2004 Racism Watch

2004 Racism Watch was an organization founded in January 2004 that called upon the 2004 to change or pull a political ad they deemed offensive from the air. The ad in question contained a partial face shot of a man who could be construed as "Middle Eastern."
Actor Ed Asner was a spokesman for the group and member of its advisory committee. Asner called the use of the picture "disturbing," comparing it to the Willie Horton ad that an independent political action committee funded by supporters of the Bush-Quayle campaign ran in 1988 criticizing the Massachusetts prison furlough system.
Other members of the group's advisory committee were actors Ed Begley, Jr., and Susan Sarandon; former U.S. Rep. Cynthia McKinney, author Noam Chomsky, feminist author Barbara Ehrenreich, Manning Marable, Elizabeth Martinez, Phil Tajitsu Nash, Ron Walters, Tim Wise and author Howard Zinn.
Racism watch reported in June 2004 that Columbia University director of African American Studies, Manning Marable, had called for immediate action to be taken to end the U.S. military's use of a book called "The Arab Mind" which was written by Raphael Patai. The book was described by Guardian Newspaper correspondant Brian Whitaker as one that presents "an overwhelmingly negative picture of the Arabs." In an article in the New Yorker magazine, Seymour Hersh said that he was told by an academic that the book was "the bible of the neocons on Arab behaviour". The Guardian also said that the book's best use was as a door stop.

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