the names of the people targeted by ISIS if the person has agreed to my including their name or issued a public statement. (I don’t want to help ISIS terrorize people.) So here they are and here’s also a taste of the right-wing attacks waged against these very same people.

  1. Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) has been targeted for death by ISIS because as one of the two Muslims in Congress, he’s a visible role model for Muslims, inspiring them to become active in American politics and serve in our government.  Oddly enough, Ellison is also hated by the right for the same reason ISIS hates him, namely because he’s both very visible and effective. Just a few of the attacks include Former Rep. Michelle Bachmann, who claimed Ellison was part of the Muslim Brotherhood. Glenn Beck infamously questioned Ellison’s patriotism, demanding of Ellison on national television, “Sir, prove to me that you are not working with our enemies.” And the bottom-feeding website Breitbart.com (Trump’s biggest cheerleader) has attacked Ellison numerous times, alleging that he has nefarious (but fabricated) ties to terrorism.

Ellison issued a defiant statement in response to ISIS’s threat that truly sums up how Muslims view this murderous cult. Referring to ISIS as Da’esh, Ellison called it “a collection of liars, murderers, torturers, and rapists. No Muslim I know recognizes what they preach as Al-Islam.” Ellison added that he was in essence proud that Da’esh targeted him because it “means I am fighting for things like justice, tolerance, and a more inclusive world.”

  1. Imam Suhaib Webb. ISIS has attacked him as being the “All-American imam” who connects with young Muslim Americans by using “thug life vocabulary and the latest pop culture references.” And they blast Imam Webb for publicly praising President Obama after he offered blessings on the Muslim Eid holiday. ISIS hates any Muslim leader who, like Webb, is encouraging American Muslims to become part of the fabric of our nation. The guys in ISIS are in “great” company because both Fox News and Breitbart.com have also attacked Webb, making unsubstantiated claims that the imam has a history of “ties to radicalism.” And many in the anti-Muslim circle of hate from Robert Spencer to Front Page.com have led a campaign to smear Webb as a radical linked to terrorism.

Webb responded in a phone conversation that ISIS targeting this group of visible Muslim Americans is proof that they are having an impact in both countering ISIS’s efforts to recruit Muslims and ISIS’s lies.  “No one can ever say again that Muslim Americans aren’t speaking out against ISIS after this because there’s now proof with these threats that we are and that it’s both effective and angering ISIS,” Webb explained.

  1. Mohamed Elibiary. ISIS claimed that Elibiary was an apostate because he had worked in the Department of Homeland Security. Well, guess who else has attacked Elibiary? Ted Cruz’s new national security adviser, Frank Gaffney, who claimed Elibiary was part of “The Muslim Brotherhood’s infiltration of the Obama administration.” And Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) waged a jihad on Elibiary while he worked in DHS, apparently at the urging of people like Pam Geller.

Elibiary’s response to ISIS via Twitter was also defiant, noting proudly that ISIS targeted him for his “service enforcing American laws 2 protect all Americans, Muslims included.”

  1. Nihad Awad. The executive director of the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), Awad was pictured at the top of the article in the ISIS magazine in the crosshairs of a gun sight. ISIS wants him dead for his work in defending the civil rights of American Muslims to ensure they have the same rights as all other Americans and feel welcomed in America. (ISIS wants Muslim Americans to be alienated to make it easier to recruit them.) Yet, as most are likely aware, CAIR and Awad has long been attacked by people on the right, from GOP politicians like Ben Carson, who just a few months claimed CAIR is a “supporter of terrorism” to Fox News, to of course Cruz’s adviser Gaffney, who has smeared Awad as a “Hamas lover.”

Awad responded to being on ISIS’s hit list with a statement that read in part, “The best response to such threats is to continue challenging extremism, whether it is espoused by organizations like ISIS or by Islamophobes who seek to demonize Islam based on that group’s brutality. “

The big takeaway is that ISIS and the right in America have much in common on this subject. They both attack American Muslims who serve in our government and want to encourage other Muslims to do the same. They both ridicule those working to defend the rights of American Muslims to ensure that Muslims feel welcomed in our country. And they both fear that the more visible American Muslims become in contributing to our nation, the more it will undermine the vision they both share for how Islam should be defined.

Of course, there’s one big difference. ISIS wants these Muslims killed. The right in America only wants these Muslim Americans to be demonized, scorned, and marginalized.  Let’s hope that neither group will succeed in achieving their despicable goals.

 

By: Dean Obeidallah,  The Daily Beast, April 14, 2016

April 16, 2016 Posted by | American Muslims, Conservatives, ISIS, Keith Ellison | , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

“The Media’s Collusion With Politicians?”: Should A Member Of The Press “Clear The Air” With A Politician?

One of the arguments that is often used to point out unfairness is to suggest what things would look like if roles were reversed. For example, pointing out that a remark was sexist by asking what it would look like if the same thing were said to a man.

That kind of argument is so often abused that I tend to avoid it. Nevertheless, it was the first thing that came to mind when I heard that Fox News reporter Megyn Kelly had a private meeting with Donald Trump and reported that they had a chance to “clear the air.”

Let’s remember what happened here. In a Republican presidential debate Kelly asked Trump some tough questions. He didn’t like them and went on for days and weeks to say horribly sexist things about her. The feud disturbed the relationship Fox News had with the presidential contender and became the focus of a lot of press reports.

Here is where I want to employ the role change argument. What would we be saying about a media reporter who asked a Democratic candidate tough questions that eventually led to a private meeting to clear the air? I submit that holy hell would break out about the media’s collusion with politicians and failure to play their role as watch dogs.

In no way do I mean to imply any sympathy for Megyn Kelly. She is part of a media institution that, while pretending to be “fair and balanced,” is nothing more than a mouthpiece for conservatives. I’d propose that is why so few people find this whole episode to be unremarkable…it’s what we expect from Fox News.

I’ll not be breaking any new ground when I point out that this is actually a perfect example of how that network is not a news organization, but a PR arm of the Republican Party. But in this case, I think it still needs to be said out loud.

 

By: Nancy Letourneau, Political Animal Blog, The Washington Monthly, April 14, 2016

April 15, 2016 Posted by | Donald Trump, Media, Megyn Kelly | , , , , , , | 2 Comments

“Hey, Hillary: Smile, Girl”: An Unhappy Century For White Men, And It’s About To Get Worse

You know, the world would be a happier place if a girl would just smile more.

Just ask the guys on Twitter.

Now, by “girl,” I mean a former U.S. senator and secretary of state who is likely to be the first female president of these allegedly united states.

As for “the world,” let’s narrow it down. We’re talking mean men who apparently spend much of their day breathing into paper bags because they’re not even allowed to ask a secretary to grab them a cuppa joe anymore without someone from HR signing them up for diversity training.

What? No more office wife? Evidence of hell in a handbasket right there. Just ask them.

So now we’ve got this Hillary woman going all presidential on us. She’s everywhere. Giving speeches. Declaring victories. Starring in one town hall after another. How much suffering must a good ol’ boy endure?

“God,” they pray, “pick another name.”

On Tuesday night, Hillary Clinton did what even Hillary Clinton thought she wouldn’t do: She swept the primaries. Missouri (barely), Illinois, North Carolina, Florida — she won them and my home state of Ohio, which is in the Eastern time zone, people. Boy am I tired of (SET ITAL) that (END ITAL) question.

Clinton strolled her conquering self across the stage in Florida as results poured in, and she delivered a victory speech while some of the white guys in TV-land offered their critiques via Twitter.

MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough: “Smile. You just had a big night.”

Because nothing says “commander in chief” like a girlish grin for the camera.

Fox News’ Brit Hume: “Hillary having a big night in the primaries. So she’s shouting angrily in her victory speech. Supporters loving it. What’s she mad at?”

Well, golly. Let’s take a look at what she was saying.

This, for example:

“Our commander in chief has to be able to defend our country, not embarrass it; engage our allies, not alienate them; defeat our adversaries, not embolden them. When we hear a candidate for president call for rounding up 12 million immigrants, banning all Muslims from entering the United States, when he embraces torture, that doesn’t make him strong; it makes him wrong.”

Banning Muslims? Torture? Rounding up immigrants? Where are the punch lines, Madam Secretary? If you can’t find a joke in this material, how will you ever make us laugh about the Islamic State group?

Or this:

“Our campaign is for the steelworker I met in Ohio on Sunday night,” Clinton continued, “who’s laid off but hoping to get back to work. It’s for the mother I met in Miami whose five children haven’t seen their father since he was deported. She dreams of a day when deportations end and families are reunited on a path to citizenship in America. And it is for the mothers I stood with in Chicago yesterday, who have lost children to gun violence.”

Not one smile during that whole paragraph.

See what he means?

Fox News’ Howard Kurtz tweeted: “Hillary shouting her speech. She has the floor; a more conversational tone might be better for connecting with folks at home.”

Uh-oh.

Kurtz’s follow-up tweet: “Getting attacked for saying Hillary shouted. Was not saying she was shrill. I’ve just heard her deliver more effective speeches.”

This reminded me of another primary night — the one two weeks ago, when MSNBC cut away from Clinton’s live victory speech so that three guys could talk about how she needs to speak more softly.

At a rally.

Okey-dokey then.

Politics is still a home away from home for women, apparently. Takes me back to a moment a couple of years ago when a Republican U.S. senator, who clearly had no idea that I was married to one of his Democratic colleagues, asked me what I do with my days.

“I write for a living,” I told him.

“Good for you,” he said, swinging his fist across his chest. The smile on his face made me think he’d misunderstood me to say that I had just learned how to make my own aprons.

Some men hear what they want to hear, and too many men don’t want to hear from women at all. This is an unhappy century for them, and it’s only going to get worse. One grandmother barreling her way toward the presidency is bound to work up all kinds of other women who’ve had it up to here with the catcall mentality of men who measure our worth by our ability to make them feel better about their limited view of us.

“Where will it all end?” they wonder.

At the White House, I’d guess.

I’m smiling as I say that. Does that help?

 

By: Connie Schultz, Pulitzer Prize-Winning Columnist and Professional in Residence at Kent State University’s School of Journalism; The National Memo, March 17, 2016

March 18, 2016 Posted by | Hillary Clinton, Media, White Men | , , , , , , | 1 Comment

“How The GOP Stupidly Enabled A Donald Trump ‘Comeback'”: GOP Anti-Trumpers Lack The Credibility To Make The Kill

Remember when Donald Trump was losing?

If you blinked, you might have missed it.

It started during last Thursday’s debate, continued through the muddled results of Saturday’s caucuses and primaries, and lasted until, oh, around the time that news outlets began calling Mississippi for Trump a few minutes after the polls closed in the state on Tuesday night.

Now that Trump’s march to the nomination appears to be back on track with decisive victories in Michigan, Mississippi, and Hawaii, it’s worth pausing for a moment to assess just what went wrong with the #NeverTrump movement. Why has it done so little to alter the shape of the race? How has Trump managed to stay on top through the unrelenting critical coverage of the past week?

A good part of the answer lies in the distinctive defects of the messengers. In just about every case, those leading the charge against Trump lack the credibility to make the kill.

Let’s begin with Trump’s opponents in the race for the GOP nomination.

For two endless, sordid hours last Thursday night, Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz tag-teamed with the three Fox News debate moderators in laying into Trump. They were merciless. By the time it was over, Trump looked like an incompetent, vulgarian huckster whose renegade presidential campaign may well pose a dire threat to the republic.

Yet when Rubio and Cruz were asked at the conclusion of the debate if they would support Trump in the event that he secured the party’s nomination, both of them outed themselves as unprincipled Republican Party hacks by answering, astonishingly, yes.

In those 30 seconds, two hours of damage was undone. After all, how bad could Trump really be if both of his antagonists wouldn’t hesitate to rally to his side and work to see him prevail in a battle against Hillary Clinton?

A similar bit of self-sabotage was at work in Mitt Romney’s historic speech ripping Trump to shreds earlier that day. It was an extraordinarily powerful statement, and unlike anything we’ve ever seen before: The Republican standard-bearer from just four years ago excoriating the present-day frontrunner of his own party.

But the moment one’s attention drifted from the message — Trump is a fraud and a phony — to the messenger, the cognitive dissonance became too much to bear. As everyone knows, when Romney was governor of Massachusetts he signed into law the direct forerunner of the Affordable Care Act — and then ran a presidential campaign devoted to denouncing the federal version of the law as nothing less than the advent of tyranny in America.

Which seems like pretty compelling evidence that Romney himself must have been at least a little bit of a fraud and a phony at one of those past moments.

Then there are the sour memories of Romney’s ostentatiously oligarchic 2012 campaign — with its denigration of 47 percent of the country as moochers, obsequious praise of entrepreneurs, brittle defenses of Bain Capital’s role in sowing creative destruction, and talk of car elevators, dressage, and other perks of life among the richest of the rich.

How likely was it that Trump’s angry white working-class voters were going to be moved by an appeal made by such a man? No wonder it seems to have backfired.

Finally, Trump has also come in for severe criticism from “members of the Republican national security community,” several dozen of whom have signed a hotly worded “open letter” that culminates in the claim that Trump is singularly “unfitted” to serve as commander-in-chief.

They’re certainly right about that. The only problem is that nearly every one of the 117 people who have (so far) signed the letter supported the disastrous Iraq War, most of them favored the military intervention in Libya that has led to similarly ruinous consequences, and many have sharply criticized President Obama for failing to commit more forcefully to arming and defending so-called (and exceedingly difficult to detect) “moderate” rebel groups in the Syrian civil war.

These are the people judging Donald Trump unfit to serve as commander-in-chief of the armed forces?

Let’s just say that their opinions would carry somewhat more weight had they not repeatedly demonstrated over the past decade and half that they possess consistently poor judgment in matters of foreign affairs.

These were the anti-Trump messengers of the past week — the week when Trump started losing. And then started winning again.

The really surprising thing is that anyone was surprised.

 

By: Damon Linker, The Week, March 9, 2016

March 10, 2016 Posted by | Donald Trump, Establishment Republicans, GOP Primaries | , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

“The Master Media Manipulator”: It’s The Donald Trump Show, And The Media Are Nothing More Than Players

I wrote earlier about the peculiar spectacle Tuesday night of Donald Trump giving a 45-minute infomercial for his product lines, but I think it’s also worth noting how his post-primary press conferences illustrate his genius for media manipulation.

Two things specifically stuck out at me watching these performances. The first was that he stacks the first few rows of these events with his friends and supporters. And being a friendly audience, they eat up his shtick – laughing at his jokes and cheering on cue. For the casual viewer who doesn’t know any better, it might seem like he’s giving a “press conference” to an adoring media (as opposed to, say, a victory speech in front of supporters where crowd enthusiasm would be more expected).

Combine that with the second thing that has stuck out to me: When he gets around to taking questions, only he is mic’d up – you cannot hear his interlocutors’ questions. This gives him a couple of advantages. First, he can, at minimum, answer the question he wants to rather than the one asked, or he can go further, and on a rolling basis, screen out or ignore questions he doesn’t like. So Tuesday night, an NBC reporter reportedly – of course, TV viewers couldn’t hear the question – asked Trump about his verbal vulgarity and how parents should explain his language to their children. Trump didn’t like the question, so he didn’t answer it. Instead (perhaps taking a page from New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s bullying playbook) he derided the reporter: “Oh, you’re so politically correct, you’re so beautiful. Oh, look at you – aww, he’s so – oh I know you’ve never heard a little bad, a little off-language. I know, you’re so perfect. Aren’t you perfect? Aren’t you just a perfect young man. Give me a break. You know what? It’s stuff like that that people in this country are tired of. It’s stuff like that.”

What was the question? All viewers got was Trump the Dominant ridiculing a reporter while the rest of the audience at this “press conference” laughed along. It’s Trump’s show, and the reporters become muted bit players abetting him.

Of course that doesn’t even get at their bosses, the “cable news” execs who carry his every utterance as if he actually were the president. (And does any other politician get to phone in interviews as much as Trump, rather than having to get in front of a camera?) Look, I get that Trump has some entertainment value and that his unscripted nature means that you never know what is going to pop out of his mouth at any time. But there’s got to be some sense of balance and/or responsibility. Fox, CNN and MSNBC gave Trump 45 minutes in prime time. As Politico’s Hadas Gold noted Tuesday night, “Forty five minutes of uninterrupted TV time on the three cable news networks is the equivalent of millions of dollars in free media for a campaign – a stunning amount of TV time.”

And he gets it routinely, because he’s a master of manipulating the media.

 

By: Robert Schlesinger, Managing Editor for Opinion, U.S. News & World Report, March 9, 2016

March 10, 2016 Posted by | Donald Trump, Media, Reporters | , , , , , , | 2 Comments

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