Page 16 News 3/13/06

Time for another edition of Page 16 News. On the block this time, some more coverage of liberal teacher Jay Bennish, and his unpunished return to teaching, as well as some analysis of the MSM's false claims of Iraq's "civil war."

Jay Bennish was allowed back into class this morning to continue to spit his one sided lectures. After only one week without pay, Bennish has claimed that he will demonstrate the other side (a.k.a. lecture 30 minutes about the "Evil Capitalists" and then spend 30 seconds in favor of Capitalism) each time he introduces a controversial political ideology. A curious quote though from his lawyer, "...[He is] not ashamed of what he said. If you want to tape him, tape him. He wished he'd picked a different dictator." Does he think comparing Bush to Joseph Stalin would have made his comments acceptable?

Liberals everywhere have also been hounding the student who recorded the lecture, asking, "Well, why didn't he go to the teacher?" Because he went to the principal instead, and they weren't doing anything, THEN he went to the radio to prove his point.

The next topic is the gross over-hyping the media has been giving to the idea that Iraq is "on the brink of Civil-War." Not only have the media over-exaggerated the violence in Iraq, they've done it to the point that one leader has been forced to threaten punishment to people who do so.

Reporters claimed that 120 mosques were attacked, when in actuality, the count was more around 30, with only a handful being more than slightly damaged. Even Donald Rumsfeld has gotten sick of hearing all the bull.
"The number of attacks on mosques had been exaggerated. The number of Iraqi deaths had been exaggerated. The behavior of the Iraqi security forces had been mischaracterized." But all this exaggeration "seem to be on one side," he said. "The steady stream of errors all seem to be of a nature to inflame the situation and give heart to the terrorists."

Jack Kelley sums it up very well saying, "There is no civil war in Iraq, but al-Qaida would dearly love to provoke one. Knowledge of that fact should make journalists more careful about separating rumor from fact. But many apparently have chosen instead to act as the propaganda arm of our enemies."

Hat Tip: News Busters

On top of that, Amir Taheri of Arabnews.com has this to say.
"Sectarian violence, however, should not be confused with civil war. Many, multireligious states suffer from that particular affliction without sliding into civil war. In Pakistan, for example, over 1000 people are killed in sectarian feuds each year. In the latest major instance of sectarian violence in India in 2002 more than 20,000 people perished. No one knows the exact number of victims of similar violence in Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines not to mention Nigeria where sectarian feuds, mostly between Muslims and Christians, may have claimed more than 100,000 lives over the past decade alone.
There is no doubt that Iraq is passing through an exceptionally rough period in its postwar history, due to three reasons.
The first is the growing desperation of the terrorist groups that, having failed to sabotage the political process and keep the Arab Sunnis out of the last general election, have decided on what could be their last throw of the dice."