Reprinted from my column in today's Phiadelphia Inquirer
The broadcast Lords of Loud on talk radio and TV have longed been pressing the hateful rhetoric from the left. Bill O’Reilly is big on saying bemoaning the contemptible vitriol comes far more from the left, even as he incessantly repeats laudable vitriol like "baby killer" while equating legal abortions to the Holocaust prior to the Dr. George Tiller killing. And he does it with his fair and balanced reporting that he handles everything. He even brings in right wing bloggers like those who from the ultra conservative Townhall.com to back him up. If Bill wanted to get an actual balance, perhaps he might want to walk down the next cubicle and check in with his Fox News colleague and anchor, Shepard Smith on his Studio B show.
While reporting on the latest hate-kill, this one by a certified white supremacist at Washington’s Holocaust Museum, Smith took after those who questioned Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano’s earlier report revealing increased possibility for right wing fanatical action; a warning that the Republican leaders and right wing talk show host, especially on Fox News, pressured her to apologize for because, as Rush Limbaugh said...
"(The Homeland Security memo is) portraying standard, everyday conservatives as posing a bigger threat to this country than Al Quaeda terrorists..."
That, even though the word "conservative" was not in the report. And that, because the right felt there was nothing there to see.
"There are no Timothy’s McVeighs out there right now," said former Focus on the Family head, Dr. James Dobson.
Or they pulled out the time-honored classic, "because they hate the troops."
"I do believe that there are people within the Obama administration, on that bizarre Hollywood-Harvard access -- axis -- who really have a disdainful view of our troops," said Fox News strategic analyst, Ralph Peters. To which O’Reilly responded, "No, I -- listen, I understand the anger, because if you read the memo, it is unnecessary -- that's the word. This memo is unnecessary.
Even MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough laughed it off while saying, "Janet Napolitano is goin’ nuts."
But trying to digest the horror that had just taken place at the Holocaust Museum, Shepard Smith wasn’t laughing.
"The right went absolutely bonkers on (the memo)," said Smith. "They were warning us for a reason. Not for something political or social. They saw signs and now it has begun... The email(s), to me, has become more and more frightening. It’s not a new thing. It’s been happening over the past few month. It’s been happening to a degree since the election"
He then read an email he said was a "representative sample of what we get here."
"I cannot stand Hussein. He is a socialist, Marxist, who is at fast rate destroying this country."
"If you’re one who believers abortion is murder," Smith continued, "at what point do you go out and kill one who performs abortions.... If you’re one who believes these type of things about the President of the United States - and I could read a hundred like this - I mean from today. People who are so amped up and so angry for reasons that are absolutely wrong, ridiculous, preposterous... hate that is not based in fact and it’s ginning itself up. But more and more people are taking the extra step and taking the gun out."
Smith may be on to something. Jim David Adkisson walked into a Tennessee Unitarian Church last year and started shooting, killing two. He had written in his manifesto that Fox News contributor, Bernard Goldberg sparked his actions.
This was a symbolic killing. Who I wanted to kill was every Democrat in the Senate & House, the 100 people in Bernard Goldberg's book ("100 People Who Are Screwing Up America"). I'd like to kill everyone in the mainstream media. But I know those people were inaccessible to me. I couldn't get to the generals & high ranking officers of the Marxist movement so I went after the foot soldiers, the chickes**t liberals that vote in these traitorous people. Someone had to get the ball rolling. I volunteered. I hope others do the same. It's the only way we can rid America of this cancerous pestilence.
In Pittsburgh, cop killer Richard Poplawski, said he was fearful that his guns would be taken away and had posted a Fox News’ Glenn Beck video to a website where Beck advanced the conspiracy that the Obama administration was forming FEMA camps to confine citizens and taking away their guns.
"Hate that is not based in fact and it’s ginning itself up," says Smith, referring to blogs feeding hate-speech. While O'Reilly never seems to be able to find any hate-speech coming from the right, perhaps he might to want to check out patriotshop.us a "Great Gifts for American Patriots" website that offers a "Liberal Hunting License" sticker that pictures a donkey in a target with five bullet holes through it. The license list the dates for the license, 2009 through 2013. Nope, nothing here that might propose violence.
Nope, nothing here that might propose violence.
If Smith wanted to investigate one step further and find out where millions more are getting their factless hatred, he might have looked in the next cubicle or just checked out the rest of the Fox News schedule.
Former talk show host Steve Young is the author of "Great Failures of the Extremely Successful," (www.greatfailure.com), and blogs the appropriately-named steveyoungonpolitics.com