Media Silence on Antiwar Violence

[thedrifter]

Media Silence on Antiwar Violence
By Patrick Poole
FrontPageMagazine.com | July 10, 2007


Airforce Airman Jonathan Schrieken, 22, is fighting for his life after being shot in the heart while standing outside his home near McGuire Air Force Base in New Jersey on July 4th by a gunman intending to make an antiwar statement. Airman Schrieken, a loadmaster with the 6th Airlift Squadron based at McGuire, remains in critical condition at a Camden, New Jersey hospital. The antiwar gunman, Matthew J. Marren, killed himself after shooting Schrieken and left two suicide notes explaining that he was “mad at the government”.

Meanwhile, the establishment media ignores the story. The initial Associated Press report on the incident never mentions Marren’s motive for shooting Schrieken. The first media outlet to discuss Marren’s intent to make an antiwar statement on the 4th of July by killing a member of our military was Phillyburbs.com, and the story has only gained national attention after a post over the weekend at LittleGreenFootballs.com.


A member of Marren’s family described to Phillyburbs.com his reasons behind the attack:



Marren’s aunt, Terina Henderson of Trion, Ga., said she spoke to Marren’s mother yesterday who told her Marren left two notes, one in his home and one in his car, indicating he was upset with the government.



She said she did not know the exact wording in the notes, but said Marren was “mad at the government and wanted to make a statement … that’s why he did what he did on the Fourth of July.”



Over at LGF, a friend of the Schrieken family described the attack:



He had been on leave here in Ohio and got back to his home off base and was unpacking stuff from his car when this 22 year old guy walked up to him and asked him if he lived in the house. When Jon said yes, the guy said “not any more” and shot him point blank in the chest. He tried to shoot him again, but his gun jammed. Jonathan made it into the house. The guy then shot himself.



This makes it clear that Marren had nothing short of murder on his mind. Providentially, the gun jammed, allowing for Schrieken to escape into his house, where he lived with several other Airmen.



If Airman Schrieken had been an abortionist or homosexual, this story would be front page news for the New York Times and the lead story on CBS News with Katie Couric for at least the next month. But since Schrieken is serving in the military, even his hometown newspaper, the Columbus Dispatch, has ignored this story.



Predictably, a law enforcement spokesman says that Marren’s suicide notes “were indicative of an individual suffering from mental-health problems”, but that raises the question of how anyone could identify anyone suffering from mental-health problems amidst those devoted to bizarre conspiracy theories and the virulent anti-Americanism of the antiwar movement. If anything, Marren would have fit right in unnoticed.



It is also worth noting that Marren was merely following the logic of the anti-war movement’s standard public rhetoric. Their language is laced with suggestive undertones justifying attacks against our military, calling our armed forces fighting the War on Terror “baby-killers”, constantly invoking the specter of Abu Ghraib, and citing their grossly inflated statistics of civilians accidentally killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Such reckless and unbalanced rhetoric (they’re not quite as adept at keeping statistics on those murdered by terrorists) fuels the hatred that drives someone like Marren to violence against a member of our own military.



Antiwar supporters will no doubt disclaim any responsibility for Marren’s attack, but in any other circumstance involving someone engaged in a politically incorrect crime, Leftists would not hesitate to point their fingers at the conservative movement. One might recall the attack on “right-wing talk radio” following Matthew Shepherd’s murder and Hillary Clinton’s indictment of the same after the Oklahoma City bombing. Add to that the attacks by the ACLU and others on the pro-life movement after the shootings of two abortion doctors in the 1990s.



But now that someone has acted on the antiwar movement’s anti-military rhetoric don’t expect to hear any apologies from Cindy Sheehan, International A.N.S.W.E.R., Daily Kos, or Rep. John Murtha. And certainly don’t expect the establishment media to give this heart-rending story the coverage it deserves.



Hopefully, Airman Schrieken will quickly and fully recover from his injuries. Realistically, his injuries may very well force him out of the military. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the Schrieken family.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

July 11, 2007, 0:00 a.m.

The July 4th Attack
When peaceniks attack, journalists snooze.

By Michelle Malkin


A young Air Force airman is fighting for his life in Camden, N.J. He was shot on Independence Day by a crazed gunman who reportedly had a beef with the military and the U.S. government and “wanted to make a statement” on the Fourth of July. Have you heard about the plight of 22-year-old McGuire Air Force Base loadmaster Jonathan Schrieken? Probably not.

The shooting got no mention in the New York Times — not even a squib in a back section (though the paper did see fit to put the shooting of a seven-year-old girl in Trenton on the front page).

Local media outlets have gathered a few news tidbits about the shooter, Matthew Marren, who killed himself after attacking Schrieken outside his Willingboro home. Schrieken roomed with a few other servicemen in the rented house. Schrieken did not know Marren. PhillyBurbs.com reported that a relative said Marren was “angry at the government and wanted to make a statement” on Independence Day. Authorities found two suicide notes that “were indicative of an individual suffering from mental-health problems.”

A random act of insanity? Not so fast. There’s more to the story. A reader whose son is the best friend of Senior Airman Schrieken wrote to Charles Johnson of the Little Green Footballs blog with background details:
My son’s best friend, Jon, who’s in the Air Force stationed in New Jersey at Fort Dix/McGuire Air Force Base, was shot by a crazed anti-military white guy on Independence Day and he remains in critical condition. He had been on leave here in Ohio and got back to his home off base and was unpacking stuff from his car when this 22-year-old guy walked up to him and asked him if he lived in the house. When Jon said yes, the guy said ‘not any more’ and shot him point-blank in the chest. He tried to shoot him again, but his gun jammed. Jonathan made it into the house. The guy then shot himself.

Turns out the guy left a couple of suicide notes stating how much he hated the military and he wanted to go out making a statement, so he chose to make his statement on Independence Day trying to kill a soldier. We are very worried about our Airman . . . he’s like a son to me. He’s been to Iraq and Afghanistan on our behalf and then gets shot in his own driveway here in the U.S. by an anti-war, anti-American lunatic. This is gut wrenching.

Now, imagine the scenario flipped: What if a soldier had attempted to murder a peace activist over the holidays in order to “make a statement”? The Times would be holding front-page vigil, and Katie Couric’s brow would be furrowed for a week. The yakkity yaks on The View would be clucking their tongues about the culture of violence bred by the military — and who knows what Rosie O’Donnell would be dressing her poor child in to exploit the story on her website.

Funny how the Root Causes crowd becomes so incurious about the root causes of crime when the suspects are anti-military nutballs and antiwar protesters. To the extent leftists pay any attention at all to this attempted murder, you can expect it to be downplayed as an isolated incident. Never mind the pro-fragging comments made by troop-bashing academic fraudsters like Ward Churchill; the iconic banners that proclaim “We support our troops when they shoot their own officers” and “Don’t impeach Bush . . . execute him”; the countless acts of vandalism against military recruitment offices nationwide since 9/11; and the burning of soldiers in effigy by hate-filled peaceniks.

Oh, and this week, the trial of Michael Curtis Reynolds began. He’s a Pennsylvania man and al Qaeda sympathizer accused of plotting to blow up U.S. energy installations in order to drive up gas prices and precipitate a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. In e-mail exchanges with Internet sleuth Shannen Rossmiller, who unmasked the bombing plot, Reynolds called the United States an “accursed country” and said “it isn’t the land of the free, but the home of the new dictators.”

Harmless rantings? No. Ideas, like the bullet in Jon Schrieken’s chest, have consequences.

Readers can send get-well wishes to Schrieken

Jonathan Schrieken
Cooper University Hospital
1 Cooper Plaza
Camden NJ 08103

Ellie

[drumcorpssnare]

I'm not suprised! The media would much rather fuel the public relations "fire" of the terrorists.
drumcorpssnare