11 Feb Opinion: Chuck Morse
Contact: Chuck Morse (617) 271-5044 / www.chuckmorse.com
Debating Islamic Terrorism with a liberal radio host Chuck Morse
Liberal talkmeister Leslie Marshall invited me on her radio program, August 14, to challenge my reference to “Islamic terrorists” in an article I wrote for the Providence Journal entitled Standing up to Islamic terrorism implying that I am anti-Muslim. She inanely argued that Hitler had not been referred to as a “Catholic terrorist.” This contention, echoed by one of her callers, reveals contempt for Christianity all too often found bubbling below the surface on the left.
bin-Laden and his radical followers proclaim themselves to be true Muslims, a claim that the vast majority of Muslims fortunately reject and one that runs contrary to more peaceful Islamic traditions. Hitler, while born a Catholic, was hardly the leader of a radical Catholic or Christian movement. Rather, Nazism, like Communism, was a radical secular socialist movement that rejected Judeo-Christian conceptions of God and morality and sought to subordinate Christianity while attempting to annihilate Judaism.
Taking umbrage over my reference in the article to the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) as apologists for Islamic terrorism, Marshall proceeded to disclose, on the air, that she had spoken at one of their events.
The chilling charge that to criticize Islamic terrorists would disparage all Muslims is the exact tactic being employed by CAIR as they seek to silence critics of a radical Islamic movement that deliberatly kills innocent people. In 1993, Omar Ahmad, co founder of CAIR, was picked up on an FBI surveillance tape at a Hamas meeting explaining that the IAP, widely viewed at the time as a Hamas front, could not, for political reasons, admit to supporting Hamas. The CAIR co-founder proceeded to discuss how the Hamas agenda could be cloaked and advanced.
The American people are, by and large, not anti-Muslim as evidenced by the restrained and tolerant reaction on the part of the vast majority of the American public, with a few scattered exceptions, to the attack on 9/11. Anyone with a half a whit knows that to criticize Islamic terrorists would have no more to do with being anti-Muslim than criticizing Nazism would have been anti-German during World War II.
Marshall became outraged when I buttressed my charge that CAIR is a lap-dog for terrorists with quotes from Democratic Senators Charles Schumer and Barbara Boxer. Senator Schumer had stated that “we know (CAIR) has ties to terrorism…intimate links with Hamas.” In discussing a decision to rescind an award given to a CAIR official, Senator Boxer stated “To praise an organization (CAIR) because they havent been indicted is like somebody saying ‘I’m not a crook.”
In scolding tones, Marshall informed me that I was now talking to her, not Shumer and Boxer, dropping the fact that she had interviewed Senator Schumer previously, that this was her radio show, and that her show is nationally syndicated as opposed to my radio show which is scheduled to start in September on WEIM, Fitchburg, Mass. Her lack of humor grew progressively into an ugly diatribe.
I realize that some talk show hosts think that conflict boosts ratings but this is not an issue that should lend itself to careerism. With Islamic terror cells amongst us, one most recently found plotting a shoot-out at Fort Dix in New Jersey, radio commentators might consider focusing more on understanding and identifying the nature of the enemy rather than on scoreing cheap points with manufactured issues. Furthermore, It would be appropriate for a radio personality such as Leslie Marshall to consider whether she is being used as a useful idiot in the service of an organization that supports those who seek to harm this nation