Helen Thomas Retiring Effective Immediately

[Guest SUNTZU]

FOXNews.com - Helen Thomas to Retire 'Effective Immediately' Following Uproar Over 'Palestine' Comments

Veteran White House correspondent Helen Thomas announced her retirement Monday following an uproar over comments she made last month about Jews in Israel.

Hearst Corporation, which employed Thomas as a columnist, put out a brief story via Hearst News Service announcing the retirement "effective immediately."

The announcement came after the White House Correspondents Association decried her remarks as "indefensible" and began to consider whether Thomas should continue to have the privilege of a front-row seat in the briefing room. White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs called her remarks "offensive and reprehensible" on Monday, as other former White House spokesmen called for Thomas to be fired.

The announcement Monday marked an abrupt end to a career that has spanned decades. Thomas, known as the dean of the White House press corps, has covered every president since Dwight Eisenhower. Her 90th birthday is Aug. 4.

The controversy escalated quickly over the weekend after the video surfaced online showing Thomas last month saying Jews should "get the hell out of Palestine," suggesting they go instead to Germany, Poland and the United States. The video, shot by New York Rabbi David Nesenoff, was posted on several prominent websites and prompted a swift apology from Thomas on Friday.

"I deeply regret my comments," she said in the statement, claiming they "do not reflect my heart-felt belief that peace will come to the Middle East only when all parties recognize the need for mutual respect and tolerance."

The apology did not satisfy her critics.

Lanny Davis, former special counsel to and White House spokesman for President Bill Clinton, said the apology "was not direct and didn't address the merits of her belief in the stereotype that Jews are aliens in Israel and don't belong there."

Calling for Hearst to at least suspend her White House privileges, Davis said Thomas had revealed herself to be "an anti-Semitic bigot."

Ari Fleischer, President George W. Bush's press secretary, said her comments amounted to a call for "religious cleansing." He told Fox News before the announcement that Thomas should lose her job over the comments.

"This goes beyond all boundaries," Fleischer said. "When you advocate that people need to be separated on the basis of their religion ... this is hatred, this is bigotry, this is prejudice."

Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said her comments were "outrageous" and urged her to make a "more forceful" apology.

"Her suggestion that Israelis should go back to Poland and Germany is bigoted and shows a profound ignorance of history," he said in a written statement.

The repercussions for the videotaped remarks built rapidly over the past three days. The speaking agency that represents Thomas dropped her over the weekend. Then a Washington-area high school canceled a graduation speech she was scheduled to deliver.

Thomas came to write as a columnist for Hearst after working for decades as a correspondent for UPI. Dana Perino, White House press secretary during the George W. Bush administration, said earlier Monday that her comments should call her privileges in the briefing room into question.

"Her comments were so offensive to so many, so personally hurtful, and they would not have been tolerated by anybody else," she said.

Just minutes before Hearst announced Thomas' retirement, the White House Correspondents Association issued a statement saying the organization "firmly dissociates from (her remarks)."

The statement noted that the WHCA has no authority over issuing credentials but would be reviewing whether she should keep her front-row seat at a meeting scheduled for Thursday.

"The incident does revive the issue of whether it is appropriate for an opinion columnist to have a front row seat in the WH briefing room," the statement said. "We are actively seeking input from our association members on this important matter."

Thomas' remarks were recorded near the White House on May 27 during a Jewish American Heritage Month celebration. Thomas, who is of Lebanese descent, said the Palestinian people "are occupied and it's their land" and that Israelis should "go home" to Poland, Germany, America "and everywhere else."

Thomas has a long history of anti-Israel rhetoric at White House press briefings. Last week at a briefing with Gibbs that followed a flotilla raid by Israeli commandos, Thomas called the raid a "deliberate massacre" and "an international crime."

"What is the sacrosanct, iron-clad relationship where a country that deliberately kills people and boycotts -- and we aid and abet the boycott?" she asked.

Nesenoff told FoxNews.com on Monday that he was in Washington to cover the Heritage Month event for rabbilive.com. He said he had no intention of cornering Thomas at the time and was not thinking about her stance on Israel when he approached her.

"It wasn't like I was singling her out," he said. Nesenoff said he was "shocked" at her response, saying it was so "relaxed" it was "like asking Arafat 'Gee what do you think of Jewish people?'"

The rabbi said he plans to release another one-minute video clip showing the rest of the exchange with Thomas.

[MikeW]

Whew... she is only 25+ years too late.

[Guest jackdm3]

I don't know her politics. Seen her forever. But she always creeped me out. So here you are.

<------- And it takes a lot to creep me out.

Edited June 7, 2010 by jackdm3

[Guest bkelm18]

K thx bai!

[Guest SUNTZU]

Hats off to John McCain effort to close gun-show loophole

From 2001...

Hats off to John McCain effort to close gun-show loophole

WASHINGTON -- Gun-control advocates have a powerful new voice in the Senate who is seeking to close a loophole that allows weapons to be sold at gun shows without background checks.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who cited cases in which suspected terrorists were caught with weapons bought at U.S. gun shows, says he will try to "force Senate consideration" early next year of the measure. Former President Clinton tried but failed to curb such sales. Hats off to the senator if he succeeds.

A spokesman said McCain hopes to attach an amendment to appropriate legislation, possibly a homeland security bill, in January. The amendment would require background checks taking up to three days for would-be buyers from private, unlicensed dealers at gun shows. After three years following enactment of the law, most checks on such purchasers would have to be completed in 24 hours.

"Foreign terrorists have exploited a loophole to buy weapons at gun shows," McCain said. "Clearly, alleged members of terrorist organizations have been able to secure guns and weapons using the gun-show loophole."

The senator had introduced a similar bill in May, but he said he was submitting a new version now because the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks lent "some urgency to tightening the law."

The National Rifle Association is bristling over the revival of a campaign for some gun control. James Jay Baker, the NRA's chief lobbyist, accused McCain of trying "to bootstrap on the Sept. 11 tragedy."

Baker also took aim at another group called Americans for Gun Safety, which seeks to close gun-show loopholes, claiming it "shamelessly manipulates" the terrorist "acts of war to jump-start its stalled political agenda."

"This is political opportunism at its calculated worst, and it cannot be allowed to spread unchallenged," Baker fumed.

He called the focus on gun shows an "outrageous attack on Americans' Second Amendment rights." He said he was particularly incensed because since Sept. 11 many Americans have been "purchasing their first firearms and learning to use them safely and responsibly for self-protection."

McCain has never been a strong gun-control advocate. In fact, he voted against the 1993 gun-control law, which requires a background check for all prospective purchasers of guns sold by licensed dealers.

But his spokesman said McCain believes that "the rights of gun owners come with responsibilities."

The Violence Policy Center, a gun-control advocacy group here, reports that a document posted on a Web site used by an al-Qaida fugitive tells prospective Muslim holy warriors they "should use lax firearms laws in the United States to get sniper and military assault rifle training."

The center quotes the document as telling trainees that in some countries, especially the United States, firearms training is available to the public and that "it is perfectly legal" to obtain AK-47 assault rifles.

The document also advises that "useful courses to learn are sniping, general shooting and other rifle courses," and it specifically discourages handgun training "until rifle training is mastered."

Tom Diaz, vice president of the center, said, "This document and the link to the cold-blooded assassins who carried out the suicide attacks" on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon "show conclusively that our lax gun laws and our tolerance of the most extreme one-stop shopping mall" -- the gun show -- are helpful to would-be terrorists.

Diaz, a former CIA agent, worries that terrorists could obtain the 50-caliber sniper rifles that can penetrate armor plate, down helicopters and, when loaded with armor-piercing incendiary ammunition, blow up fuel and chemical storage tanks.

He insists that such weapons can be purchased more easily than handguns in the United States. Furthermore, he says, 25 50-caliber sniper rifles weapons were purchased in this country by the al-Qaida terrorist network of Osama bin Laden in the 1980s.

"This chilling new information presents the NRA and its gun-industry cohorts with a stark choice: Support America or support terror," Diaz argues.

Supporters of closing the gun-show loophole are expected to cite evidence that a man named Ali Boumelhem, linked to the anti-Israel Hezbollah and convicted in Michigan on Sept. 10 of conspiring to smuggle guns to Lebanon, was seen buying weapons at three U.S. gun shows.

Even without the threat of weapons falling into the hands of terrorists, this nation faces a scary, general proliferation of handguns and its appalling consequences.

Earlier this week, President Bush, who does not support gun-control legislation, told a gathering of U.S. attorneys that they have a "clear-cut challenge to fight gun violence." He said more teenagers die from gun-shot wounds than from any other causes.

Tragically, the FBI reports, in the five-year period from 1995 to 1999, 32.1 percent of child handgun homicide victims were murdered by another child. In that period, two children a day, on average, were killed with handguns. Black children suffered a far higher rate -- seven times higher than white children.

Let's hope members of Congress who usually are allergic to any form of gun control will see the sanity of supporting background checks on all prospective buyers at gun shows.

[Guest 6.8 AR]

It's great one is retiring. I wish the other one would. He's a RINO, that maverick.

[Volzfan]

Man she scares me! She is worse than Hillary and Nancy put together!

[creeky]

She reminds me of the Penguin from Batman.

[Smith]

Kinda curious that all the sudden she's offensive. I've heard worse from her and others. Maybe we're finally putting our foot down on the history re-writers.

[Guest Sgt. Joe]

Man she scares me! She is worse than Hillary and Nancy put together!

Fret not my friend, at least she is leaving and never had any real power......

Those other two on the other hand do have power and are not planning on giving none of it up until the voters take it away and they are both Bat Crap:screwy:

If they were both to retire I believe I would have my first drink in years in celebration:)

But as the old song says "Another one bites the dust";)

[towerclimber37]

she's not retiring of her own volition, you can bet on that..and the liberal media is up in arms about it.

You can tell this by how many pundits are screaming in their shrill, ugly voices.

[greenego]

It was long past time for her to go.

[Raoul]

It's great one is retiring. I wish the other one would. He's a RINO, that maverick.

Gosh I wonder who...

I think it's time for a common sense party. There sure doesn't seem to be any out there.

[Garufa]

I think it's time for a common sense party. There sure doesn't seem to be any out there.

You can't have one without a foundation.

This country threw common sense out with the trash years ago.

[Guest TargetShooter84]

Too bad she couldn't take Obuma with her...

[Raoul]

You can't have one without a foundation.

This country threw common sense out with the trash years ago.

Absolutely true.

[Mike.357]

good riddance to Thomas and it will not be too soon when McCain is gone, **** him

[Guest jackdm3]

Only if you wish to be further entertained, go to the commentary on this article.

Helen Thomas as cautionary tale MarketWatch First Take - MarketWatch

[Mark@Sea]

Yes, I felt a great disturbance in the Farce, as if millions of liberals were suddenly silenced...

Help us, Onlywon, you're our only hope.

[Guest jackdm3]