What Will the State Department Say About This?

12 Salmon Rushdies. (via Memeorandum.) Again, this is no longer about whether or not the original cartoons were offensive. Certainly not exclusively.

Update: I was reading this nice piece from a senior fellow at Freedom House, and I was simply stunned to read the comments from the current UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. I thought, that simply can't be right, but apparently it is: she is taking up an investigation of the cartoons as possible racism. This is what happens when the value of not giving offense is given pride of place over and above every other value.

Update: How are people not getting the difference between sit-ins, statements, and death threats and the destruction of embassies? Embassies being, of course, sacrosanct by international law, now will the State Department complain?

Update: It actually sounds as if the Canadians are having a fairly robust debate, despite the fact that it doesn't sound as if many outlets will show them what they're debating about. (via Memeorandum.) And that piece points out something I'd missed but shouldn't have: AP isn't showing any of the cartoons.

Have you noticed that every media outlet not showing them is treating the cartoons as an unbreakable set? In other words, because the Muslim argument is against any depiction of the Prophet, and because one of the cartoons legitimately seems to make many folks nervous as potentially crossing the line -- depicting the Prophet as a terrorist -- they've accepted the Muslim argument that the 12 therefore compose a set, and if they aren't going to depict the one that is problemmatic by their own journalistic standards, therefore they can't depict any, despite the fact that most of them are utterly innocuous unless you accept the Islamic standard.

Couldn't they simply show some of them?

Update: Oh wait! It was the Norwegian embassy, too.

Comments

[XWL]

Regarding torching the Norwegians also, maybe they got confused about the similar flags (a cross is a cross is a cross)

(Finland, Iceland and Sweden better watch out)

(if the situation weren't so sad it'd be absurd)

(or is that if the situation weren't so absurd it'd be sad?)

[Flashman]

Actually they already got the swedish and chilean embassy during the burning of the danish embassy in Damascus. They're all in the same building, with the chilean embassy on the ground floor. They got three wuth the kindling for one.

I suppose the reason for omitting this fact has something to do with MSM sensitivity. It might give the impression that the jihadis sometimes hurt the odd innocent while pursuing their righteous peaceful inner struggle against the enemy.

It _is_ news in Sweden and Chile, though.

[Media Hound]

CNN (the Coward News Network) has decided to pull an Eason Jordan on this story:

Feb 2: "Storm grows over Mohammad cartoons"
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/europe/02/02/cartoons.wrap

"CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons in respect for Islam."
 

Feb 3: "Muslim anger on cartoons spreads"
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/europe/02/03/cartoon.wrap.reut

"CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons out of respect for Islam."
 

Feb 4: "Cartoon row: Danish embassy ablaze"
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/02/04/syria.cartoon.ap

"CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons out of respect for Islam."
 

Feb 5: "Protesters burn consulate over cartoons"
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/02/05/cartoon.protests

"CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons out of respect for Islam."
 

Feb 6: "Cartoon protests turn deadly"
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/02/06/cartoon.protests"

"CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons out of respect for Islam."
 

Feb 6: "Danes feel threatened in cartoon row"
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/europe/02/06/denmark.cartoons

"CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons out of respect for Islam."
 

Feb 6: "London protest: Calls for arrests"
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/europe/02/06/london.cartoon.protests

"CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons out of respect for Islam."
 

[Media Hound]

Like clockwork, the NY Times position on this controversy is utterly predictable:

http://newsbusters.org/node/3918

[Nate]

This comment in the linked CNN article really captured my attention."The right to freedom of thought and expression ... cannot entail the right to offend the religious sentiment of believers," the Vatican said in a statement. What!??!!!? The Vatican!! How many times has the Vatican been involved in fanning the flames of muslim anger. How many crusades were there again? Moreover, one would have to be quite stupid not to realize that the vatican opposes the right to offend religious sentiments of believers. They hate it when anyone turns a critical eye on the fairness of their beliefs or institutional structure. Consequently, while CNN covers the Vatican's response, the rest of us in the sane world will be looking to the blogosphere to provide real commentary on the current developments.