The Attack on Horowitz: A Whirlwind of Lies

Officials at the University of Northern Colorado have kicked up quite a dust storm this morning, in their ongoing battle with David Horowitz.

The whirlwind of charges and counter-charges they have generated blinds the eyes and numbs the mind with the scalding fury of an Arabian simoon. Yet we at Moonbat Central will not be sidetracked. We will ride out the storm. The dust will settle. And when it does, we suspect that David Horowitz's charges against UNC may prove to have been, if anything, too gentle.


Horowitz Accusers Backpedal

For two weeks, UNC administrators kept mum while bloggers and print journalists pilloried Horowitz for allegedly spreading an "urban legend" about a supposedly non-existent student who had suffered political persecution at their school.

Horowitz claimed that a UNC student had encountered an essay question on an exam instructing her to "explain why George Bush is a war criminal." The young woman instead wrote an essay on why Saddam Hussein is a war criminal, for which she claims she received an F. Horowitz's accusers said the woman never existed.

Because the student in question feared to go public, Horowitz had difficulty proving her story or even her existence. Bloggers and journalists descended like piranha, confidently condemning Horowitz as a liar.

But the tide turned quickly. Sufficient evidence of the student's existence had accumulated by Tuesday, that many of Horowitz's accusers began backpedaling.


The Counterattack

Now comes the counterattack. This morning we read on the InsideHigherEd.com Web site a piece by Scott Jaschik whose headline, "Tattered Poster Child," seems to imply that the student – whose very existence Mr. Jaschik questioned as recently as yesterday – should now be regarded as "tattered" or damaged goods.

Mr. Jaschik informs us that UNC officials have suddenly broken their silence and admitted that yes, they knew all along that the young woman really existed, and that she had in fact been given an exam which asked her to "Make the argument that the military action of the U.S. attacking Iraq was criminal."

However, they claim that the grade she received was not an "F"; that the essay question was optional, not mandatory; that the student was given a poor grade for reasons other than political; and that the words, "explain why George Bush is a war criminal" are a most inaccurate paraphrase of the actual words that appeared on the test, which were (they now claim), "Make the argument that the military action of the U.S. attacking Iraq was criminal." Got that, folks?

As for the professor in question, he turns out to be one Robert Dunkley, an assistant professor of criminology at UNC who claims to be a registered Republican and a patriot to boot.


Liars and Slanderers at UNC

Here's my question: Why should we believe one word that assistant professor of criminology Robert Dunkley or any of his colleagues at UNC has to say?

For two weeks, they kept silent while bloggers and journalists tarred David Horowitz as a disseminator of "urban legends" at best, and a liar at worst. Dunkley and his colleagues allowed this slander to stand, knowing all along that the incident Horowitz described had really occurred.

Indeed, under direct questioning from the Cleveland Plain Dealer, the Dean's office, Provost's office and acting head of the political science department at UNC flatly denied any knowledge of such an incident, such a student or such a professor.

UNC administrators broke their silence only yesterday when their backs were to the wall. Clearly, these people have something to hide.


The Facts Aren't In Yet

David Horowitz responded to the new information this morning with a piece called, "Correction: Some of Our Facts Were Wrong; Our Point Was Right." In my opinion, he was overly gracious, admitting error prematurely.

We do not yet know all the facts in this case.

One thing we do know, however – because UNC finally decided to release it in the last 24 hours – is the exact wording of the infamous essay question which Robert Dunkley gave to his students on their exam (or perhaps we should say, the wording that Dunkley claims to have used in the exam). It reads as follows:

"The American government campaign to attack Iraq was in part based on the assumptions that the Iraqi government has ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction.’ This was never proven prior to the U.S. police action/war and even President Bush, after the capture of Baghdad, stated: ‘we may never find such weapons.’ Cohen’s research on deviance discussed this process of how the media and various moral entrepreneurs and government enforcers can conspire to create a panic. How does Cohen define this process? Explain it in depth. Where does the social meaning of deviance come from? Argue that the attack on Iraq was deviance based on negotiable statuses. Make the argument that the military action of the U.S. attacking Iraq was criminal.”

As a real patriot Patrick Henry once said, "I smell a rat."