Cranking up the crazy, Jindal style

LONDON — In a foreign policy speech delivered Monday in London, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said that in the West, "non-assimilationist Muslims establish enclaves and carry out as much of Sharia law as they can without regard for the laws of the democratic countries which provided them a new home."

The Republican governor added that "it is startling to think that any country would allow, even unofficially, for a so-called 'no-go zone'."

Jindal remarks came during an address to the Henry Jackson Society in a committee room at the U.K.'s House of Commons with several British members of parliament attending.
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In his speech, Jindal warned attendees that he was going to say things that would not be deemed politically correct. "So brace yourselves," he said, noting that he had no interest in defaming any religion, but "dealing with reality and facts."

"And the fact is that radical Islamists do not believe in freedom or common decency nor are they willing to accommodate them in any way and anywhere," he said.

Jindal is traveling through Europe on a 10-day economic development mission that could also bolster his foreign policy credentials as he considers a possible presidential campaign.

"We spent several days here, had the chance to meet with several elected leaders and what you hear from them, for example, these so-called no-go zones," he told NBC News in an interview. "I think it's a mistake for any country to allow the development of areas within their country, whether it's neighborhoods or other areas, where the same laws, the same values, the same rules, simply don't apply."

If Fox News anchors hadn’t gotten the message before, they will now: The network isn’t going to sanction loose and utterly unsupported chatter about Muslim “no-go zones” in Europe. In its programming last night, Fox News issued two corrections on the matter, one of which acknowledged that “we have made some regrettable errors on air regarding the Muslim population in Europe, particularly with regard to England and France.” That came from Julie Banderas during the Saturday night program “Fox Report.”

She continued: “To be clear, there is no formal designation of these zones in either country and no credible information to support the assertion there are specific areas in these countries that exclude individuals based solely on their religion.”

Later in the evening, Jeanine Pirro, host of “Justice with Judge Jeanine,” presented her own correction for the centerpiece of Fox News’s “no-go zone” week. On her Jan. 10 program, Pirro welcomed terrorism analyst Steve Emerson to speak about these zones, which Emerson described this way: “They’re sort of amorphous, they’re not contiguous necessarily, but they’re sort of safe havens. And they’re places where the governments, like France, Britain, Sweden, Germany — they don’t exercise any sovereignty so you basically have zones where Sharia courts are set up, where Muslim density is very intense, where police don’t go in.” Though Emerson claimed that this phenomenon plagued Europe very broadly, he zeroed in on Birmingham, England: “There are actual cities like Birmingham that are totally Muslim, where non-Muslims just simply don’t go in,” he said. (A separate no-go-zone correction was issued by”Fox & Friends” on Saturday morning.)

In her correction, Pirro laid responsibility for the bad information on Emerson, and on her failure to correct him: “Last week on this program,” said Pirro, “a guest made a serious factual error that we wrongly let stand unchallenged and uncorrected. The guest asserted that the city of Birmingham, England, is totally Muslim and that it is a place where non-Muslims don’t go . Both are incorrect.” She went on to provide 2011 census data noting that 22 percent of the city’s population self-identifies as Muslim and that there’s no evidence of the whole no-go thing.

Not bad, though a review of the offending segment reveals that Pirro’s errors extend beyond just the failure to challenge Emerson. She gave the impression that she was rooting for these falsehoods. “This is metastasizing into a simple takeover,” she said at one point of the Muslim presence in Europe.

The Emerson-Pirro exchange mushroomed into a big problem for Fox News. Not only did the usual media-watchdog suspects hammer the network for trading in nonsense, the British prime minister did as well. “When I heard this, frankly, I choked on my porridge and I thought it must be April Fools’ Day,” said David Cameron, who finished with this rip against Emerson: “This guy’s clearly a complete idiot.”

Even before Emerson embarrassed Fox News on an international level, the network was pushing the no-go myth. On Jan. 7, three days before Emerson’s assertions, Fox News host Sean Hannity said this: “It seems if you watch in recent years, it’s not just France but all of Europe, there’s been a major influx, immigration, people from Muslim countries. They’ve even — and they’ve not assimilated, they’ve separated,” said Hannity. “They have no-go zones. If you’re non-Muslim, you’re not allowed. Not police, not even fire department if there’s a fire. Sharia courts have been allowed to be established. Prayer rugs in just about every hotel.”

Sometimes a claim is so egregious that a prime minister chokes on his porridge.

So infuriating that international backlash spurs a sassy hashtag and leads the speaker to apologize profusely the very next day.

So wrong that even though it’s already been widely debunked, people are still asking that we give it the PunditFact treatment.

Such is the case with a comment about Birmingham, England, by news pundit Steve Emerson, who appeared as a guest Jan. 10, 2015, on Fox News’ Justice with Judge Jeanine.

Host Jeanine Pirro introduced Emerson as founder of The Investigative Project on Terrorism for a segment about "no-go" zones for non-Muslims in Europe. Emerson said the zones exist in France and throughout the rest of Europe as "safe havens" for Muslims ruled by Sharia courts and not a country’s own laws.

"In Britain, it’s not just no-go zones," Emerson said. "There are actual cities like Birmingham that are totally Muslim, where non-Muslims just simply don’t go in. And parts of London, there are actually Muslim religious police that actually beat and actually wound seriously anyone who doesn't dress according to Muslim, religious Muslim attire."

Western Europe is just not dealing with the situation, he said.

Western Europe, meanwhile, did not seem amused by his comment. And make no mistake, the claim is wrong.

The city of Birmingham, situated north and west of London, has more than 1 million residents. There are more whites and Christians than any other ethnicity or religion, we found.

According to a report of the 2011 UK Census by the Birmingham City Council, 46 percent of residents said they were Christian and 22 percent, or 234,111 people, identified as Muslim.

No doubt, Islam is a growing and popular faith in Birmingham, up 7.5 percentage points from 2001 to 2011. Three Birmingham wards, Heath, Bordesley Green and Sparkbrook, had Muslim populations that exceeded half of the population, all ranging from 70 percent to about 77 percent.

Not that this gives any credence to Emerson’s claim about the city of Birmingham as a whole. This does not amount to the city "being totally Muslim."

Emerson apologized on his website and on the BBC, among other forums, for his remarks. He attributed his statement about Birmingham to sloppy fact-checking. (No kidding.) Here is the apology:

I have clearly made a terrible error for which I am deeply sorry. My comments about Birmingham were totally in error. And I am issuing this apology and correction for having made this comment about the beautiful city of Birmingham. I do not intend to justify or mitigate my mistake by stating that I had relied on other sources because I should have been much more careful. There was no excuse for making this mistake and I owe an apology to every resident of Birmingham. I am not going to make any excuses. I made an inexcusable error. And I am obligated to openly acknowledge that mistake. I wish to apologize for all residents of that great city of Birmingham.

Steve Emerson

PS. I am making (a) donation to Birmingham Children's Hospital.

British Prime Minister David Cameron, who really did say the remark caused him to choke on his porridge, called Emerson a "complete idiot."

"He started with an apology," Cameron said. "That's not a bad start. But what he should do is look at Birmingham and see what a fantastic example it is bringing people together of different faiths and different backgrounds and building a world-class brilliant city with a great and strong economy."