Check this editorial from my local paper

Although the fact that print newspapers are having trouble generally saddens me, I have to admit I wouldn't mind seeing the "Orange Liar" go down in flames. I've written better letters to the editor than this garbage, and these writers are supposedly "professional"? All dwellers in the Chicago metropolitan area have long supported dirty elections and thus deserve corrupt politicians and Franken stole the MN Senate race b/c some dumbass blogger on the NY Post website said so? Teh stoopid is killing me...

We need to demand more from elections

Orange Leader Editorial Staff
The Orange Leader

>>>>It seems that every time a national election rolls around, there are problems or irregularities that crop up somewhere. This season is no different, with the drama in Illinois as disgraced Gov. Rod Blagojevich appointed former state Attorney General Roland Burris to fill the unexpired term of President-elect Barack Obama. We also witnessed shenanigans in Minnesota as Al Franken demanded a recount of the votes after Norm Coleman narrowly triumphed over Franken in the Nov. 4 election. One wonders to what extent Americans are going to continue to accept such shenanigans and how long it will be until they demand better from their elected officials.

Blagojevich didn’t make it so far as to actually sell Obama’s Senate seat for favors or cash, but the cloud cast over him by his words and actions speak for themselves. One could say that Illinoisans — or more accurately, the 66 percent of Illinoisans that live in metropolitan Chicago — got the government they deserved, as they have tolerated and encouraged Chicago-style machine politics since time immemorial. However, when that sort of corruption makes its way into an institution governing the rest of us and threatens those of us with higher standards, that sort of thing can be nothing but bad for our republic. If we can’t trust our elected officials to do the right thing by us, then what’s the point of an elected government in the first place?

As for the affair in Minnesota, one blogger seemed to sum that one up quite nicely — “Quick, someone call the cops! An election has been stolen!” According to a column in the New York Post by Minneapolis attorney Scott Johnson, missing ballots from a Democratic precinct were included in the recount and 650 improperly rejected absentee ballots identified by the Coleman campaign were excluded in the recount. Considering that in the first certified vote count Franken trailed by 215 votes yet was winning by 225 votes in the most recent count as of Tuesday, one could be forgiven for thinking the Minnesota Democrats were trying to wrestle the election away from its rightful winner.>>>>

http://www.orangeleader.com/opinion/local_story_006231103.html?keyword=topstory

to see the kind of myths that are being passed off as factual information in allegedly non-partisan media. The editorial's claims about the Minnesota recount come straight from the Coleman campaign and right-wing media, but are passed off as simple factual information in the context of this editorial, no doubt influencing how many less discerning citizens perceive the event.

Oh yeah, but next time, I'll be sure to check in with you before I post something, to ensure that it meets your standards. :patriot:

Very rarely do I venture into the land of the Reactionary media, be it print, blog, TV or radio, so it's very interesting to me to see that they are still pulling the same old shit that they always pull. Lie, lie, lie, and lie some more.

Guess I can't say I'm surprised that it's coming from Texas, home of the Liar-in-Chief--soon to be former Liar-in-Chief Emeritus.

I stopped regularly reading the local papers here years ago, but still pick them up from time to time. The Leader's editorial slant seems to depend entirely on who happens to be the editor that year (they never tend to stay for very long.) A few years ago, the editor was a hardcore wingnut who posted regularly on Free Republic, but he was followed by a guy who seemed to be almost apolitical. Reading the staff editorial today, it's looking like the wingnuts are back in charge again.

Oh yeah, and don't even get me started on the talk radio station here... :scared:

I'm planning to mail it this afternoon.

I'm not the most concise writer there is (that's an understatement), but I did keep my response under the 300 word limit and I think this letter makes my point fairly well. I only addressed their bullshit about the Minnesota recount, though, and not the Blagojevich issue.





>>>>While I agree with the sentiment of the Orange Leader’s recent editorial, that we should demand more from our elected officials, I would argue that we should perhaps also demand more from our newspaper editorial staffs.

For instance, I’m curious as to why the Leader staff evidently believes that the comments of one uncredited blogger and one Scott Johnson, a lawyer affiliated with several conservative “think tanks,” writing a column for a right-wing newspaper, constitute sufficient evidence to support the assertion that Minnesota Democrats have committed “shenanigans” and are attempting to steal an election.

The rejection of the “650 improperly rejected absentee ballots” by local canvassing boards, cited by Johnson, was evidently such a suspicious occurrence that the Minnesota Supreme Court rejected the Coleman campaign’s petition to review the ballots outright.

Alongside Coleman’s efforts to include properly rejected ballots, his attempts to simply discard valid votes, described by Johnson as “missing ballots from a Democratic precinct,” for which there are backup records in the form of what was originally counted by the voting machines, is incredibly hypocritical. Arguably, however, it is perhaps not as hypocritical as Coleman’s change in stance from demanding, shortly after Election Day, that Franken concede before the state-mandated recount could even take place (“to begin the healing process,” in his words) to his newfound interest in extending the post-election process indefinitely, now that the recount’s completion has seen Franken emerge victorious.

The recount of the Minnesota Senate race has been an unusually transparent process, largely open to the media, with the counting of the vote overseen by representatives from both campaigns, and with disputed ballots available for public viewing. The Leader editorial staff’s unquestioning presentation of the fanciful claims of conservative commentators as factual is misleading and suggests a gross bias on their part.>>>>