"Are beheadings common in western New York?" asks Mark Steyn, is his NRO posting entitled Headless Body in Gutless Press.

Steyn's question follows the story of Mrs. Hassan, whose husband launched a TV network to counter negative stereotypes of Muslims. Mr. Hassan had no problems with press coverage of the launch, which appeared in newspapers everywhere, e.g., The Columbus Dispatch, The Detroit Free Press, The San Jose Mercury News, Variety, NBC News, the Voice of America, the Canadian Press, etc. But when Mr. Hassan killed his wife at his TV studios and detached her head from her corpse, there was barely a mention in the local press, e.g., "page 26 of Newsday, plus The Buffalo News, and a very oddly angled piece in the usually gung-ho New York Post, 'Buffalo Beheading: Money Woe Spurred Slay,'" writes Steyn.

So "he beheaded her for some goofy clause in the insurance policy?" wonders Steyn. Well, "not exactly," in fact as one the papers reported:

"An upstate TV exec who set up a channel promoting Muslims as peace-loving people was stressed about his failing business in the days before he allegedly chopped off his estranged wife's head, a friend of the couple said today." 

(Read Steyn's posting for more.)

You gotta wonder, though, if these peace-loving beheaders are any relation to the folks our government likes to call "moderates"?

A very important distinction, as who wouldn't wanna be killed by a moderate terrorist rather than a hardline one? Those moderate killers are so much more civilized...

[Posted by R.S.]