The Helen Thomases of Talk Radio?

By Peter Wilson

"Will Beck and Limbaugh be Next?" asks Boston Globe columnist Joan Vennochi. The Globe Op-Ed page displays a rogues gallery of photos of reporter Helen "go home to Poland" Thomas, Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck in a lame attempt to accuse talk radio hosts of being "occasionally anti-Semitic."

Ms. Vennochi's own words undermine her accusation; she points out that:

Conservatives have turned fealty to Israel, no matter what policy its government embraces, into another litmus test.

So if Beck and Limbaugh are great friends of Israel, what evidence does she provide to back up her slur?

Vennochi provides not a single quote to prove Rush's anti-Semitism, since he "was off the air" last week. Apparently nothing from Rush's last twenty years of broadcasting was worth repeating.

As for Beck:

Ironically, in discussing it, Beck might be accused of similar insensitivity. Before her retirement was announced, he questioned why Thomas was still employed with this observation: "You know, may I tell you this Jewish-run media, really, they're really bad at running the media, if they are indeed Jewish. You know what I mean? The Zionist masters really suck at being Zionist masters.'' Sarcasm or anti-Semitism? Call the PC police.

If I could translate for the obtuse Ms. Vennochi: Beck is indeed being sarcastic, pointing out that anti-Semites routinely accuse the media of being dominated by the Zionist lobby, which is odd given the media's pro-Palestinian bias.

Although Vennochi takes pains to distance herself from Helen Thomas's "ugly" remarks, her overall argument attempts to dismiss the incident as mere political incorrectness committed by both left and right.