Fort Hood Shooting

On Boston Bombing Anniversary, CNN Analyst Says U.S. Right-Wing Extremists Kill More Than Jihadists
By Kristine Marsh | April 15, 2014 | 4:13 PM EDT

Are “right-wing” extremists more dangerous than Al-Qaeda terrorists? According to CNN’s National Security Analyst Peter Bergen, they are. In a CNN commentary posted yesterday Bergen wrote, “U.S. right wing extremists [are] more deadly than jihadists.” He also also happens to be a director for the George Soros-funded liberal New America Foundation. What a coincidence.

 Bergen claimed that “white supremacists, anti-abortion extremists and anti-government militants have killed more people in the United States than have extremists motivated by al Qaeda’s ideology.” He cited a New America study which counted 34 people killed by right-wing extremist acts and just 23 people killed by Al Qaeda-linked terrorism, after 9/11. Why start there? Wouldn’t the 2,977 people killed that day by jihadists skew those findings somewhat?

Rep. Keith Ellison: Islamist Terrorists Struggle For Democracy Like We Struggle Here For Income Equality
By Mark Finkelstein | January 17, 2014 | 9:11 AM EST

Whatever the question, politicians have a way of working their issue of the day into the answer.  Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minnesota) took that tendency to new heights today.

Asked on Morning Joe to explain the disproportionate amount of terrorism against the United States that emanates from the Islamic world, Ellison, the first Muslim Member of Congress, asserted that it is the struggle for democracy, not the Islamic faith, that motivates the terrorism.  In a giant leap, Ellison then compared people in Islamic countries "who don't want to yield power to the vast majority" . . . to the struggle in the United States over "income inequality." View the video after the jump.

Flashback: In 2009, Media Cringed That Fort Hood Killer Was Muslim Since It ‘Inflames’ Right Wing, ‘Makes It Much Worse’
By Rich Noyes | August 6, 2013 | 4:25 PM EDT

The military trial of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan began Tuesday, with the government arguing that the onetime Army psychiatrist was motivated by “a jihad duty to kill as many soldiers as possible,” while Hasan —  representing himself —  seemed to agree, arguing: “Evidence will clearly show that I am the shooter and the dead bodies will show the war is an ugly thing.”

But in the hours and days after the November 5, 2009 shooting that killed 13 soldiers and wounded more than two dozen others, liberal journalists resisted the idea that this episode was part of the broader war on terrorism and openly fretted about how everyday Americans would respond to news that a Muslim soldier had committed such a massacre. As NPR’s Nina Totenberg mourned at the time: “It really is tragic that he was a Muslim.”

Here are some of the quotes MRC/NewsBusters gathered at the time:

NBC Affiliate: Ft. Hood Shooter Still Drawing Paycheck, Victims Denied Benefits; When Will 'Nightly News' Cover?
By Ken Shepherd | May 23, 2013 | 6:10 PM EDT

Fort Hood shooter Maj. Nidal Hassan is still drawing his military paycheck while the Defense Department has refused to deem Hassan's victims as suffering combat-related wounds, which would entitle them to Purple Hearts and additional pay and benefits to aid the cost of their rehabilitation, Scott Friedman of Dallas, Texas, NBC affiliate KXAS reported on Wednesday morning. [watch the original KXAS report below the page break]

Yesterday, native Texan and MSNBC anchor Tamron Hall aired Friedman's report on her NewsNation program in her "Gut Check" segment in which she asked her viewers to weigh in on her Facebook page, "Should the Pentagon designate the Fort Hood shooting a terrorist attack?" [For their part, 76 percent of her viewers agreed that it should.] Although this is a pretty compelling report, at time of publication, neither NBC's Nightly News nor Today programs have aired the story.

MSNBC's Alex Wagner Hints O'Reilly Believes Obama's a Secret Muslim
By Jeffrey Meyer | April 24, 2013 | 3:01 PM EDT

Ultra-liberal MSNBC host Alex Wagner may have hit a new low on the Wednesday edition of her program, Now.  Discussing the response to the Boston bombing, Wagner absurdly hinted that Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly and Charles Krauthammer's criticism of Barack Obama are "a precursor" to saying that "the president [is] actually secretly a Muslim." 

Speaking directly to Politico’s Maggie Haberman, who as of today appears to be suffering from Fort Hood amnesia, Wagner railed against Fox News and conservatives who call for more active surveillance of potential terrorists.   [See video after jump.  MP3 audio here.]

Fort What? Politico Asserts Obama 'No Longer Has an Unblemished Record' on Stopping Domestic Terrorism
By Tim Graham | April 20, 2013 | 7:39 AM EDT

Add Anna Palmer and her blinkered editors at Politico to this week's outbreak of Fort Hood amnesia. In a piece on how the Boston bombings would affect the political scene, she asked, "Where does this leave Obama’s record on terror?" She answered herself: "President Barack Obama no longer has an unblemished record in stopping domestic terrorism."

To the Obama voters at Politico it all begins and ends at Zero Dark Thirty, and no one there can seem to have the memory of a certain terrorist mass shooting that killed 13 and wounded 30:

Fort What? NPR's Diane Rehm Demonstrates More Fort Hood Amnesia
By Tim Graham | April 17, 2013 | 10:25 PM EDT

Fort Hood amnesia seems to be a recurring malady this week. First came the Washington Post. Then on NPR’s Diane Rehm Show on Wednesday, Rehm falsely described the Boston bombing (with three fatalities) as worse than Fort Hood (13 fatalities). “This has been described as the second most lethal event since 9/11. But we are told that there've been a great many incidents prevented. What do you know about that? "

At least her guest Gary LaFree of the University of Maryland, in reviewing the statistics in his Global Terrorism Database, eventually pointed out that two terrorist attacks since 1971 had a higher death toll:

MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow Gleefully Admits To Using Edited Video To Smear GOP
By Jeffrey Meyer | February 27, 2013 | 12:27 PM EST

MSNBC’s propensity to selectively edit video to smear conservatives has reached a new low.  Speaking on her self-titled show on February 21, host Rachel Maddow openly admitted to playing edited footage of Senator John McCain to smear the Arizona Republican.

Speaking last week, Maddow aired footage of McCain addressing a constituent whose son was killed last year at a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, who spoke to Senator McCain about her belief that “These assault weapons allow a shooter to fire many rounds without having to reload. These weapons do not belong on our streets.”  [See video after jump.  MP3 audio here.]

ABC Uniquely Highlights Barack Obama's 'Betrayal' of Fort Hood Victims
By Scott Whitlock | February 14, 2013 | 11:56 AM EST

ABC's Nightline on Tuesday night uniquely highlighted the "betrayal" of Fort Hood victims by Barack Obama, exposing how the President "used" survivors as props for the 2010 State of the Union address. After 13 people were murdered by Nidal Hasan, the government labeled the shooting an example of "workplace violence" (instead of terrorism) and the Army decided not to award Purple Hearts to the victims. This has led to skyrocketing recovery costs for those who lived through the violence.

Talking to one of the heroes, Kimberly Munley, Ross explained, "A hero betrayed? Her courage saved lives during a massacre on a Texas Army base. So why is she now claiming President Obama and other victims?" He informed viewers that Munley believes "the President broke the promise made to her that all the victims and her families would be well-taken care of." ABC alone covered this angle of  the survivors' suffering. NBC and CBS have, thus far, skipped it. [See video below. MP3 audio here.]

MSNBC's Wagner Fails to Detail Al-Awlaki's Al-Qaeda Ties
By Matt Vespa | February 7, 2013 | 5:11 PM EST

With this afternoon's Senate confirmation hearings for CIA director nominee John Brennan in view, the February 7 broadcast of Now with Alex Wagner devoted significant attention to the Obama administration's use of armed drones and the recently-leaked DOJ White Paper defending the legitimacy of drone strikes that explicitly targeted American civilians overseas. 

For her part, host Alex Wagner failed to mention Anwar al-Awlaki’s activities as a terrorist operative affiliated with al-Qaeda.  The Now host merely tagged al-Awlaki as an American-born cleric, even though he served as a talent recruiter within the organization and inspired Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hassan.  Al-Awlaki also had contact with Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the terrorist who attempted to blow up a passenger airliner on Christmas Day of 2009.  None of that was mentioned on the show. 

Bob Schieffer: If Connecticut School Shooter 'Had An Arab Name People Would Be Going Nuts'
By Noel Sheppard | December 16, 2012 | 12:09 PM EST

CBS's Bob Schieffer made a comment Sunday about the elementary school massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, that's likely to raise eyebrows on both sides of the aisle.

During a Face the Nation panel discussion about the incident, Schieffer said, "If [shooter Adam Lanza] had had an Arab name, people would be going nuts about what we ought to do right now" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Dear Media, Accurately Portraying Muslim Rage as Muslim Rage is Not Islamophobic
By Rusty Weiss | September 18, 2012 | 9:39 PM EDT

This week we learned what really gets the liberal media in a ... well ... rage.  It isn't the act of perpetrating violence upon the innocent.  No, it's calling out that rage for everyone to see.  In Liberal Land, words speak louder than actions.

The media on the left side of the aisle took more umbrage with a Newsweek article titled, Muslim Rage, than they did with the incidents that demonstrated that rage - the killing of four Americans in Libya, including Ambassador Christopher Stevens, and the hoisting of Islamist flags on sovereign U.S. soil. Outlets like Think Progress called the Newsweek cover, which featured an image of a group of obviously agitated Muslims, Islamophobic. Newsweek for their part did not apologize for their portrayal of events in the Middle East saying: