Dave asked that I re-post what I wrote this morning. (It’s a good thing I wrote it this morning, because after reading this article, I can hardly see straight to write anything …)
I, for one, am more disturbed about what occurred in Russia last week than I can recall being upset about anything since 9/11/01. And it’s not just the terrorism, but the international media coverage of it.
I taught our adult Sunday school class at church this morning. Early on in the lesson I made reference to the tragedy at Beslan, simply because it helped to drive home the point of the lesson.
There were maybe forty people in the class and, from the discussion that ensued, it was apparent that almost all of them were pretty much in the dark about the details of what occurred in Russia last Thursday and Friday.
These are intelligent citizens of ‘middle America’ – and Christians, to boot. Good people. They aren’t tuned into FoxNews eight hours a day, but I would venture to guess that they listen to as much news as the average American – probably more.
Only eight or ten people (roughly one quarter of those in the room) were aware that 340+ people were killed in the incident, half of them young children. No one was aware that some of the murdered children were shot in the back as they attempted to escape. Only one person was aware that very few of the children were allowed to go to the bathroom, most were not provided water, and some were reduced to urinating in cups and bottles, and then drinking their own urine, or pouring it on themselves to lessen the effects of the sweltering heat. No one was aware that a man was murdered in front of a group of children, after which they were told, ‘This will happen to you if you don’t obey us.’ No one was aware that some of the barbarians have been identified as members of the Wahhabi sect of Islam, and that many of the hostages were ordered to pray to Allah. Just a handful knew that many of the victims were Christian. Most of them knew that many of the hundreds of survivors will be maimed for life.
Why is this? Why are the important facts (the number of children involved, direct connections with radical Islam, the sadistic torment that was visited on the victims before their death or rescue … ) about this tragedy not being hammered home by the mainstream media?
Last night I watched about two hours of FoxNews (we report … you decide) while preparing this morning’s Sunday school lesson. What I saw and heard was very unsettling. In the two hours time (now mind you, this news report was occurring a mere twenty-four hours after the ‘resolution’ of the crisis in Russia) of news coverage, I saw maybe a grand total of five minutes coverage of the massacre in Russia – and that five minutes contained virtually no references to any of the facts mentioned above.
Other than occasional mention of President Clinton’s upcoming heart surgery, the remaining hour and fifty-five minutes was spent interviewing Geraldo Rivera and various other Fox correspondents, attired in rain gear, standing out in the rain and wind, and prognosticating about how hard hurricane Frances was going to hit Florida at any moment. These reporters were frantic -- in a look-at-me, aren’t-I-brave-standing-out-here-in-the-wind-and-rain? kind of way (maybe they should issue purple hearts for hurricane reporting). They would point to the palm trees swaying behind them, or the boats being tossed about in the harbor, occasionally pick up a severed tree branch that had been ripped from a nearby tree, complain about the pounding rain and ferocious (if I hear that word one more time, I think I will lose it) winds that were battering them, and paint a grim picture about what was imminently going to happen to the area around them.
The correspondents’ (supposedly) conspicuous bravery, and humanitarian kindergarten-level advice and warnings (stay indoors, or find a nearby shelter, be aware that strong rain and winds can cause significant damage …) that were being dished out, for hours on end, gave the term overkill new meaning.
I’m not in any way minimizing the personal tragedy that many in Florida will have to endure as a result of the devastation caused by Frances. But let’s put things in perspective here.
Hurricane Frances is an act of nature – and an act of nature for which the residents of coastal Florida must always be as prepared as they are able. Considering modern meteorological advances, we receive fair warning that such natural catastrophes are approaching. And, although material losses are usually significant (a sad fact in itself), very few lives are lost. And very few people receive life-long emotional scars as a result of the tragedy.
On a scale of human heartbreak, what occurred in Russia just a few days ago eclipses any havoc that Frances may wreak on the lives that she touches.
More than three hundred innocent people (half of them young children) had no advanced warning that, on the very first day of the school year, their innocent lives would be infiltrated, suddenly and violently, by a handful of evil, sadistic men bent on mindlessly torturing, and eventually killing, hundreds of them. Men who were joyful at the prospect of instilling instantaneous, paralyzing fear in the hearts of young children. Men whose barbaric behaviors, in some instances, forced young children to decide to attempt to escape rather than continue to wonder what their captors’ next sadistic cruelty would entail. Men who shot those children who attempted to escape in the back.
More than a thousand innocent people in that school building had no warning of the tragedy that was to occur. They endured humiliating, traumatizing torment for what must have seemed a seventy-two hour eternity. More than three hundred of them (most of them children) will not live to tell about it.
We need to hear their stories. We need to be told, over and over again, that at least a segment of their captors was aligned with the radical Islam fanaticism that threatens not only school houses in Russia, but school houses, airports, train stations, waterworks, public utilities, football stadiums, small towns, and large metropolitan areas, all over the world.
What happened in Russia last week will serve as a foretaste of things to come unless the rest of the world connects-the-dots and looks beyond our noses. The media, now interminably focused on hurricanes and heart bypasses, are obscuring the dots and attempting to take our eyes off the horizon.
I learned, once again, at church this morning that, unless good people demand to know the truth, and demand that our leadership and our media get their priorities in order, the madmen of this world are going to continue to catch us off-guard, and focused on bread and circuses, while they lie in ambush, waiting to prey on their next victims.
Many of those killed in Russia just two days ago were Christians. All of those daily killed in Israel by Palestinian terrorists are Jews. The bloodthirst of radical Islam will not be satisfied until such atrocities bring Christianity, Judaism, and all liberty-loving people to their knees at the feet of Allah. And we help them in their evil crusade by minimizing many of those atrocities by choosing to occupy ourselves with disasters that are somehow easier to face.
~ joanie
When that time comes, either we as a people will realize (and demand) that we are the front lines, and that the people must be armed so they can interdict these things as they happen...or we will bow to governmnet moves to drastically increase our "Security" by disarmning the people and turnig it all over to the government security aparatus...which cannot protect us from this type of thing, only react to it.
I pray that we can wake up beforte then, and that we can do the right thing (ala the Home Guard in Dragon's Fury)
Time will tell.
As always, thanks for the astute comments.
You just put your finger on it. I am very disturbed at the lack of coverage in the US television press. Its wall to wall hurricane coverage, which is something that happens every year, just like clockwork.
This massacre is in many ways Russia's 9/11, although I will grant that it is not their first. But it is extremely important in what it tells us about the nature of our enemy.
I have been surfing the channels looking for coverage, and the only channel to treat it with any importance at all is the Canadian news channel. I usually find them to be far too left-leaning for my taste, but the fact remains that they are the only ones to focus on Beslan.
I find this shocking, and it worries me. It explains a lot. We at this site tend to be news junkies, and we usually have a good feel for what is going on around us. But the average person depends on Fox or CNN, and if they didn't cover it, it didn't happen.
I keep waiting for Bush to speak, but so far he has not mentioned it as far as I am aware. I hope I'm wrong. But for him to remain silent would be equivalent to remaining silent after the fall of the World Trade Center. It would be unthinkable to treat it as a non-event.
And so far, we are treating it as if it didn't happen.
EXCELLENT~!
Thanks for the ping, well said. We need to hit the call-in talk shows this week and demand that the media turn on the kitchen light so we can step on some Islamo-cockroaches.
Joanie, this is a very well written piece. Thank you - it is astonishing that the American people are kept so much in the dark by the mass media. If they would just reach out to a few other news sources they could have a better chance at hearing the truth.
Probably already posted but the answer is simple. They don't want to turn Americans on Muslims in THIS country.
George Bush has little to do with this type of event not occuring in the US. Al Quaeda knows that they have just one more shot here. Fooled me once shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. That is why preemption is the only option.
Our news media does not report, because they don't want anyone to decide. Film of 9-11 vanished from tv screens because it was determined that watching it was causing too much patriotism. Can't have patriotism rearing it's ugly head.
Politicians won't talk about the details of what happened in Russia any more than they will talk about illegal immigration and open borders. Musn't stir unwanted emotions in the unwashed masses.
Red