Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/680616
GregStevens,Publisher Chip Thompson, Editor EDITORIALBOARD How to have your say: Letters must be signed and provide the writer's home street address and home phone number. Anonymous letters, open letters to others, pen names and petition-style letters will not be allowed. Letters should be typed and no more than two double-spaced pages or 500words. When several letters address the same issue, a cross section will be published. Email: editor@ redbluffdailynews.com Fax: 530-527-9251 Mail to: P.O. Box 220, 545 Diamond Ave., Red Bluff, CA 96080 Facebook: Leave comments at FACEBOOK.COM/ RBDAILYNEWS Twitter: Follow and send tweets to @REDBLUFFNEWS OnNBCNewstheothernight,anchorman Lester Holt reported that Donald Trump was pivoting to a more presidential image. In the measured tones that we commonly associ- ate with "objectivity," Holt said: "Trump's comments appear to signal a more moderate shi ..." WhenIheardthat,Isighed to myself, "Right on schedule. The normalization of Trump has begun." On MSNBC the other night, Chuck Todd equated Trump and Hillary Clinton, raising him up by lowering her down, bowing to the journalistic rit- ual of "balance." Todd said, "Are we re- ally going to be here for six straight months of the two most unpopular people run- ning for president, probably going down a low road led by Trump, Clinton probably feel- ing doing the same thing, and it's sort of this race to the bot- tom?" When I heard that, I sighed to myself again. Just as I have sighed when- ever Trump has stated, in de- bates and in press interviews, that he strongly opposed the Iraq war before it began — a blatant lie that has typically gone unchallenged, despite the dearth of evidence that he ever opposed the war before it be- gan. Trump routinely whips up fanboy hatred against the me- dia, but in truth the media — or, more precisely, the "ob- jective," "balanced," main- stream media — is potentially his best friend for the next six months. Under the longstanding rules of the game, newspaper and broadcast reporters are barred from stating what is in- controvertibly accurate about this historically asymmetric matchup. Namely, that one candi- date, regardless of how anyone might feel about her policies, has the demonstrable experi- ence and qualifications to run the world's pre-eminent super- power. The other candidate, by dint of his temperament, his zero public service expe- rience, and his racism, xe- nophobia, and misogyny, is manifestly unfit. Everything in that para- graph is factually incontest- able. But most of the reporters, hewing to traditional stan- dards, will pretend other- wise. They will be compelled to find "balance" — or, as we more accurately call it these days, "false equivalence." Their implicit mission, in the bril- liant words of one analyst, is "to make it Coca-Cola versus Pepsi, instead of Coca-Cola versus sewer water." It would be great if the "balance"-saddled press could keep in mind its most crucial mission: to hold these candi- dates fully accountable. If that means dogging Hill- ary about her email server, fine. If that means questioning her about her flip flops on free trade and the minimum wage, go for it. But let's not pretend that a flawed but seasoned centrist is on a par with a policy ci- pher who advocates the spread of nuclear weapons in Asia, who shrugs off violence at his rallies, who demeans women and minorities, and who's cur- rently the target of two fraud trials. It would be great if the "bal- anced" press can keep that in mind, because the various au- tumn rituals will have the ef- fect of equating them. He says something, she reacts. She says something, he reacts. It's all very binary. And if he tries to sanitize his past by moving to the cen- ter, the "balanced" press will likely flush his track record of rhetorical hatred down the memory hole. If he's not spewing anew, they can't keep reporting the old stuff — lest they be ac- cused of "bias." And heck, the mere act of putting them on the same debate stage will raise him up at her ex- pense. Ironically, the best place to find truth, in the months ahead, may well be in the con- servative press. Those folks don't give a whit about false balance. They have no love for Clin- ton, but they see Trump for ex- actly who he is, and they're saying it with devastating ac- curacy. Here's conservative an- alyst Jay Cost: "[Trump is] a racist, nativ- ist demagogue with few ties to government, no experience in public office, no service in the armed forces, and little to no knowledge of anything in- volving governance, from pol- icy to basic questions like, 'What is the Supreme Court, and what does it do?' If you conjured all the ignorance and arrogance and gave it hu- man form, you would have Donald Trump, give or take a spray tan." If mainstream reporters es- chew those self-evident truths, rest assured that Trump will play them for suckers. And voters will potentially pay the price. DickPolmanisthenational political columnist at NewsWorks/WHYY in Philadelphia (newsworks. org/polman) and a "Writer in Residence" at the University of Pennsylvania. Email him at dickpolman7@gmail.com. Dick Polman Normalization of Trump has begun Cartoonist's take One way to look at the cur- rent controversy over bathroom rules is to step back and take in the big pic- ture. The very use of those 4 words, "controversy over bathroom rules," says a lot about the decline of public standards as I see it. There is nothing contro- versial about a bathroom that is a single-occupant room with a locking doorknob having sig- nage that allows any "mamma- lian biped" to access the plumb- ing fixtures for the plumbing on said biped's body. The reality is that all, and I mean all, "mammalian bipeds" are born with either male or fe- male "parts." That is called bi- ology and would seem to be, as the cultural and political left put it endlessly when it suits their issue, "settled sci- ence." Letting a person "iden- tify" with "parts" not present at birth would—(cue the movie voice-over) in a world where ba- sic "facts of life" were not sub- ject to interpretation—get he/ she laughed out of public dis- course. Such feeling-based accommo- dation of nature-defying pref- erences would, in such a world, not be accorded any further at- tention beyond being 1) the butt of ridicule summed up by 2) "you must be joking" and 3) "if you are serious, you need coun- seling and/or physical restraint until authorities can take you away." The little signs on the doors that routinely show either the symbol for a man with pants or a woman with a skirt are ap- parently now to include a third figure: the ludicrous combina- tion of a pant leg on one side and skirt on the other half. Beyond that is the truly bi- zarre contention that such gen- der coin-tossing should de- termine whether a biologi- cally confused/defiant man can walk into a public rest room for women with nothing but stall walls separating the toilets, or into a locker room with show- ers restricted to women and girls. A cartoon summed it up: on one side of the line repre- senting the bathroom stall wall is a mom and her little daugh- ter; on the other side is the fig- ure of a man pulling himself up to peek over the top of the di- vider. It could just as well show him peeking through the small gaps around the door or using a mirror below the divider. The "joke" is on all of us. It's on the traditional major- ity that finds it outrageous to even devote any time or effort to pushing back on such insan- ity. That includes the need to write about it in a local newspa- per in a conservative part of a "fruits and nuts" state like Cali- fornia where "moonbeam" Jerry Brown has or will make it the law of the land. The sick joke is also on those liberals who've gone along with every loony idea foisted on so- ciety by the cultural, Marxist academic left because…politi- cal correctness, multicultural- ism, diversity, tolerance or the latest iteration of their trans- formational "brave new world." You see, the goofy idea factory for the left has no "off" position; you have gone along with the leftist position on each new is- sue—illegal/undocumented im- migration, gun control, sentenc- ing "reform," socialized med- icine, gay marriage, and now "transgender rights" (yet an- other made-up term). There will be no redoubt or sanctuary for you when the last vestige of traditional life is stripped from you and you family, your occu- pation, your recreation or your money. That's a nice little personally abundant lifestyle you have. It'd be a shame if something were to happen to it while your rel- ative wealth (vis-à-vis the un- derprivileged masses in foreign lands), is taxed by the United Nations to improve their stan- dard of living. So sorry about those astro- nomical energy costs, America, but you just didn't recognize that you and your wealth have been acquired at the expense of environmental degrada- tion through carbon-intensive technology, making the "third world" nations suffer. You want your children brought up to have standards and preferences based on their best interests? Moreover, you've done responsible things and made the right decisions—fin- ished school, taken any job you could until you could get the job you wanted, used no drugs, had no out-of-wedlock babies and moved your family to a bet- ter part of town for their safety and education. While you have done those things and more to advance and build a better life for your- self and your loved ones, you haven't, as our cultural Marx- ist-in-chief and his ideological cohorts would say, really "built that." White privilege, capitalis- tic exploitation and inattention to "the needs of the village" ac- count for what you have and the lower classes don't. They, the cultural and political left want what you have; at the least they just don't want you to have it or to think you've earned or de- serve it. You may think it a stretch from "transgender rights" to economic redistribution and forced conformity to the ideo- logical demands of the left but, as H.L. Richardson described in "Confrontational Politics," the left uses every issue to its or- ganizational advantage. He de- scribed the sausage that loses a slice or two, never to be re- stored. The inexorable advance of progressivism allows for occa- sional retreat to accommodate the sensitivities of the major- ity, while simultaneously con- solidating power and support for the next battle. Margaret Thatcher described it as "the ratcheting" tighter of leftist (Labor) policies that never get fully undone. I recall the saying of a Ger- man clergyman that those who failed to object to the persecu- tion of each group by the Na- zis, found no one left to defend them when the ire of the state turned their direction. Chris- tians yesterday, traditionalists today, who's next? You will not be left alone and you will be made to care the way they want you to care. Don Polson has called Red Bluff home since 1988. He can be reached by e-mail at donplsn@ yahoo.com. The way I see it Accepting the unacceptable StateandNational Assemblyman James Galla- gher, 2060 Talbert Drive, Ste. 110, Chico 95928, 530 895-4217, http:// ad03.asmrc.org/ Senator Jim Nielsen, 2634 For- est Ave., Ste. 110, Chico 95928, 530 879-7424, senator.nielsen@ senate.ca.gov Governor Jerry Brown, State Capital Building, Sacramento 95814, 916 445-2841, fax 916 558- 3160, governor@governor.ca.gov U.S. Representative Doug La- Malfa, 507 Cannon House Office Building, Washington D.C. 20515, 202 225-3076 U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein, One Post St., Ste. 2450, San Fran- cisco 94104, 415 393-0707, fax 415 393-0710 U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer, 1700 Montgomery St., San Fran- cisco 94111, 510 286-8537, fax 202 224-0454 Local Tehama County Supervisors, 527-4655 District 1, Steve Chamblin, Ext. 3015 District 2, Candy Carlson, Ext. 3014 District 3, Dennis Garton, Ext. 3017 District 4, Bob Williams, Ext. 3018 District 5, Burt Bundy, Ext. 3016 Red Bluff City Manager, Rich- ard Crabtree, 527-2605, Ext. 3061 Corning City Manager, Kris- tina Miller, 824-7033. YOUR OFFICIALS Don Polson It would be great if the "balance"- saddled press could keep in mind its most crucial mission: to hold these candidates fully accountable. If that means dogging Hillary about her email server, fine. If that means questioning her about her flip flops on free trade and the minimum wage, go for it. OPINION » redbluffdailynews.com Tuesday, May 17, 2016 » MORE AT FACEBOOK.COM/RBDAILYNEWS AND TWITTER.COM/REDBLUFFNEWS A6