There’s plenty of buzz from the mainstream media about Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter’s so called defection from the Republican to the Democratic Party.

But in the VDARE.COM breakroom, the consensus is “who cares?” Specter has been officially and unofficially a Democrat all his life, dating back to his early political career as Philadelphia’s District Attorney.

More recently as a RINO, Specter has consistently voted with the Democrats on passing an amnesty and issuing more non-immigrant visas.

Whichever party he represents, Specter will face a tough re-election bid. Here in Pittsburgh, the Post-Gazette ran an unofficial poll asking readers if they thought Specter made the right or choice by switching or if he should retire. By nearly a 2-1 margin, readers wanted the fossilized Specter to retire.

Specter’s political future is just as tenuous as a Democrat as it was as a Republican

Of all the incidents of mainstream media failure in the decade or so that I have been analyzing its stories, none is greater than the Washington Post’s 2001 total breakdown while pursing Chandra Levy’s killer. Levy had been California U.S. Representative Gary Condit’s intern.

The press in general, and the Post specifically, was so intent on defaming and ultimately convicting Condit of Levy’s killing that it completely ignored that the apparent actual killer, Salvadoran illegal alien and alleged MS-13 member Ingmar Guandique, was right under its nose. [Warrant Issued for Suspect in Levy Killing, by Sari Horowitz and Scott Higham, Washington Post, March 4, 2009] l

As usual, VDARE.COM is several miles ahead of the MSM in getting to the bottom of things.

At the risk of self-aggrandizement, I refer you to my October 17, 2008 column: The Condit Case Revisited: MSM Smeared Congressman—Ignored Illegal Alien Suspect.

If you missed it the first time around, read it now. And if you caught it back in October, re-read it to note its striking parallel to the headline news unfolding today and being presented to you as “breaking news”.

Effective immediately, let’s all agree to ignore the New York Times. Simply stated, it is unrealistic to expect that we can influence the Times to write without bias–or even responsibly– about immigration.

Look for example at its two most recent Sunday and Monday editorials, The Nativists Are Restless and The Nativists Are Restless, continued analyzed by Patrick Cleburne and James Fulford.

After reading those columns plus my twenty years of experience reviewing other Times stories for some semblance of fairness and balance, I cannot come to any other conclusion except than it’s time to move on.

Consider that several Internet blogs do nothing but legitimately criticize the Times for its shoddy journalism. The leading one is TimesWatch, which also took the Times to task for its “restless nativists” columns.

One of the most popular and widely read bloggers, Mickey Kaus at Slate routinely dissects the Times for its shallowness.

At least four full-length books have been published about the agenda driven Times: The Trust: The Private and Powerful Family Behind the New York Times, Behind the Times, The Kingdom and the Power,  and The Gospel According to the New York Times.

Other books like Coloring the News have devoted chapters to biased Times reporting.

Coloring the News, and The Kingdom and the Power (written by Gay Talese) were, national and–of all things–New York Times best sellers. Coloring The News did it without ever being reviewed by the Times itself.

Net result of all the negative publicity: the Times remains unrepentant.

The greater the successes of the patriotic immigration reform movement, the more outrageous the Times’s immigration coverage.

With Times‘ reporters all facing the possibility of being laid-off, I doubt any would have the courage–given what they know about the editorial board’s leanings–to write a decent story about immigration. But if they did, certainly the editors would kill it.

If you were to ask me which I think would happen first, the Times reporting fairly about immigration or declaring bankruptcy and ceasing publication, I would bet on the latter.

While I was editing last night’s letter, it struck me that a growing and extremely frightening trend is upon us–loss of Freedom of Speech that, if left unchecked, could morph into a more aggressive campaign under the Barack Obama administration of robbing us of our Constitutional rights.

In his op-ed piece, Michael Meyers, former assistant director of the NAACP, warned against denying Suffolk County executive Steve Levy his right to hold and express an immigration view different from his own and ethnic identity groups like the New York-based Hispanic Across America. [Don’t Rush to Judgment, By Michael Meyers, Newsday, November 14, 2008] 

But the case is growing more out of control. According to Newsday, Hispanics Across America may sue the parents of the accused killers of citing lack of

“moral responsibility.”

“Parents that teach their children hate are just as responsible as the kids who commit the crimes,”

said Fernando Mateo, president of Hispanics Across America. [Latino Group May Sue Parents of Hate Crime Suspects, by Sophia Chang, Newsday, November 11, 2008]

Even a shred of success in such a lawsuit would further squash free speech–you’ll have to rear your children according to the Hispanic Across America guidelines.

Forget that the “suspects” haven’t been convicted of anything. In fact, they haven’t even gone to trail.

And it is, at this moment at least, totally unknown to anyone involved in the case what parental role anyone may have played in bring up the children.

What’s alarming is this incident comes on top of the item in James Fulford’s blog of two days ago pointing out that a  University of Texas football player was suspended for what were deemed inappropriate comments.

George Putnam died this morning. He lived a long and full life. His radio show was host to many VDARE.COM contributors including Peter Brimelow, Allan Wall, Rob Sanchez and Joe Guzzardi. George was gracious to all of us and dedicated to our cause. Our thoughts and prayers are with him and his family.

The San Joaquin County Fair ended Sunday. And, I did pretty well but would have scored higher if I weren’t so stubborn.

As I know all too well, judges prefer “smaller” cookies and baked goods with “less” frosting.

I’ve had points taken off for these two infractions, if you can call them that, in past years. But since I bake for my friends and not a group of anonymous judges, I press on. My cookies are the size of your palm and the frosting is as thick as the Lodi telephone book.

My motto: if that’s too big, then eat half and put the other half in your pocket for a snack later. And if there’s too much frosting, then scrape some off and give it to your dog.

What’s most important, however, isn’t my on going dispute with the judges but my triumphs in a new category the fair introduced this year: ethnic baking.

Around the central California valley, “ethnic” translates to Hispanic or Asian.

But I threw the panel a curve by entering Irish Brownies and Italian Lemon Almond Biscotti.

The brownies–with their healthy spike of Guinness Stout–won first prize. And the biscotti took second place. For anyone who likes to bake but has never tried biscotti, I recommend it. They’re easy to make and your homemade versions will bear no resemblance to those nasty store bought ones that you break teeth on.

Mail me for the brownie and biscotti recipes, if you want to give them a try.

I just went to Hillary Clinton’s website where I entered the following message: “Please run as an Independent!”

One purpose and one purpose only motivated me. If Clinton runs as an Independent, the already high entertainment value of the November election becomes even greater. Barack Obama, Democrat vs. John McCain, “Republican” vs. Bob Barr, Libertarian , vs. Chuck Baldwin, Constitution Party vs. Clinton, Independent.

With five candidates–three of them viable, all of them sniping at each other–any outcome is possible.

And since I am of the mind that Obama, Clinton and McCain are equally bad, I–as a columnist always on the hunt for fodder–opt for having the most fun possible between now and November.

One thing that does strike me as odd is the talking heads and their insistence that Clinton must do the “right thing” for the Democratic Party.

Why should Clinton, may I ask, care about her party? It just rejected her in favor of a novice.

Clinton’s hour is now. She’s 60 and her future within the Democratic Party is non-existent. Unless she makes it to the White House in November, she’ll replace John Kerry as history’s meaningless footnote.

Last weekend while I was researching my column, I spoke with Glenn Spencer whose website American Patrol is one of the key sources (along with VDARE.COM, of course) of information about the illegal alien invasion.

Some time had passed since I had talked with Glenn. And as we were chatting I realized–again–how much he has done for patriotic immigration reform and how indebted we all are to him for his efforts. “Heroic” is how our Juan Mann describes Glenn.

Glenn’s been detailing the immigration crisis and getting the message out to American longer and better than almost anyone.

Recently, Glenn has taken to the air to monitor the progress (or lack thereof) of the border fence project and he posts his photo of the day that captures other border outrages, mainly in the form of unchecked crossings by aliens.and archives previous photos.

Anyone looking for accurate, current border information should not ask the federal government–that’s akin to leading with your chin–but instead seek out Spencer.

American Patrol’s photo of the day is an essential part of your immigration reading.

Here’s some encouraging news from Major League Baseball.

One of the Detroit Tigers’ relief pitchers is stuck in the Dominican Republican on “immigration problems,” said Dave Dombrosky , the team’s president and general manager, last night during an ESPN broadcast of the Tigers humiliating 13-2 loss to the Chicago White Sox.

Last month, the Detroit News confirmed that Francisco Cruceta, one of the Tiger players acquired during the off-season, “ran into not only a visa holdup in trying to leave the Dominican Republic, he ran into visa captivity for reasons the State Department has not divulged. He never made it to spring training.” [The Foils To the Tigers’ Toils, Detroit News, March 29, 20008]

Why the Tigers would be in a hurry to get Crucetta, with his 10.05 MLB career ERA , is a mystery. But one hopes that this may mark the beginning of closer State Department scrutiny of visa applications from foreign-born players.

Evidence indicates that, like many other visa holders, baseball players don’t always return home when their time is up.

In my 2005 column about baseball and visa over-stayers, I quoted former Cincinnati Reds manager Ron Plaza:

“Out of 10 (Dominican players) who are released, I’d say nine stay here illegally. They would rather live in the worst areas of New York than go back home. You can’t handcuff them to the plane, so there is very little we can do.”

To the huge disappointment of Japanese fans and the Beantowners who paid $5,000 for a VIP package to fly to Tokyo, the Oakland Athletics bounced back this morning to beat the Boston Red Sox 5-1 in the second game of the two-game Globalism Opening Day Series.

This is sweet revenge for the A’s whose brass is irked that its second home game of the season, April 2nd against the same Red Sox, was moved from a night game to a day game at the request of the insufferable Sox players.The Red Sox claim it needs the extra travel time to readjust to eastern daylight time. But this is more nonsense from the pampered players since after returning home, the team has a full day off before playing a night game–essentially forty-eight hours–to rest up.

The switch from a night start to day eliminated a television date from the cash-poor A’s and angered the many local fans that bought tickets. But who in the “Red Sox Nation” would care about that?

Carping about travel is one more reason to laugh at the players. To hear them tell it, the experience is like taking a Southwest Airlines flight from Los Angeles to Miami with a plane change in Houston instead of the charter airline comfort it really is. Someone packs their bags, the airport bus is waiting for them at their luxury hotel, the food is first class, etc.

Although Daisuke Matsuzaka was the focus of all the fan and media attention, what his start yesterday proved is that he can’t get much past the fifth inning even with a considerable hometown advantage.

In fact, Dice-K was out-pitched by both A’s starters, the comparatively obscure Joe Blanton and Rich Harden.

The truth about Dice-K is hard for many Sox fans—both here and in Japan— to come to grips with.

Here it is from ESPN announcer and Hall of Fame great Joe Morgan.

Last year, while I was listening to the World Series, Morgan in a moment of unusual candor said this about Matsuzaka:

“He’s not as good as the Red Sox thought he was.”

Matsuzaka isn’t responsible for the media frenzy that continues unabated despite his mediocre pitching. But it would be refreshing if sports reporters could tone down their enthusiasm to face the facts about Matsuzaka–he’s just another run-of-the-mill pitcher.