William J. Bennett and Alan M. Dershowitz are right to bemoan "A Failure of the Press." But the Danish journalist union is going even further. The union not only downplays the seriousness of the death threats against the cartoonists (they live in hiding) but argues that making a fuss over their plight will worsen it. Helle Merete Brix and Lars Hedegaard lay out the unhappy story of how"Islamic Extremists and Their Western Allies on the Offensive against Free Speech in Denmark." The money quote:

Among the Danish organisations that are busy downplaying the recent death threats against the Danish cartoonists is the Danish Union of Journalists -- the trade union to which the great majority of journalists belong and which boasts a membership of more than 12.000.

Until 21 December the union's journal Journalisten had not mentioned the row over the pictures of Muhammad. But then something happened and the cover of the 21 December issue was dominated by the headline"Blæst op" -"Overblown". Inside the issue journalist Jacob Berner Moe writes about"The Reward that Vanished". His angle is that the entire affair has been blown out of proportion and that we just don't know if a price was put on the artists' heads. He is convinced, however, that"the media storm aggravated the threat against the 12 artists."