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Rossi tries to derail the Payback Express; J.D. Prose; Beaver County Times; May 28, 2011.
As you read this opinion column and his Twitter “tweets,” 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? (You may recall NPR claimed it fired Juan Williams for doing exactly what Mr. Prose does.) 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.
Below is a detailed critique of portions of this column.
In the “BOY BLUNDER?” portion of his column, Mr. Prose wrote, “GOP state Rep. Jim Christiana was a popular target last week after the GOP-led House passed a state budget that ignores a $506 million surplus, and slashes spending for social services and education while letting corporations off the tax hook.”
In case you don’t know, “letting corporations off the tax hook” is leftyspeak for no tax rate increases for anyone whether they are individuals or businesses. You’ll recall “tax cuts for the rich” was leftyspeak for tax rate cuts for everyone.
As for the “$506 million surplus,” I believe the last time we spent “found money” for recurring spending was in 2001 when then-Gov. Tom Ridge (R) and the Republican-majority General Assembly used it to increase state pensions. I don’t know if it’s true or not, but I’d like to think Gov. Tom Corbett (R) and other Republicans learned from that blunder. Why not use most or all of the surplus to pay down some state debt, thereby reducing ongoing interest expense in the budget?
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