The backlash is in full swing, and librarians now find themselves on the front lines of a spirited political debate following their efforts to oppose the USA PATRIOT Act. This week NATIONAL REVIEW Editor Rich Lowry penned a
vicious column, syndicated nationally, trashing librarians.
Paraphrasing the famous Shakespearean quote "Let's kill all the lawyers," Lowry added, "Sure--but only if we can kill all the librarians next." Lowry's scathing editorial comes on the heels of Attorney General John Ashcroft's recent attacks during his 16-city tour in support of the Patriot Act. Lowry, however, went far beyond Ashcroft, playing on
librarian stereotypes ("librarians have recently let down their hair, usually wrapped in a tight bun, of course,") and accuses the profession of harboring "thoughtless and unreconstructed leftism."
Lowry railed that librarians' ideology is akin to what "you expect to find among naive
college students and destitute Latin American peasants." He goes on to castigate the American Library Association for "making an otherwise worthy profession seem a blight on the republic." To read the full article, visit:
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/richlowry/welcome.shtml