ISIS Attacks, CNN Blames Victim

RUSH: We have the ISIS shooting in Garland, Texas, to deal with. Pam Geller is the leader of the group that was conducting this little convention, and she was fascinating on CNN this morning, being grilled, interrogated by the former Fox News infobabe Alisyn Camerota who has now moved over to CNN.

RUSH: "Two gunmen were killed Sunday after opening fire on a security officer outside a ... contest for cartoon depictions of Prophet Muhammad in Texas and a bomb squad was called in to search their vehicle as a precaution, authorities said." Now, I left out a word when I read that lead by the AP. They put the word "provocative" in there. Let me read it again. "Two gunmen were killed Sunday after opening fire on a security officer outside a provocative contest for cartoon depictions of Prophet Muhammad..."

Even this hatemonger that runs this specious organization called the Southern Poverty Law Center (which is somewhere in Alabama), this guy named Mark Potok... In fact, we just got a sound bite from this guy. Grab sound bite number 23. Listen to this. This is a classic example of a leftist, a leftist activist saying, "Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. You got the freedom to do what you want. You got the freedom to say what you say. BUT you had better beware that you are responsible for what happens to you," or some such thing. Let's listen.

POTOK: I couldn't agree more. The First Amendment should be defended. Free speech is a good thing. It's integral to democracy. But Pam Geller and her organization is a hate group today just as they were day before yesterday. I think that is important to remember. She really does specialize in this kind of events. It seems to me it's rather similar to the Reverend Terry Jones burning Korans in Florida. These are provocations that are aimed at stirring the pot, and it doesn't seem terribly surprising that, in fact, they get the response that, in a sense, they're seeking.

RUSH: Yeah, they want to be shot at. Right. (impression) "They're trying to provoke being shot at, see? They're provocative. Freedom of speech? Heck yes! Use it all you want. But recall when you do that you are responsible for what happens to you." Well, that doesn't work in a lot of other things. I mean, in a rape case, try telling the woman, "Hey, you know, look at the way you were dressed." Doesn't fly, does it? Nor should it!

So here are people at a convention. Pam Geller... You'll hear her in a moment. We have sound bites coming up. She simply doesn't hate anybody. She just doesn't want any part of Sharia law. She doesn't want any part of Islamic extremism becoming mainstream in the United States. You know, I have a question, folks. It's very simple question.

If Americans are to respect and obey the laws of Islam that say the drawing pictures of Mohammed is not permitted and should not be done -- and you deserve what you get if you do -- then why wouldn't we have to respect or obey other things in Islam? What is it about drawing cartoons of "the prophet"? Why don't we respect Islam's punishment for gays and women, hmm? I mean, if they're right, they're right, aren't they?

RUSH: Now, I want to go back to the shooting in Texas, and before we get to the Pam Geller sound bites, a serious question here, folks, a very serious question. You just heard Mark Potok from this hate organization called the Southern Poverty Law Center. Make no mistake, that is a hate organization. And their hatred is for anything not Democrat. Their hatred is for anything Republican or conservative.

I wonder how the president is gonna with respond to the situation Garland, Texas. ISIS shooters show up because it is said they were provoked. Pam Geller and her group, oh, yeah, they can have a convention on drawing cartons of the prophet, but they are responsible for what happens. So if somebody pulls a gun out and shoots at 'em, it is their fault, not the perps, not the shooters. It is their fault because Islam tells us you cannot draw pictures of the prophet.

Okay, fine. If Americans are to respect and obey the laws of Islam, that prohibit the drawing of pictures of Mohammed, then why wouldn't Americans have to respect and obey Islam's laws and punishments regarding gays and women? I mean, if it's that important to them, who are we to disagree? If they say you can't draw pictures of the prophet, we say you're right, we can't, and anybody that does, why, they're gonna get what's coming to them.

Now, you move over to other aspects of militant Islam, and we know what happens to homosexuals in Iran or any other Islamic country. We know what happens to women. Well, if we're gonna respect and obey the laws about drawing cartoons of the prophet, don't we have to respect what Islam says about homosexuality and women? Where do we draw the line? We say, "Nah-nah, we can ignore that." But this picture business, nope, we gotta follow that to the letter of the law. We gotta follow that to the letter of Islam. We gotta follow that to the letter of Allah. But the gay and women thing, not so much.

Now, the president of the United States, I wonder if anybody will say that he might have some involvement in this incident in Texas, because was it not President Obama who said something about the future must not belong to those who slander the prophet? "The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet." That would be Pam Geller and her group. And slander the prophet is according to Islam, not me. Militant Islam says drawing pictures of the prophet Mohammed is slander, it's criminal, and Obama himself said the future must not belong to those who slander the prophet, i.e., Pam Geller and her group.

The president said that at the UN, he said it any number of places. Does that not sort of green light people in ISIS who want to take up arms and go after people who they believe are slandering the prophet? Could the president say this: The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet by allowing same-sex marriage. You know militant Islam prohibits that. When militant Islam prohibits the drawing of pictures of the prophet, we snap to. When militant Islam does not permit gay marriage or in fact homosexuality, are we gonna snap to and respect that?

What do you think? Obviously not. So why one and not the other? How do the Democrats, how does Mark Potok of the hateful Southern Poverty Law Center get to pick and choose which parts of Islam are going to be respected and which parts are going to be ignored?

RUSH: Pamela Geller was on with Alisyn Camerota today on CNN. The question: "The point isn't that you don't have the right to do it," have this convention of cartoon contests about the prophet Mohammed. "Of course you have the right to do it. It just seems that you don't draw the distinction between extremism and violence and Islam as a whole."

GELLER: You don't draw the distinction between civilized men and savages, because you're saying that if something I say offends someone, then they have the right to behave in a certain way; that it's going to incite them. I think it's ridiculous. I think the blasphemy laws under the Sharia is ridiculous. I think the people -- the tens of thousands of people -- that are slaughtered under this law is monstrous. And that's what you and I should be addressing.

RUSH: It's an excellent point. Just because I say something that offends someone, they have a right to come shoot at me? You think that they're justified? It's my fault for inciting them? So Camerota and Pam Geller continue on the same theme.

CAMEROTA: The problem comes when you paint with this broad brush and when you say "savages" in the same sentence as "Islam." It makes it sound as though you're calling Muslims savages, and when he said -- When he makes these broad-brush, uh --

GELLER: Alisyn, show me. Show me where I use "Muslim" and "savages" one time in my entire life. Show me now. You just made an accusation. Show me where I said that.

GELLER: I said you did not draw a distinction between civilized men and savages. Civilized men can disagree. Savages will kill you when they disagree.

RUSH: She's exactly right. It's a mistake for anybody to go up against this woman intellectually. She's gonna have 'em tied in pretzel knots, particularly if they just deal in knee-jerk reactions like many half-informed journalists do.

RUSH: By the way, just so you know: ISIS-linked Twitter accounts claimed responsibility for Texas shooting even "moments before it happened," and yet the media is still trying to blame Pam Geller for being provocative.

RUSH: According to the Daily Mail: "Former Terror Suspect Well Known to the FBI Is Named as One of Two Gunmen Shot Dead by Cops After Attack on [the] 'Draw Muhammad' Art Contest Near Dallas," Garland, Texas. "The FBI has named one of the gunmen as Elton Simpson, who was convicted of lying to federal agents about traveling to Africa five years ago, but a judge ruled it could not be proved that he was going to join a terrorist group," so it was thrown out. "Simpson's Phoenix, Arizona, home has been surrounded and a bomb squad is carrying out a search."

Simpson, by the way, was placed on probation five years ago for his terrorist activities. He and his roommate are the prime suspects in the attack. Simpson is the guy that sent the tweets before the attack claiming responsibility. That's right. ISIS-linked attackers, this guy Elton Simpson, tweeted minutes before the attack that they were responsible for it. If this guy were half as smart as he thinks he is he would have sent out a tweet saying, "I'm only doing this because Pam Geller is making me do it!"

The media would have supported the guy, and then Alisyn Camerota and others could have gone to Pam Geller and said, "See? See? You made him do it! You had to do this contest on drawing their prophet Mohammed, and you knew that somebody was gonna come out and shoot you, and he did." If this guy was... What an idiot! Don't claim credit for it. Blame the people that could the convention, and then you'll have the media in your hip pocket.

We have one more Pam Geller sound bite with CNN this morning, Alisyn Camerota, in which she has to explain what her conference was about. Question: "I don't want to play a semantics game with you, but I do think that your critics have a point when they say that you paint with a broad-brush stroke, and it sounds like you are anti-Islam."

GELLER: I am anti-jihad. I am anti-Sharia. You, by saying, I "paint with a broad brush," are saying all Muslims support sharia. And, Allison, you sound very Islamophobic. My event was about freedom of speech. Period. Who would decide what's good and what's forbidden? These arbitrary voices? You? (chuckles) The Muslim Brotherhood? The fact that we have to spend upwards of $50,000 in security speaks to how dangerous and how in trouble freedom of speech is in this country. And then we have to get on these news shows and somehow we are -- those that are targeted, those that were going to be slaughtered are -- the ones who get attacked speaks to how morally inverted this conversation is!

RUSH: Do you see her point? She's making the point that she's not anti-Muslim. She's anti-jihad. She's anti-Sharia. Believe me, none of you want Sharia. Well, I mean, I don't know. But you hear the term Sharia bandied about, and it's something distant and it's over here and you think it's so un-American. "It's specious to even worry about it here, and it's nothing more than fearmongers and panicmongers trying to get everybody worked up about it."

Well, I can give you a great example of what living under Sharia would be like. Remember Indiana, after they passed the Religious Freedom Protection Act? Remember what happened there? You had the news media joining with militant gay groups to go out and find bigots. They wanted to find bigots. They went door-to-door shopping for bigots and they found this naive little girl, part of a family that runs a pizzeria in some town in Indiana, 2,000 people, and they asked her a question:

You saw what happened to her? The entire news media, accompanied by militant gay groups, descended on that family, tried to put it out of business. You've seen it with flower shops and cake shop, bakeries and photography studios. That's essentially what Sharia is. "You will behave, you will conform, you will not say what we don't want to hear. You will obey -- and if you don't, bammo! This is what gonna happen to you."

That's what Sharia is, except with the tenets of militant Islam thrown in. You're not given any choice in the matter. "You must conform, you must convert, you are going to live the way we tell you." There is no First Amendment. There is no freedom to assemble. It all has to be sanctioned and approved; it has to come under the guidelines of whatever the Sharia says is permissible or isn't. You saw just a modified little version of it.

It's really rooted in the fact that if you behave or speak in an unacceptable way, you are going to feel the full force and brunt of the people and organizations who do not permit you, will not permit you to do or say what you are doing. You'll be shamed for whatever, and that's a form of it. I would venture to say that while not technically Sharia, you can find examples of what it would be like already happening in this country.

Pam Geller is simply saying, "I don't support Sharia. I'm opposed to Sharia, I'm opposed to jihad, and I'm demonstrating something. We live in a country with freedom of speech, and I'm organizing a little cartoon-drawn contest here. I have the First Amendment right to do this," and she's illustrating this to make a point. Look what happens to people who follow and obey the Constitution. They get blamed. Folks, call it whatever you want: Stalinism, statism, Sharia.

Sharia has a specific definition. It's not just Stalinism. But the Regime comes and gets you. If you don't comport, the Regime's gonna come and get you. You're gonna be blamed. And so she's simply saying, "Look, I had to go out and spend 50 grand for security because we knew that some people were gonna come here and try to incite violence," and what she's saying to the media is, "It sounds like you condone them!

"You're blaming me! I'm the peaceful person here. I'm not doing anything to anybody. We're just speaking. We're drawing. You sound like... Journalist, Ms. Journalist, you sound like you think all of this is my fault." She's merely saying, "It's really, really dangerous when the people who come and try to blow things up or shoot people dead are the victims." But in liberalism, this is how things have been twisted.

Alison Camerota used to work for Fox News..a shame that she turned into a dips*hit for the left..the left blamed Charlie Hebdo for their demise as well so Im not surprised by this..Muslims are NEVER the cause of violence according to the left its always someone elses fault

There is a whole lot of “blaming the victim” going on here. And much of the mainstream media current meme is that the Garland incident would not have happened if only the event’s participants had complied with Muslim “decree” that the “Prophet” not be defamed. In other words, the media is doing their part to help enforce sharia law.

One of the “liberal” guests on Fox News said that the Southern Poverty Law Center (the communist group to which I give NO credibility) has declared that Pamela Geller’s organization is a “hate group”. So, not only do they blame the victim, they are also DEFAMING the victim.

Dear Mr. Limbaugh,

Decent Americans such as yourself may think that they are not at war with Islam. But Islam is most definitely at war with America.

Sincerely,
Ben

POTOK: I couldn't agree more. The First Amendment should be defended. Free speech is a good thing. It's integral to integral to democracy But Pam Geller and her organization is a hate group today just as they were day before yesterday.

Nothing he says before the Word "But" means anything.

I did not see the interview, but I was listening to it on the Sat Radio. I thought Geller did a fine job.

Alison was spouting the typical TV crap about being provocative.

It is time that people in this country started to realize that there ARE differing opinions about things. America needs to realize that there are a ton of folks who do not hate Islam per se, but feel offended when they are told what we can and cannot believe about it, what it stands for, and how it is practiced.

The argument is about freedoms and liberty in the country. We are being told what words we can use, what we can say about different religions or lifestyles, and we are castigated when we do not toe the party line.

Well, I applaud Geller for standing her ground and not apologizing for something she should not be sorry about.

The SPLC itself is a racist, bigoted organization. It’s “victims” are always the PC types. Anyone who sees racism, etc. thru its lens is bigoted by definition. A bunch of left wing loonies who couldn’t get a job in the real world.

CNN...It brings out, (pause)

...the inner liberal...

Alisyn Camerota...

Another one bites the dust...

I watched that exchange between Camerota and Geller.

Camerota could have redeemed that conversation at any point if she had even once asked a question based on what the critics of the attackers were saying.

Every comment was based on the opinions and questions of Geller’s critics. That is pretend neutrality. Stephanopolous is a master of the technique.

The critics say this, the critics say that, the critics want to know blah, blah, blah.

“Pamela, supporters of free speech are claiming there should be no backing down. What do you see as the future direction this protest on your part will take?”

Well, look at it this way, does anyone believe Pam Geller was NOT prepared for the onslaught of media inquiries and attention, regardless of what happened in Garland last night???

The big question that was raised by my FRiend “Spktyr” on the Texas board last night was a fantastic, “nailed it!” moment...He gets all the credit for this one...

Why and where were the muslim protestors outside at this event???

Maybe they knew something???

And if they knew something, there had to be some “chatter”???

And if there is “chatter”, I bet a dollar to a donut hole that someone heard it...

And if someone heard it, was it reported up the chain of command...

And if the chain of command knew something, why was this attack not stopped before it manifested itself...

It is either this path, or we have a case of gross incompetence we are dealing with here...

Either way...No Bueno in my book...

Whenever someone says “Critics say blaa blaa blaa” the word “Critic” is just another way of saying “Yeah I feel this way but instead of saying I want to know I have to pretend that others are outraged too so hence, critics say”

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.