J.D. Prose – 4/2/10

This page was last updated on April 4, 2010.

Corbett hops a ride on the Pander Express; J.D. Prose; Beaver County Times; April 2, 2010.

As you read this opinion column, keep in mind Mr. Prose wears at least one other hat for the Times. In addition to being an entertainer/pundit, Mr. Prose is a part-time reporter covering political stories. Ask yourself this. When a pundit gives his political opinions in one part of the paper, can he be trusted to report politics objectively elsewhere in the paper? After all, would a person whose opinion is 1+1 equals 3 report 1+1 really equals 2? Does he have a “Chinese wall” in his head to keep his opinions from bleeding into his reporting? If it can get worse than that, Mr. Prose has made name-calling and personal attacks a foundation of his columns. If pushed, I’d be willing to bet Mr. Prose would try to excuse his writing by claiming he’s paid to be controversial and stir debate. The problem is, you don’t need to get into name-calling and personal attacks to accomplish those goals.

You can find the archive of my Prose column critiques here.

Most of the column is Mr. Prose’s SOP of name-calling, smearing, et cetera, so I’ll stick to only four points he mentioned.

Mr. Prose wrote, “Ever notice lately that when conservatives lose, be it in an election or legislative process, they scream that it’s illegitimate?” You have to love this coming from a lefty. Remember Al Gore and Democrats in 2000? Further, throughout Mr. Bush’s time in office we constantly heard “selected, not elected.” Let’s also remember FDR tried to pack the U.S. Supreme Court because it didn’t rule on “New Deal” programs as he wanted. Before Mr. Prose complains about a few wackos, perhaps he and his fellow travelers should move out of that glass house.

In one paragraph Mr. Prose claims “the Do-Nothings have about as much knowledge of constitutional law as” he, then in the next paragraph he assures us of the constitutionality of Obamacare. More “do as I say, not as I do.” I noticed Mr. Prose didn’t tell us where in the Constitution and “established federal powers” the federal government can force citizens to buy anything as a condition of citizenship.

“[R]ight-winger state Rep. Sam Rohrer?” Please see “Not your father’s Republicans.” Please do the same for Tom Ridge. Mr. Ridge is what I call an “à la carte Republican,” not a conservative. When in the U.S. House for 12 years, Mr. Ridge had a lifetime American Conservative Union (ACU) rating of only 51%. In three of those years Mr. Ridge actually got a better Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) Liberal Quotient (LQ) than his ACU rating. Mr. Prose currently appears to agree with the DNC that Mr. Ridge is a “centrist” or “center-right.” That view will change if Mr. Ridge ever gets into a political race with a lefty. The lefty with an ADA LQ of 100% will be the “centrist” and Mr. Ridge will be the extreme “right-winger.” That’s what we saw in the 2008 McCain/Obama race.

Finally, the column says, “Marin seems to have other, um, issues. His Web site, the Herald said, ‘suggests that gays use parades and clowns to seduce young people.’ We hate parades and clowns. Does that make us (gulp) a homophobic Democrat, too?” Remember this column for the inevitable day when Mr. Prose refers to those on the right as homophobes. It’s like the 2008 presidential campaign. All the negative talk about Mr. Obama’s skin color was by Democrats (both black and white) during the Democrat primaries, but Republicans were the racists.