MSNBC is not "Making Sense"

(Combined News Sources)
by, Rabbi Moshe Ben-Chaim
Founder, Mesora.org

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It's just another afternoon...Arafat's twisted mind calmly decides to hire more terrorists to assemble another dozen deadly bombs. Where will they strike tomorrow with their rat-poisoned nails? At unsuspecting shoppers in some Israeli mall? Or perhaps, a school bus stop in some remote, unguarded town. With such force, these bombs and projectiles rip the human body apart like paper, infecting us, if it doesn't kill us. Israeli and American civilians and children now face life without limbs, the inability to walk, and permanent disfigurement. One cannot start to imagine facing such a tragic reality. Our worst nightmares could not paint such horror. Israelis must face a new life, if only they heal physically, and psychologically. To protect the innocent, Israel continues to defend itself against Arafat's militant, homicide bombers.

New evidence surfaces - satisfying President Bush - that Arafat again financed terrorists with a $20,000 payment. Bush says Israel has a right to self defense against terrorists. Bush makes no moral equation.

Both Powell and Condoleezza Rice, the president's national security adviser, said the United States will not deal with Arafat. They too condemn Arafat's terror.

I just read that MSNBC canceled Alan Keyes. MSNBC's reasoning? Erik Sorenson, MSNBC's president said, "Keyes' ratings were not satisfactory". This contradicts MSNBC's own reports: WorldNetDaily.com, June 27th, entitled "Keyes' Ratings Better Than Replacement" accurately notes, "The report dated May 27, just one month ago, touts Keyes' quick growth since January: 'Alan Keyes jumps 21 percent over [the first quarter of 2002] - more than competing news networks in the time period."

Keyes' show held strong support and very rapid growth among the 25-54 male viewer bloc, and the "male 25-54 age segment is considered the most important group of viewers in terms of the value of television advertising." Because Keyes got more of this viewing group than Banfield every single night, his show was more financially beneficial to MSNBC than Banfield's show. When Keyes is canceled, support among the "most important group of viewers" will decrease. Yet MSNBC is claiming that Keyes' removal is simply a "business decision."

Neilsen ratings pose questions on the top ranking MSNBC executives who, on June 28, telephoned and faxed Mesora.org saying, "Banfield scored higher than Keyes on one night." It is known that stations use cumulatives ("cumes") to determine popularity, not individual shows. MSNBC's top executive said, "Keyes' hasn't shown significant growth..." In the MSNBC June 10 report, the network itself says, "Alan Keyes grows even more - +38 percent more households week to week."These confusing statements by MSNBC pose serious questions on their motive to remove Keyes. Keyes in fact has the higher scoring month of the two. Neilsen ratings show Keyes' highest rated night surpassed Banfield's at a 7-6 ratio - and this is despite Banfield having 20% more air time during May than did Keyes. Additionally, Banfield showed up on Neilsen ratings for only one month, in contrast to Keyes' five months. Would MSNBC use such limited data to make such a decision, or is there another reason for Keyes' removal?

Advertisers should rethink spending another cent with MSNBC, as Sorenson claims Keyes is not attracting enough viewers. Why then doesn't MSNBC cancel Banfield? Her ratings are no better than Keyes'. MSNBC is not consistent.

MSNBC is hiring still more outspoken pro-Palestinians...the likes of Jeff Cohen. I listened to their recorded news casts. supporting Palestinians. Cohen was just hired last month to be senior producer of Donahue's new show. Cohen is founder of the liberal media watchdog group, Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting -- known for its pro-Palestinian activism, among other things. FAIR favors the notion that Palestinian violence can be labeled "retaliation," and it states that a person who "retaliates" is not responsible for his actions, since he was merely responding to "someone else's aggression." FAIR objects to the "tendency to define Israel's role as defensive, and the Palestinian role as aggressive." Up until last month, when he was hired by MSNBC, Cohen was on FAIR's board of directors.

Cohen had holocaust denier and anti-Semite Noam Chomsky guest speak at FAIR's anniversary. Alan Dershowitz wrote, "My next encounter with Chomsky revolved around his writing an introduction to a book by an anti-Semite named Robert Faurisson who denied that the Holocaust took place, (who denied) that Hitler's gas chambers existed, (who denied) that the diary of Anne Frank was authentic, and (who denied) that there were death camps in Nazi occupied Europe. He claimed that the "massive lie" about genocide was a deliberate concoction initiated by "American Zionists" and that "the Jews" were responsible for World War II.
Chomsky described these and other conclusions as "findings" and said that they were based on "extensive historical research." Chomsky said,"I see no anti-Semitic implications in denial of the existence of gas chambers or even denial of the Holocaust. Nor would there be anti-Semitic implications, per se, in the claim that the Holocaust (whether one believes it took place or not) is being exploited, viciously so, by apologists for Israeli repression and violence. I see no hint of anti-Semitic implications in Faurisson's work." Perhaps Cohen will have Chomsky appear on Donahue.

Are the Cohens and Chomskies of the world MSNBC's choice for America?

In addition to acting as senior producer of Donahue's new show, Jeff Cohen will be appearing on MSNBC each weekday afternoon as an "on-air commentator." (Link: http://www.fair.org/press-releases/cohen-resignation.html)
Cohen founded Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting in 1986. He stepped down from FAIR's board of directors in May 2002, when he was hired by MSNBC. (Link: http://www.fair.org/extra/writers/cohen.html)

FAIR favors the Palestinian viewpoint, particularly in its "action alerts" and "media advisories" dealing with the Middle East. (Link: http://www.fair.org/international/middle-east.html)

In an April 4, 2002 "action alert," FAIR recommends persuading the media to use the term "retaliation" when describing Palestinian action. FAIR explains this is important because those who "retaliate" are merely acting defensively "in response to someone else's aggression," and that the "responsibility for the cycle of violence [lies] at the doorstep of the party being 'retaliated' against, since they presumably initiated the conflict." Strangely, the action alert implies that, while both the Israelis and the Palestinians "retaliate," the Israelis are more at fault. The alert also warns against the tendency in the press to label Israel's role as defensive, and the Palestinian role as aggressive. (Link: http://www.fair.org/activism/network-retaliation.html)

A June 26th "media advisory" by FAIR refers to "land illegally seized by Israel after the 1967 war," and bemoans the fact that Palestinian suicide bombings in these regions were inaccurately reported to have been in Jerusalem instead of on "land illegally annexed by Israel." (Link: http://www.fair.org/press-releases/settlement-euphemisms.html)

Pat Buchanan co-anchors a two-hour afternoon MSNBC program. He's pro-Palestinian. . . . "The cause of the present intifada," Mr. Buchanan said, referring to the Arab name for the uprising that began in September 2000, "is the Israeli control and occupation" of Palestinian territory. (Link: http://www.washtimes.com/national/20020501-91611235.htm)

"The Israeli repression has radicalized the Palestinians." Buchanan suggests giving Palestinians their own state as a way to induce them to stop their terror attacks. (Link: http://www.townhall.com/columnists/patbuchanan/pb20020403.shtml)

Eric Alterman's list to MSNBC.com regarding pro- and anti-Israeli pundits: (Link: http://polyconomics.com/showarticle.asp?articleid=1931)

Alterman lists Keyes as pro-Israeli and Buchanan as pro-Palestinian, and suggests there is an imbalance in the media represented by the large number of pundits who unquestioningly support Israel.

I end up with a disturbing feeling in my stomach. How can human beings, let alone groups of news reporters, support the perpetrators of such violence, and their positions? How can they have anything positive to say of those villains who can calmly assemble a device designed to dismember the body of children, and ruin human lives? People who storm Israeli settlements and at point blank range, shoot and kill a five year old Danielle Shefi, must be condemned. I will most certainly shun and verbally denounce any human being having any word of consent for such atrocities. I will angrily blast any morally decayed soul who twists words suggesting the slightest acceptance of terror, who makes any equation at all between Israel's defense and Arafat's ruthless murders.

Our president said, "you are either for or against terror." I am only so thankful that our president and his staff have the morality and backbone to sense evil, and combat it in speech and action. My praise to you Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney, Mr. Rumsfeld, Mr. Powell. and Ms. Rice.

I will no longer view MSNBC, and I have posted a petition to this effect: http://www.mesora.org/_private/alankeyes.html
I ask all you who read this to sign. Send your message to MSNBC and their advertisers.

Those who hire people who cannot distinguish between self defense, and between bombs designed to shred children, is in my mind, an accomplice.