Regional Media

At Memories Pizza, New Threats Arise; Press's Determination to Ignore Them Continues (See Update)
By Tom Blumer | April 2, 2015 | 10:41 PM EDT

Update, April 3: The Indiana man who claims to have been hacked now admits that he wasn't, but says he was "joking" about robbing Memories Pizza, and is threatening to sue those who exposed his (ahem) public comments. 

Those of us following the Memories Pizza story won't have trouble remembering it as the years go by, thanks only partially to the Walkerton, Indiana store's fairly unusual name for a pizzeria.

What will also easy to recall are the "memories" of the unhinged and threatening leftist behavior that accompanied its owner's simple statement that, if the request ever arose, they would have to turn down catering a same-sex "marriage" because participating in or supporting such a ceremony violates their firm Christian religious beliefs — and the press's attempts to cover up what their journalistic malfeasance unleashed.

Selective: AP Cribs Paper's Report on Memories Pizza — Except For GoFundMe Effort
By Tom Blumer | April 2, 2015 | 6:49 PM EDT

A short unbylined Associated Press report at its national site on the situation at Memories Pizza in Walkerton, Indiana this afternoon made sure to mention that the pizzeria "won't cater gay weddings" (in the headline).

It also misstated the owner's statement to a South Bend TV station, claiming, using its own words, that she "said the state's new religious objections law backs their right to deny catering to a same-sex wedding." (Sorry, the statement that they wouldn't cater a same wedding was independent of any legal opinion.)

Local Indiana Station Ambushes Memories Pizza to Gin Up an RFRA Story
By Tom Blumer | April 1, 2015 | 11:43 PM EDT

Something hasn't seemed right about the Memories Pizza story from the get-go. Now I know why.

In a Tuesday report, TV Station ABC 57 cited the Walkerton, Indiana business's Crystal O'Connor as saying that, in the station's words, they "don't agree with gay marriages and wouldn't cater them if asked to." In other words, they've never been asked to. The non-story which ignited a national firestorm is the result of a dangerously irresponsible ambush. The reporter involved admitted as much in a tweet late this morning:

IBD: Obama Tried to Swap For Bergdahl Only After Other Efforts to Release 'Taliban 5' Failed
By Tom Blumer | April 1, 2015 | 8:13 PM EDT

On Monday, as has been their habit going back at least to the Clinton administration, Investor's Business Daily's editorialists once again broke a story the establishment press likely could have reported years ago.

IBD revealed that the Obama administration "was secretly negotiating the Taliban Five's release without (Bowe) Bergdahl." IBD reasonably believes that coming up with any reason to get the five out of Guantanamo Bay was important to the administration, as it would set a precedent for releasing others from the facility, and eventually emptying and closing it against the will of the majority of Congress, the U.S. military, intelligence officials, and the American people.

Guess Why This Is Not News: Four 'Teens' Murder 94 Year-Old Woman in Mississippi
By Tom Blumer | March 11, 2015 | 4:11 PM EDT

A Google News search at 3 p.m. Eastern Time today for stories published in March about "Eva Carmichael" (in quotes; sorted by date) returned only 11 items.

Who is Eva Carmichael? She is a 94 year-old woman who was murdered in Meridian, Mississippi on March 1. Based on the complete lack of press coverage outside of the immediate area, it's reasonable to believe that the nation's journalists don't think, in the popular parlance, that "her life mattered" all that much. And why is that?

Cincinnati Enquirer Considered Suppressing Coverage of Gay Activist Who Faked His Abduction
By Tom Blumer | March 7, 2015 | 9:35 AM EST

Monday night, a Cincinnati-area same-sex "marriage" activist posted on Facebook and tweeted that he had been abducted and was in the trunk of his car. A short time later, police found 20 year-old Adam Hoover and determined that he had (very clumsily) faked his abduction, and would be charged with the crime of "making false claims." In the meantime, news of Hoover's abduction and then its false nature made it to several national news outlets, including the Washington Times, Huffington Post and Buzzfeed.

In its two reports on the story Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning, the Cincinnati Enquirer posted the following introductory note:

Corrine Brown (D-Fla.) Boycotts Bibi's Speech, Then Virtually Copies May 2011 Press Release to Effusively Praise It
By Tom Blumer | March 6, 2015 | 6:42 PM EST

In 2004, Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry infamously stated, in connection with an Iraq War spending resolution, that "I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it."

Democratic Congresswoman Corrine Brown of Florida has done her own John Kerry imitation. She was against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's speech to Congress earlier this week, and expressed her disapproval by boycotting it. But in a press release issued shortly after that speech, she effusively praised it. The Tampa Bay Tribune's Alex Leary noted the breathtaking switcheroo on Tuesday. The rest of the establishment press has been utterly uninterested. There's even more to this story, as will be seen after the jump.

Jezebel Writer Falsely Accuses Walker of Wanting to Stop Reporting of Campus Sexual Assaults
By Tom Blumer | February 28, 2015 | 9:45 AM EST

On Friday morning at Jezebel, a Gawker-affiliated web site, Natasha Vargas-Cooper thought she had Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker by the — well, you know.

In a post tellingly tagged "Conservative Werewolves," Vargas-Cooper was absolutely sure — so certain that she apparently felt no need to check any further — that Walker's proposed budget would allow its colleges to "to stop reporting sexual assaults." Vicious vitriol ensued (bolds are mine throughout this post):

AP Vaguely Headlines and Weakly Covers the Halbig Contingency Plan Controversy
By Tom Blumer | February 26, 2015 | 6:10 PM EST

The Associated Press's headline at Alan Fram's coverage of the controversy over the existence of an Obama administration contingency plan if it loses the Halbig v. Burwell case pending at the Supreme Court may be among the most inchoherent ever: "GOP CLAIMS PAPER SHOWS FED AIDES' PREPS FOR HEALTH LAW LOSS."

"Paper"? What is in question is an alleged 100-page contingency plan should the Court declare that subsidies paid by HealthCare.gov, the federal health insurance exchange for over three dozen states, are illegal. "Health law loss"? What does that even mean?

WashPost's Philip Bump Lamely Denies Obvious Kitzhaber-Christie Double Standard
By Tom Blumer | February 14, 2015 | 2:05 AM EST

Late Friday afternoon, roughly two hours ("shortly after noon" Pacific Time) after the press release announcing Oregon Democratic Governor John Kitzhaber's resignation effective next Wednesday, Philip Bump at the Washington Post's "The Fix" blog tried to explain away the national press's nearly complete failure to cover Kitzhaber's mounting ethical and now potentially criminal problems for nearly four months. This is the same bunch which obsessed over Republican Governor Chris Christie's "Bridgegate" non-scandal for months on end.

Bump specifically linked to and quoted — and, predictably mischaracterized — yours truly's related Thursday afternoon post at NewsBusters. The short answer to Bump's whining is simply that Kitzhaber's problems were self-evidently very serious from the get-go in October, and grew by degrees with virtually each passing week, while Bridgegate, which was beaten like a drum for months on end, never progressed beyond the status of a pathetically weak hatchet job.

AP National Wire, NY Times Finally Focus on Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber Corruption Story
By Tom Blumer | February 12, 2015 | 7:29 PM EST

In a sign that the walls are truly beginning to close in around him, the Associated Press's national site and the New York Times, both of which have largely ignored the growing ethical scandals surrounding Oregon Democratic Governor John Kitzhaber and his fiancee Cylvia Hayes for months, have gotten busy during the past 24 hours.

The very belated national attention cannot possibly be helpful to his survival prospects. It should have come months ago, but apparently ensuring that a Democrat would remain in charge of the Beaver State was too important a matter for the national press to consider spreading the results of the outstanding investigative journalism done by Nigel Jaquiss at Willamette Week beyond the state's borders.

Least-Known, Genuinely Scandal-Plagued Governor in U.S.: Oregon Dem John Kitzhaber
By Tom Blumer | February 12, 2015 | 1:27 PM EST

The establishment press has obsessed over Republican Governor Chris Christie's non-scandals in New Jersey for 18 months. Anything appearing to be problematic during the past four years for Wisconsin GOP Governor Scott Walker, including a "John Doe" fishing expedition driven by a power-abusing Democratic prosecutor, has been national news.

Meanwhile, the press appears to have lost interest in Democratic New York Governor Andrew Cuomo's possible connections with arrested State Speaker Sheldon Silver. In a far more glaring omission, the vast majority of the country outside of the Pacific Northwest, even those who closely follow the news, barely recognize the name of John Kitzhaber, Oregon's Democratic Governor. Kitzhaber is embroiled in an ethics scandal so serious that he was apparently on the verge of resigning on Tuesday before he changed his mind.