Another case of media mistaken identity

By now you’re familiar with the incident at the U. S. Capitol in which some nut pulled a gun on the security police and they shot him. The suspect was identified as Larry Russell Dawson from Antioch, TN. The mainstream media went to Facebook to find him and quickly posted a picture of the suspect. He was a white male who didn’t look to be 66 years old, the age of the suspect. It didn’t matter. He was a Trump guy, a tea party guy. The mainstream media had their story. Trump had driven another crazy person to violence.

The REAL Larry Dawson

The problem was they had the wrong guy.

It took our staff about 60 seconds to figure that out. How? Because the URL address of “the suspect” was Larry F. Dawson, not Larry R. Dawson. Plus, this guy was from Pikeville, TN, not Antioch. So our staff went looking for the real Larry Russell Dawson. They found him. A 66-year-old left-wing black preacher who was known to protest in favor of raising the minimum wage to $15-per-hour.

The mainstream media then realized their error. Instead of correcting the mistake, they just deleted the first picture of the white guy and replaced it with a static shot of the Capitol. No mention of the mistake. No corrected photograph. No back story on who this nutcase really was. All of a sudden it didn’t matter what his politics were, or his race.

How many times have we seen the mainstream media jump to conclusions? Remember the Colorado theater shooter? ABC first reported that he was a conservative tea party type. Again they erroneously picked the wrong profile from Facebook and ran with it. When it turned out the real suspect was a crazy liberal they ignored it. His political views no longer mattered.

I was reading a piece in the New York Times about how there were no clues that would yield information on who would become a terrorist. How about we start with the basics? The common thread of today’s terrorists is they’re Muslims. The Times piece never went there. They simply listed some warning signs to look for like depression and anger.

The 9/11 hijackers weren’t depressed. Nor were the San Bernardino killers or the Boston Marathon bombers. The one thing they all were was Muslim.

Now, this is not to say that all Muslims are terrorists, but to ignore the fact that we’re at war with radical Islam is dangerous.

The thread that ties all this together is the agenda of the mainstream media. They see conservatives as more of a threat than radical Islam. They want so much to tie violence to the tea party or Trump or Cruz and want so desperately to disassociate violence and Islam.

Hillary Clinton even chided Cruz and Trump over their response to the Brussels bombings. She said profiling Muslims in America would only radicalize them. Think about that for a second. She’s saying if you make Muslims mad they’ll kill you. Isn’t that a problem in and of itself? If a group of people is just one unjust traffic stop away from blowing up an airport, don’t we have a problem with that group?

The media are dead set on making conservatives the boogeyman. President Obama speaks far more passionately against conservatives than he does radical Islamic terrorists. In fact, he won’t even use the term, but he’ll constantly refer to conservatives as the enemy.

The real enemy is political correctness. It prevents us from having frank discussions. Frank discussions about real life and death situations.

Phil Valentine is the host of the award-winning, nationally syndicated talk radio show, The Phil Valentine Show.

Obama's unfortunate message to the world

The folks in Washington are fond of talking about “the optics” of this or that. The optics of our president in Cuba have gone viral on the Internet. The image of President Barack Obama standing with the U.S. delegation in front of a 5-story steel outline of Che Guevara is chilling. It is tacit approval of a man the left hails as a hero, but the real story of Che Guevara is quite disturbing.

Guevara was an Argentine marxist who played a major role in the Cuban revolution. Che joined the Castro brothers in overthrowing Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista. Talk about jumping from the frying pan into the fire, the Castro reign of terror ended up being even worse than the Batista regime, and Che Guevara played a key part in its terror. Guevara presided over the notorious La Cabana prison, a hell hole where hundreds were executed. Guevara’s forced labor camps became concentration camps with untold misery and horror. They held homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and anyone else deemed to have committed so-called crimes against the revolution.

Guevara’s own diaries outline much of the slaughter, so this is not post-revolutionary propaganda put forth by anti-Castro forces. Guevara was instrumental in the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 and favored nuclear annihilation of the United States to “build a better world.” He was involved in a plot blow up Grand Central Station and major shopping centers in New York on Black Friday.

He described his own idea of justice as “unbending hatred for the enemy, which pushes a human being beyond his natural limitations, making him into an effective, violent, selective, and cold-blooded killing machine.” This killing machine was blessedly exterminated while trying to lead another bloody revolution in Bolivia.

The iconic two-tone portrait of Che Guevara by Irish artist Jim Fitzpatrick has been emblazoned on countless t-shirts, coffee mugs, and flags since it was introduced in 1968. The romantic image leads many to believe that Guevara was a hero. He was anything but. Certainly he was a complicated man, but his thirst for blood became his overriding legacy. The number of people Guevara personally murdered is impossible to tally. We do know that he oversaw the execution of thousands. To say the least, he was a butcher of barbaric proportions. The Castro regime in Cuba is famous for its brutality and Che Guevara is its most heralded hero behind Fidel himself.

To have the president of the United States visit this totalitarian dictatorship is bad enough. To see our president posing in the shadow of one of history’s most notorious murderers is beyond the pale. It’s as if Obama is trying to do as much damage to the United States as he possibly can before he leaves office.

There’s no doubt that Batista was a bad man. There’s no doubt that he should have been deposed. However, what took his place was even worse, and icons no less than John F. Kennedy tried to do something about it. It was Guevara-trained forces that repelled the invasion at the Bay of Pigs. How someone can be pro-JFK and, simultaneously, revere Che Guevara is beyond me.

How our president can honor such a butcher with a photograph that will no doubt be used as propaganda by countless marxist ideologues is unconscionable. To say that the photo op was unplanned stretches the limits of credulity. Every Obama photo op is carefully choreographed. This was meant to send a message to the world. That message is that marxism trumps capitalism. It’s a sad message indeed.

Phil Valentine is the host of the award-winning, nationally syndicated talk radio show, The Phil Valentine Show.

Let the revolution begin

Sometimes it’s difficult to recognize history when you’re living it. Make no mistake, we’re living through historic times and Donald Trump is the reason. Whether or not he wins the nomination, this campaign season will be remembered for one refrain: We’re going to build a wall and we’re going to get Mexico to pay for it.

This simple idea seems to elude the party elites and talking heads on television. They’re still scratching their heads trying to figure out why Donald Trump became the phenomenon he is. It’s not hard to figure out if you have your finger on the pulse of the people. Quite simply, they’re fed up with illegal aliens and Washington’s apparent lack of desire to do anything about it.

But the illegal aliens have become emblematic of another movement that has been festering beneath the surface and Trump has brought them out of the woodwork. It’s more than just the Bernie Sanders crowd, a phenom in and of itself. What’s shaping up is an epic showdown between what Ayn Rand called the looters and moochers in her classic novel, Atlas Shrugged — I call them the loochers — and the producers on the other side.

Say what you will about Trump, he’s a producer. The barbarians at the gate are the scads of entitlement-class brats who don’t produce anything but a burden and demand someone else bear the cost of it. They want free college, free healthcare, living wages, and the like, having no clue that nothing is free except to the looters and moochers who take it by force of law.

The cancelled Trump rally in Chicago will be looked back upon by historians as a turning point in this long overdue battle between the producers and the loochers. We hear ad nauseam about income inequality, but what does that even mean? To those who shout it, it means some people have more than they do and they aim to take it from them.

The loochers have taken many forms before. They were Occupy Wall Street. They were MoveOn.org. They are Black Lives Matter. These people suppose that destroying a political rally and keeping the candidate from speaking is somehow an exercise of their own free speech. It isn’t. It’s anarchy. I’ve often said that the left is all about diversity except when it comes to diversity of thought. It’s not enough to just ignore an opinion counter to their own. They have to shut it down. That’s the textbook definition of fascism.

Every revolution has its turning point, a moment by which the battle lines are drawn and from which the status quo will never return. For the American Revolution it was the Boston Massacre. For this current revolution it was Chicago. This revolution, however, is not the cause of the anarchist and loochers. It’s the moment the producers decided they’d had enough. When Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and John Kasich should have recognized the turning point for what it was and stand with the producers, they saw it as a political opportunity and, thus, lost their place in its history.

They shall only be remembered as cannon fodder in this battle between those who keep our economy moving and those who attempt to rape it. An unlikely, braggadocious narcissist managed to tap into the anger that was created by a political party that took the producers for granted and existed only to perpetuate its own existence.

Whether Trump ever makes it to the White House remains to be seen. What is indisputable is that he has put a match to a raging bonfire. 

Phil Valentine is the host of the award-winning, nationally syndicated talk radio show, The Phil Valentine Show.

The ever-changing meaning of rape

When is rape rape? It sounds like a silly question but it’s not. Today on college campuses the obvious has been cast into doubt. Used to be that we knew what rape was. It was as heinous a crime as one could imagine. The ultimate violation. Now its definition has been opened to interpretation by the politically correct forces that dominate universities big and small. Today, we’re no longer sure and the consequences will be devastating.

Yale’s basketball team has made it to the NCAA Tournament for the first time since JFK was president. The accomplishment was bitter-sweet. Its captain, Jack Montague, was not only ejected from the team, but expelled from school in February. Yale officials have been tight-lipped, as has the Montague family. Jack’s father is keeping silent on advice from his attorney but says he can’t wait to tell their side of the story.

Shortly after Montague’s expulsion, the team sported practice jerseys with Montague’s number and nickname: Gucci. This prompted a women’s group on campus to plaster posters all over campus admonishing the team for supporting a rapist. This is where the story gets murky.

Before I continue, let me just state for the record that I know what rape is. If Montague is guilty of rape, he needs to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. It appears that definition has been so distorted that we may never know the truth.

Here’s what we’re hearing.

Montague broke up with his girlfriend. Shortly after doing so, the woman contacted school officials and reported that Montague had raped her while they were dating. Local police say they have had no complaint filed against Montague, criminal or otherwise, and are not investigating him for rape or any other crime.

Let’s assume just for a second that the woman’s accusations are true. Wouldn’t Yale have an obligation to report such a crime to police? If they didn’t, are they covering it up to protect the reputation of the school? That should be a crime in and of itself.

Now let’s assume that the accusations are not true. They’re going to expel a student and ruin his chance to be part of the school’s sports history on hearsay from a scorned lover?

It sounds like what we would expect to come from the ‘Yes Means No’ legislation that originated in California and quickly spread to colleges across the country. Basically, the rules of engagement between men and women on campus have changed. If the two end up having sex, which tends to happen in college, the woman has to give her verbal approval of the act. Not just at the beginning but periodically throughout the encounter. If she has been drinking, she is not capable of approval, therefore any sex act with a woman who has consumed alcohol or drugs is assumed to be rape. Oh yeah, and the accused is guilty until proven innocent.

We saw what a mess was made of this newfound assumption of guilt in the University of Virginia case. Rolling Stone magazine went all out with a story about a gang rape at a frat house, relying only on the story of the accuser. As it turns out, the woman made the entire story up. In the meantime, an entire fraternity and its members were dragged through the mud. Protests were staged at the frat house. Nasty words were spray-painted on the building. All of the brothers were assumed to be rapists. And no one at the school even hesitated to believe the story.

Is UVA happening again at Yale?

Phil Valentine is the host of the award-winning, nationally syndicated talk radio show, The Phil Valentine Show.

The Oscars buckle to political correctness

Don’t know if you watched the Oscars on Sunday night. If you didn’t, you were in the vast majority. It was the third-lowest rated since they’ve been televised. With all the hoopla about blacks being snubbed, you’d think people would’ve been tuning in in droves. They didn’t.

I must admit that I enjoy the Oscars. I even watch the pre-Oscars red carpet show. Before you come for my man card, I have a good excuse. I love movies. I love how they’re made. I love how they’re written. I’m just fascinated with the biz. This year, I turned the Oscars off after 45 minutes.

I love Chris Rock but I simply got ‘diversity fatigue.’ The whole opening monologue was about how Hollywood is racist. Yes, there were some very funny lines, but the subject was worth three minutes of attention, tops. Instead, every bit, every reference, every everything was about how Hollywood isn’t diverse enough.

You know, it’s funny but I never hear these same people saying the NBA isn’t diverse enough. In fact, it never occurs to me, as a white man, to question why there aren’t more white folks playing. The reason is the NBA, and most organized sports, rely on one thing, and it’s not diversity. It’s excellence.

When I’m watching basketball not only do I not care what race they are, I never think about it. I love seeing Steph and LeBron, Durant and Griffin, Kyrie and Carmelo, Duncan and Kobe. I’m a bigger college basketball fan than I am pro. My team is the North Carolina Tar Heels. You’re sure the Heels have the game well in hand when the white boys come in at the end. Is that racist? No, it’s just a matter of fact.

Why can’t the movies be the same? Why can’t we just celebrate good movies without people worrying about diversity? Excellence always floats to the top. Look at Denzel Washington. I can’t think of any actor in modern times — maybe in any time — that can hold a candle to Denzel. Jamie Foxx is another great actor. Notice I didn’t qualify it by saying ‘black’ actor. 

The movie that allegedly got snubbed this time around was Straight Outta Compton. Here’s the problem. The acting in that flick was average at best. That’s why the screenplay was nominated for an Oscar and the movie wasn’t. Great idea, poor execution.

It’s not like white folks won’t pay to watch black people perform. Denzel sells millions of dollars worth of movie tickets. The NFL packs ‘em in every Sunday, primarily to see black athletes at their best. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has made a grave mistake buckling to the political correctness of the quota crowd. Next year, when there will most certainly be scads of black actors and so-called ‘black films’ nominated, one will be left wondering if they actually deserved the recognition or are a product of Hollywood’s new quota system. Not only is that not fair to those actors and films left out at their expense, it’s not fair to the actors and films that win and are left with a cloud of doubt hanging over them.

You see, the most direct route to a world in which race or racism play no role is to recognize excellence and only excellence. Diversity is the buzzword of racists. People whose primary goal it is to simply see more people of color care not a whit about excellence.

It’s that striving for excellence that makes us all better. Excellence knows no color. Excellence knows no race.

Phil Valentine is the host of the award-winning, nationally syndicated talk radio show, The Phil Valentine Show.