Unbelievable. During the recent GOP debate, Ron Paul (R-TX) made some comments that suggested that the US’s past interventions in the Middle East had made us a target for terrorists. Seems logical enough. But it’s not the type of logic that sits well with the pundits that appear on Fox news, however, since it doesn’t really fit the “they hate us for our freedom” (repeat ad nauseam) meme. Fox’s solution: Smear Paul by lumping him in with the ‘9/11 Truth’ movement (they even mentioned Rosie and Charlie Sheen).
Luckily, at least a few of the commentors over at Hot Air could see right through this BS:
It is absolutely absurd to accuse Ron Paul of any type of trutherism; not only did he not mention any sort of Bush-knowledge of 9/11, he doesn’t even say the U.S. is responsible for 9/11 as he is smeared. He simply says one of the reasons we were targeted is our involvment in the middle east, especially the bombing of Iraq. You know who believes the crazy theory? Osama bin Laden, you know, the guy who planned the whole thing.
Yeah turns out back in 1996 when he and al-Queda officially declared war on the United States he issued a fatwa outlining why he was going to kill us–the reasons why? Well mostly our involment in the middle east, especially our bombing of Iraq. Weird huh?
Attacking him, smearing him, purging him fro your polls…are Republicans afraid of big, bad Ron Paul?
JaHerer22 on May 16, 2007 at 8:53 PM
Unfortunately, I doubt that the bulk of Fox’s viewership was this insightful. Gibson and Malkin didn’t even come close to entertaining the idea that Paul’s comments might be grounded in reality. The just went straight for the smear. Fox is supposed to be a news channel, right? ….Nevermind.
Speaking of Paul being purged from online polls, Hot Air wasn’t the only one. One of my favorite hangouts, LGF, did it too. It seems that Paul has developed quite a following on the internet. It’s the ‘Truthers’!
Update: One more thing. This isn’t even about ‘blaming America’ for 9/11. To me, it’s like blaming Brad Pitt for the crazy things that the paparazzi does. It’s simply one of the realities of being famous. One of the realities of having an interventionist foreign policy (rightly or wrongly) is that you might wind up on someone’s hit list. I applaud Ron Paul for pointing this out. After all, we’ll never be able to effectively address the threat that exists out there as long as we’re lying to ourselves about it.
Update: Others are noticing the Fox smear job as well:
ChenZhen's Chamber 