More on the American media silence

Here's an excerpt from a longer Tony Blankley column:

The American media is proud of its alleged tradition of speaking truth to power and reporting without fear or favor. Every year journalists give awards to one another under those banners. But in truth, it doesn't take much courage to criticize a president, corporation, Catholic priest or labor union boss in America. A president is powerless to adversely effect a reporter or news organization that criticizes him. But today, the Danish cartoonists are in hiding. Many who have spoken out against radical Islam — Muslim and non-Muslim alike — are dead or in hiding. Instant Muslim boycotts of Danish products already threaten Danish prosperity. Hirsi Ali, the black, Muslim, female co-producer of assassinated Dutch film maker Theo van Gogh, talked about western journalists to Der Spiegel this week, while in hiding: 'They probably feel numb. On the one hand, a voice in their heads is encouraging them not to sell out their freedom of speech. At the same time, they're experiencing the shocking sensation of what it's like to lose your own personal freedom. One mustn't forget that they're part of the post-war generation, and that all they've experienced is peace and prosperity. And now they suddenly have to fight for their own human rights once again ... 'The [Islamists] call Jews and Christians inferior, and we say they're just exercising their freedom of speech ... Islamists don't allow their critics the same rights … After the West prostrates itself, the [Islamists] will be more than happy to say that Allah has made the infidels spineless.'