How the MSM Protects Its Favorites

Suppose, for just a moment that Rush Limbaugh went into an anti-Semitic tirade in which he accused the Israeli lobby of sabotaging him. We really don’t have to imagine. We have the example of just such an occurrence in the person of Patrick Buchanan who is roundly denounced for proclaiming essentially identical views to those expressed by Chas Freeman. Buchanan is denounced while, in the Washington Post, Walter Pincus puts lipstick on the Freeman pig.

From Powerline:

In his article on the withdrawal of Chas Freeman from his pending appointment as National Intelligence Council chairman, Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus provides an expurgated account of Freeman's parting blast. According to Pincus, the rap on Freeman derived from "questions about his impartiality."

Scott Johnson comments:

One would never know from the article that Freeman ascribed his withdrawal to "unscrupulous people with a passionate attachment to the views of a political faction in a foreign country," to "a special interest group," to "a powerful lobby determined to prevent any view other than its own from being aired," to "the Israel Lobby," to "a group so clearly intent on enforcing adherence to the policies of a foreign government - in this case, the government of Israel," or to any of the other variations Freeman worked into his statement.

Pincus's article does reveal that one of Freeman's congressional critics is named Israel. I'm sure that makes Freeman happy. Pincus's article does not report on any of the opposition to his appointment by activists for Chinese human rights activists and sympathizers (including my old teacher Jonathan Mirsky), or the reasons for their opposition. I'm sure that makes Freeman happy too.

Freeman's parting shot combined falsehoods, misdirection, and anti-Semitism combined with imputations of dual loyalty. It is not only newsworthy in itself, it also raises serious questions about the Obama administration's judgment. In short, the Washington Post has expurgated this story in a most discreditable manner.

Judge for yourself by realing Freeman's comments in full.

Are they that much different from Pat Buchanan's comments? And if Pat is classified as an anti-Semite, should Freeman be exempt?

Keep in mind that anti-Semitism is used as a cudgel by some of the leading lights of Liberalism. Take, for example Ben Smith accusing Sarah Palin of anti-Semitism for using this quote:

"We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty and sincerity and dignity,"

The anti-Semitism doesn’t jump out at you? Well let Smith explain:

…[this quote was] drawing from a once-powerful, now forgotten mid-century conservative columnist named Westbrook Pegler.

And who is Westbrook Pegler?

He was also known for what Philip Roth described as his "casual distaste for Jews," which had become so evident by the end that he was bounced from the journal of the John Birch Society in 1964 for alleged anti-semitism. According to his obituary, he'd advanced the theory that American Jews of Eastern European descent were "instinctively sympathetic to Communism, however outwardly respectable they appeared."

So now we must distance ourselves from closet anti-Semites who praise good people in small towns who exhibit honesty, sincerity and dignity because that will scare Ed Koch.