Today's Topics:
Spotlight
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From: Bill Marrs <bill@wpi.wpi.edu>
Message-Id: <9111091358.AA15654@wpi.WPI.EDU>
Subject: Spotlight
To: Subgenius@mc.lcs.mit.edu
Date: Sat, 9 Nov 91 8:58:46 EST
Cc: William H Marrs <bill@wpi.wpi.edu>
The following is a letter to the editor taken from
Nov/Dec 1991 Utne Reader:
Project Censored critique
I was dismayed by the article ("Top 10 censored stories of 1990,"
July/August 1991) about Project Censored, the news media-criticism group
based at Sonoma State University in California. The article discussed the
project's choices for the ten most important underreported news stories of
1990 and paid tribute to publications that addressed those ten stories.
Among the newspapers and magazines honored was the leading
anti-Semitic publication in the United States. The Spotlight, which was
cited for two of the ten stories, is the journal of Liberty Lobby,
the wealthiest and most active anti-Jewish organizations in America.
Liberty Lobby's founder and prime mover, Willis Carto, has lamented
the defeat of Hitler and called the Jews "Public Enemy No. 1." A
federal district court judge ruled in 1986 that The Wall Street Journal's
characterization of Liberty Lobby as "anit-Semitic" was not libelous. The
ruling was upheld on an appeal.
The Spotlight's editorial slant is predicated on a conspiracy
theory of history, a nightmare in which hidden forces -- including the
Trilateral Commission and Jews -- dictate policies of governments
throughout the world. Jews constantly turn up under The Spotlight's glare
in familiar code words such as "political Zionists," "Israel's American
supporters," "dual loyalists," and "international bankers." The paper has
even carried stories praising the neo-Nazi Skinhead movement.
The Spotlight's journalistic credibility can be judged by some of
its headlines: "Israeli Mossad-Soviet KGB Collaboration Viewed with Alarm";
"White Race Becoming an Endangered Species"; "Revisionist Institute Returns
to Challenge Historical Myths" --this last referring to the Institute for
Historical Review, a Liberty Lobby-linked outfit devoted to promoting the
lie that Hitler's Holocaust of the Jews never took place. The institute's
propaganda has been regularly featured in The Spotlight.
Much of The Spotlight's success, at least when compared to other
anti-Semitic periodicals, stems from its ability to project an image of
populism and patriotism. In 1990, for example, it launched mini-crusades
against proposed tax increases, trade agreements with Soviet Union, gun
control, gay rights, pornography, and the welfare system. However, it
would be very difficult for any discerning reader to miss the pronounced
anti-Jewish bias and conspiracy-minded outlook of The Spotlight, elements
that should immediately call into question its legitimacy as a news source.
It is very unfortunate that your readers may well have been misled
into considering The Spotlight to be a journal worthy of recognition.
Thomas Halpern
Anti-Defamation League of
B'nai B'rith
New York, NY
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What we need is some Politically Correct High Weirdness...
-bill
Mega-Spoo Temple of the Squirting Yeti-Dobbs
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End of Subgenius Digest
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