d'accord writes:
>Rallies that include taped addresses from convicted cop-killers
>like H. Rap Brown--whatever the reason--are not going to lead to a broad
>movement.
I covered the H. Rap Brown trial, which was to be held in September 2001 but was delayed until this past March, and Jamil Al-Amin (Brown) is as much a 'convicted cop-killer' as Geronimo Pratt is a 'convicted murderer.' I don't claim to know what actually happened that night but the prosecution story sure as hell didn't fit the evidence. For one thing, the cops were both convinced they'd shot the assailant (one officer later died) but when Al-Amin was apprehended he had no injuries. I'd be interested to know where Corn got this take on the trial from, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution? Certainly not from the Nation, which ran an extensive pre-trial story by Ekwueme Michael Thelwell which left considerable doubt.
There's plenty to attack WWP/IAC/ANSWER for, but attacking them for opposing anti-black, anti-Muslim judicial railroading is not one of the stronger arguments. I see it as one of their more obviously opportunistic quirks. Also, I'd be very surprised if there was a taped address by Jamil Al-Amin, that's very much not his style--of course Corn says 'like H. Rap Brown' by which I suppose he means that other 'convicted cop-killer,' Mumia Abu Jamal. (My take on the trial--which I think was criminally underreported in the left press-- is at http://www.afn.org/~iguana/archives/2002_04/20020405.html )
>Heck, if
>Pat Buchanan called an anti-Nafta rally, don't you think journalists should
>explore why he was doing so and what differences existed between him and
>other anti-Nafta forces? And how he was shaping the message of the
>anti-corporate trade resistance?
Of course Buchanan did speak in Seattle, and people criticized it, rightly. But they didn't go on O'Reilly to 'expose' the movement as secretly led by Buchananites, and give O'Reilly free rein to say that the WTO protesters were a bunch of racist immigrant-bashers. Or if they did I missed it.
>At this stage in the game, they have no reason to be worried about the
antiwar
>movement and, thus, no pressing reason to discredit it. But, if we're lucky,
>such a day might come.
He's wrong there. There's plenty of discrediting going on. Doesn't he ever listen to talk radio? Read white house press releases? The thing is, it's not longer the worst thing to be called a communist, didn't it seem almost quaint coming from O'Reilly? It's much worse to be called a terrorist sympathizer.
Jenny Brown