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Little Green Footballs

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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Chris Chittleborough (talk | contribs) at 21:10, 10 September 2006 (→Allegations of threats from LGF readers: Only one allegation, as far as I can tell; we have to mention that Charles denied CAIRs slur). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Little Green Footballs logo
Little Green Footballs logo

Little Green Footballs (LGF) [1] is a political blog run by California web designer Charles Johnson. In the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks, Johnson transformed his blog's discussion of bicycle racing, programming, web design, and the occasional humorous news item into a very active discussion of the American War on Terror and the Arab-Israeli conflict. [citation needed]

LGF helped expose the forged Killian documents, possibly contributing to the resignation of CBS' Dan Rather. The site won the Washington Post's reader poll for Best International Blog in November 2004.

History and notable events

Ideological influences

Posts on LGF frequently cite the writing and views of Victor Davis Hanson, Charles Krauthammer, Mark Steyn, Oriana Fallaci, and James Lileks.

"Idiotarianism" and the "Fiskie"

Main article: Idiotarian

LGF webmaster Charles Johnson coined the internet neologism and political epithet "Idiotarian," and runs an "Idiotarian of the Year Award" named for journalist Robert Fisk.

Killian documents

Main article: Killian documents
The animated GIF image posted at LGF, comparing what CBS claimed to be a 1973-era typewritten memo with a 2004-era Microsoft Word document made with default settings.

LGF was one of four sources to conduct the initial investigation of Dan Rather's assertions on 60 Minutes that the Killian documents were genuine.

Within hours of the segment, the authenticity of the documents was questioned by posters on Free Republic , a conservative Internet forum, and discussion quickly spread to various weblogs in the blogosphere. The following morning, several blogs including Little Green Footballs[1][2] concluded that the memos were almost certainly forgeries. At 11 am on September 9, Charles Johnson at LGF produced an animated .gif file (at right) superimposing the photocopied memo on a copy he produced using the default settings of Microsoft Word. Others, including typography experts Peter Tytell and Thomas Phinney, analyzed the memos, concluding they were indeed crude forgeries. (See Killian documents authenticity issues)

These commentators were criticized by Jonathan Klein, a former CBS News executive, as persons working in their living rooms in their pajamas. In response, some of these individuals started calling themselves Pajamahadeen. [citation needed]

Death Threat From Reuters Employee

In May 2006, someone working at Reuters News sent a message to LGF saying "I look forward to the day when you pigs get your throats cut." Reuters claims to have identified and at least suspended the person responsible.[3]

Allegation of threats from LGF readers

Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council of American Islamic Relations has claimed that the FBI has "investigated several threats of physical harm against Muslims posted by Little Green Footballs readers".[4] Johnson strongly denies this claim[5] and alleges that CAIR "initiated the complaints to try to stifle free speech on his blog."[4]

Doctored Reuters photographs

Main article: Adnan Hajj photographs controversy

On August 5, 2006, LGF pointed out that a photograph of Beirut after an Israeli air strike, taken by Reuters news agency stringer Adnan Hajj, had been manipulated to create the impression there was more smoke over the city than was actually the case.[6] Subsequently, another "photograph" by Hajj was found to be faked, and dishonestly captioned.[7] Reuters subsequently admitted that the images were faked, "ended its relationship with Hajj" and removed all his photographs from their catalog.[8]

Charitable contributions

Little Green Footballs supporters have helped raise thousands of dollars for the charity organizations Spirit of America and Pizza for the IDF.

Pajamas Media

Main article: Pajamas Media

In late 2005, Johnson, along with blogger and author Roger L. Simon launched a news site called Pajamas Media (briefly called Open Source Media) featuring mostly conservative bloggers and journalists (e.g., Michelle Malkin, Glenn Reynolds, Michael Barone, Tammy Bruce, John Podhoretz, Michael Ledeen, Cathy Seipp) with some liberal participants (e.g., David Corn, Marc Cooper). The name refers to Jonathan Klein's comment about bloggers working in their pajamas. [citation needed]

Recurring Themes

"Palestinian Child Abuse"

Johnson often posts photos taken by press photographers of Palestinian children in terrorist and/or military clothing carrying machine guns and signs emblazoned with miltant slogans. [citation needed] Johnson refers to such photographs as evidence of "Palestinian Child Abuse." [citation needed] He often uses the term "Religion of Peace" (sometimes abbrievated as "RoP") in the title of posts which reference Islamic terror attacks, an ironic allusion to President Bush's assertion that Islam is a "religion of peace." [citation needed]

Rachel Corrie

Johnson has stated many times that he is disgusted with media coverage of the death of ISM activist Rachel Corrie, who was killed in Rafah, a town in the Gaza Strip.[citation needed]

Johnson disputes eyewitness accounts, claiming out that Corrie voluntarily placed herself in front of the bulldozer 'while trying to "protect” a house used for drugs and weapons smuggling'.[2] [citation needed]

Johnson also claims that the ISM, rather than being a pacifist organization, is explicitly pro-Palestinian and sympathizes with Palestinian terrorists; in support of this view, he has cited a diary entry from Corrie in which she claims that the Palestinians are justified in their terror attacks because the Israeli military's capabilities, aided by the U.S., put the Palestinians at a disadvantage. [3] [citation needed]

In posts about Corrie on LGF, Johnson often posts a picture of her burning a drawing of an American flag in front of Palestinian youths, an image rarely shown in mainstream news sources. [4]

Changes and controversies

Claims of anti-Arab and anti-Muslim sentiment

In October 2002, MSNBC's Will Femia wrote of LGF:

This site is the focus of considerable controversy for its focus (and particularly the focus of the constituents in its comments section) on Islamic culture and dogma as the source of Islamic terror. As a popular, active, and well presented site, it is worth checking out, but some may find its content hateful or even racist.

RJ Smith in Los Angeles Magazine asserts that:

"Little Green Footballs believes all Muslims are terrorists until proven innocent. Slangy, clever, the site is a dysfunctional mix of beautiful photos Johnson takes on coastal bike rides and constitutionally protected hate speech ...most of the time [Johnson's] site isn’t about high-wattage scoops; it’s about shaping opinion on the fringes, about giving haters a place to hang.[9]

Eric Boehlert has claimed that LGF is "concerned with highlighting that most of the MSM [Mainstream Media] reporting from Iraq and the Middle East is biased in favor of Islamic terrorists" and that it "oozes overt bias for Arabs and journalists (and most of all, Arab journalists)"[10] Antonia Zerbisias in the Toronto Star described LGF as a "virulently anti-Muslim/Arab website". [11]

Netiquette and redirects

Johnson and LGF "regulars" (the self-proclaimed "Lizardoids") have engaged in a number of high-profile feuds and flame wars.[citation needed] At various times, these debates have pitted LGF supporters against readers of a number of other blogs and alternative media sites.[citation needed] Sometimes the debates even "spilled over" to Wikipedia. When such confrontations trigger a stampede of visitors from rival sites, Johnson sometimes redirects the traffic thus generated to the Israel Defense Forces homepage.[citation needed]

Registration

As the volume of comments from argumentative newbies rose with the site's increasing profile, many regular users requested a simple registration system; Johnson obliged them in June 2004. Registration was closed in 2004, and is briefly opened on an irregular basis.

Media attention

Mainstream American Media

Since founder Charles Johnson's claimed post-9/11 "turn to the right", certain mainstream media sources have accused LGF of promoting ethnic hatred and bias; in return, the LGF webmaster asserts that "The Media are the Enemy." A few examples that support this assertion:

  • On September 25 2004, the New York Times Sunday magazine ran a cover story about political bloggers. Although Johnson had been interviewed for 43 minutes by author Michael Klam, neither he nor his weblog got a mention in the final piece - Klam focused instead on longtime rivals Wonkette and the Daily Kos. Johnson struck back with a post entitled "They Smile in Your Face" (an allusion to the 1972 soul hit "Back Stabbers" by the O-Jays), noting:
"There is not one word about the anti-idiotarian blogosphere... The mainstream media’s shameful, arrogant bias [is] up there for all to see."
  • In January 2005 columnist Andrew Sullivan described LGF as "enthusiastically pro-torture".
  • Vanity Fair writer James Wolcott has characterized the LGF community as "sort of like a disorganized Nuremberg Rally, a lot of angry ruffians with nowhere to go...." [5]
  • In September 2006, a satirical article in WIRED purporting to describe the "ultimate blog post" contrasted LGF with longtime rivals "The Daily Kos" thusly: [6]
Daily Kos: Bush caught in three-way with Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh.
Little Green Footballs: Bush enjoys triumphant three-way with Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh.

Johnson has frequently complained about the failure of Google News to index his blog. [citation needed] In March 2005, he called attention to that service's inclusion of the white supremacist National Vanguard site, while not including LGF. [citation needed] He has also noted Google News's inclusion of several terrorist "news" organizations such as the Hezbollah Al-Manar site. [citation needed]

Conservative American Media

I'm losing patience with this notion, surely one of the most successful media Big Lies of the past few years, that Charles runs a racist hate site. By now it's been repeated so often that even normally reasonable people believe it.[8]

Israeli Media

For "promoting Israel and Zionism" and "presenting Israel's side of the conflict," LGF won the "Best Israel Advocacy Blog" award from the Jerusalem Post in 2005.[9]

Notes Gil Ronen, a reporter for Israel National News [10]:

"If anyone ever compiles a list of Internet sites that contribute to Israel’s public relations effort, [Charles] Johnson's site will probably come in first, far above the Israeli Foreign Ministry's site."

Pro

Anti

Other

References

  1. ^ "lgf: Bush Guard Documents: Forged". Retrieved 2005-12-21.
  2. ^ "lgf: The Smoking Memo". Retrieved 2005-12-21.
  3. ^ A Death Threat from Reuters, LGF, May 26 2006
  4. ^ a b Paul Farhi (August 9, 2006). "Blogger Takes Aim At News Media and Makes a Direct Hit". Washington Post.
  5. ^ WaPo Covers Reuters Scandal, Quotes CAIR LGF, 8 August 2006
  6. ^ Reuters Doctoring Photos from Beirut? LGF, 5 August 2006
  7. ^ Another Fake Reuters Photo from Lebanon, The Jawa Report, 6 August 2006
  8. ^ Reuters withdraws all photos by Lebanese freelance, Reuters AlertNet, 7 Aug 2006
  9. ^ RJ Smith (February 2006). "Pajama Game". Los Angeles Magazine.
  10. ^ Eric Boehlert (August 15). "Little Green Footballs, Staged War Photos, and the Story the Press Won't Tell". Yahoo News. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  11. ^ Antonia Zerbisias (Aug. 9, 2006). "And now it's 'Reutersgate'". Toronto Star. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
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