Selective Facts

This morning I heard about a breakup of a plot to bomb an Ikea store in Amsterdam. They gave us the facts ... that some of them are thought to have been involved in the Madrid bombing, that there were males and females, and what their ages were. But I guess they just couldn't put their finger on anything that ties them all together, some little detail they had in common... hmmmm .... hmmmm .... nope, just can't come up with anything.

You know, if McCain flies somewhere and has dinner with a female campaign official that happens to be attractive, the press has no problems reporting speculative motives ... is it an affair??? After all, he's male and powerful, and she's female and attractive!!! But apparently absolutely no curiosity as to what the motive behind the thwarted Ikea boming might have been.

They're all European citizens, maybe? Well are they? Was the question even asked? What else might have tied them together? Did we mention they were males and females of various ages?

So you have to wonder why the detail about the local radio station that organized this event ... the detail that it happens to be a "Conservative" radio station -- was deemed important. I mean, there were males and females there from all age groups. Hey, one of them was even a French National. They could have just said it was a local radio station, you know, like the people involved in the bomb plot were "people" of no particular ethnic or religious background. No binding belief system that drove them to try it.

Could it be that it's ok to marginalize Conservatives for their opinions but not to marginalize Muslims because Muslims seem to be making threats, and backing them up by slitting throats and bombing public places every time you turn around?

I don't care if they characterize the crowd or the radio station as "Conservative", frankly. But when the media selectively qualifies like that (you don't hear about the "Liberal" news channel MSNBC) you can bet it's being done to marginalize the noun being modified by it.