Polis Politics

Commentary: ESPN's Yankee Stadium Tribute Uncalled For

Today is Opening Day for Major League Baseball. We are neither Yankees nor Red Sox fans, but with ESPN being based in Connecticut, and the two teams being of good fortunes over the past decade, we understand the channel's propensity to lavish coverage upon the two teams.

But this has gone too far.

Last week, ESPN's SportsCenter began airing a daily segment honoring Yankee Stadium's final season with a daily "This day in Yankee Stadium history" segment called "Honoring the House that Ruth built."

Yankee Stadium has a long history, and the Yankees do have the most World Series Championships, and as a result, one of America's largest fan bases. But this is the first time SportsCenter has run a tribute to a Stadium! And it screams of unequal treatment for a media outlet.

Shea Stadium is also closing its doors this year, and it also has a long history. Joe Namath played there with the Jets. The Beatles held their most famous concert there. Where's the Tribute?

Here in Indianapolis, the RCA Dome closed its doors. It hosted probably the best AFC Championship game in 20 years in 2007. It also hosted one of the greatest NCAA Basketball Championship games we can remember between Arizona and Kentucky in 1998. Where was that Tribute?

New York always has been accused of a media bias, and it shows many times in sports. The Yankees' playoff games are always shown in prime time despite the fact more compelling games may be being played. In the NFL, The Dallas Cowboys, Cleveland Browns, and Pittsburgh Steelers all have larger national fan bases than New York's Giants and Jets. Three Rivers Stadium received no such tribute when it closed its doors, despite being the site of many memorable moments, including the Immaculate Reception. Texas Stadium is in its final year for the Cowboys, and it remains to be seen what tribute will be given.

Small markets have disadvantages already competing in sports. Athletes are given endorsement bonuses for signing contracts in New York, Los Angeles, or Chicago. ESPN worship of a select few sports teams only furthers this problem. We hope that ESPN does not make the same mistake next year when Fenway Park closes shop.

South Bend says no to Clinton

While local Democrats whimper, Washington High School in South Bend has turned down a request to host Hillary Clinton for a rally Friday.

Rep. David Niezgodski (D-South Bend), who has two children at the School, was disappointed his kids wouldn't get to see history first hand. School Officials said it was too disruptive to the school day.

In the past decade, the new vogue campaign event is the speech with attendees as the backdrop. Every time I have seen them in 2008, they have been bored to tears. Kudos to the South Bend school administrators for protecting our children's education, at least for one day.

Green-Eyed Ladies

The Democrats have always been a party comprised of loose coalitions appeased by government programs, and their National Candidates have exhibited such by presenting liberal ideas as priorities far ahead of their time. This is because Democrats lose on identifiable issues: abortion, affirmative action, national security. They then feel they have to crack into certain demographics.

Some attempts are laughable (universal health care as a "moral issue" to reverse trends amongst churchgoers). Others are simple pandering (universal health care and increased college student aid to those who have debt issues). Trial Lawyers donations certainly aid in Democrat efforts to expand lawsuit rights. Unions most certainly affect manufacturing and trade policies, despite becoming an ever shrinking portion of the workforce.

Which brings us to the latest common campaign pledge amongst Democrats: Green-Collar Workers. Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and most recently Jim Schellinger has touted green-collar jobs as the solution to declining manufacturing jobs across America. An after Hollywood's 2006-07 global warming guilt trip, promoting The Day After Tomorrow and Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth, being green is as popular and fashionable as ever.

Green-Collar Workers design eco-friendly buildings and technology,and other build those buildings and install those technologies. And the Green-Collar Movement is classic Democrat politics:

• Since these products don;t sell on their own, Green-Collar technologies are stimulated through government regulation, either requiring their installation or regulating outputs and thus mandating their usage for compliance.
• As a result, construction workers, plumbers, electricians, and other trades are needed to install the technologies. Coincidently, these trades are also classically Unionized.
• In order to develop these technologies, government must increase study grants to liberal Higher Educational institutions, many in the form of earmarks.
• And where action has not moved fast enough, the Democrats have allies in the environmentalist movement to aid in their grassroots lobbying efforts.

"Green-Collar" has become the new Democrat campaign buzz-word and pledge, which means we conservatives must be weary of it. Watch out!

Beth White is just plain LAZY!, according to website.

Indianapolis may be the 13th largest city in America, but Beth White definitely does not run her clerk's website like it.

We have chronicled the multiple times Marion County's top Elections Official has simply failed to keep her website current with elections information or who our elected officials are. A recent check has shown that once again, Beth White hasn't made an effort to give Marion County any current information as to who are its elected officials.

According to the "Current Elected Officials" section of Clerk White's website, Internet users can "Click here for a list of current 2007 Elected Officials." The list is still a relic of an era now past:

• Julia Carson is Congresswoman
• Bart Peterson is Mayor
• King-Ro Conley, Rozelle Boyd, and Ron Gibson are all Councilmen At-Large
• Still on the Council in District Seats are Ike Randolph, Phil Borst, Scott Schneider, Scott Keller, and Sherron Franklin.
• Mae Dickinson is still a State Representative.

Takes you back, doesn't it? We have no qualms to declare Beth White the most lazy elections official we have ever seen.

The Company You Keep

Congresswoman Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick (D-MI), who is Chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, was the first eulogist at Julia Carson's funeral to speak of the need to elect her grandson Andre Carson to fill her vacancy.

Less than a month after Andre's special election victory, Kilpatrick's own political scion is under heavy siege. Kwame Kilpatrick (left, below), Democrat and Mayor of Detroit, will be arraigned today on charges of Perjury, Obstruction of Justice, and Conspiracy, along with a top aide. The Detroit Free Press has called for Kwame Kilpatrick to resign, in what Andre might call "bold, courageous leadership."

Mayor Ballard continues to pester liberal elite

Matt Tully writes a column today about Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard's political timing and recent victory on police pensions. Despite recent criticism, Tully gives Ballard credit for the move:

Nonetheless, the mayor does deserve credit, as it was he who sat before a hostile House Ways and Means Committee last month and first suggested the state take over the pension payments

At the time, Statehouse types mocked Ballard for making the request and predicted it would be as hard to sell as tuition to an Indiana Pacers Charm School. Few are mocking Ballard now.

At least few in the mainstream media. You can be sure that Tully's column will provoke those in the Accidental Blogosphere to make this seem like Indianapolis is the center of the downfall of Western Civilization. They will continue to question his intelligence and ability to serve in a way that if such "criticism" was directed at, say, Barack Obama, a discourse on offensive racial commentary would ensue. They will continue to complain about every single, minute, and miscellaneous thing the Mayor does while only serving to make themselves look shrill, petty, and irrelevant in the process.

And Mayor Greg Ballard will continue to get things done. It's that simple.

White Wash

Gary Welsh over at Advance Indiana had this to say regarding the Indianapolis Star's sketchy reporting of Special Election problems (last item):

Even more insulting was that same column's attempt to misrepresent Beth White's performance in Tuesday's election. The column reads:

Tuesday's special election came with something voters haven't been accustomed to the past few years: nothing going wrong.

Despite three Republican press releases sent throughout the day about minor election flaws, the Marion County Election Board escaped the day virtually unscathed.

No ballot shortages, no mass failure of polling places to open, no machines malfunctioning. County Clerk Beth White's predecessor saw repeated election problems, and White's election debut a year ago was called a "catastrophe."

"It absolutely did go well," White said late in the week. "The honest answer is I'm relieved, I guess. We've been on the defense since the beginning of my term."

Again, we have a deliberate attempt by the Star to cover up what really took place. It is a fact that at least 6 precincts did not open on time--in Republican areas naturally. Isn't it true that heavily Republican precincts traditionally vote early in the morning as opposed to heavily Democratic precincts, which seem to get most of their voters in the closing hours of election day? The incredible part of this item is where White acknowledges that a Franklin Township precinct was opened in the wrong location. "A third release highlighted the fact that a Franklin Township precinct hadn't opened on time," the column reads. "The inspector, White said, had opened the precinct on time -- but in the wrong location." So the county spends all that money on post cards to alert voters of their polling locations last week and one of Beth White's inspectors in a heavily Republican precinct just happens to open up the polling place in the wrong location and that's no big deal? The Star apparently thinks so. "But none of the problems drew much attention, and the GOP press releases didn't stick."

What the Star is trying to tell you is that it really doesn't matter when mostly white Republicans are disenfranchised. Republicans petitioned to keep the polls open later in those precincts which did in fact open up late. The Democratic-controlled election board told them to go to hell. Apparently some Center Township polling places which delivered a big Carson vote were allowed to stay open late. Their votes didn't get delivered to the convention center until several hours after the polls closed. The fact remains that in every election she has conducted there have been voters denied the right to vote because of Beth White's mismanagement of elections. That's not a conspiracy theory. It's a fact, even if the Star doesn't give a damn.

Quote of the Day: Steve Buyer Edition

Shortly before 3:00pm, Andre Carson was sworn in as the United States Representative from the 7th District of Indiana. When given the Oath of Office from Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Congressman Carson responded, "Yes, ma'am."

Congressman Steve Buyer made the following remarks after Carson's swearing in:

"What just happened in the well is Andre responded to the Speaker with two words that would have made Julia very proud, when his first words as a new member of Congress, he turns and says, 'Yes, ma'am.'"

Why do we have the feeling that won't be the last time Andre says "Yes, ma'am" to Nancy Pelosi?

More on the Special Election(s)

More from the Wall Street Journal's Political Diary (subspcription only):

It Pours, Man, It Pours

The news just keeps getting worse for Republicans in Congress: After losing a Congressional seat that once belonged to former Speaker Dennis Hastert in Illinois, the party lost what may have been a winnable seat in Indiana. Adding insult to injury, the National Republican Congressional Committee spent more than $1.2 million losing the Illinois race and yet didn't spend a penny in Indiana despite its candidate getting slammed by the NRCC's heavy-spending Democratic counterpart.

But members of the House Republican Caucus aren't ready to pack it in and go home just yet. The party raised $8.6 million at an annual dinner in Washington last night, headlined by President Bush, exceeding even the $7.5 million goal set for the shindig. And members of Congress let it be known they consider the loss of the former Hastert seat an aberration that can be blamed on the candidate.

While the loss was a blow, GOP leaders blamed dairy owner and wealthy businessman Jim Oberweis for being a flawed candidate. "Jim Oberweis went from being perceived [as] the tenacious guy to just being a wealthy individual looking for a gig," one Republican Member of Congress said. "There's nothing the NRCC is going to do about that. To lay [the loss] on the doorstep of the NRCC, it would be inaccurate."

In turn, a strategist familiar with the Illinois campaign suggested Mr. Oberweis lost because Democrats effectively tied him to President Bush, even casting the special election as an opportunity to vote against the current administration. That has to be troubling to national Republican leaders, who have long maintained that Mr. Bush will not be on the ballot, and thus not a factor, in 2008.

Shrugging off the Bush albatross would be difficult enough if the party were on an equal financial footing with Democrats. But that's hardly the case. Even after last night's dinner (and assuming they spent nothing on the dinner), the NRCC still trails House Democrats by more than $20 million in cash on hand. The job of defending a stunning number of vulnerable open seats will be even more difficult if the GOP has an empty checking account.

-- Reid Wilson, RealClearPolitics.com

The Brighter Side of the Special Election

The Wall Street Journal's Political Diary has this take on the Special Election yesterday (subscription only):

Hoosiers Always Look on the Bright Side

Republicans did better than expected in last night's special election to fill the House seat vacated by the death of Democratic Rep. Julia Carson of Indiana. Her Indianapolis district leans left -- as evidenced by John Kerry's 58% showing in 2004. But Andre Carson, the 33-year-old grandson of the deceased incumbent and a local city council member, eked out only a 54% victory, hardly a barnburner for Democrats. He now becomes the second Muslim serving in Congress. "I'm an Indy 500 Hoosier, I'm a Covered Bridge Festival Hoosier.... I just happen to be a Hoosier of the Muslim faith," he said at his victory celebration.

Defeated was Republican Jon Elrod, who will almost certainly be the GOP standard-bearer when the seat is again up for grabs in November. Mr. Elrod in 2006 pulled off the rare feat of knocking off an incumbent Democrat in the state legislature. But who will he face in November? Despite yesterday's win, the new incumbent Mr. Carson will face serious competition in the May 5 Democratic primary. State Reps. David Orentlicher and Carolene Mays, and former state Health Commissioner Woodrow Myers are all well-financed and claim Mr. Carson only won the Democratic nod for the special election by pulling strings with the local party machinery.

In any event, Mr. Elrod's showing should be of some cheer to Republicans. He performed a full four points better than the GOP "base" vote in the 2004 presidential race. That's certainly better than the seven-point loss in their base vote that Illinois Republicans suffered in surrendering the House seat of former Speaker Denny Hastert on Saturday. Clearly, the GOP has trouble heading into the fall election but the Indiana results aren't pointing to anything like a meltdown.