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ground zero mosque
How about a short break from cat videos to talk about Something That Matters, hmm? The Ground Zero Terror Mosque! Satan's Community Center! Everyone has an opinion.

I have an opinion, but I'm not going to tell you what it is. I just want to explore how the controversy was driven by the web to an extent that possibly no other media frenzy has ever been, and how it is likely a blueprint for every political kerfuffle to come.
Way back in December of 2009, the New York Times published the first coverage of the proposed Muslim community center. Shortly after, Daisy Khan, wife of Feisal Abdul Rauf (the guy who wants to build the center), was interviewed by Fox News's Laura Ingraham.
In watching the above footage, you'd hardly think there was much of a controversy. It was here that the Internet picked up the ball. Pamela Geller, who runs a blog called Atlas Shrugs, wrote an incendiary post:
Islamic jihad took down those buildings when they attacked, destroyed and murdered 3,000 people in an act of conquest and Islamic supremacism. What better way to mark your territory than to plant a giant mosque on the still-barren land of the World Trade Center? Sort of a giant victory lap. Any decent American, Muslim or otherwise, wouldn't dream of such an insult. It's a stab in eye of America. What's wrong with these people? Have they no heart? No soul?
Ick. I won't get into how crazytown it is for a self-described Randian to advocate for government intervention in what is essentially a private property rights dispute.

Anyway, this kickstarted a churning media firestorm which picked up steam with some miniscule New York Post coverage. The reporter, Andrea Peyser, followed up with the first serious mainstream coverage that positions the mosque as an outrage.

The controversy came to a head in late July with Sarah Palin's Twitter commentary. A few weeks ago, Sarah Palin sent out a now-infamous (now deleted) tweet:
Ground Zero Mosque supporters: doesn't it stab you in the heart, as it does ours throughout the heartland? Peaceful Muslims, pls refudiate,
Geller, now something of a right-wing celeb, continues to blog about the issue constantly. Meanwhile, YouTube has proved to be incredibly fertile ground for the hysteria. I've collected some of the most viewed videos related to the Ground Zero Mosque (which is neither at Ground Zero nor a mosque, btw).

This first guy has nearly four million views. He's Pat Condell, a straight-talking everyman whose English accent seems to lend his ideas a bit of credibility. But he can't conceive of a peaceful Islam. His ideas lie far to the right, but he at least doesn't shriek at the camera.
And here's Keith Olbermann, offering a counterpoint. I'd argue that his commentary is as full of leaps in logic and manipulative emotional appeals as Condell's. He claims that if non-Muslims blew up a mosque and killed a bunch of people, we might not even hear about it on the news. Sure Keith.
A country song called "Salt in The Wound," written by Rita Wilson is, hoo-boy, pretty inflammatory.
See also Trade Martin's "We've Gotta Stop the Mosque."
This is perhaps the most compelling of the arguments against the Park51 community center. Just a basic appeal to sensitivity to the 9-11 victims featuring relatives of those who died and people who worked to rescue those who survived.
Here is some footage of some protesters harassing and shouting insults to Mohammad at a brown person wearing a hat (who looks vaguely Muslim compared to the protesters I guess). Turns out he was just a random construction worker.
Smugface McRosycheeks here has almost three million views. He talks about how some of his best friends are Muslim and this makes him an authority on Islam and how all Muslims secretly want death to America.