David Horowitz has yet to correct false story of Princeton assault

[ck4829]

On December 17, FrontPageMag.com, the "online magazine" of the David Horowitz Freedom Center, posted an excerpt from a New York Sun article published that day detailing allegations by a Princeton University student who claimed he had been assaulted because of his conservative views. The Sun article reported that Francisco Nava, "leader of the Anscombe Society, a morally conservative student group that speaks out against same-sex marriage and pre-marital sex," claimed he was attacked by two men two days after he and other members of the Anscombe Society "received death threats via e-mail." Horowitz was quoted in the article saying: "It's a terrible incident, but it doesn't surprise me. ... The left has now become the hate group." The very same day, however, the Sun updated the story, reporting that Nava admitted to police that "he fabricated the assault, and that he sent e-mail death threats to himself, three other Princeton students, and a prominent conservative professor at Princeton." But FrontPageMag.com -- which promoted the article on its main page on December 17 as an "Academic Battleline[]" -- has yet to acknowledge that the entire story was fabricated. As of 6 p.m. ET, the excerpt from the original Sun article was still posted on FrontPageMag.com, with a link to the New York Sun article that includes the update, but with no reference to the update on FrontPageMag.com.

Horowitz, author of The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America (Regnery, 2006), spearheads a purported watchdog effort to promote "academic freedom." As Media Matters for America documented, Horowitz's "academic freedom" campaign has been marked by self-contradiction, repetition of unsubstantiated and self-evidently false claims, and ad-hominem attacks. In October 2007, Horowitz launched "Islamofascism Awareness Week," a series of protests and speeches on college campuses intended "to confront the two Big Lies of the political left: that George Bush created the war on terror and that Global Warming is a greater danger to Americans than the terrorist threat." As Talking Points Memo blogger Josh Marshall noted, however, Horowitz appeared to offer yet another goal for Islamofascism Awareness Week: "I'm a prominent conservative but no one is inviting me to speak at their campuses. ... I had to create an event."

The Sun reported on December 17 (original article available via Nexis):

"An outcry from students and faculty at Princeton University is rattling the campus here after a student who is leading a movement to instill conservative moral values among undergraduates was physically attacked Friday, beaten, and rendered unconscious in a rare incidence of violence within the Ivy League.

The incident is prompting an outcry from conservative students and faculty who say they feel singled out by the Princeton administration and the majority of the student body, who have remained silent in the face of what many say is a politically charged attack."

In a December 17 post, FrontPageMag.com posted the first three paragraphs of the above article under the headline "Violence Rattles Princeton." The Sun, however, later updated its original report, posting the following to its website at 9:13 p.m. ET:

"Princeton Student Admits to Staging Attack, Police Say"

...

That link no longer appears on FrontPageMag.com's main page. The excerpt from the Sun article is still available on FrontPageMag.com, but gives no indication that the Sun story was based on a complete fabrication.

http://mediamatters.org/items/200712190001?f=h_latest

[Buzz Clik]

1. Horowitz is looking for balance in academics, remember?

And balance means you can tell total lies and never be accountable.