1.) Since he was released from a prison medical facility, Jim Traficant has also refused interviews with Vindicator reporters Harold Gwin and Jon Moffett. So, Eliot, your premise is flawed.
3.) Bertram joins others who expect Mr. Traficant to come completely clean. Obfuscating this legitimate viewpoint with "So-and-so was pressured!" or "Every politician is a crook; Jimbo just got caught!" clearly will not quell every opinion.
4.) Every one of your posts contains a formulaic recitation like this: "the Vindy has ignored so-and-so who was pressured" as if being "pressured" whether externally or internally to testify is mutually exclusive with "telling the truth." Could it have been possible for people to both feel pressured AND to have told the truth? Further, in the version you portray, everyone who felt pressured is automatically guilty of lying under oath BUT they never lied when they told Mr. Traficant they felt "pressured." Really?
5.) Your pugnacious advocacy is acceptable, but Skolnick stating the actual record is somehow an affront?
6.) Again, Dave was stating the actual record. However, we would be happy to review any of Mr. Traficant's recordings or evidence. If they are as legitimate as the mob tapes, we'd be happy to post them online, too.
7.) That drum beat you hear is also reflective of a large segment of the population.
8.) See No. 4. You are repeating your methodology.
9.) Ditto.
10.) Retrying a trial seven years after a guilty verdict and a prison sentence is not going to get much traction after the "Jimbo is back!" novelty wears off. The "they-had-to-cheat-to-get-me" logic raises another battle of the mutually exclusives: Even if he was a high-profile target of the Justice Department, had he walked the straight-and-narrow, they would not have been able to get so many people close to him to testify to wrong-doing. It is possible that both "They were out to get me!" and "Jim broke the law!" are true. The first doesn't cancel the second unless your remaining point is reduced to: "Even if Jim Traficant was guilty, the prosecutors broke the law therefore Mr. Traficant should have been freed on a technicality." Which, of course, is entirely different from "not guilty of any wrong-doing whatsoever."
11.) I am suggesting an editorial board meeting before several editors similar to the endorsement interview process that scores of local politicians are undergoing right now. You make it sound as if he is afraid of Bertram and Dave, let alone Harold and Jon.
Eliot, I don't mind shadowboxing with some proxy, but I've stated our case. Either Jim sits down with us or he doesn't. We'll be fine either way. But if he chooses to continue to duck The Vindicator, no one, yourself included will be fooled as to why.
I laughed, too. So, let us bid farewell to weareanon who tried to pass himself off as an employee and – as we saw - eventually admitted he was not.
These cowards who create anonymous accounts BUT who think it is perfectly OK to attack others by name just annoy me. Of course, they are always the first to cry "Free Speech!" as if they have any idea about the responsibility associated with speech.
Feel free to debate the wisdom of hockey at the Covelli. But I think it is possible to do so without being mean spirited or pretending to be something you are not.
Let's be clear, Eliot: The Vindicator would only seek to ask Jim Traficant serious questions, not fawn over him like supporters or Greta, et al. That is what is at issue here. He knows, as he has always known, that the only way to regain true credibility is to sit down and take hard questions from professional, working journalists who are very familiar with the record and have the insight to press him on facts.
Unfortunately, those very same hard questions are why you'll see him on ANY TV show from Jerry Springer on down before you'll see him sit still for this newspaper or, say, journalists from The Washington Post, etc.
If you are going to be honest, then you have to admit he is ducking The Vindicator and choosing the friendly fire of outdoors radio shows and "On the Record" and such so he can hit softballs out of the park while controlling the setting.
Skolnick, Mangan, de Souza, et al would welcome his appearance at a meeting of the editorial board. In fact, one technological evolution since he was sent to prison, is that we can now video-record our editorial board meetings so they can be posted online. We'd be happy to record such a meeting with Jim. That pretty much eliminates the oft-stated concern that somehow he would get over-edited. Skolnick has further offered that we also run his interview in verbatim in print as we did with Marc Dann in May, but to no avail.
Sorry, Pot, but I am not going to let you squirm away by allowing you to refocus your comments to conveniently escape the falsehood you originally posted.
You wrote: "I am still waiting for the first mention of the recent ACORN scandal in this paper." That's pretty definitive. Are we to believe that you were unable to read The Vindicator since Wednesday but were prepared to criticize it anyway?
So now we know several truths: a.) You were wrong about what was published; b.) As a "potential subscriber" you are not even reading "this paper" every day hence you are posting criticisms without even availing yourself of the ability to know what you are talking about; c.) You don't have the ability to say "I was wrong."
One more thing that I failed to note about your original post: There is no "local" ACORN office. The closest one is Akron; the next is Pittsburgh. (Reverse that if you are one of our Pennsylvania readers). So, again, demagoguery blah, blah, blah, witless... You get the point.
Maybe if you spent more time reading The Vindicator and less time getting all of your news from Glenn Beck, who also doesn't read this newspaper, you would not have missed these stories from the past week:
Most callers to the newsroom who I've spoken with, by the way, are NOT complaining that we are burying Traficant. These callers say we are giving him too much space. Thoughts?
Tyler can't blog about local issues because he hasn't lived here long enough and editors can't comment on our own Web site.
If people say things that can be easily defended or explained or answered, editors should and will join the chorus. If you want to set the rules, start your own Web site. But certainly if you direct comments specifically at us, you'll probably be answered.
You've got three relatively negative comments (on this account) all making roughly the same commentary about who should be allowed to say what on someone else's Web site. That's a little weird...
Posted on November 3 at 5:47 p.m.
Headline has been corrected. Sorry, Jay.
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor
Posted on October 23 at 9:13 a.m.
We try to pay attention. Thanks for the catch.
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor
Posted on October 3 at 10:55 a.m.
Eliot:
1.) Since he was released from a prison medical facility, Jim Traficant has also refused interviews with Vindicator reporters Harold Gwin and Jon Moffett. So, Eliot, your premise is flawed.
2.) Sean Hannity is not an opinionated "editorial writer?" Go here: http://www.hannity.com//Article.asp?id=1...
3.) Bertram joins others who expect Mr. Traficant to come completely clean. Obfuscating this legitimate viewpoint with "So-and-so was pressured!" or "Every politician is a crook; Jimbo just got caught!" clearly will not quell every opinion.
4.) Every one of your posts contains a formulaic recitation like this: "the Vindy has ignored so-and-so who was pressured" as if being "pressured" whether externally or internally to testify is mutually exclusive with "telling the truth." Could it have been possible for people to both feel pressured AND to have told the truth? Further, in the version you portray, everyone who felt pressured is automatically guilty of lying under oath BUT they never lied when they told Mr. Traficant they felt "pressured." Really?
5.) Your pugnacious advocacy is acceptable, but Skolnick stating the actual record is somehow an affront?
6.) Again, Dave was stating the actual record. However, we would be happy to review any of Mr. Traficant's recordings or evidence. If they are as legitimate as the mob tapes, we'd be happy to post them online, too.
7.) That drum beat you hear is also reflective of a large segment of the population.
8.) See No. 4. You are repeating your methodology.
9.) Ditto.
10.) Retrying a trial seven years after a guilty verdict and a prison sentence is not going to get much traction after the "Jimbo is back!" novelty wears off. The "they-had-to-cheat-to-get-me" logic raises another battle of the mutually exclusives: Even if he was a high-profile target of the Justice Department, had he walked the straight-and-narrow, they would not have been able to get so many people close to him to testify to
wrong-doing. It is possible that both "They were out to get me!" and "Jim broke the law!" are true. The first doesn't cancel the second unless your remaining point is reduced to: "Even if Jim Traficant was guilty, the prosecutors broke the law therefore Mr. Traficant should have been freed on a technicality." Which, of course, is entirely different from "not guilty of any wrong-doing whatsoever."
11.) I am suggesting an editorial board meeting before several editors similar to the endorsement interview process that scores of local politicians are undergoing right now. You make it sound as if he is afraid of Bertram and Dave, let alone Harold and Jon.
Eliot, I don't mind shadowboxing with some proxy, but I've stated our case. Either Jim sits down with us or he doesn't. We'll be fine either way. But if he chooses to continue to duck The Vindicator, no one, yourself included will be fooled as to why.
Mark M. Sweetwood
Managing Editor
Posted on October 2 at 6:53 p.m.
jrolley:
I laughed, too. So, let us bid farewell to weareanon who tried to pass himself off as an employee and – as we saw - eventually admitted he was not.
These cowards who create anonymous accounts BUT who think it is perfectly OK to attack others by name just annoy me. Of course, they are always the first to cry "Free Speech!" as if they have any idea about the responsibility associated with speech.
Feel free to debate the wisdom of hockey at the Covelli. But I think it is possible to do so without being mean spirited or pretending to be something you are not.
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor
Posted on September 24 at 7:11 p.m.
Let's be clear, Eliot: The Vindicator would only seek to ask Jim Traficant serious questions, not fawn over him like supporters or Greta, et al. That is what is at issue here. He knows, as he has always known, that the only way to regain true credibility is to sit down and take hard questions from professional, working journalists who are very familiar with the record and have the insight to press him on facts.
Unfortunately, those very same hard questions are why you'll see him on ANY TV show from Jerry Springer on down before you'll see him sit still for this newspaper or, say, journalists from The Washington Post, etc.
If you are going to be honest, then you have to admit he is ducking The Vindicator and choosing the friendly fire of outdoors radio shows and "On the Record" and such so he can hit softballs out of the park while controlling the setting.
Skolnick, Mangan, de Souza, et al would welcome his appearance at a meeting of the editorial board. In fact, one technological evolution since he was sent to prison, is that we can now video-record our editorial board meetings so they can be posted online. We'd be happy to record such a meeting with Jim. That pretty much eliminates the oft-stated concern that somehow he would get over-edited. Skolnick has further offered that we also run his interview in verbatim in print as we did with Marc Dann in May, but to no avail.
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor
Posted on September 20 at 9 a.m.
Sorry, Pot, but I am not going to let you squirm away by allowing you to refocus your comments to conveniently escape the falsehood you originally posted.
You wrote: "I am still waiting for the first mention of the recent ACORN scandal in this paper." That's pretty definitive. Are we to believe that you were unable to read The Vindicator since Wednesday but were prepared to criticize it anyway?
So now we know several truths: a.) You were wrong about what was published; b.) As a "potential subscriber" you are not even reading "this paper" every day hence you are posting criticisms without even availing yourself of the ability to know what you are talking about; c.) You don't have the ability to say "I was wrong."
One more thing that I failed to note about your original post: There is no "local" ACORN office. The closest one is Akron; the next is Pittsburgh. (Reverse that if you are one of our Pennsylvania readers). So, again, demagoguery blah, blah, blah, witless... You get the point.
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor
Posted on September 19 at 10:27 a.m.
Hey Pot:
Maybe if you spent more time reading The Vindicator and less time getting all of your news from Glenn Beck, who also doesn't read this newspaper, you would not have missed these stories from the past week:
http://www.vindy.com/news/2009/sep/19/se...
http://www.vindy.com/news/2009/sep/19/as...
http://www.vindy.com/news/2009/sep/18/ho...
http://www.vindy.com/news/2009/sep/17/ac...
http://www.vindy.com/news/2009/sep/16/ac...
Prime example of why demagoguery is is the last refuge of the witless...
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor
Posted on September 14 at 11:06 a.m.
Fixed, daysleeper.
Most callers to the newsroom who I've spoken with, by the way, are NOT complaining that we are burying Traficant. These callers say we are giving him too much space. Thoughts?
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor
Posted on September 8 at 9:16 a.m.
Fixed, north_side.
My wife won a big teddy bear at the same game!
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor
Posted on August 13 at 2:33 p.m.
Wow, JJ. You've got it all figured out:
Tyler can't blog about local issues because he hasn't lived here long enough and editors can't comment on our own Web site.
If people say things that can be easily defended or explained or answered, editors should and will join the chorus. If you want to set the rules, start your own Web site. But certainly if you direct comments specifically at us, you'll probably be answered.
You've got three relatively negative comments (on this account) all making roughly the same commentary about who should be allowed to say what on someone else's Web site. That's a little weird...
Mark Sweetwood
Managing Editor