Is "it was a mistake" really an excuse?

I sometimes wonder if there is anything worse than a conservative talk show host. They’re generally sexist and racist. They say truly offensive and outlandish things just for the shock value, and for as much as they preach, they don’t seem to have any morals at all. Everything they do and say is meant to generate attention and dollars. I guess you could say they’re true capitalists. They know how to give the American public what they want in exchange for money and power, but is being a true capitalist ok when you’re harming people?

These talk show hosts are showmen at best and mud-slingers at worst, but a lot of people seem to confuse them with actual journalists, and this is very, very, very bad when these showmen are giving their opinion as fact. To bring in the listeners and the viewers, Limbaugh, Hannity and O´Reilly are willing to ruin reputations and careers and ridicule, insult, threaten and lie about people that don’t agree with them (example: Bill O´Reilly´s ferocious attack of Jeremy Glick, the young man who lost his father in 9/11 and is against the invasion of Iraq). To me it’s all rather sickening, but I guess it gives millions of listeners and viewers a rush. So I guess we should ask ourselves, is the rush worth the repercussions?

I’m going to have to go with no. And while I could cite many, many, many, many, many reasons for why I am right, I’ll limit myself to writing about the latest negative occurrence I’ve read about.

John Loftus, former federal prosecutor, FOX News commentator and the gnomish character pictured above, wrongly identified a La Habra, California home as belonging to Iyad Hilal on his August 7th segment on Inside Scoop with John Loftus. According to Loftus, Iyad Hilal, a "leader of Hizb ut-Tahrir, which has been banned in parts of Europe and the Middle East," had ties to the terrorists that planned the London bombing. He then announced the address of Hilal´s supposed house. Wait a minute, isn’t that illegal? And why would he do that anyway, unless, of course, he wanted local dimwits to start rioting and promote mob mentality?

But as it turns out, Loftus´ great idea came back to bite him in the ass, as Hilal had moved out of that house three years ago. Oops. Yep, and a big oops indeed. The current owners of the house, Randy and Ronnell Vorick, have faced harassment and destruction of their property.

"I´m scared to leave my kids at home," says Randy.

Fox has since "reprimanded" Loftus, and Loftus has since apologized, adding "mistakes happen." And they probably wouldn’t happen as often if these guys dealt more with fact and less with fiction.

It turns out that Iyad Hilal has not been linked to any terrorist groups or acts by the FBI. They just want to know more about his group’s activities. So it seems like the first mistake was reporting on him at all.

Source: "Couple Wrongly Tied to Radical Harassed," The Associated Press, August 25, 2005