Joni Balter is the Seattle Times' annoying and fact-challenged editorial writer, whom I've busted on several occasions (most recently here) for publishing wrong information that she refuses to retract.
Balter is also a shrill Democrat hatchet woman, and the author of the hilariously partisan column in today's Times opinion section: "Who is Maria Cantwell?". Of course, the Seattle Times is free to publish whatever dishonest and partisan rubbish they care to publish. On the other hand, none of us are obligated to keep subsidizing it.
If you're no longer inspired to help pay for Joni Balter's salary, you can contact the Times circulation department to cancel your subscription. You'd be part of a trend!
Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at April 24, 2005 10:32 AM | Email ThisPart of the problem for these bozos is that they now are being checked and publically challenged by people more intelligent, informed, and better spoken than themselves. In vastly better words than mine, PowerLine excerpts a description of the situation (http://tinyurl.com/de53t).
So if journalists for significant media outlets still don't understand the nature of the tectonic shift, how can anyone expect a pair of podunk, third rate hacks like Balter or Connelly to get it?
Posted by: iconoclast on April 24, 2005 11:05 AMCoincidentally my donations to the election fight have increased.
Posted by: Andy on April 24, 2005 11:38 AMWhat a joke! If a balanced newspaper were started in Seattle, it would catch on like wildfire, because the two we have are essentially published by the Democratic party.
Reminds me of Mexico, where throughout the 70 year PRI rule, all newspapers were beholden to the PRI. Of course, Mexico has "freedom of the press," but not freedom of paper supplies. The PRI controlled government controlled the supply of paper and any paper that published something the PRI did not like would find that a paper shortage ensued.
What is the Seattle Time's excuse?
Posted by: DeadManVoting (aka Iguana) on April 24, 2005 12:35 PMIt's also too bad we cannot file a complaint with the WA-PDC on stuff like this, about failure to file a report on a substantial in-kind campaign contribution. Remember only a small percentage of the electorate takes any appreciable time to become truly informed on candidates and issues:
A lot of voters probably just blindly follow the editorial endorsements of the Seattle Timid and the Passed-on-Intelligence-r....
I know, I know: Freedom of the Press. I am not in any way suggesting they should not be able to write it. I just find myself wishing there was some kind of 'equal time' recourse.... I guess SP is a start....
Methow Ken
Pretty clever, Shark, you won't rest until the only source of news is your own unbiased non-partisan blog!
Posted by: docbenton on April 24, 2005 12:49 PMHer career appears to be one of struggle between nurturance of her inner hippi and trying to be taken seriously. Funny how they want to explain themselves before they have a clue who they are.
Posted by: scott158 on April 24, 2005 01:02 PMReading soundpolitics the last few months has done nothing to persuade me to go back to the paper. It remains a biased source, uninterested in accurate reporting.
Posted by: ranboy on April 24, 2005 02:08 PMDidn't you get the message? Isn't your decoder ring working?
CEN-COM-PAC-FLT OUT
Posted by: alphabet soup on April 24, 2005 02:48 PMWhy should I when I can get everything they would print and more on the net.
Posted by: jaybo on April 24, 2005 03:05 PMNah, let them keep publishing this garbage. Their fate is sealed and they know it. Why do you think the Seattle Slimes and Pablum Informer editorial boards refuse to actually debate their issues? Matrix-phobia. Yup, I can't wait till at least one of them dies. The other is sure to "slowly wither on the vine" over time as well.
It's funny, in 99-00 years, my company spent at least $450k in advertising with them. Now we are down to about $25-35k a year. And we are not alone.
How I love it!
Posted by: dan on April 24, 2005 03:09 PMI think the idea of letting the advertizers know is a great idea.
Posted by: Victor on April 24, 2005 03:12 PMI just wish they would stop running Doonesbury. Where's the fair and balanced cartoon to balance it?
Posted by: Janet S on April 24, 2005 03:55 PMI had never heard that. (It must have gotten lost in favor of the even more deserved Maria Can't~Do~Well - bestowed upon her in "honor" of her ability to be on the job full time and still not get anything accomplished ;'}
Posted by: alphabet soup on April 24, 2005 04:40 PM"Will the real Joni Balter please stand up"
Chairs shuffling....more shuffling...sound of desk flipping over...blur of figures racing across the stage...fiery eyes searing..... audience gasps.......Producer screaming "cut to commercial".....
Blackness.
Posted by: Ken Muller on April 24, 2005 06:07 PMShe paid off her campaign fund loans. . with our money.
Posted by: Amused by liberal tramps on April 24, 2005 06:21 PMThe decline of print news- and MSM news in general- is almost entirely due to their constant, unremitting and flagrant liberal bias. For proof, look no further than the Wall St Journal and Fox News. Both have gained tremendous market share at the expense of their more biased competitors. The WSJ really stands out, since it is now essentially at parity with the nations largest newspaper, USA Today. Not bad for a paper that didn't even have color pictures until a couple years ago, and most people still think of as something only commodities brokers would read. And Fox, in no time at all has taken more market share than CNN. I'm sure this is news to you all since the MSM studiously avoids reporting it, but there you have it.
And say, one of these rags- Times or PI, I forget- I just read on NRO that one of them now carries a column by NRO Editor Kathryn J Lopez. Not that that alone would make me buy either one of them, but got to give credit where credit's due.
Posted by: chuck Miller on April 24, 2005 07:55 PMAlthough I will never eat at the Falls Terrace in Oly specifically because they spend on the Zero.
Posted by: Andy on April 24, 2005 09:26 PMdan: "can't wait til one of them goes under" -- one already has - If I remember correctly - the Times bought the P.I. about 20 years ago -- the managed news spin of course was that they "merged" - duh -- then Times went from being an afternoon paper to being a morning paper to "compete" - at least the Sunday edition is actually combined --
Janet: - Right you are there -- Doonesbury is so passe that only a real kool-ade swigger would swallow its' crap - hell - it wasn't ever any good with it's cast of hippy dips
Alphabet Soup: It was: "Can't-Vote-Well" now they are trying to spin that one - duh
Amused by liberal tramps: Remember -- she "financed most of her own campaign" -- when it came to light -- "she loaned it to the campaign" the spin was - "she wouldn't be be-holden to big money interests" -- WHAT A LOAD OF CRAP -- WITH WHAT HAS BEEN EMERGING IN THE PROBING INTO OF THE KC ELECTION MACHINE IT IS LOOKING VERY LIKELY THAT HER "NARROW WIN" OVER GORTON WAS A TYPICAL DEMOCRAP RIGGED ELECTION -- LOOKS LIKE SHE OWES THE WAWA DEMOCRAP/UNION MACHINE BIGTIME -- getting back to paying off the campaign cost - paid it to herself from "WHOSE?" funds -- at what interest rate???
Posted by: Bill on April 24, 2005 09:28 PMJust a few years ago the Seattle Times was a fairly balanced newspaper...but then it changed..
The Times went to the left and the PI just went insanely liberal....
They are both pretty embarrassing to read these days....
Right. Got it.
Second, if you find anything which I present as factual but is not true, please let me know and I promise to correct it. Try to get Joni Balter to live up to the same.
Posted by: Stefan Sharkansky on April 24, 2005 11:31 PMIn answer to the question you posed at the top of this item, "Who cares."
Posted by: MIMike on April 24, 2005 11:42 PMBoth the Times and the PI are good for when I want to spray paint something and need to protect my garage floor.
Thanks, I agree whole-heartedly, but I'm glad you said that.
Nelson, where's the beef? Ronches reefer?
Thanks for the fun.
Posted by: Amused by liberals on April 25, 2005 12:44 AMThe question is, when will the Times and PI come around? Oh, wait--it's in their best interests not to hear feedback. Guess that's why they are heading towards the big "B".
Posted by: Patrick E. Bell on April 25, 2005 12:46 AMBtw, on the rare occasions when I see one of Ms. Balter's columns, I marvel at her outrageously self-righteous ignorance. The woman absolutely flaunts her stupidity, and even seems to be proud of it.
Posted by: Maryallene on April 25, 2005 07:14 AMAccept the subscription, cancel when it's over. Within 2 weeks you'll get a call to see if you want to re-up. Say no, you don't see the value in it, and they'll offer another 3 month free subscription.
You get what you pay for, and in the case of these two, that's about right...
Posted by: Edmonds Dan on April 25, 2005 09:04 AMOr perhaps it (they) will simply be replaced by the interactive blogosphere. There’s nothing wrong with accepting their largess; their problem is rooted in thinking the task is merely repackaging a product, when in fact the product is packaging for garbage.
In contrast, what has this thread demonstrated? That balter is hoisted up for examination on her words, not her demographic profile. There are numerous examples of her factual errors, blatant partisanship, and, well the usual lengthy litany of liberal and looney bias.
Still, those who defend such people as balter are so close in nature to her that they cannot see the proverbial forest…hmmm…proverbial old growth being replaced by no growth and the clear-cut of logic and facts. For them, the lib/left agenda is paramount, and they substitute the group-speak, priorities, and ethos of pc orthodoxy for traditional mores enjoyed by those not similarly encumbered.
Spare us, Ms. Balter, your pixilated and dysfunctional enlightenment. Your arguments are not compelling or even to be taken seriously outside of Ward 6 out at the home. It’s not that you are a woman, or because you are a lefty, or because you failed to couch your argument in comprehensible terms. It’s because one cannot base a well-reasoned conclusion upon a series of terminally flawed premises.
A wise person plays cards, not uses them for construction.
Posted by: scott158 on April 25, 2005 10:41 AMThe guy from the NY Times (what was his name, Jayson Blair or something) gets the axe for making stuff up.
Folks at the WA Post got in trouble for similar crap. Mitch Albom basically fabricated a column recently and was suspended or some such.
Joni Balter uses incorrect information, does no fact checking and basically writes (another) untruth. What does she get? She gets assigned to do the honors on an outrageous puff piece on Patty Murray's gofer.
She's too lazy to fact check, too stupid to check out info sources. Hell, she probably didn't even do the reporting on this...the writer gets the byline, of course.
Just wait til another poor telemarketer calls my house...I hope they take good notes!
Posted by: SnoCo Voter on April 25, 2005 10:52 AMAdd George Howland, Jr. to the list of annoying local journalists...
Posted by: Mickymse on April 25, 2005 01:31 PMIn regard to the LTEs the Times and PI publish, I'm not as sure as you are that what they publish isn't a proportional representation of the letters that they actually receive. My reasons follow:
1) People on the left are more likely to have free time.
2) People on the left are less likely to care about literacy and logic, or to know them when they see them. Therefore it takes a leftie far less time to crank out a letter.
3) This is only anecdotal, but, up until a year or so ago, when I just couldn't find the time any more, I sent in at least one letter a month. About half of them were printed.
Maryallene
Posted by: Maryallene on April 25, 2005 09:55 PM