Final Score for All Star Game: Arizona a Big 1, Detractors a Big 0

Last week on July 12, Phoenix hosted the Major League Baseball All Star Game, and despite calls from liberal activists and media activists to boycott Arizona, the event came off as a great success for the city and the state.

As many of you know, Arizona’s state legislature passed Senate Bill 1070, which was signed into law by the courageous Governor Jan Brewer.  The legislation enables law enforcement officials to check on the immigration status of anyone they stop on suspicion of violating another law.  When the bill was signed, the national media did a terrific job of distorting the law to the extent that many people who were ignorant about the law actually believed that police were just randomly stopping anyone they suspected of solely being here illegally.  It didn’t matter to the activists and the liberal advocates in the media that the law specifically prohibited law enforcement officials from solely stopping anyone just to check immigration status.

Nevertheless, a campaign developed to get Major League Baseball to move the All Star Game from Phoenix as a form of protest to the anti-immigrant legislation, which was not really anti-immigrant.  Baseball commissioner Bud Selig refused to buckle to the pressure, and so activists and advocates used their misinformation campaign to call for a boycott of Arizona during the All Star festivities.

Fortunately for the State of Arizona, truth won out, and the boycotts failed.  All the events of the All Star week were packed, and the game, itself, was a complete sellout.  Early indications are that the event was an economic boom for both Phoenix and the state.

Of course, there were a few demonstration by activists trying to get people to avoid the events.  However, in most cases these activists were actually outnumbered by pro-Arizona demonstrators.

There were also a few added bonuses for Phoenix and Arizona during this period.  A liberal columnist from the Washington Post Writers Group, Esther Cepeda, came to Arizona and wrote a glowing piece about her recent 10-day visit to the state.  She began her article by admitting that she came looking for the intolerance that activists had reported existed in Arizona.  What she found was quite different.  Cepeda wrote, “Unless I inadvertently lucked into some Utopian Twilight Zone, everywhere I went – fast food joints, town squares, water parks – Hispanics and Whites seemed to work and play together peacefully.”  She also noted in her story that “Arizona is full of lots of really, nice regular people.”

Finally, Forbes Magazine recently declared Phoenix one of the top ten cities best positioned to proper in the coming decade.  The magazine indicated that although Phoenix has not done well in the recession, it still has more jobs now than in 2000.  Forbes also stated that “demographics remain surprisingly robust.”

There you have it.  Despite the efforts of major media and liberal activists to paint Arizona as a racist, bigoted and intolerant state, Arizona has seemingly won the debate in the minds of regular Americans who have embraced the truth and ignored the lies and distortions.  It is heartening to know that sometimes the truth really does win out.

Maybe the Morning Show at MSNBC Is Really a Comedy

A few days ago I wrote a post about the show called “Morning Joe” on MSNBC claimed the Rod Blagojevich verdict was a miscarriage of justice because the participants on the show could not tell the difference between an acquittal and a hung jury.  A few days later, that same morning crew set up political analyst Mark Halperin for a suspension.

When I say set up, I don’t believe it was intentionally done, but when you listen to the give and take in its entirety, you wonder why everyone was suspended.  Halperin, who is senior political analyst for MSNBC and Time magazine, asked before he spoke, “Are we on a seven-second delay?  He made it clear that he might say something offensive, so he wanted to ask if protection was available, so what he said wouldn’t go out on the airwaves.  The co-hosts of the show, Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski, assured him that he could speak freely.  Scarborough went as far as to say, “You fall down, I’m going to catch you.”

Unfortunately for Halperin, the co-hosts seemed not to take him seriously, and when Marks said that President Barack Obama came off as “kind of a d__k,” the show went up for grabs.  All of a sudden, Scarborough, the man who said he was going to catch Halperin, suddenly changed his tune and said he couldn’t believe Halperin said what he said.  There was no seven-second delay, so Halperin was out on a limb with the rest of the morning sawing it off.

I don’t know Halperin at all, but I do know that he tends to liberal advocacy in his reporting.  However, I may be the only person who doesn’t think he should be suspended.  What he said on the air was an inappropriate comment about any sitting President.  There is no question about that.  Nevertheless, he did warn everyone on the show that he was about to say something that could be deemed offensive.  Whether intentional or not, it certainly appears that Halperin was hung out to dry.

There are two major observations I am taking away from this unfortunate scenario.  The first is that is appears that even Obama cheerleaders, like Halperin, are starting to realize that the current President may not be anything more than smoke and mirrors.  The other is that if I were Halperin, I would never trust Joe Scarborough again.

Will Main Stream Media Heap Scorn on Emanuel Like They Did on Walker, Kasich and Christie?

How many of you know that Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is letting public employee unions know that there better be some kind of concessions to union contracts with the city, or he predicts as many as 600 public employees will face layoffs soon.

Emanuel’s proposal seemed to catch some public employee union leaders by surprise and they issued statements indicating that no negotiations have taken place between the city and union representing the city’s unionized workforce.  Emanuel said it would not be necessary to do the layoffs if the unions agree to reforms.  He noted that if the unions don’t agree to changes in the contracts layoffs will be the only choice left to him on the behalf of the taxpayers.

It’s not exactly the same, but Emanuel’s recent public proclamations are very similar to the ones made by Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, New Jersey Governor Chris Christies and Ohio Governor John Kasich.  All three governors have signed into law changes in public union contracts to keep their states from going bankrupt and to avoid having to lay off large numbers of public employees.

The dynamics in all these situations are very much the same.  Since public employee contracts in many of the cities and states are so generous, even far more generous than the private sector employee contracts, concessions must be made if the cities and states can avoid financial ruin.  The difference is that Walker, Christie and Kasich are Republican government officials, and Emanuel, the former chief of staff for President Barack Obama, is a Democrat.

It will be very interesting to see how the liberal advocates in the main stream media report on these new developments in Chicago.  In Wisconsin, New Jersey and Ohio, those Republican governors were savaged by some of the vilest commentary I have ever seen on the public air ways.  All three were called union busters, and Christie of New Jersey was labeled a Nazi by a state union official with nary an objection from main stream media reporters.

This will be a big challenge for the Democratic cheerleaders in the media.  Emanuel is doing what he has to do, just as Walker, Christie and Kasich had to do what they did.  Will these biased news reporters actually start reporting on this issue fairly now that it involves a Democratic government or will they, especially those at MSNBC, call Rahm everything from a union buster to a Nazi?

My guess is that they will their best to ignore the story, especially at the national level.  Stay tuned.

MSNBC Makes Totally False Charges About Blagojevich Trial

In my posting yesterday, I discussed how news media advocates across the political spectrum seemed to equally heap scorn on Rod Blagojevich, the disgraced and now convicted former Democratic governor of Illinois. As you recall, earlier in the week, Blagojevich was convicted on 17 counts of corruption in his second trial after his first trial resulted in a minor conviction and a hung jury on the remaining counts.

To my surprise, the morning crew at MSNBC, probably the most biased news network in the history of television journalism, decided to label the Blagojevich convictions as a “miscarriage of justice.”  Yes.  You read that correctly.  Joe Scarborough, Mia Brzezinski, Willie Geist and Mike Barnicle all believe that the second trial was a violation of the Constitution’s protection against double jeopardy, being tried a second time on charges for which a person has already been acquitted.  There is only one problem with their premise:  “Blago,” as the former governor of Illinois is often named, was not acquitted of the same charges in the first trial he was convicted of in the second trial.

As I reported yesterday, after the first trial ended, several jurors made no mistake about the fact that Blagojevich would have been convicted of multiple counts, including some of the very serious charges involving the sale of the Illinois senate seat.  The reason that didn’t happen was because of one lone holdout, juror Jo Ann Chiakulas, who refused to go along with the other jurors on a guilty verdict for all but one of the charges.  In fact, there are some reports that Blagojevich would have been convicted of at least 11 more charges if it wasn’t for the reticence of one juror.  Several of the jurors from the first trial have publicly questioned how this one person could ignore what they believed was overwhelming evidence of guilt.

Chiakulas is a retired director of the Illinois Department of Public Health.  She was also known to be a political activist for the Chicago Democratic Party.  She made no mistake that she was the lone reason that Blagojevich was not convicted on more counts in the first trial, and in retrospect, many court observers are wondering how she ever made it on the jury considering her background.

Now I don’t know if it is willful ignorance on the part of MSNBC’s morning crew, but having a hung jury on multiple counts does not equal an acquittal in any way, shape or form.  Joe Scarborough actually has a law degree.  How does he not know that?  Did they just not review the fact of the first trial?  Are they that biased about the conviction of a Democratic governor?

Unlike many of the liberal advocates in the news media, I can’t read the minds and hearts of the morning crew at MSNBC, but what they did on that show in reporting on the Blagojevich trials was an embarrassment to anyone who believes in true quality journalism.  It is one thing to report facts in a biased manner.  It is quite another thing to completely ignore or falsify the facts. 

The corporate officers of MSNBC should be ashamed of what happened on their network.  Something tells me they are not.

Media Provides No Context from Blagojevich's First Trial

Former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was convicted in 17 of 20 counts of corruption, including the sale of the Illinois senate seat once held by President Barack Obama. This was the second trial for the man known as “Blago,” and many in the news media on all sides of the political spectrum have not placed the second trial in context with the first.

The first trial ended last August with one conviction of lying to the FBI and a hung jury on the remaining counts.  Almost immediately, many members of the media began questioning the need for a second trial, indicating that U. S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald might be wasting taxpayer money in a desperate effort to have the former governor convicted on more serious charges.

The criticism of Fitzgerald came from all quarters even though there really was no cheerleading for Blagojevich because media pundits, both liberal and conservative, heaped plenty of scorn on the former government.  The amazing thing to me is that so few reporters told the whole story of the first trial.

After the first trial ended, several jurors made no mistake about the fact that Blagojevich would have been convicted of multiple counts, including some of the very serious charges involving the sale of the Illinois senate seat.  The reason that didn’t happen was because of one lone holdout, juror Jo Ann Chiakulas, who refused to go along with the other jurors on a guilty verdict for all but one of the charges.  In fact, there are some reports that Blagojevich would have been convicted of at least 11 more charges if it wasn’t for the reticence of one juror to convict on more serious counts.  Several of the jurors from the first trial have publicly questioned how this one person could ignore what they believed was overwhelming evidence of guilt.

Chiakulas is a retired director of the Illinois Department of Public Health.  She was also known to be a political activist for the Chicago Democratic Party.  She made no mistake that she was the lone reason that Blagojevich was not convicted on more counts in the first trial, and in retrospect, many court observers are wondering how she ever made it on the jury considering her background.

Nevertheless, “Blago” has met justice, and is likely to serve at least six years in prison.  As I said earlier in this post, I didn’t notice anyone in the new media cheering for him to be acquitted, but I wish they would have put the difference between the first trial and the second trial in a more honest context.

Jon Stewart and Other Fox News Detractors Factually Wrong

When John Stewart, host of The Daily Show on the Comedy Network, appeared on Fox News Sunday, he boldly proclaimed that polls show that Fox News viewers are consistently ill informed.  Stewart actually based his claim on one poll reportedly run by a George Soros organization worldpublicopinion.org.

The poll, conducted in 2010, asked some good factual questions, but they were few in number compared to the politically loaded questions that were asked in the survey. The Baltimore Sun’s television critic, David Zurawik, hardly a conservative, wrote an entire column criticizing the poll.  He noted that a person was considered informed by the poll if they agreed with the conclusion of a government agency expert.  One of the questions in the poll asked if the respondent agreed that global warming was a real problem.  If you disagreed, you were considered ill informed.  That sounds more to me like a survey to gauge a person’s opinion and not factual knowledge.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning website PolitiFact, operated by the St. Petersburg Times, noted that there are several other national polls that rate Fox viewers as well-informed as most viewers of other major news networks.  These polls, conducted by the Pew Organization, actually show that viewers of Fox News’ two most popular shows, the O’Reilly Factor and Hannity rank consistently higher than viewers of just about every show, including Stewart’s own show.  In last year’s Pew Poll, Fox News viewers scored better, not worse, than MSNBC, CNN, the network evening news and the network morning news.

Jon Stewart consistently points out that his first priority is comedy, and liberal advocacy is secondary.  However, he was very serious when he used the skewed poll to denounce Fox News viewers.

I have many liberal friends, and, fortunately, none of them are anywhere near as arrogant and condescending as Jon Stewart and other liberal advocates in the media.  These liberal media personalities consistently talk about their intellectual superiority and belittle and berate anyone who disagrees with them.  When you find out the facts, however, you can’t help but laugh at their self-proclaimed superior intellect.

Can Presidents Ever Work With the Opposition Party Like Governors Do?

New Jersey Republican Governor Chris Christie has done something that President Obama can only dream he could do.  Christie worked with a Democratically-controlled House and Senate in New Jersey to pass historic pension and health care reform that is expected to save the state $130 billion over the next 30 years.

This is not the first example of a governor of one party working with a state legislature dominated by the opposition party to achieve good outcomes for a state.  George W. Bush had a great record or working with the Democrats in Texas when he was the governor there.  In fact, a few Democratic office holders from Texas showed up at the Republican National Convention in 2000 to sing Bush’s praises.

Bill Clinton also appeared to have a good relationship with Republican legislators in Arkansas when he was governor of that state.  They achieved a record of accomplishment together that enable Clinton to catapult himself to the Presidency in 1992.

Unfortunately, for Clinton and Bush, their success with opposition party leaders did not continue when they became President of the United States.  Both ended up serving two terms, but both faced fierce opposition and sometimes vitriolic attacks from the opposing party.

The national news media in these instances tends to blame the party the respective reporters don’t like instead of examining the phenomena.  I wish they would do extensive reporting on why governors of both parties who have won the Presidency with strong records of reaching out to the opposition party face little more than gridlock once they get to Washington, D.C.  It may have happened, but I have never seen a news reports that really investigate the reasons that former state chief executives with great records of bipartisanship can’t achieve the same outcome as President.

Could somebody in the national media really take a look into this situation, which has existed for decades?  There are many of us out here in the other states beyond the beltway who would like to know if the political situation in our nation’s capitol is so toxic that any future President is likely to face unreasonable opposition no matter what he or she proposes.