RichMatthews's Blog

It looks like Packer fans are not the only ones disappointed with Ted Thompson and his draft/ free agent negotiations. Favre has reportedly requested a trade as part of his disgust with  the GM. Who can blame him?

Even under the best of circumstances, Thompson's picks are "projects".  His first round pick was rated as a 3rd or 4th rounder, due to his injury history. Instead. he will be paid as a #16 pick, affecting the salary cap for at least 3 years. The running back has had surgery on both shoulders, and has not even been hit by a pro player. The Wunderlik(?) scores are marginal at best,  meaning difficulty in understanding and adapting to the Packer system is probable. So what is the upside to the draft?

As for free agents, picking up a third-string D-Back is not the answer, nor is extending the contracts of defensive players who have led the Pack to seasons of 4-12 and 8-8. They have made no improvements on offense, leading their 3-time MVP quarterback to publicly criticize their lack of effort to get him a quality receiver to throw to. Without  a proven running game, what is the offense going to do? Or is the kicker they drafted going to win games with 70-yard FGs?

I know, the rah-rah sports writers and reporters are all saying how Thompson knows what he's doing - look at the Seahawks - but where is the running back and receivers he drafted there? None of the players he has taken since he's been here are of their caliber, and his free-agent moves are, for the most part, questionable.

Having said all that, it appears that one Thompson's goals. getting rid of Favre so the Packers are "his" team, is close to fruition. If he holds his present course, Thompson will take us back to the '70s and '80s. The problem is, I probably won't live the 20 years necessary to recover like the last time.

I have been listening and reading the blogs re: Michael McGee, Sr. and I am not surprised at the reactions. However, I am here to say that he has the same freedom of speech that Imus and the others have! As  I previously quoted, true freedom is " freedom for the thought you hate". I have never listened to McGee and have no intention of ever doing so, as his past has shown that he has nothing whatsoever to contribute to society and any rational discussion or actions about the improvement thereof. By not listening, I exercised my freedom, the same freedom available to all of those who are so offended by free speech. The true tragedy is the extensive media coverage of his hateful comments (just as in the Imus incident), amd Fox 6, by conducting the "interview" and allowing him an even larger audience to his ranings, is the worst of the bunch so far! No useful "news" was presented, no background or reason except for a general rant about media coverage of his idiot son's actions, and no apology was presented. So what was the purpose of presenting the interview except to further inflame the public? Even if you grant that McGee is a "public figure", since there was no new information contained in the interview, what was the news value that warranted its airing?

   Whether or not McGee continues on the air is of no consequence to me, just as Imus's future in broadcasting is of no conseqeuence. However, what is of concern is the media's failure to secure comments from the leaders of the black community. Fox 6's failure is especially egregious in light of their airing of their "interview". I have not seen any condemnation of McGee by the African-American community leaders (except fo Jerrol Jones, who was backed into a corner and suspended Mcgee's talk show until he "meets" with him to "discuss the issue"). Where is an interview with Eugene Kane, Gregory Stanford, and the other McGee defenders ? I do not think there will be any united calls for Mcgee's head on a platter, largely due to Syke's unpopularity among blacks ( as if this would any way be relevant). This acceptance of a total lack of decency directed at a white target is why there is no dialogue on race relations in the Milwaukee area and can never be. Therefore, I'll be moving on to other subjects.

One final note: Even though I personally hate everything McGee has said and done over the last 30+ years, I would like to remind everyone that, as a Vietnam veteran, he has actually earned the right to express himself. How many of his critics, including Charlie Sykes and Jeff Wagner, have even served in the military, let alone in a combat zone?

 

 

 

 

 

  Well, it's happened again. A white celebrity has said something stupid and racist on the air and all the usual suspects are demanding his scalp. As I stated in my comment on Ted Perry's blog, he was exercising his freedom of speech; to get him off the air permanently, keep tuning him out. But let's look at the bigger issue.

  First of all, let's look at the two major black critics to step forward. Al Sharpton gained national attention when he "represented" a  black teenage girl who accused several white policemen of abducting and degrading her. Her charges were proven to be lies she fabricated to alibi her absence because she was with her boyfriend of whom her family didn't approve. Sharpton was subsequently sued for defamation and was ordered to pay large damages. He has done nothing since to gain any credibility, yet is treated as a leader of the African-American community.

   After years of expressing moral outrage at the white community, Jesse Jackson was exposed as an adulterer and found to have used donations to pay hush money. He, too. is still hailed as a leader of the African-American community.

   What gives these two the right to sit in moral judgement on Imus? And, carrying the argument further, why should anyone pay attention to them and their supporters? It is because the balck community rallies behind these "leaders" that little progress is made in race relations. While the African-American community can choose who the want as representatives, the white community has the right to refuse to deal with any they don't respect. These two don't deserve any.

    We have the same problem on a local level with Alderman Mike McGee. Remember the Labor Day sexual assault of an 11-year-old girl by several men and boys? When the incident was first reported, McGee held a news conference at the site and denied it ever happened, saying that the neighbors would have noticed any suspicious activity such as the multiple comings and goings of the males involved, When it was established beyond any doubt that the incident DID occur, Mcgee then backtracked and said the reason the neighbors didn't report seeing any activity was that the back door was used. Finally, when court testimony and other statements given to police showed this was false, McGee then  went on record calling for prosecution of the people involved in this crime. Coupled with his bizarre personal legal problems, is it any wonder that he doesn't command any respect among the white community and therefore has no credibility? Why should the white community listen to him or deal with him?

    There will be no progress in race relations until the African-American community selects representatives worthy of respect. This not a case of the white community dictating to the black community who their leaders should be; this is reality.

 

As expected, my previous post received many responses, all defending Frank Jude and none addressing his actions, especially the fact that the incident occurred because he was cheating on his wife. This reflects the polarization between the races.

The next point I would like to raise is the media-types such as Eugene Kane and Gregory Stanford who have a vested interest in crying "Racism" and ignoring the very real lack of personal responsibility that is at the root of most of problems  which are attributed to racism. These two in particular would have the world believe that Milwaukee is so steeped in racism that all people of color are automatically kept from gainful employment, financial security, and any form of success based on the fact that they are not Caucasian. It is only the fact that they are so superior to the rest of their counterparts that they have achieved their success, not because the white power structure allowed them the opportunities.

Remember the firestorm that greeted Bill Cosby when he blamed the African-American community for the teenagers being impregnated by adults, the lack of family structure and support, the rampant crime, and lack of respect for law and each other which plagues the community? Eugene Kane in particular vilified Mr. Cosby as being totally out of touch. He later backtracked and even supported Cosby's subsequent efforts in Milwaukee. He did not mention that Bill Cosby achieved his success through his own hard work in a truly racist environment; that would be admitting that perhaps the problems faced by the African-American community could be solved in a large part by looking inward.

Mr. Kane and Mr. Stanford have achieved success by shouting "Racism". They do not admit that dysfunctional families in the community are the result of the lack of personal responsibility. The fact that the vast majority of teenage pregnancies in the community are the result of grown men in their 20's and older having sex with young girls is, according to them, "irrelevant". The fact that these children are then condemned to poverty because the mothers do not finish their education or develop job skills is due to "racism". The fact that the fathers refuse to support these children is also due to "racism".  The fact the the number of families headed by single females in the black community is more than double that of the white community is due to "racism". The fact that the children in these families fail to complete high school or develop job skills is due to "racism". According to Mr. Kane and Mr. Stanford, the fact that these facts are cited by non-blacks is also "racist" and therefore not worth being addressed.

As long as there are prominent black "journalists" who can maintain an upper-middle class lifestyle, not available to those they claim to stand up for, by shouting "racism" and not offering any viable solutions that include personal responsibility, I don't see how any meaningful dialogue is going to develop.

 

Fox 6 has been running a series on the lack of dialogue on race relations in the Milwaukee area. One of the biggest roadblocks to any kind of dialogue has been and continues to be the apparent unwillingness of the African-American community to accept any criticism of their community by anyone who is not African-American. Any time any negative comment is made about events occuring ing the black community by a non-black, the person who makes the comment is immediately labelled racist and the comment, however true or relevant, is relegated to the trash heap. One example is the Frank Jude case. To hear the African-American community talk about it, this was a planned attack against a totally innocent, upstanding representative of the black community led by racist cops and covered up by their co-workers. The fact that no convictions were handed down against the individuals charged in the incident has been laid at the door of the DA's office and racism. But what really happened?

Jude and Harris, convicted felons, crashed a party of off-duty police officers while Jude was in the process of cheating on his wife (a fact not mentioned in said wife's claim against the City of Milwaukee). After they left, the person throwing the party claims a badge was missing/stolen. A group from the party went outside and found Jude and Harris still hanging around (why?) and confronted them. Since alcohol was involved, the confrontation got out of control and Jude was beaten, resulting in visually-arresting damage to his face and thus guaranteeing extensive, overblown news coverage, particularly by the TV news crews. There were criminal charges presented, trials held, and acquittals given by jurors who were given all the facts availabe, not just those the media decided the public should know to foster the notion that the police are just racist bastards picking on innocent felons.

There has been no blame put on Jude whatsoever; in fact, he has been elevated to near-sainthood by Eugene Kane and others in the media. Not one of them has questioned why a convicted felon would choose to go to a party of off-duty police officers to which he was not invited. Not one of them has questioned why he was cheating on his wife, yet claims all he could think of while being beaten was what would happen to his family. And not one of them has questioned the propriety of Jude's wife seeking $5 million for injuries he suffered while cheating on her. Even Jude's attacking his own mother (is there a more despicable crime?) has been declared by the black community as not his fault, but instead the fault of those who attacked him ( apparently his felony conviction does not indicate any character fault).

As long as the African-American community continues to make heroes of people like Jude (remember that other paragon of virtue Rodney King? The officers were acquitted in that case, so they kept trying them in different jurisdictions until convictions were achieved)and rejects criticism from outside the community, no dialogue can occur, because there is no common ground.

It seems that Gov/ Doyle is backing off his plan to infringe on the rights of individuals to use a legal product in public, bu only in taverns. His stated reason is he "lives in the real world." Apparently, his stated reasons for the proposed ban ( saving people from the dangers of second-hand smoke because they can't make the decision themselves to only patronize smoke-free establishments, saving smokers from themselves by limiting their opportunities to exercise their personal choice to smoke, etc.) don't apply in taverns due to the very real possibility that the tavern's business may fall off. This, of course, is anathema to the Wisconsin Tavern League, which is only second to WEAC in political contributions. Of course, there is absolutely no connection between the League's opposition to the ban and Gov. Doyle's proposed exemption to the ban. If you don't believe me, just ask the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny. They also agree that there is no connection. By the way, I don't smoke, but I do believe in freedom to use legal products in public.

Hello. This is my first blog entry. I expect to be putting my thoughts on various subjects as time allows. Talk to you later.