Saturday, September 15, 2007

Recap of Horizon's Journalists' Roundtable


As requested by a regular reader since there are no conservative journalists on Horizon's Friday night Journalists' Roundtable, pretend this is what a conservative journalist would have contributed (it's not like there is any shortage of conservative writers who could be on that show - Darcy Olsen from the Goldwater Institute for example is young, smart, witty and attractive, and would provide some balance to the old guard they have on there now).

The show began with a discussion of a front page Republic story on how the Corporation for Economic Development (CFED) gave Arizona an F for financial prosperity. None of the journalists had heard of CFED, and couldn't remember its name on the show. Which proves the point of this piece, why is the CFED report front page news when an equally shocking economic analysis by the recognizable local group Arizona Federation of Taxpayers is buried in the back pages inside a regional section of the paper? Because the journalists had never heard of the group, they couldn't really analyze its criteria for giving Arizona an F. Its criteria was the typical left wing factors, I won't bother covering them since this piece already did. I might point out in addition,
if you read the bios of CFED board members, they have ties to Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton, former President Jimmy Carter, former Senator Tom Daschle, the Rockefeller Foundation, and numerous race-based groups.

The journalists continued discussing economic problems, including concerns that wages aren't going up as fast as home prices, taxes and the cost of living. Mike Sunnucks said that it would be ok for Governor Napolitano to set wages in order to fix the problem, since she was the "smartest person in the state." Gosh, don't let your partisan views color your analysis. Howie Fischer jumped in and played the token conservative, explaining basic free market 101 principles to Sunnucks. To Sunnucks's credit, when asked about the new employer sanctions law and the protests from certain businesses that are challenging the law, he responded that businesses should already be verifying the identities of potential employees.

When discussing the recent city elections, Mary Jo Pitzl said that Mayor Gordon was easily re-elected by a wide margin because the voters are "happy and disconnected." I don't see how anyone can be "happy" driving through the light rail mess. But she is correct about being disconnected - since the local media has been nothing but a cheerleader for Gordon, the Phoenix City Council, and other local spending propositions, while at the same time deliberately omitting negative coverage of them, the voters are disconnected because they don't know what's really going on. Robert Robb had a great column yesterday on how the out-of-control spending is taking place at the local levels, so that's where activists need to focus their efforts. Unfortunately that's only a small part of the problem, the real problem is getting the mainstream media to give them coverage. As I mentioned above, the AZ Federation of Taxpayers scorecard of local government barely made the back pages of the Republic.

Sunnucks said that McCain is doing better, noting that McCain's popularity rises and falls with the popularity of the Iraq war. Of course liberals like Sunnucks want to create the illusion McCain is doing well, because he's one of the least conservative Republicans in the race. If a Republican is going to win, best it be the most liberal Republican. Sunnucks is wrong, the latest 8 polls at realclearpolitics.com over the past week show Giuliani winning the primary, with McCain also trailing Thompson and to some extent Romney.

1 comment:

x4mr said...

If you think the economic development machinery is flawed in Maricopa, look at Tucson.

Our local economic development chief is hosting a special luncheon featuring Dr. Florida, author of "The Creative Class" who argues that the way to promote economic development and raise wages is to import "alternative lifestyle" artists and "bohemians."

Dr. Florida created a "gay male index" for communities, arguing that increasing this index supports prosperity. Google "creative class" and you can learn all about the guy. Tucson is going to "get cool."

Should Phoenix ask the doc to stop by while he's in the state?