The Tolerant Left

The Tolerant Left 79 Comments

Juan Williams has been fired by NPR.

Cable news blogger Johnny Dollar red-flagged NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik’s Twitter feed, which announced tonight that liberal NPR analyst/Fox News contributor Juan Williams’ contract was terminated — over comments Williams made about Muslims on The O’Reilly Factor. He gave his honest opinion: “[W]hen I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous.”
Guess who stirred up the pot to get Williams fired?

More: NPR – where the “P” stands for “Plantation”.


At Instapundit:

ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader Dale Beihoffer writes: “According to the NYT story on Juan Williams, ombudswoman Alicia C. Shepard said that Juan was a ‘lightning rod’ for NPR, noting that ’she had received 378 listener e-mails in 2008 listing complaints and frustrations about Mr. Williams.’ Your readers should be able to do much better than 378 emails to her!”

Just 378? Heck, I think we can manage that many ourselves. Click here to complain that Ombudsman Alicia C. Shepard should be fired for her illiberal position on the Juan Williams controversy.

79 Replies to “The Tolerant Left”

  1. I hope the following is a credible analogy. Let me know if you disagree.
    In today’s politically correct environment, isn’t it odd that it is acceptable to say this:
    “On a recent trip to what was East Berlin, I was driving through a neighborhood and saw a number of young white male skinheads hanging out on a street corner when I stopped for a red light. It made me very nervous.”
    Though it is unacceptable to say this:
    “On a recent trip to the south side of Chicago, I was driving through a neighborhood and saw a number of young black men hanging around a street corner when I stopped for a red light. It made me a little nervous.”
    Both are acceptable reactions. Both are likely what 99.9% of the population would feel, yet one would likely get you fired if you said it publicly. What a strange world we live in!

  2. Kathy
    But CNN did not wrote why he is afraid of the “people in Muslim garb”, only that he is afraid. The way they wrote it seems like he really is just an islamophobe/racist, i.e. more spin from MSM.

  3. I have zero sympathy for Mr. Williams – he reaped what he sowed. I have heard him countless times defend the indefensible. He is part of the left wing tribe that created the rules by which he was let go. He has no one to blame but himself.

  4. The Ismaili women I have worked with are outstanding people, well-dressed, classy, cool and calm, genuinely superb individuals, and their ethnic community is very charitable and active.
    It may be so. There are many shia from Iran who are also cool, calm, superb individuals. Their community is vibrant, well educated and some of them died for their beliefs when visiting Iran – beliefs in democracy that is , not in sharia. . Still, some of them believe in what Khomeini professed and would like to introduce sharia to Canada. So the relevant question is not what majority of their branch of Islam believe but what this particular person believe in.

  5. I wish Juan well. Honesty will always triumph.
    Slightly O/T po’ed, we had our 3rd giant windmill public meeting of the month last night. I counted seven uniformed OPP officers, five plainclothes OPP, and eight private security. And a posted demand that no video or cameras were permitted! Welcome to rural Ontario!
    I think the WASPs are humming. Videos will be posted shortly.

  6. He’s been officially DENOUNCED by some HuffyPoo commenter who appears to consider him/herself the voice of the “Black or Brown Community” (capitalization in original, fer gawdsake) as a “TOM”
    Honestly, it’s just impossible to parody these people any more.

  8. Although I didn’t vote for Nenshi (he was my second choice after McIver), he never once described himself as anything other than a “Calgarian”.

  9. I agree 100% with ‘Yoptvoimat’. I have been very fortunate to have befriended many Ismaili Canadians. The ones I’ve met are just as “Westernized” as you & me, have exactly the same foibles as you & me, and the same hopes & dreams for their children as well.
    Incidentally, there’s an interesting background story on how so many of them came to move to Canada in the early 1970’s. When Idi Amin came to power, he forced all Ismailis to leave. As the story goes … their spiritual leader, the Aga Khan, went to Harvard with Pierre Trudeau. He apparently made a phone call to his old classmate and asked if Canada would accept thousands of Ismailis.
    I am convinced our country is a better place for it!

  10. “I think the WASPs are humming.”
    -John
    I couldn’t figure out that comment until I read the monumentally brain dead, ignorant comment that sparked it. I assume that you, like myself, are a member of the elite in Southern Ontario and spend most of your time asking people about their social status, income and education? (Thank God nobody has ever asked me!)
    Seriously, how does a person get so bigoted and ignorant regarding millions of people?
    Fortunately most of the Westerners I meet don’t have their heads up their butts.

  11. Progressive/socialists’ libtard abhore free speech, they want to control the content of public debates and if someone says something the progressives don’t like they go after said person like sharks to chum. The progressives’ need to be stopped, they are an out of control fascists bunch of arseholes, leading this pack of retarded over emotive zealots are feminists. He’s just the latest victim in a long list of victims the progressives’ smear and libel for blood sport. I hope he sues the pants off all those involved, character assassination is the latest lib tool to silence their opponents.

  12. HD, I took a more ‘liberal’ view of the comment.
    When you are surrounded by police, have to show ID and are videotaped when entering a public meeting (all “for your own safety” as the constable explains), your viewpoint on those comments may vary.
    The hive is on University Avenue in Trawana(sic). When you start hitting it with a big stick (figuratively of course)it start to hum. Sticks that are keeping the OPP Public Liason Team very busy.
    Rob Ford is William Lyon Mackenzie redux. He must be stopped before the rest of us get too uppity.
    By the by, my videos and email bring great amusement to the OPP, as do my comments at SDA I suppose.

  13. Gord Tulk: “Is it a fair question to ask this legislator if he favors having sharia law?”
    Jonathan Kay, writing in today’s National Post (that liberal rag!), offers thoughts that may be of some relevance to your question:
    “The happy truth is that multiculturalism is a fraud — a made-up word whose function is to cover up Canada’s real cultural policy: integrating immigrants into Canadian society. Canadian officialdom may spout a lot of bumpf about respecting other cultures. But the fact is that whenever any part of those cultures comes into conflict with the values we hold dear — liberalism, religious pluralism, humane treatment of children, respect for women, equal treatment for gays — we properly demand that immigrants adjust their values to conform with Canada’s. To the extent multiculturalism means anything, it is the right to dress, eat and pray as one wishes — a right that already is treated as a baseline in any liberal society, whether or not it proclaims itself “multicultural.”
    “Seen in this light, could there be a better example of Canadian “multiculturalism” than the election of Naheed Nenshi as Calgary mayor this week?…[A]s Kevin Libin reported in Wednesday’s Post, the man’s religious and ethnic background was the furthest thing from Calgary voters’ minds. They were more fixated on an impressive resumé that included stints at Harvard and the elite McKinsey & Co. management consulting company, as well as his engagement with civic issues and non-profit groups — not to mention his ideas and enthusiasm for improving Calgary…
    “Although we are talking about a mere municipal election, there is a model here for the rest of the country. If multiculturalism is to be understood as a social contract between minority cultures and established Canadian society, then both sides must pursue their obligations in good faith. Immigrants and their children should do their best to integrate — which means learning an official language, getting an education, and becoming a productive member of society — while the rest of us should do our best to exhibit genuine colour-blindness.
    “It is only when one side or the other ignores these obligations that a cycle of conflict emerges. Immigrants who insist on special treatment — say, by demanding the right to veil their women in courtrooms, or by demanding to have their legal cases heard according to the tenets of their own religious law — create the (false) impression that immigrants from certain backgrounds cannot become “real” Canadians. On the other side of the coin, unprovoked expressions of bigotry toward new Canadians cause immigrants to view themselves as a besieged minority, which only encourages militant gestures and ghettoization.”

  14. I wish you had been in Calgary on 9/11, Davenport.
    The joy expressed that day by Muslim taxi drivers was a real eye opener.

  16. Oz, some are too blinkered by Marxist ideology to notice the joy of the Muslim taxi drivers.

  17. Davenport, truly you are a glittering jewel of perfect liberalism.
    A Black man, a liberal commentator for NPR, one of your own, gets fired for expressing his own feelings on a topic of interest. On a -different- network.
    He is summarily fired from what is virtually an all-white radio network paid for by tax dollars. He is kicked to the curb as if the 1960’s and Martin Luther King had never happened, and has his sanity insulted by the president of NPR into the bargain.
    SDA reacts with uniform condemnation of this unjustified action, because it is bullsh1t for NPR to fire this man over this issue. (And we don’t even -like- the guy, personally I think he’s a dork who’s wrong about everything in life.)
    So here you are Davenport, the noble Toronto socialist lecturing the thuggish SDA rednecks on being more tolerant. I think not, my dear.
    I’m pretty sure nobody thinks the mayor of Calgary’s most important attribute is his religion. I’m pretty sure Hizhonor the mayor doesn’t seek to impose Sharia on Calgary. I’m pretty sure that’s not the point.
    The point, dear Davenport, is that no one dares ask him the question. They would be FIRED for even suggesting the question might be relevant, never mind actually asking it.
    People like yourself make things like that happen, Davenport. Liberals, not conservatives. I for one am not going to let you slide on it. This -you- get to wear.

  18. From Davenport, Jonathan Kay wrote: “Canadian officialdom may spout a lot of bumpf about respecting other cultures. But the fact is that whenever any part of those cultures comes into conflict with the values we hold dear — liberalism, religious pluralism, humane treatment of children, respect for women, equal treatment for gays — we properly demand that immigrants adjust their values to conform with Canada’s.”
    That sounds very nice but I think it’s rarely true. For example, “dare” talk about the inhumanity of honour killings and officialdom shuts you down faster than …. You get the idea.

  19. ET is now veering towards holocaust denial. The Nazis were in no way motivated by religion. They were resolved to kill off the Jewish nation as a people, without regard for religion. Very large numbers of the Jews thay killed were in fact Lutheran or Catholic by religion. Many more were atheists.
    As we know from experience, the stupid don’t learn, and so this will be wasted on ET, but I’ll repeat it for the benefit of any innocent soul who’s tempted to take her seriously. The Jews are a nation, defined by common descent. You’re a Jew if you’re born a Jew. Like anybody else, a Jew can have any religion or none, but it’s generally expected that Jews will practise Judaism. Judaism is a religion. It’s supposed to practised only by Jews. To convert to Judaism is to naturalize as a Jew, and a convert is required to be treated in all ways as if he had been born a Jew.
    Nazism was predicated on race, not religion. Hitler considered the Jews as a people to be worthy of death, without regard for their religion. He felt exactly the same way about the Gypsies, the Poles and the Ukrainians, who were all pretty much entirely Christian. Just like the Germans, whom Hitler had no desire to kill. The Holocaust was important. To misrepresent it so seriously is reprehensible. I’d suggest to ET that she open her eyes and realize what road she’s heading down.

  20. ebt – I’d suggest that you stick to the issues and steer clear of trying to win an argument by insults.
    Your opinion that ‘the Jews are a nation’ is just that: your opinion. It’s not fact; it’s not truth.
    Who says the Nazis were motivated by religion? They were motivated by fascism – and fascism is a utopian ideology that posits a perfect state, based on an ideal population/mode of life that presumably existed in the past. In this case of the Third Reich, the fascist utopian population was ethnically ‘pure Aryan’ and they defined anyone outside of this as..non-human. What does this have to do with religion?
    The fact that many of the people murdered by the Third Reich had moved, long ago, out of the Judaic religion was not the point; according to the Reich, these people were ‘genetically impure’, being non-Aryan. These were primarily of Judaic ancestry but as you acknowledge, included Roma or gypsies (who are not a nation) and people of other ethnicities, including slavs, polish, etc…and disabled, etc..[who are also not a ‘nation’.]
    What does the FACT that Judaism is a religion have to do with denying the holocaust?
    Again, Judaism is a religion not a nation. The term ‘nation’ means, not a population defined by ethnicity or genetic commonality [that’s a tribe] – but a population defined both geographically AND sharing a culture, traditions. Many of the so-called Jewish people of Germany had lost all cultural and traditional connections to the Judaic religion. Therefore, they were not part of the ‘nation of Jews’; they were Germans, but not aryans. That’s the key.
    Again, stick to the issues and don’t move into insults.

  22. ind: “It’s like saying that the sight of a black person on the street makes you nervous”
    I think a better analogy is to say that the sight of a Black Panther makes you nervous. Or a Hell’s Angel, or a Nazi skinhead, or……others?

  23. Its just proves that free speech in any form is now considered a friable excuse to cook people in a self righteous stew of their own making..
    So much for the 4th Estate & its braying about the right to speak truth or have a free press. Internal censorship by political commune is more threatening in the long run, than even the Islamists.
    JMO

  24. I hope FNC continues the segment with Juan and MaryKatherine Ham, I just love the way she rolls her eyes whenever Juan is trying to make some ridiculous point.

  26. The NPC Contact link is working again. Even though I’m Canadian (they don’t know that), I sent off a sternly worded missive the the NPR ombudsman. I recommend everybody flood their office with (respectfully-worded) letters of outrage.

  27. The left is never one to waste an opportunity,throwing one of their own under the bus if they aren’t radical enough.
    Witness Mike Harcourt’s gracious exit ‘stage left’, pushed out by Mo-Mo-Mo and Glenocchio Clark, two extremists from the unionized left. Harcourt ws a middle of the road consensus fellow, more than willing to debate and discuss the issues. You may have disliked Premier ‘Bonehead’s politics, but he was a decent fellow.
    Witness the current lament amongst the radicals in the BC NDP, Carole James, current leader, is bland and without much controversy. She is very proper and civil……and the radicals in the party hate her for it, and want to toss her under the bus as fast as possible. They smell their chance at government, but she ain’t radical. Instead, they would rather have Jim Sinclair, or some other off-the-deepend leftard, as if it was manna from heaven.
    Yes, the left eat their own, and you have to be an extremist, a purist…..or it’sunder the bus you go!

  28. “I get worried. I get nervous.”
    To me, these are the pivotal words in Mr. Williams’ remarks. Everyone will note he is not inciting hatred or violence in others towards Muslims; he is not alleging they are perpetrators of, or considering, crimes. He is not suggesting he believes they are terrorists. All he is doing is articulating his feelings.
    For that, he gets fired. Apparently, groupthink is alive and well at NPR. Perhaps you are allowed the 7 or so inches between your ears to think or feel as you wish, but you are certainly not allowed to express your feelings. That is the most frightening aspect of this affair to me.

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