MSNBC cries wolf on assault weapon racism

by Robert Sam Siegel on August 20, 2009


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By now you probably know the story; MSNBC showed video of a man armed with an assault rifle at a health care rally. MSNBC made a big deal of the racial overtones in the armed man’s presence; this was they said, part of the anger built up because a black man was elected president.

The problem with MSNBC’s analysis is that the armed man is also black. MSNBC seems to have deliberately not shown his face and hands in their video. The video, combined with MSNBC’s commentary calling the gun toting man symbol of “Racial overtones,” was no different than had they committed their lie by saying, “A white man carrying an assault rifle.”

Let’s stipulate right here that this man was wrong to carry an assault rifle to a political rally held in these United States of America. Yes, I know he had a license for his guns, but I don’t care. He was wrong. He is a kook. There is no justification for his action.

Folks, racism is still a part of America. MSNBC falsified their report to make this incident into racism. That is race baiting and in cases like this race baiting is as bad as racism itself because it desensitizes people to real acts of racism. How can Americans fight racism when people assume that news reports of racist incidents are fabricated? What MSNBC did was very wrong. The American people need to be well informed and to be well informed they need to trust news outlets. This blatant distortion of the truth will hurt our nation deeply by further reducing trust in the press. People that actively work to move this country past racism should denounce MSNBC. Every decent American should denounce MSNBC for this bit of extremism in search of better ratings.

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{ 7 comments }

Brett August 20, 2009 at 6:34 pm

And while it’s legal to carry firearms that way in Arizona, where the heck was the Secret Service? Shouldn’t have to read about a guy with a gun near ANY sitting president.

Nancy Evans August 20, 2009 at 7:56 pm

I’m all for carrying guns having grown up in the household of a gunsmith, but something about seeing someone other than Secret Service carrying a gun near a presidential appearance is kind of creepy. Must be because the assassinations of JFK , Robt. Kennedy and Martin Luther King so close together when I was young was kind of traumatic for me.

Nancy Evans August 21, 2009 at 12:09 am

I just took time to watch the video and I swear my head almost exploded. Talk about spin. Zooming in on the guns then saying “here you have a man of color in the presidency and white people showing up with guns strapped to their waists or to their legs.” Failing to mention the man whose guns they zoomed in on was BLACK!!!!!!! Inexcusable, untruthful, inflammatory broadcasting. Yellow journalism at it’s best.

Brett August 21, 2009 at 4:41 pm

Nancy…if the unthinkable would happen, Biden would be Pres. and Pelosi would be VP. Scares the hell out of me.

TL August 21, 2009 at 6:18 pm

I am tired of people calling gun toting Americans “kooks”. Since when did the President become omnipotent? I guarantee that Obama was never ever close to being in a position of being in the line of sight of this guy. If he were, no doubt several teams of snipers had his ass lit up.

We should not curtail our gun rights just because a couple of crazies took out past presidents. It should never be a crime to carry firearms anywhere in public and it shouldn’t matter if the President happens to be nearby somewhere in a meeting.

The fear mongering about guns needs to stop. A well armed society is a polite society. How many people in that crowd would pull their firearms to protect the president if some dude started shooting at him?

I am against every one of Obama’s policies and I think he will damage this nation even more than Bush did, but if I were in a crowd protesting his policies and some dude pulled a gun and started firing – I would be one of the first to draw down and attempt to stop the whacko. The Secret Service would probably kill me by accident, but my sense of honor and love of this Republic would require that I take action to save my President.

Fear is usually a tool of the ignorant and cowardly. Do not fear guns or the mongerers who misrepresent what guns are all about.

Brett August 24, 2009 at 9:25 am

TL: You should be also worried about David Michaels as Obama’s pick for the head of OSHA. Particularly his anti-gun sentiments.

SawDust{RM} September 16, 2009 at 8:55 am

Well MSNBC That Should Tell You Something Right There
And The Same For Fox-News
News isn’t about News anymore & may Have Never Been, Just About Watch My Report So You Will See Our Commercials
Red Topics Like Guns, Racism, etc. Are Always Big Attention Getters. Look How Many Years Now We Have Been Goinf On About North Korea Being A Terroist State, The Whole Thing Started Because Clinton Was Giving N.Korea 500,000 Barrels of Oil Free To Use For Heat etc. In Exchange of Them To Stop Using Their Outdated Nuclear Plants, The 1st Thing G.W. Does Is Cut Off The Free Oil, So Their Only Recourse Was To Fire Up Those Leaky Reactors Again, But The Media Has Played The Drama Out For 9yrs Now, As For The Media’s Credit This Info Was Stuffed Back In A Saturday Paper & I Only Saw The Truth Once & Never Mentioned Again, As Many Things In The News Your Lucky If You Even See The Truth Once, If At All.

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