The Political Whore

By Eric Snider
cross-posted from The Daily Loaf

“The whole purpose of the law is to stifle speech against people who speak against the deviant [gay] lifestyle.” —Bill Keller

The first and second installments of The Devi’s Advocate with Bill Keller drew lots of traffic and comments. Welcome to our third Q&A. I’ll be playing the role of Devil’s Advocate.

One of our most controversial religious figures, Pinellas-based Bill Keller is known for his incendiary rhetoric and unbending view of Bible-based morality. He believes homosexuality is an abomination, abortion is murder and … you can pretty much guess the rest. Click here for a bit more detail on Keller’s ministry.

Today’s Topic: The U.S. Congress is in the process of expanding Hate Crimes laws to include “sexual orientation,” “gender” and “gender identity” to federally protected classes that already include race, religion, color or national origin. Bill Keller doesn’t like this at all.

The Devil’s Advocate: By opposing the addition of gender identity to the existing hate crimes bill, does that mean you’re OK with crimes against gays?

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For years, the family of imprisoned former USF professor Sami Al-Arian insisted that their nemesis and most dogged chronicler, Tampa Tribune investigative reporter Michael Fechter, was doing the bidding of anti-Arab forces.

Today, they got some more ammo for their argument in the news that Fechter has resigned from the paper to take a job working for Al-Arian critic Steven Emerson.

“It just proves what we’ve known and asserted all along,” said Laila Al-Arian, Sami’s daughter. “I can say we’re not surprised by it.”

Trib editor Janet Coats confirmed Fechter’s resignation and said his last day is today. He could not be reached for comment.

Other longtime critics of Fechter’s work were abuzz with the news. One, Ahmed Bedier of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said, “The Tampa Tribune should revisit his work and act accordingly.” He characterized Fechter’s reporting on Al-Arian as unobjective and slanted. “Fechter was not serving journalism but was serving the interests of an anti-Muslim agenda.”

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