Don’t turn someone else into a stereotype for your own political gain

I can’t believe it! I’ve finally been inducted into the liberal news media.

Just imagine. I’ll probably get a better parking space at my office, maybe even better working hours.

And let’s not forget an improved health insurance package. Because if there’s anything that members of the liberal news media demand, it’s universal health care.

I hope this is going to come with a newsletter and information about when the meetings are; I’m not quite sure which left-wing agenda item we’re all supposed to be pushing right now. I’ve usually relied on my own judgment in determining what kind of news will appear in my newspapers. But now that I’m a member of the liberal news media (yes, it is a conspiracy), I’ll have to tune into what the group-think is day to day.

I discovered that I’m a new member of the liberal news media by reading it on the Web site for GOPUSA Illinois (Oct. 20), overseen by Dave Diersen of Wheaton. Diersen is the 9th precinct committeeman for the Milton Township Republican Central Committee. GOPUSA Illinois presents Web links to numerous articles from news organizations and political organizations posted each day by Diersen

It’s quite a listing, and I admire Diersen’s commitment to compile it each morning. On his Web site, he says he has more than 800 subscribers who receive his list each day via e-mails. Diersen also notes that he accepts no money from anyone else to produce his Web site each day and doesn’t use advertising.

My concern (and it’s shared by other people familiar with GOPUSA Illinois) is the unsubstantiated claims Diersen makes virtuallty every day about some person or group. When the stock market dropped sharply due to the crisis in the mortgage and financial markets, Diersen said that liberal groups such as certain newspapers were actively trying to sour the economy so they could elect Barack Obama.

As a co-worker of mine (sarcastically) observed, that makes perfect sense. Never mind that we all work for businesses that will be adversely impacted by a recession, perhaps even losing our own jobs. The ideological thrust to elect Obama is so great that we’ll do whatever we can to see Obama become president, even jeopardize our livelihoods.

It’s completely ludicrous.

Diersen wants to shove everyone in an ideological cookie-cutter. If someone doesn’t match up perfectly what his idea of a conservative, this person is labeled anti-American, anti-conservative, anti-religious, etc., regardless of the facts.

The problem with this approach is that is perpetuates gross generalizations about people and their motives. Diersen probably wouldn’t know some of these people if he met them, yet he’s fully prepared to diagnose their political ideologies.

Ken Vanko, a lawyer with the Wheaton-based firm of Clingen Callow & McLean, maintains a blog called View From the Center. In a posting today called “Any ‘Reason’ for an Illigent Debate?” Vanko writes that hashing out pre-formed platitudes rather than engaging in an intelligent discussion demeans the political process. He believes this is driving many people away from John McCain’s campaign and toward Obama, and he’s correct.

Diersen is certainly not alone in devising false characterizations of people who challenge his claims. This is incredibly common. Since I’ve been writing newspaper columns for nearly two decades, I’ve been called just about every name and accused of every political inclination — and they often contradict each other.

And once again, many of these are people who have never met me. How in the world can they sum up my ideology when they’ve had so little contact with me?

This is a major problem with our political system. People create these theoretical frameworks according to their own ideology. This is unhealthy in a society like ours that practices democracy. It’s dehumanizing and breeds contempt for others who don’t think exactly like you do — and I mean exactly.

Don’t presume to know someone’s worldview or political ideology unless you know them well or at least have had their philosophy explained thoroughly to you. I’m not suggesting that people shouldn’t defend their beliefs. But don’t turn someone else into a caricature while doing so.

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Too much going on to bother with last-minute request for coverage

Open blog posting to Ken Vanko:

Ken, did you see Dave Dierson’s notice on his GOPUSA Illinois Web site this morning about tonight’s Oktoberfest for the Milton Township Republican Central Committee?

Diersun asked if either you or I would be covering the event or if we would merely continue to “harass” him? If by harassment he means challenging him to back up the unsubstantiated claims he makes every day in his “headlines,” put me down in the latter column.

First of all, Diersan has no sense of timing when it comes to public relations. If he wanted something covered, he should have made a request a few days ago.

But if I know Diersin as well as I think I do, that’s the way he planned this because he’s done it before. He won’t send us any notices about an event in which he’s involved, and then he’ll whine about how we, as part of the liberal media, won’t bother to cover it. He doesn’t seem to grasp that newsrooms need a little more than a few hours of notice to prepare to cover an event.

So I’m going to have to take a pass tonight. I’ll probably regret it tomorrow because I’m sure Diersyn will complain about it on his Web site tomorrow. Typical.

And by the way, did you see the lengthy headlines Deersen had about our two blog postings? He actually had very little commentary; the headlines mostly just repeated points that you and I made about his doing this very thing — he still hasn’t addressed my questions to him. Amazing.

Well, we’ll see what Dearsen comes up with tomorrow. Thanks again for the plug yesterday on your blog View From the Center. Talk to you soon.

— Jerry Moore, Suburban Life Publications

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A breath of fresh air lifts political discourse out of the crap on the Web

There’s intelligent life out there in cyberspace.

Ken Vanko is a lawyer with the Wheaton firm of Clingen Callow & McLean. He writes a column for the Aurora Beacon News and submits postings to several blogs.

(While I’m on the topic of the Aurora Beacon News, let me send a long-overdue greeting to Rick Nagel, publisher of the Beacon News, an old acquaintance who used to work for Press Publications when it was based in Elmhurst. I got to know Nagel when I was with The Beverly Review on Chicago’s Far South Side; we worked together on a committee for the Illinois Press Association. During Nagel’s tenure, Press Publications won numerous journalism awards with all the excellent writers and photographers the company assembled. Hey, Rick, I hope all is well. But I digress …)

In a posting today on his blog View From the Center, titled “The Dangers of Excessive Partisanship,” Vanko examines why political independents do not appear to be supporting U.S. Sen. John McCain in his bid for the presidency. Vanko argues that McCain really isn’t the problem — it’s the uber-partisans in the GOP who are driving independents to the Democratic Party and to U.S. Sen. Barack Obama.

Vanko mentions my previous postings about why the McCain campaign is foolish to criticize Obama for his association with William Ayers, co-founder of the Weather Underground. In the late 1960s and early ’70s, Ayers & Co. carried out a bombing campaign that targeted public buildings. Some people were injured as a result of the group’s activities, and several members of the group were killed while making bombs.

McCain and his running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, have cited Obama’s connection to Ayers (both Obama and Ayers served on the board of a charitable group, and Ayers hosted a coffee when Obama first ran for public office in the 1990s) in questioning his judgment. Why would a sensible person associate with a domestic terrorist?

I pointed out that McCain has a problem in this area himself. He has appeared on the radio program of G. Gordon Liddy, who served time in prison for his role in the Watergate scandal. McCain has publicly praised Liddy’s “adherence to the principles that keep our nation great.” I’m not the first to spot this example of hypocrisy; columnist Steve Chapman wrote about this in the May 4, 2008, edition of the Chicago Tribune.

Dave Dierson of Wheaton, editor of the Web site GOPUSA Illinois, chastised me for “demonizing and denigrating” Liddy, who Liddy said “fought for America and against communism.”

I have repeatedly asked which of Liddy’s violent proposals (firebombing the Brookings Institute, kidnapping anti-war leaders and assassinating newspaper columnist Jack Anderson) or illegal activities (helping to plan break-ins at the office of Daniel Ellsberg’s psychiatrist as well as the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate Hotel) reflect the conservative values that Diersen attributes to Liddy or the American principles to which McCain claims that Liddy adheres.

Vanko understands that Diersen is merely spouting Republican platitudes and not engaging in any serious discussion of important issues. On his Web site every day, Diersen affixes ridiculous “headlines” on links to stories posted on the Web sites of news organizations.

Diersen grossly simplifies how everything good happening in DuPage County is the work of Republicans and everything bad happening in DuPage County is the work of Democrats. He claims that social problems occur in DuPage County only because Democrats recruit people to live in blissful, peaceful, crime-free, conservative, Republican DuPage County; this then lowers the quality of life that DuPage County Republicans have worked so hard to create, as if Republican DuPage County were incapable of producing criminals itself (OK, except for Ayers, who grew up in Glen Ellyn).

The rationale that Diersen displays is laughable. To their credit, many DuPage County Republicans don’t take Diersen seriously. With his sloppy thinking on display each day, how he has managed to maintain the position of Milton Township GOP committeeman is beyond comprehension.

Diersen has still refused to explain what makes Liddy a noble American in his mind or point out where I promoted Ayers and Obama. He merely whines again and again about being “demonized and denigrated.”

If Diersen understood anything about the news business, he would know that journalists are supposed to challenge the kind of tortured logic he exhibits. Vanko has identified incidents like this as a key problem facing McCain and the GOP, and he’s right. Thank God someone in the blogosphere is using his brain.

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