The SPLC has it right. CNN should take Dobbs off the air for peddling so many racist lies, particularly the Birther lies against our President. He should be taken off the air immediately!SPLC Reports:
The following is a letter from SPLC President Richard Cohen to CNN President Jonathan Klein.
July 24, 2009
Jonathan Klein
President
CNN/U.S.
1 Time Warner Center
New York, N.Y. 10019-6038
Dear Mr. Klein,
As an important and respected news organization, CNN has a special responsibility to ensure the accuracy of its reporting. We have written to you before about our concern that Lou Dobbs repeatedly fails to live up to this standard in his reporting on immigration. Now, Mr. Dobbs is again trading in falsehoods and racist conspiracy theories, questioning President Obama's American citizenship.
On the July 15 edition of "Lou Dobbs Tonight," Mr. Dobbs questioned the official certificate provided by the president and the State of Hawaii and complained that President Obama has not made public the "original document." On his radio program, Mr. Dobbs has repeatedly questioned the president's fitness for office, demanding he "show the documents" and, at one point, jokingly suggesting President Obama may be "undocumented."
The truth about the president's birth is not in dispute. It has been verified by Factcheck.org, among many other serious news organizations, and his official birth documents have been made public. CNN itself has repeatedly reported on the falsity of the claims of the "birthers," and the network's esteemed legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin, recently called those claims "a joke." As you know, even Mr. Dobbs' frequent fill-in anchor, Kitty Pilgrim, debunked the birthers on the July 17 edition of Mr. Dobbs' own CNN show. The fact that Mr. Dobbs suggests otherwise on CNN — while real CNN reporters tell the truth — is both deplorable and an embarrassment to all serious journalists.
As he has in several other instances, Mr. Dobbs, in taking up the birthers' claims, is adopting an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory that originated on the radical racist right. As Gawker.com has reported, this particular conspiracy theory was first developed by an open anti-Semite and circulated by right-wing extremists who cannot accept the fact that a black man has been elected president of the United States. Among its adherents was neo-Nazi James von Brunn, the alleged murderer of a security guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., this June. Von Brunn had helped spread the birthers' claims on the Internet and attacked the "dishonest & conspiratorial Media" for not taking them up.
This is not the first time Mr. Dobbs has pushed racist conspiracy theories or defamatory falsehoods about immigrants. We wrote you in 2007 to bring to your attention his utterly false claim that 7,000 new cases of leprosy had appeared in the United States in a recent three-year period, due at least in part to immigrants. (The real number, according to official statistics, was about 400. Mr. Dobbs took his spurious information from the late right-wing extremist, Madeleine Cosman.) In addition, Mr. Dobbs has reported as fact the so-called Aztlan conspiracy, which claims that undocumented Mexican immigrants are part of a plot to "reconquer" the American Southwest. He has suggested there is something to a related conspiracy theory that claims the governments of Mexico, the United States and Canada are secretly planning to merge into the "North American Union." He has falsely claimed that "illegal aliens" fill one third of American prison and jail cells. And Mr. Dobbs has routinely disparaged, on CNN's air, those who have had the integrity to point out the falsity of these and similar claims.
Respectable news organizations should not employ reporters willing to peddle racist conspiracy theories and false propaganda. It's time for CNN to remove Mr. Dobbs from the airwaves.
Sincerely,
J. Richard Cohen
President
The following is a letter from SPLC President Richard Cohen to CNN President Jonathan Klein.
July 24, 2009
Jonathan Klein
President
CNN/U.S.
1 Time Warner Center
New York, N.Y. 10019-6038
Dear Mr. Klein,
As an important and respected news organization, CNN has a special responsibility to ensure the accuracy of its reporting. We have written to you before about our concern that Lou Dobbs repeatedly fails to live up to this standard in his reporting on immigration. Now, Mr. Dobbs is again trading in falsehoods and racist conspiracy theories, questioning President Obama's American citizenship.
On the July 15 edition of "Lou Dobbs Tonight," Mr. Dobbs questioned the official certificate provided by the president and the State of Hawaii and complained that President Obama has not made public the "original document." On his radio program, Mr. Dobbs has repeatedly questioned the president's fitness for office, demanding he "show the documents" and, at one point, jokingly suggesting President Obama may be "undocumented."
The truth about the president's birth is not in dispute. It has been verified by Factcheck.org, among many other serious news organizations, and his official birth documents have been made public. CNN itself has repeatedly reported on the falsity of the claims of the "birthers," and the network's esteemed legal analyst, Jeffrey Toobin, recently called those claims "a joke." As you know, even Mr. Dobbs' frequent fill-in anchor, Kitty Pilgrim, debunked the birthers on the July 17 edition of Mr. Dobbs' own CNN show. The fact that Mr. Dobbs suggests otherwise on CNN — while real CNN reporters tell the truth — is both deplorable and an embarrassment to all serious journalists.
As he has in several other instances, Mr. Dobbs, in taking up the birthers' claims, is adopting an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory that originated on the radical racist right. As Gawker.com has reported, this particular conspiracy theory was first developed by an open anti-Semite and circulated by right-wing extremists who cannot accept the fact that a black man has been elected president of the United States. Among its adherents was neo-Nazi James von Brunn, the alleged murderer of a security guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., this June. Von Brunn had helped spread the birthers' claims on the Internet and attacked the "dishonest & conspiratorial Media" for not taking them up.
This is not the first time Mr. Dobbs has pushed racist conspiracy theories or defamatory falsehoods about immigrants. We wrote you in 2007 to bring to your attention his utterly false claim that 7,000 new cases of leprosy had appeared in the United States in a recent three-year period, due at least in part to immigrants. (The real number, according to official statistics, was about 400. Mr. Dobbs took his spurious information from the late right-wing extremist, Madeleine Cosman.) In addition, Mr. Dobbs has reported as fact the so-called Aztlan conspiracy, which claims that undocumented Mexican immigrants are part of a plot to "reconquer" the American Southwest. He has suggested there is something to a related conspiracy theory that claims the governments of Mexico, the United States and Canada are secretly planning to merge into the "North American Union." He has falsely claimed that "illegal aliens" fill one third of American prison and jail cells. And Mr. Dobbs has routinely disparaged, on CNN's air, those who have had the integrity to point out the falsity of these and similar claims.
Respectable news organizations should not employ reporters willing to peddle racist conspiracy theories and false propaganda. It's time for CNN to remove Mr. Dobbs from the airwaves.
Sincerely,
J. Richard Cohen
President
Posts
6 comments:
Lou Dobbs, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck :
They will choke in their larynx or trachea with their putrid saliva and mucous fetid material of Hate and Racism.....
Like the Nazi Priest of the 1930s Father Charles Edward Coughlin, another great bastard thriving on Hate against Jews and others ....
Their own bodies will betray them !
*******************
I agree 100% with Frank Rich of "The New York Times", he said almost a year ago, that Most White Americans were excellent People, capable of voting for a "Black" man, and able to be better than previous generations.
Frank Rich said that White America could grow to be Tolerant and that he was Optimistic about the Election of Obama .... This was a time in August and September when some journalists were talking of the Bradley efect .... and that Obama could never be elected.
This made me more optimistic to work harder for Obama before the election.
I have always said that Obama is going to be a Great President, and Wall Street agrees with the DOW over 9,000, Nasdaq approaching 1,600 and S&P 500 in 976 ...
That is a Stocks Recovery that announces better times ahead for the Economy.
We should never fall prey to Envy and SchadenFreude hating Obama so much that we want him to fail .... In fact he will succeed for the Benefit of America and the World.
And yes ! .... Race Relations will improve in the long range, Thanks to Obama !
***************
And the putrid and fetid will choke with their own poison and venom.
Raciality.com
Vicente Duque
It would be well for the SPLC to document its sources when it says Dobbs is wrong. That would make a stronger message. Maybe it would be a good thing to remove all liars from the airwaves. That would be the end of all political speeches. Do you think CNN will respond?
Frank Rich's judgment of the American people shows how far off base those people are who persistently claim to the contrary.
Ultima,
They did list the sources. The Birthers are WRONG and Dobbs was WRONG to support such lies.
Will CNN remove him? Possible. They rid themselves of Beck. Dobbs is sure to be next. I doubt that Fox would take him though. His 15 minutes are over.
I refuse to even flip the channel to fox. I suspect they use the 10 second "flip" as points to their ratings.
Beck and O'Reilly are the worst of the worst. They are what is WRONG with America!! Network Racism and LIES at their worst!
Yes, the bias is everywhere in TV. Even Brian Williams on NBC sounded like a White House employee giving Obama's health care plan free advertising. Looks like the Public Option is foundering. There was a demonstration against it here in Denver today. Of course, some believe the so-called co-op is just another name for a public option. I would be more amenable to some sort of health care reform if the Administration and Congress had shown any ability to pay for past sins in Social Security and Medicare amounting $106 trillion. How much more government spending can we handle before the whole house of cards falls. It won't be long before we will be able to see when the European welfare states founder because no one wants to give any benefits while at the same time there will never be enough people to pay for them much longer.
Of course, maybe they can depend on jizya, a sort of poll tax levied on Djimmi (Jews, Christians and Majians living in a Muslim society). You could say we are already paying jizya through our subsidies of the Palestinian Authority, the billions lavished on Egypt to no effect, and the $20-$50 you pay to fill up you gas tank.
Americans are paying for the rope that will hang them and they are oblivious.
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