Two days after the New Hampshire presidential primary, I was listening to KPLU on my way to work. At the top of the hour, as always, NPR news came on to regurgitate the previous days' headlines. The first item was George Bush's reaction to his trouncing at the hand's of John McCain. Normally, I would tune out at this point and gaze with glassy eyes at the taillights in front of me, but I wanted to hear the spin ol' Georgie-boy put on his embarassing defeat.

Bush gave his whole "New Hampshire is a notorious bump-in-the-road for the frontrunner" spiel, and then the NPR reporter returned to announce that the site Bush had chosen to kick off his South Carolina campaign was none other than Bob Jones University, a fundamentalist Christian institution that REFUSES TO ADMIT AFRICAN-AMERICANS, AND HAS BANNED INTER-RACIAL DATING.

POW! The sentence went off like a shotgun in my brain. Surely such a place doesn't exist today, not 40 years after the National Guard was called in to forcibly integrate schools throughout the South.

I waited in gleeful anticipation for the NPR reporter to skewer Bush like a sow at a pigroast, but she continued on without a peep. What the fuck! I was seething! For days, NPR and every other international media outlet had been blasting Austria for allowing Joerg Haider and his extreme-right Austrian Freedom Party to form a coalition overnment in Vienna, and here at home, the Republican frontrunner for the office of the President, the next potential "leader of the free world" is rubbing elbows with southern bigots and nobody says a word?!? What the hell is going on?

When the most progressive major media outlet in the nation reports, as part of its own newscast, that the probable next President of the United States, the most powerful man in the world, is PANDERING TO ADMITTED RACISTS, but does not raise the slightest objection, choosing instead to point their finger at alleged fascists overseas, SOMETING IS TERRIBLY WRONG! Of course, fascism is to be condemned wherever it surfaces, but it's Austria for christsakes! Nazi sympathizers are noting new to their government (remember Kurt Waldheim 1986-93).

There is a HUGE difference between a relatively powerless European nation being courted by supposed far-right extremists and the most powerful nation in the world being lead by a racist sympathizer. So, if you don't want our country led by a blatant fascist, get out and vote in the Washington primary. Vote Democrat, better yet, vote independent, better still, write in the name of your neighbors' Chihuahua! And be sure to support Eat The State!, the Washington Free Press, and other mind-expanding media publications because NPR can no longer be trusted.