School Editors Suspended for Cartoons

The editor-in-chief & opinions editor of the Daily Illini - a student-led newspaper serving the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign - have been suspended for publication of 6 of the 12 cartoons that have recently spawned self-righteous indignation by crazed Muslims throughout the world. A task force has been established to investigate "the internal decision-making and communication" that led to the publishing of the cartoons, said the newspaper's publisher.

"I pretty much have an idea how this is going to run, and this is a thinly veiled attempt to remove me from my position," said editor Acton Gorton.

"The board and publisher reaffirm that final decisions about content in The Daily Illini rest with the editor in chief," Cory said in a written statement. "But the board and publisher also recognize that journalistic norms regarding professional behavior dictate that it is the editor's obligation to engage other student editors and student staff members in rigorous discussion and debate of sensitive content."

On Monday, the paper ran an editorial apologizing for Gorton's decision and called the move "a blatant abuse of power" by a "renegade editor who firmly believes that his will is also the will of the paper."

"Renegade editor"..."blatant abuse of power". Sounds like something straight out of Pravda, the official newspaper of the dearly departed Soviet Union. Amazing. This is a shaft job by the task force against the editors, pure & simple. What is it about Muslims that cause professionals in news publishing to freely & willingly give up their right of freedom of the press. They have no reluctance to print anti-Christian works or photos of Abu Ghraib prisoners or bloody messes of bodies in accidents or any number of other sensitive areas. But cartoons of Muhammed are forbidden. Most all newspapers in the country have refused to print the cartoons.

This is not sensitivity on the part of the newspapers. That's what they want you to believe. Instead, it is pure cowardice & kowtowing. The newspapers, as well as tv news, know that the world is saturated with crazy, irrational Muslims & they are intimidated by them - they fear them. For them, the papers give up their right of a free press. In the process they are denying their readers & viewers the opportunity to judge the cause of the Muslim "unrest".

The media are a pathetic lot.