A friend of mine reckons Ashcroft is “one of the worst Republicans alive” and often posts evidence to my inbox in support of her case. Here's today's submission. [Requires New York Times registration. Do not apply to irritated skin.]
22Jun04 — 2
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It’s a dirty job, but someone has to do it.
I’ve reached the stage now were I find it hard to take any criticism of the Bush adminstration at face value. While, the William Krar case did not get massive coverage, it was noted on various blogs like this one, and was on the television. In that piece it is stated that “the case is so sensitive that President Bush received daily intelligence about it”. Hardly evidence that the administration was not taking the case seriously.
Perhaps the problem is that the media chose not to focus on the issue, maybe there was plenty to occupy the media in Iraq at the time? Far be it for me to suggest that the media are as distracted by Iraq, as they accuse Bush as being. Krugman’s point isn’t even original, he’s five months late and his column reads like a rehash of others comments.
Much as I can’t stand Ashcroft, Krugman is making a lot of assumptions by implying that Ashcroft was trying to play Krar’s actions down because he likes white supremacists.
In fact, the story was in Krugman’s own paper, in a story written by an expert on domestic US terrorism.
There is also an interesting article debating the reasons for the low interest in the story, one is a reliance on automated systems used to gather news by media organisations, and the other a fear of offending religious groups.
“Press coverage of domestic terrorism has come in fits and starts and has never been consistent,” Frederick Clarkson told WorkingForChange. While Clarkson also believes there are many reasons for this, he said that “perhaps the leading reason is that many of our domestic hate groups and terror groups are religiously motivated and it would be hard to imagine a news outlet — or for that matter, the Justice Department — having the nerve to call them ‘faith based’ groups. News media and government officials are deeply fearful of offending people’s religious sensibilities or being accused of being anti-religion and this fact alone profoundly inhibits coverage of important news stories and long term trends.”
Th Department of Justice makes the following statement about domestic terrorism in the light of the Krar case.
How prevalent are cases of “domestic terrorism”? You may be surprised. Domestic terrorism cases have nearly doubled over the past five years, from almost 3,500 in 1999 to more than 6,000 in 2003.
Hardly something they would publish if they were trying to downplay the threat.
Like that.