“Lowe’s has fallen for a demagogic ruse dreamt up by an obscure Floridian Christian outfit.” The Financial Times opposes the US retailer’s decision to withdraw advertising from All-American Muslim.
Category Archives: USA
Is anti-Muslim politics on the rise in Florida?
Kate Dailey reports for BBC News Magazine.
How Geller and Spencer inspired Breivik
Jeff Sparrow, one of the contributors to the recently published collection of essays On Utøya: Anders Breivik, Right Terror, Racism and Europe, examines the role of Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer in promoting the ideology that inspired the Norwegian mass murderer.
All-American Muslim: Kayak executive Robert Birge issues world’s worst ‘apology’ ever
Robert Birge, chief marketing officer of KAYAK, the online travel company that withdrew its advertising from All-American Muslim following a right-wing campaign, has issued an apology. LoonWatch is not impressed.
Lowe’s pulls TV ads – and gives a Christmas gift to Target et al
Lowe’s decision to pull its advertising from All-American Muslim bows to the bigots and risks a huge commercial own goal, argues Wajahat Ali.
Islamophobes try to pin Liege killings on Islam
See “Daily Telegraph, Washington Post and Huffington Post report Twitter lie as fact: Liege killer ‘Nordine Amrani was Muslim terrorist'”, Anorak, 13 December 2011
And “Robert Spencer attempts to falsely link Belgian attacker to Islam, based solely on his Muslamic sounding name”, LoonWatch, 13 December 2011
(Atlas Shrugs screenshot from Expose.)
Update: See also “Geller and Spencer turn another shooting tragedy into an Islamophobic hate fest”, The American Muslim, 14 December 2011
Controversy drives advertisers from ‘All-American Muslim’ – or does it?
At least two advertisers have withdrawn commercials from “All-American Muslim,” a new series on the TLC cable channel, since an activist organization called the Florida Family Association condemned the show. But others cited by the organization as pulling out as sponsors are disputing the claim.
The organization has attacked the series as propaganda that obscures “the Islamic agenda’s clear and present danger to American liberties and traditional values.” The series, which has been on TLC at 10 p.m. Sunday since mid-November, follows the lives of five Muslim-American families in Dearborn, Mich., a Detroit suburb with a sizable Muslim population.
The organization says 65 companies have left the show since it began urging advertisers to withdraw their support. Among those that have were Kayak, the travel Web site, and Lowe’s, the home-improvement retailer.
However, at least three of the companies that the Florida Family Association included on its list of 65 say they have not followed the organization’s call to end their sponsorships.
“We didn’t pull” commercials from “All-American Muslim,” John W. Faulkner, a spokesman for the Campbell Soup Company in Camden, N.J., said on Tuesday. Other Campbell Soup commercials “could run in subsequent episodes,” he added.
The problem with Gingrich’s simplistic attack on sharia
The epochs of Newt Gingrich’s public life are defined by the books that have revolutionized him – generally of the type that sell well at airports. There is Isaac Asimov’s “Foundation” trilogy, Alvin Toffler’s “The Third Wave,” Napoleon Hill’s “Think and Grow Rich,” Stephen Covey’s “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” and various foundational texts of Total Quality Management and Lean Six Sigma.
These idea crushes are mostly harmless. Sometimes they are not. Gingrich has recently been captured by the theory, developed in books such as Andrew C. McCarthy’s “The Grand Jihad“, that sharia law is a mortal threat to the survival of freedom in the United States and the world as we know it.
Michael Gerson in the Washington Post, 13 December 2011
See also Eli Clifton, “The dangers of Gingrich’s war against Islam”,Think Progress, 13 December 2011
And “Read this before you support Gingrich (the bigot)”, Craig Considine’s blog, 11 December 2011
Lowe’s stands by decision to pull ads from ‘All-American Muslim’
Lowe’s is planning to stick by its decision to yank its ads from a reality TV show about American Muslims despite the growing opposition the home improvement chain is facing over the move.
California Sen. Ted Lieu put a statement out on Sunday that he is considering calling for a boycott of Lowe’s Cos., sparking criticism of the chain from both inside and outside of the Muslim community.
On social media web site Twitter, actor Kal Penn began directing people to a petition on signon.org in support of the TLC cable network show, “All-American Muslim.” By Monday afternoon, there were about 9,200 signatures.
On Monday, U.S. Representative Keith Ellison of Minnesota, who is Muslim, released a statement condemning Lowe’s for choosing “to uphold the beliefs of a fringe hate group and not the creed of The First Amendment.”
And Democratic state Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Detroit, the first Muslim elected to the Michigan Legislature, voiced her concerns directly with the company. She wrote a letter to Lowe’s CEO Robert Niblock. “I told them I was extremely disappointed that you give credibility to these hate groups,” Tlaib said. “People of Muslim faith are being attacked. It’s disappointing, disheartening.”
Pamela Geller turns Hollywood shooting tragedy into an Islamophobic hate fest
On Friday, there was a tragic incident in Hollywood, California. A man began shooting people randomly near the corner of Hollywood and Vine, and injured two men, one critically, before he was finally shot and killed by police.
Pamela Geller had an article online right away titled HOLLYWOOD JIHAD: SHOOTOUT, GUNMAN CALMLY TARGETED DRIVERS AND PEOPLE WHILE SHOUTING ALLAHU AKBAR! She said in her lede: “What is most disturbing about this story, apart from the obvious horror, is that not one news account reported what one witness said the shooter was screaming: ‘allahu akbar.’ Not one news account. The media is the enemy.”