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Dan Proft: The Two Jerrys

Posted by Juliana Johnson on Tuesday, April 29, 2008 12:30:40 PM
The two Jerrys are in the news again.

One is a pompous ringmaster who appeals to the lowest common denominator, exploiting ignorance, and preying on people's irrational fears.

The other one is Jerry Springer.

Together, Jerrys Wright and Springer represent the most startling examples of a disturbing socio-political phenomenon where we are instructed to treat remorseless carnival barkers as serious contributors to civilized society.

Barack Obama's ole, kooky uncle Jeremiah, a living, breathing Horn of Plenty for John McCain, spent yesterday giving David Axelrod heart palpitations by roosting his chickens before the National Press Club.

Reverend Ocho Cinco tended to his theatrical excesses high-fiving one audience member, pointing and winking to another like he just scored a touchdown while he boasted about his military service as evidence that he was more patriotic than Dick Cheney.

By Wright's, ahem, logic, Lee Harvey Oswald, Timothy McVeigh, and John Allen Muhammed, all of whom served in the U.S. military, are also more patriotic than the vice president. The point is that military service, including Wright's, is deserving of respect and thanks but it does not provide lifelong absolution for everything a person does or says.

Meanwhile, Jerry Springer was busily figuring out how to fit a pithy anecdote about a Nazi werewolf boy who married his pet parakeet into the commencement speech he was invited to deliver at Northwestern University Law School in two weeks.

One can only hope U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, a NU Law alumnus, is on hand for this dignified affair to join in the chanting: "Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!".

In response to the howls of protest over selecting Springer, Northwestern Law School Dean David Van Zandt offered the non-responsive response that Springer held public office and was successful in the entertainment industry implying that he was therefore a legitimate choice.

Dean Van Zandt glossed over the fact that while in public office Springer distinguished himself by getting caught paying for a prostitute with a check and that Springer's "success" in entertainment was predicated on himself being a prostitute, servicing the general public with every possible incarnation of inbreeding.

So here's my "Final Thought": What a society exalts, it begets.

I am not concerned that the two Jerrys are held in high esteem by common sense Americans--that is certainly not the case.

Rather, I get concerned when I consider exactly what we as a nation are begetting when a venerated law school and the likely Presidential nominee of the Democrat Party take their respective Jerrys seriously.
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VIDEO UPDATE: Proft: Engendering a Republican Renissance in Illinois

Posted by Juliana Johnson on Monday, April 28, 2008 1:41:12 PM
I have had the good fortune to speak at many county GOP Lincoln Day dinners and before a number of Republican organizations around the state over the past several months. The speech I have linked to here was last week before a great group of concerned Republicans in Yorkville (Kendall County) as represented by the Kendall County Women's Republican Club.

Click below to watch the video...
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5918482949442718112&pr=goog-sl

My talk breaks down into four component parts and is, in part, my contribution to the important discussions and debates Republicans across the state are having as to how to make our party relevant and competitive again in Illinois. The four parts: (1) Where are we? What is the landscape?; (2) How did we get here?; (3) Where do we want to go? What kind of party do we want to be?; and (4) How do we get to where we want to go?

I want to again thank the Kendall County Republican Women for their indulgence as well as offer my thanks to the many other GOP county chairmen, township GOP organizations, and rank-and-file Republicans throughout Illinois who have welcomed my thoughts and observations (and who, of course, have expressed their undying devotion to WLS-AM 890 and the "Don Wade & Roma Show").

I would welcome your feedback and your ideas as to the policies and practices the Illinois GOP must embody in order to be successful again.

--DP
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Getting in Touch with Clinton, Obama

Posted by Juliana Johnson on Tuesday, April 15, 2008 1:33:39 PM
Hillary Clinton downs a boilermaker at a local watering hole in Crown Point, Indiana, and we are supposed to understand that symbolic act to mean she is a regular Johnny Punchclock?

We know instead that Hillary would bite the head off of a live kitten and drink the blood from its still twitching carcass if that should earn her one additional vote.

Barack Obama offers condescending statements about small town Americans who "cling" to "guns or religion or antipathy to people that aren't like them" at a San Fran funder with his effete, liberal friends, but he just chose his words poorly.

In response to the firestorm, we get glibness from Obama to make it all better, "Now I am the first to admit that some of the words I chose I chose badly, because as my wife reminds me, I'm not perfect," so said Obama.

Actually, Obama was not the first to admit it and he only reluctantly conceded the point after being pressed on the issue. Further, Obama's imperfection is not being hotly contested. It is rather his perfectly clear mischaracterization of those who have not embraced his candidacy.

But is not the pandering or the indignation that most clearly exposes both Clinton and Obama as tasked, in their minds, with having to save all of us mouth-breathing troglodytes across the American countryside from ourselves.

It is that both believe that they are entitled to make choices for which others should not be similarly endowed.

Both Clinton and Obama can send their children to expensive, private schools but believe that low-incomes families in failing school districts should not have such a choice.

Both Clinton and Obama can make millions of dollars through politics but target producers in the private sector with class envy politics and redistributive policies.

So is it Clinton or Obama who is the elitist? Yes.
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VIDEO UPDATE: Race, Religion & The Presidential Campaign: Fox News Panel

Posted by Juliana Johnson on Wednesday, April 09, 2008 3:25:37 PM
On Sunday, Fox Chicago Sunday with host Dane Placko featured a full hour devoted to the discussion of Rev. Jeremiah Wright's impact on Sen. Barack Obama's Presidential campaign and the larger issues of race and religion in the political arena. The first two segments featured an exchange of views between: WVON (V-103) radio talk show host Santita Jackson; Eric Easter, Director of Digital Strategy for EbonyJet.com; and yours truly.

Following our panel was a revealing conversation in terms of how those who present the news view the newsworthiness of the Wright/Obama connection wherein several reporters and anchors for Fox-32 offered their views.

A lot of thought-provoking material from persons with widely diverging views. Thought you might be interested to give it a look in case you missed it.

--DP

+++

Click below to watch the video:

http://www.myfoxchicago.com/myfox/pages/News/Politics/Detail?contentId=6225138&version=1&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=VSTY&pageId=3.14.1

Note: There are five separate segments that follow the one linked above. To view the remaining five segments of the program, please click the images in the "Side Bar" area next to the video player on the website.

###


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How Charlton Heston Saved Academic Freedom at Northwestern University

Posted by Juliana Johnson on Monday, April 07, 2008 1:38:37 PM
His autobiography was entitled, "In the Arena" and that is most certainly where Charlton Heston lived his life.

When fundamental principles of individual rights and human liberty were at stake, Heston wheeled his chariot into the arena to do intellectual battle. He was the rare iconic figure who did not let his status inhibit him from consistently acting in furtherance of what he knew to be just.

News accounts about his passing have detailed his record on civil rights and gun rights but it is on free speech rights that I am able to give eyewitness testimony.

There is an independent, student newspaper on the campus of Northwestern University today because of Charlton Heston.

Ten years ago, at the behest of the student government and with the tacit acceptance of the university's administration, the Northwestern Chronicle was to be silenced.

The student government did not like some of the right-of-center views expressed in the Chronicle so as leftist hypocrites who preach tolerance and practice intolerance are want to do, they moved to "derecognize" the newspaper, which effectively would have prohibited its publication.

Northwestern University President Henry Bienen (who is still the university's president) said at the time that expunging the Chronicle was not a matter of free speech.

The Northwestern alumni who founded the Chronicle in 1992--including me--strongly disagreed.

Heston had also attended Northwestern (where he met his wife) prior to being called up to serve by the U.S. Army Air Forces during World War II. We believed he would be concerned about what was happening at his alma mater-and he was.

We brought this matter to Heston's attention and he intervened on the paper's behalf.

Heston corresponded with President Bienen and availed himself to both local and national media outlets that picked up the story.

Upon further reflection, the university's administration rekindled their stated love affair with academic pluralism on campus and a permanent stay of execution for the Chronicle was so ordered.

There were many prominent persons of varying political stripes that entered the fray to defend the Chronicle. Liberals like Chicago Tribune columnist Eric Zorn and Medill Journalism Professor David Protess as well as conservative commentators like Tom Roeser and John Leo all came to our aid. But Heston's involvement was clearly the key.

This may not seem like a big deal to some. Heston used his influence to save one campus newspaper at one small, private university. So what? How much difference did that make in the grand scheme of things as political correctness still rages on in colleges across America?

To assess Heston's actions in terms of scope is to miss the fundamental point.

Heston saw an opportunity to assist those who were acting in accordance with a shared belief that institutions of higher learning should be free marketplaces of ideas. Because it mattered to us, it mattered to him.

Heston made all the difference for us as well as for the annual addition of new students that publish the paper to this day.

Fortunately, in one of the true highlights of my life, I was able to publicly thank Charlton Heston for the difference he had made when he came to speak at Northwestern and I was privileged to introduce him.

The morale of this story and, for that matter, of Heston's life is not to be found simply in the magnitude of his accomplishments but in his enduring personal example of principled activism.
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