America's hypocritical p.c. mullahs

Actually, the night of the show, the remarks garnered little attention. The next day though, a religious fundamentalist and talk show host in Houston, Texas, urged his listeners to call "Politically Incorrect's" advertisers and complain.

Soon Maher, like Dr. Laura before him, faced defecting advertisers and local affiliates reacting to the growing controversy. By conservative standards, that's "blatant censorship," as O'Reilly would put it, right?

Wrong.

Once again, the Wall Street Journal offered up the new explanation: "[Maher's] comments fully merit First Amendment protection. But the advertisers who yanked support from his show were also within their rights: That A may speak hardly means B must fund A's speech."

Conservative media monitor Brent Bozell agreed: "It's not 'censorship' if [ABC] decides that Mr. Maher's regularly kooky left-wing remarks are too offensive to its audience or advertisers."

Now they tell us.

The conservatives' p.c. flip-flop on college campuses has been just as dramatic.

Writing one of his many ardent columns about how political correctness was stifling free speech at universities, syndicated columnist George Will once bemoaned the plight of a conservative English professor who became the victim of left-wing p.c. witch hunt when he labeled a master's level program in Third World and minority literature as "racist." The professor's punishment? According to Will, he was "shunned" by colleagues, "avoided" by graduate students, and "denounced" at a student rally.

How times have changed. According to the Wall Street Journal's new guidelines, that's now all fair game because "speech must be free, but cannot be without cost." Will's English professor in question was simply paying the price -- the cost -- for his provocative statements.

Just like University of Texas journalism professor Robert Jensen recently paid the price for his fiery column published in the Houston Chronicle, in which he suggested the Sept. 11 attacks were "no more despicable than the massive acts of terrorism" committed by the United States." Days later, in an unprecedented move, UT president Larry Faulkner (Jensen's boss, in effect) wrote a letter to the Chronicle repudiating Jensen's remarks and calling him a "fountain of undiluted foolishness."

In the past (or if Jensen were expressing conservative views), that sort of singling out, particularly from a college administrator, let alone the president, would have generated howls of protest from conservative ranks complaining about the chilling effect the move would have on campus free speech.

As anti-p.c. crusader and U.S. News & World Report columnist John Leo complained before Sept. 11, "The [campus] culture is pretty adamant about what you say and what you should think. So when someone comes from the outside and says, 'No, I'm suggesting the opposite,' a great intolerance is forced to the surface."

Leo has yet to come to the aid of Jensen or the "great intolerance" that surfaced on the Texas campus.

In a UPI story earlier this year on political correctness, National Review columnist John Derbyshire bemoaned "the steadily narrowing rules about what can be said in public."

Yet what was the National Review Online's reaction to Jensen's being publicly censured by his university employer for making controversial statements? Instead of lamenting the steadily narrowing rules about what can be said in public, the conservative outlet complained, "[the] university administration has done nothing to Jensen -- he hasn't been fired, placed on administrative leave, or told to clean out dormitory bathrooms on Saturday mornings."

National Review mocked the notion that "criticizing [Jensen] should not be permitted because it might have a chilling effect on free speech. If that logic is hard to follow, consult George Orwell."

Or maybe George Will.

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