What You’ll Never Read In The NYT

Michael Totten is reporting from Iraq. In the fifth part of the series he shows quite a lot of what's going right in Iraq. It's a lot more than the NYT and the rest of the MSM will ever tell you.

You might also want to consider donating to help keep reports like this coming.

Duke Lacrosse Case - Arrests made

Two members of the Duke lacrosse team were arrested early this morning.

Kirk Osborn, Seligmann's attorney, said, "We're looking forward to showing that he is absolutely innocent as soon as we can."

Defense lawyers said players maintained that there was no sex at all. They said the accuser concocted the story, that she was drunk and injured late March 13 when she arrived at the three-bedroom house at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd.

"… Two young men have been charged with crimes they did not commit. This is a tragedy," Bob Ekstrand, who represents team players, said Monday in a prepared statement. "For the two young men, an ordeal lies ahead. They do not face it alone; they face it with the love of family and friends and strengthened by the truth. They are both innocent."

This has been a media driven frenzy. Two things in this report that show how frenzied:

Just after 7 a.m., Seligmann and another man left the jail and ran to a Ford Explorer with New Jersey license plates. They pulled onto Pettigrew Street and went to the traffic light at Pettigrew and Mangum streets. They stopped at a red light, waited for traffic to clear, and then turned left, running the red light.

In other words, the media was chasing the vehicle.

Throughout Monday, there were many more reporters on the sixth floor of the courthouse than the 18 members of the grand jury panel. Reporters tracked the district attorney's movements in minute detail. Just after noon, Nifong emerged from his office and walked across the hallway to the bathroom.

Reporters surrounded the bathroom door in a crowd that included five television cameras, three still photographers, sound men with boom microphones and at least a dozen print reporters. At the sound of flushing, the group tensed, raised cameras and prepared. Nifong did not emerge with news.

I'm surprised they didn't burst into the men's room and try to interview Nifong's private parts.

UPDATE: Link to previous posts.

Outrage

It seems the tempest of the day involves Michelle Malkin and the University of California Santa Cruz (UCSC) anti-war group Students Against War (SAW). (I have a post around here somewhere on that little group's antics). To recap; military recruiters attended a job fair at UCSC. The folks from SAW made a very vocal demonstration against them. University officials feared that the demonstration appeared to be heading toward possible violence. The recruiters left rather than let the situation escalate.

In other words, SAW doesn't understand what free speech is and believe they have the right to stifle it in the name of their cause.

Michelle Malkin, staunchly conservative, decried the SAW actions and posted information from the SAW group's own website that happened to include the some of the students phone numbers. SAW had put the information there in press release format labeled "for immediate release". This is an important point; Malkin did not dig up confidential information, she posted the SAW press release.

Here's where it gets ugly. Some people have reportedly been making threats, including death threats, against the SAW members. These include email and telephone threats. When the left-wing sites began decrying Malkin's publication of the SAW press release, Malkin began receiving abuse and threats, including death threats.

From my perspective: The SAW people are a bunch of idiots. If you post your contact info you can not whine when someone actually uses it. Malkin did absolute nothing wrong to post the SAW press release. The people sending threats in either direction should be tracked down and jailed. Period. Freedom of speech does NOT include the right to threaten others.

Malkin might want to consider deleting the phone numbers since she's now aware that there are some loons out there that are misusing them. I do not believe she is obligated to do so, but it might help calm the situation. The SAW group is now learning that some actions bear consequences. The lesson to anyone who can't figure it out for yourself - don't post contact info if you don't want to be contacted.