LOEWENSTEIN WATCH

In a post with the seemingly warm and cuddly title, " Working together is essential", Antony Loewenstein both exaggerates and manipulates. In his first paragraph Loewenstein talks about the "increasingly vicious anti-Muslim sentiment within the Australian community". His link is to a Sydney Morning Herald article that says nothing more than this about anti-Muslim sentiment:

A leading Australian Islamic body will send letters to 200 Muslim clerics and community leaders today calling on them to condemn terrorist bombings and to acknowledge that some Muslims have been involved in attacks such as September 11.

The chief executive of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils, Amjad Mehboob, said the decision to send the letters had come after a "very disturbing and very distressing" day when talkback radio callers in Sydney launched what he called a "free-for-all" attacking Muslims.

"It was a pretty bad day from our perspective," Mr Mehboob told the Herald. "There was talk about getting all the Muslims packing from this country and closing down mosques."

Talkback radio is disturbing at the best of times and shouldn't be taken as indicative of the wider community's view.

Apparently to ram home the spread of vicious anti-Muslim sentiment, Loewenstein then edits this:

The Anglican Bishop of South Sydney, Robert Forsyth, said he had no time for Islam, whose teachings he believed were false, but he opposed any discrimination of prospective immigrants based on religion.

To produce this:

The Sydney Morning Herald reports that "he had no time for Islam, whose teachings he believed were false."

Not only is the editing disguised, it changes the Bishop's sentiments to make them seem decidedly intolerant. Regardless, does Loewenstein expect a Christian cleric to say that he believes the teachings of Islam are true? That would make the Bishop a Muslim, wouldn't it?

Jeez, you'd reckon there's enough news out there to blog about without having to resort to making stuff up. Oh well, his leftarded readers apparently don't care, so why should he?