FOX News, Ever Eager For New Ways To Attack Academia, Picks A Racist Chickenhawk As Its Latest Vehicle
Reported by Ellen - December 29, 2005
Tuesday night (12/27/05), Hannity & Colmes devoted a segment to, as substitute co-host Mike Gallagher called it, “America’s most bizarre and politically correct college courses.” Gallagher chortled as he read the list (The Unbearable Whiteness of Barbie, The Psychology of The Lesbian Experience, Cultural Production of Early Modern Women) which came straight from a press release from The Young America’s Foundation. The YAF spokesperson was Jason Mattera. It turns out Mattera has an interesting media history, none of which was mentioned on H&C.
I discovered Mattera was exposed last summer as a chickenhawk by Chris Matthews on MSNBC's Hardball. On that show, Materra claimed his service “fighting the culture wars” exempted him from serving in the Iraq war, which he professed to support. (Crooks and Liars has the video.) Furthermore, less than a year before his stint Tuesday night, he was criticized by both Sean Hannity and Alan Colmes during a previous H&C appearance for setting up a whites-only scholarship as a way of protesting affirmative action. During that same interview, Mattera admitted accepting a $5,000 scholarship earmarked for minorities (Hispanics).
Gallagher introduced Mattera by saying, “You do some good stuff.” Gallagher continued, “I mean, you talk about a waste of tuition money... It really is outrageous. When you think about parents paying their kids’ tuition and they’re going into school to learn, for example, Lesbian novels since World War II.
Jason Mattera, full of outrage, demanded to know where the line is drawn. “Homeo-erotic (sic) experience of Alvin and the Chipmunks?”
Gallagher chuckled maliciously. “To liberals, there’s no limit. Anything goes.”
Alan Colmes, who has been on a roll lately, interrupted to say, “Oh, please!”
Mattera, obviously an Ann Coulter fan, “quipped,” “How does studying same-sex eroticism in the Renaissance period enrich your education unless you want to become a pimp or a prostitute?”
Speaking of Coulter, check out the provocative photo of her promoting her university appearances on the homepage of YAF's website. Apparently eroticism for students is A-OK when it’s done in the name of conservatism.
Mattera claimed that Eurpides and Socrates are out, lesbian novels in. When it was Colmes’ turn, he said, “Let’s be honest... you are guilty of suggesting that these elective courses are the only things being offered on college campuses.”
Mattera tried to argue that his so-called PC courses pre-empt Western civilization courses. Colmes called that disingenuous and dishonest “because you know they teach those other courses… Be honest!”
Colmes added that Mattera was also being disingenuous because the courses were provocatively titled in order to draw students. “This is a sales pitch. They’re not talking about Barbie and only Barbie. They’re talking about race and culture and popular culture in the United States. Those are very valid subjects for a college to be teaching.”
Mattera never addressed that point, other than to try and push his racial agenda by complaining about the course title using the phrase, “The Unbearable Whiteness.”
Evidently, FOX News has no compunction about Mattera’s hypocrisy and racism. As Nancy posted, Brit Hume not only did a segment on Special Report about the YAF list of classes, he particularly highlighted “The Unbearable Whiteness of Barbie,” just as Mattera did. The same segment was posted on the Special Report web page.
There's more of Mattera to come on FNC. His website indicates he’ll be a guest later this morning on FOX & Friends.
