Drinking the TEA

It’s not very often faithful readers that you hear me say I have changed my mind about something. Mainly, it’s because I am extremely hardheaded about the opinions I hold and it takes a near act of God to shake my beliefs enough to say I am wrong.
(My lovely bride would confirm this for you, if I were permitted to release her name publically and you could ask her, but as you know I must protect her identity, or she’ll hurt me.)
Anyway, after reading a couple of books and listening to some recorded speeches over the last few weeks, I just can’t go forward with my position on certain aspects of a movement that has taken the country by storm and will change American politics, and life in general, forever.
I am talking, of course, about the TEA Party movement. In the past I have told you that the party is dangerous and unfocussed, but I have found that this is just not true.
I came to this realization after reading former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin’s Going Rogue and the latest masterpiece by Glenn Beck, Arguing with Idiots: How to Stop Small Minds and Big Government. These two publications, more than anything else opened my eyes to the Socialist agenda that the Obama bin Commie Administration is forcing down the throats of right-thinking Americans.
Now some of you may think that I am selling out and, in the spirit of complete disclosure, I must say that I went back to reexamine my positions on the TEA Party movement and these two great authors and statespersons because, after a three-year wait, I was finally contacted by FOX News concerning my application for employment as a news-script writer for the network.
I am equally honored and a bit saddened to tell you that I will be leaving Ashe County in the fall to begin my new career earning those Rupert Murdoch dollars. As I understand it from my pre-interview, I will be part of the research and writing team that will work directly for Mr. Beck and I am extremely excited to be heading to a news organization that stands for principled, fair and balanced reporting. As I understand it, I will also have the opportunity to aid the network’s various hosts and contributors in pumping Governor Palin’s 2012 bid for the White House, should she choose to run.
I know that many of my Democrat friends will turn their backs on me, and that is fine. I understand that the indoctrination you have undergone from the liberal media is difficult to overcome. I have always seen myself as a Libertarian and even that was hard to put behind me, but as the old saying goes, money talks. I have now seen that Capitalism pays, and I like to get paid.
I will miss all of you and this wonderful community that I have been so pleased to serve over the past few years and will continue to serve until I leave for the bright lights of New York City. I feel that I will be able to serve my fellow countrymen as I help Mr. Beck and Governor Palin grow the TEA Party movement into a viable political party that will finally set America back on the Right path.
Until I leave, faithful readers, I give you my solemn word that I will give you, and the issues that are important to you, my full attention and honest efforts to bring you the news fair and balanced.

Yeah right! APRIL FOOLS!!!

Fitzwater’s Pro-death Platform

At just a few minutes before noon on Tuesday, President Obama signed the hotly contested Health Reform Bill that has consumed the attention of most of the country for months now.
In celebration of this historic event, I want to simply say, welcome to my world of delays and what I like to call afterthought services. Yes, welcome to the same red tape, back of the bus treatment that Vets and those receiving Medicaid and Medicare have been saddled with for years and years. Welcome my brothers and sisters, have a seat and learn patience. Unless you are very wealthy or a member of the House or Senate.
Now, I have nothing against providing healthcare for the citizens of this country. In fact, I honestly believe that the words “promote the general Welfare” in the preamble to the Constitution of the United States means to promote the general welfare. Ensuring the good health of the citizens would be promoting the general welfare wouldn’t it? But the healthcare debate hasn’t been and isn’t now about healthcare, it’s about access and insurance.
That simple distinction has been ignored in the national press, at the protests and on the floor of the House because that is how government works.
Still, all things considered, this exercise in civics we have witnessed, if nothing else, has educated the citizenry about just how back-door-dirty the process of making laws really is. It’s not what we learned from Schoolhouse Rock and it’s not what our elected officials want us to know. You see, we become dangerous to Big Politics when we get educated about how things really work.
As for me, the one thing that really ticked me off the most about this process wasn’t the threatened reconciliation process, that wasn’t needed after all, or the filibustering because both parties use those processes all the time. No, it was the hypocrisy of those Democrats that at first said they were standing on a Pro-life platform and that unless the abortion language was cleaned up they wouldn’t vote yes. But they were quick to switch their votes on the word of the President that he would issue an executive order to prohibit federal funding for abortion that wouldn’t be worth the paper it was printed on. Executive orders cannot trump law. This, they seemed to feel, would satisfy both their party (who wanted their yes vote) and their constituents (who wanted a no vote.) Of course, some of them still voted no after waiting to vote until the magic number of 216 votes were achieved. That’s called having it both ways.
These worms are a perfect example of the outright lie the whole Pro-life v. Pro-choice argument has become, and really always has been.
I wish I had gotten his name during all the sound bytes on Sunday, but one elected official gave the truest definition of Pro-life I have ever heard when he said “life begins at conception and ends at natural death.” I’ll say it again, “conception to natural death.”
Given that definition, I feel quite comfortable saying that all other Pro-life/Pro-choice positions are hypocritical. You see, you can’t call yourself Pro-life if you believe in the death penalty because folks on death row do not choose to die an unnatural death and you can’t call yourself Pro-choice if you believe in abortion because a fetus can’t make a choice to live or die. Both those lives are taken or given by others, not by God or natural selection. I have never understood how exactly Conservatives and Liberals can justify their particular group’s positions on this topic when their positions on those issues are in conflict.
As for me, well I guess I would have to call myself Pro-death. You see I believe that there are times when abortion is the correct answer, such as when a mother’s life is in danger or a child will be born in such terrible condition that it can’t survive. Those folks who know me know that the only smart thing I think Bill Clinton ever said was that “abortions should be legal, safe and rare.”
On the other side of the coin, I believe that there are some people who are so vile and so evil that they need to be taken into a field and shot dead and left to feed the coyotes, rather than remain a drain on resources that could be funneled to childrens’ homes. Those folks are murderers, rapists, child molesters and certain white-collar criminals that completely ruin lives, just so there is no confusion as to whom I’m talking about.
Maybe that is too simplistic a way to look at such complex issues, and I know that there are anomalies in any given situation, but it’s a base to stand on and one I’m comfortable with.

Bad News

Printed by request. Please see the Ashe Mountain Times online archive (www2.mountaintimes.com/archives) to find stories referenced in the following piece.

News outlets are always taking a beating for only reporting bad news and are often accused of using it to sensationalize people’s suffering to make a profit. Mostly, when people talk about this issue, they are talking about major broadcast media or big city newspapers, but now and then we get a call about a story topic that offended someone and we take a hit, too.
One of the things that makes small community journalism so appealing for those of us lucky enough to do it for a living is that we get to, for the most part, report the good news that most often comes our way. It’s nice to be able to have a front-page story about a student who has excelled in their studies or received an award for community service or a local business that is making a difference through philanthropic endeavors, but once in a while we have a story that can only be called bad news.
Another thing that makes small community journalism so enjoyable is that you quite often already know the people you are reporting on, so their successes are meaningful to you as a person and as a reporter and you feel good about sharing their stories with your readers.
Then you have weeks like this week, (March 18, 2010) where the bad news is so bad that you almost hate to write the reports and, as you look at the full body of work in the edition, you can only wonder if the good has outweighed the bad. This week, I sadly think it does not.
Coverage this week of the men accused and/or convicted of sexual assaults and child molestation and accused of kidnapping and torture of women and the loss of a popular and well-respected police officer at a young age has left your Ashe Mountain Times (www.AsheMountainTimes.com) staff feeling a bit wrung out and wishing for something happy to tell.
At the end of the day, it is our responsibility to give you the bad as well as the good and to do it in a manner that is as professional as possible without allowing our personal feelings and revulsions for the acts committed to influence the reporting. Trust me folks, when dealing with crimes against women and children it is extremely hard to be impartial.
When we do have to report on the ugly underside of life, we do it in a manner that admittedly may leave a few questions unanswered for the reader. For instance, unlike publications such as our in town competition The Jefferson Post, we do not print the names of sexual assault victims, because it is quite simply irresponsible journalism to do so. Why should someone have to face additional embarrassment in a small community for being victimized? Does this keep the public from knowing something they need to know? Absolutely not, because what the public needs to know is who the predators are, not the victims.
I received a call this morning in fact asking me why a newspaper would print a victim’s name and the only thing I could tell the very distressed woman on the other end of the line was that either they were not taught any better or they must not have much in the way of empathy for those who are wronged. Think back at how long it took to learn the name of the accuser in the Duke Lacrosse team gang-rape allegations, and she turned out to be lying.
So for anyone who thinks they didn’t get the full story this week (March 18, 2010) when you read Joel Frady’s excellent coverage of two horrendous crimes, I do not apologize. As much as we have a responsibility to report the bad news, we also have as big a responsibility to report that bad news in as compassionate and responsible a manner as possible.
We feel we are more than just your trusted community newspaper. We are your neighbors and hopefully your friends and you deserve our respect as well as our honesty.
Thanks for reading.