No Hate Watch
July 12, 2009
May 15, 2009. Issues of the Berkeley Daily Planet that contain nothing incendiary or hateful are still rare beasts. However, thanks perhaps to our efforts, the situation may be improving. The last three issues contained only two such pieces, and these were in the Letters section, rather than in the News or Commentary sections.
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No Hate Watch Revisited
July 25, 2009
When an issue of the Berkeley Daily Planet is hate free, we believe that it deserves a kudo. On May 15, we began a No Hate Watch in the kudos section of the website to list all hate free issues. We began by complimenting the Berkeley Daily Planet for its May 7, 2009 edition.
But then the matter languished. We did not forget about our No Hate Watch. We simply could not find another such edition. So we waited, and waited, and waited some more.
Patience has finally paid off. We are happy to declare that two and a half months later we have found the July 23, 2009 issue to be hate free. Of course, the Israel/Palestine issue was there as usual. However, the anti-Israel letters were serious and thoughtful, and, much to our surprise, there were a number of pro-Israel letters (O’Malley has been known not to publish pro-Israel letters), again thoughtful and polite. There is, however, a grim underside to this story. It just so happens that Becky O’Malley is vacationing in Europe. We would feel better if responsible journalism were being practiced on her watch.
Becky O'Malley Kills Free Speech
August 14, 2009
On reading the August 13, 2009 edition of the Berkeley Daily Planet, we were sorely tempted to give it our much-coveted Hate Free Award, that is, until we received a complaint from one of our readers. Now we don’t know what to do.
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No Hate Watch: The August 27, 2009 Issue
September 1, 2009
This is a borderline issue of the Daily Planet. It is relatively hate free. There is a commentary by Virginia Bowning calling a certain unnamed faction in the upcoming KPFA election liars and rats. However, we might generously regard that as normal KPFA trash talk, rather than hate speech.
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The September 10, 2009 issue: So close and yet…
September 11, 2009
The Berkeley Daily Planet almost scored another hate free issue. Conn Hallinan wrote a piece critical of Israel, b ut it seemed accurate and was reasonable. So, no problem there. But then came Becky O’Malley’s editorial. It was almost entirely on the subject of Van Jones’ recent resignation from the Obama administration. But then, for no apparent reason, she veered off with this:
Now, you can’t believe everything you read in a Wikipedia bio. (We have first-hand experience with that problem, since the entry for the Berkeley Daily Planet is being stalked by one “Dr. Mike” Harris of Sausalito, a card-carrying member of the lunatic fringe of supporters of right-wing Israeli politics. Every time someone corrects the misinformation he’s inserted into the entry, he changes it back.)
The problem is that Dr. Harris is not from Sausalito, is a centrist Zionist and not from some lunatic fringe, and has submitted proof to our website that he only edited Wikipedia on one day, many months ago. This is hardly “stalking.” We recall that in its June 4th attack on this website. the Daily Planet described the editor of our website as a frequent newspaper caller (i.e., stalker), despite the fact that he had only returned their call, and another occasion followed up to get a promised answer to a specific question. This is a very far cry from being a frequent caller or stalker. He, too, has been described by the Berkeley Daily Planet as a right wing religious fanatic (and worse), even though he is a left wing secularist.
A Hate Free Issue Plus We Learned Something
September 24, 2009
We congratulate The Berkeley Daily Planet on its September 24, 2009 issue. First, despite the fact that Becky O’Malley’s editorial is given over almost entirely to a condemnation of this website and its editor, we believe that she did so in about as hate-free a manner as is possible for her. Sure, she called us “crazy” and “liars” (without specifying the lies), but we will let it pass as pretty mild by Daily Planet standards.
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Hate Free Award Redefined
October 2, 2009
Becky O’Malley sneaked her September 24, 2009 issue by us. It was, loosely speaking, hate free, and so we issued her a Hate Free Award. However, there was egregious malfeasance of a different type. As detailed elsewhere (see here), O’Malley’s own editorial contained two obvious and presumably intentional fabrications.
So we have decided to raise the bar, and rename our much-coveted No Hate Award the No Hate (or Other Forms of Malfeasance) Award.
It is, after all, part of our duty to continuously raise the bar for O’Malley until we can declare with a full heart that she is running a damned fine paper. May that day arrive soon.
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