U.S. revokes visa for Muslim scholar
Tom Coyne AP/Guardian

The U.S. visa of a Swiss Muslim scholar who was to teach at the University of Notre Dame has been revoked, a State Department spokeswoman said Tuesday, apparently under terms of the Patriot Act. The visa for Tariq Ramadan, who has been criticized for links to Islamic militants and for remarks branded as anti-Semitic, was revoked at the request of the Department of Homeland Security, spokeswoman Kelly Shannon said.

She cited the Immigration and Nationality Act, part of which deals with aliens who have used a "position of prominence within any country to endorse or espouse terrorist activity." Another section denies entry to aliens whose entry may have "potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States." Shannon did not immediately clarify whether either section applied to Ramadan's case. Notre Dame had named Ramadan earlier this year to be its Henry B. Luce professor of religion, conflict and peacebuilding at the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. ...

Related: The profiling puzzle: A dumb book defends a discredited policy
Cathy Young Reason Magazine

Ever since the Sept. 11 attack on America by radical Islamic terrorists, the use of ethnic and religious profiling in assessing security risks has been a subject of controversy. In this debate, the mass internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II has been often cited as a cautionary tale. Now, a conservative author and columnist, Michelle Malkin, has come out with a book provocatively titled In Defense of Internment: The Case for Racial Profiling in World War II and the War on Terror. ...

You can report, but we will decide
Ben Wasserstein Los Angeles Times

Last Thursday, the Washington Post reported that the military records of Larry Thurlow, one of John Kerry's major accusers among the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, contradicted Thurlow's version of events and confirmed Kerry's. At the very least, this cast severe doubt on the charge that Kerry fabricated the events that earned him one of his Vietnam War medals. The conservative media had been pushing the fabrication story energetically. How did it deal with this new evidence undermining it? As it turns out, at almost every turn it soft-pedaled the new evidence or outright ignored it, showing its bias throughout. ...

Still failing the "fair & balanced" test
Steve Rendall & Julie Hollar Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting

"Special Report" leans right, white, Republican & male.

FAIR’s latest study of Fox’s Special Report with Brit Hume finds the network’s flagship news show still listing right—heavily favoring conservative and Republican guests in its one-on-one interviews. And, according to the study, Special Report rarely features women or non-white guests in these prominent newsmaker inter-view spots.

In previous studies FAIR has found that looking at a show’s guest list is one of the most reliable methods for gauging its perspective. In the case of Special Report, the single one-on-one interview with anchor Brit Hume is a central part of the newscast, and the anchor often uses his high-profile guests’ comments as subject matter for the show’s wrap-up panel discussion. If Fox is the “fair & balanced” network it claims to be, then the guest list of what Fox calls its “signature news show” ought to reflect a diverse spectrum of ideas and sources. FAIR has studied Special Report’s guest list on two earlier occasions (Extra!, 7–8/01, 7–8/02). FAIR’s current study looked at 25 weeks of Special Report’s one-on-one interview segments (6/30/03–12/19/03), finding 101 guests. ...

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Media Matters for America™ is a Web-based, not-for-profit progressive research and information center dedicated to comprehensively monitoring, analyzing, and correcting conservative misinformation in the U.S. media. Conservative misinformation is defined as news or commentary presented in the media that is not accurate, reliable, or credible and that forwards the conservative agenda.

For the first time, Media Matters for America™ has put in place a system to monitor the media for conservative misinformation – every day, in real time -- in 2004 and beyond. Media Matters for America’s website ... is the principal vehicle for disseminating research and information through a range of initiatives: ...

Noted: Kiss your rights goodbye
Gary Indiana Village Voice

From John Ashcroft's lips to God's ear — 9-11, the Patriot Act, and the current frightening state of the union where the attorney general runs the Department of Justice like a Pentecostal revival meeting.

It will never be said of George W. Bush that he left office with any less intelligence, grace, and dignity than he came in with. Intimidation of black voters in Florida has already begun, with surprise visits to the newly registered by Jeb Bush's state police, "investigating voter fraud"—an ingeniously ironic whopper, of the stripe that's endeared the Bush family to generations of Saudi princes, defense contractors, and homicidal dictators.

Iraq is a catastrophe, bloodier by the hour. Our Afghan proxy controls a full 10 yards of sovereign territory around his office in Kabul. The only successful war Bush has waged from the comfort of his ranch thus far has been an unremitting attack on the U.S. Constitution. The First, Fourth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments in the Bill of Rights have already sustained serious injury. The usual method of redressing constitutional grievances is through the court system. But well in advance of the fait accompli, Bush's fans in Congress derailed most of President Clinton's judicial nominations, a practice the media overlooked in its frenzy to document a cum stain artfully preserved by Monica Lewinsky and Linda Tripp. No member of the Senate was more fanatical in excluding qualified people from the federal bench than our current attorney general, John Ashcroft. The vacancies imposed by Ashcroft and other Senate evangelicals have now been filled by right-wing ideologues, who dominate seven of 13 federal appellate districts. It's a small, telling measure of G.W. Bush's contempt for the electorate that after Missouri voters chose to elect a deceased candidate rather than give Ashcroft another term, Bush promptly installed him as the country's chief law enforcement officer. When sworn in, Ashcroft was, appropriately, anointed with oil by Justice Clarence Thomas. ...