Thanks to former city councilwoman Helen Gym Flaherty’s failed campaign for the 2023 Democratic nomination for Mayor of the City of Brotherly Love, this site has reported several times on the Edward T Steel Elementary and Middle Schools, noting something that The Philadelphia Inquirer never bothered to tell readers as Mrs Flaherty, who campaigned on her educational record, used that school as a backdrop for her campaign, proudly telling the voters that she helped keep the school from “going charter.” What didn’t the newspaper tell its readership? That the school had an absolutely abysmal academic performance. That school is ranked 1193th out of 1591 in Pennsylvania Elementary Schools and ranked 656th out of 875 in Pennsylvania Middle Schools. Schools are ranked on their performance on state-required tests, graduation, and how well they prepare their students for high school. In the current rankings, 8% of students tested grade-level proficient in reading, and 2% of students who scored at or above the proficient level for math. Continue reading
Category Archives: Journolism
The death of the Lexington Herald-Leader
OK, OK, it hasn’t actually died yet, but it’s clearly terminal. But when the newspaper sends an opinion columnist rather than an actual reporter to cover a news story, what other conclusion is possible? Continue reading
The left want to control language; don’t let them!
We have previously noted how the left attempt to use control of language to control the argument. The Associated Press Stylebook, which is used by many, though certainly not all, credentialed media sources, specifies language which reinforces the notion that a person can define his ‘gender’ as something different from his biological sex, and that such choices can, should, and must be accepted by society as real. The First Street Journal maintains its own Stylebook, and we do not go along with the silliness of the AP.
The Philadelphia Inquirer either uses the AP Stylebook, or maintains its own policies to identify the ‘transgendered’ by the gender they claim to be rather than their actual sex, but reporter Susan Snyder decided to go one step further, and hammer down on the feminine pronouns, just to make sure the reader got it. Continue reading
Soft-peddling the Gangs of Philadelphia
Ellie Rushing, from her Twitter profile.
If there’s one thing of which no one can accuse Philadelphia Inquirer reporter Ellie Rushing it’s laziness. Her author profile states that her beat is “cover(ing) criminal justice and law enforcement in Philadelphia, including how crime and the court systems impact communities,” and there’s certainly plenty of that in foul, fetid, fuming, foggy, filthy Philadelphia.
Miss Rushing gave us a deep look into the West Philly gang Young Bag Chasers, about whom we have nine times previously noted. Despite the fact that we were reliably informed by the newspaper that there are no gangs in the city, just “cliques of young men affiliated with certain neighborhoods and families,” who sometimes had “beefs” with other cliques, and that we have previously reported that the newspaper really, really, really doesn’t like to refer to gangs as gangs, Miss Rushing, though using other descriptions occasionally for prosaic reasons, does refer to “YBC” as a gang occasionally.
But, sadly enough, in a very in-depth article, one that the research of which must have put the reporter in some physical danger, Miss Rushing gives us far too many excuses as to how and why the gang became a gang and the gang members became gang members. Continue reading
Can The Washington Post be saved? The newspaper industry has updated as much as possible, but it's still 18th century technology.
We have previously reported on how owner Jeff Bezos’ decision that The Washington Post not make any endorsement for President in 2024 cost the newspaper hundreds of thousand of subscriptions.
But now columnist Joe Concha of the New York Post says that Mr Bezos is doing what is necessary to save one of our nation’s newspapers of record:
Three cheers for Jeff Bezos, fighting to save The Washington Post from itself
By Joe Concha | Thursday, March 6, 2025 6:52 PM EST
Jeff Bezos is one of the world’s most successful entrepreneurs — but making his Washington Post staffers face reality may be his toughest-ever career challenge.
A long time ago in a media galaxy that now seems far, far away, the Post was one of the most respected newspapers in the country, capturing 68 Pulitzers in the process. Continue reading
The New York Times and the control of language
I wonder if it will be approved.
At 10:56 AM EST I submitted a comment on The New York Times main editorial, “The MAGA WAR on Speech.” The Editorial Board is aghast that the Trump Administration has done radical things such as “The National Park Service (having) erased the letters T and Q: from L.G.B.T.Q. references on its website describing the Stonewall National Monument in New York City.” I responded:
On November 29, 2018, the Times gave OpEd space to Chad Malloy[1]Chad Malloy is a man male who claims to be a woman who goes by the faux name “Parker” Malloy. to write, “How Twitter’s Ban on ‘Deadnaming’ Promotes Free Speech.” On October 4, 2019, the Times gave OpEd space to Andrew Marantz to claim that “Free Speech Is Killing Us.” When Elon Musk bought Twitter, promising to promote greater free speech, Times Editorial Board member Greg Bensinger told readers that “Twitter Under Elon Musk Will Be a Scary Place.”
The Associated Press’ Stylebook mandates that ‘black’ be capitalized when referring to race, but not ‘brown’ or ‘white.’ More, the AP Stylebook has media all across the country referring to the transgendered by their preferred, fake names and the pronouns of what they claim to be, rather than what they actually are.
The left have been attempting to control the debate by controlling the use of language for as long as I’ve been aware of it.
References
| ↑1 | Chad Malloy is a man male who claims to be a woman who goes by the faux name “Parker” Malloy. |
|---|
Joy Reid and DEI: Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
With the news that MSNBC has cancelled Joy Reid’s prime time show, my Twitter feed filled up with the laments of the left over that, and the inevitable complaints that she was fired because of raaaaacism the network hates black women. Former Representative Jamaal Brown (D-NY) tweeted:
Joy Reid educated a nation every single night. She is a beacon on MSNBC and all of media! Shame on MSNBC for this. SHAME SHAME SHAME! We have to build our own multimedia empire. Anchored in truth, and justice and humanity. We stand up for Black people, and GAZA and the LGBTQ, and oppressed people and vulnerable people everywhere! And we will never stop!
I absolutely support the right of Dr Brown — he tells us that he’s an “Ed.D.” in his Twitter handle — to build his own multimedia empire! We have freedom of speech and of the press in this country, and anyone can say anything he wishes, can start and try to build a show, at network, a publishing empire, whatever.
Elie Mystal, whom Dr Brown included in his tweet, is the “Justice Correspondent and Columnist” for The Nation, the socialist-left opinion journal, so he had plenty of space to express his opinion.
The Value of Joy
By canceling Joy Reid’s cable news show, MSNBC has not only silenced a brilliant host: It’s silenced the next Black voice you haven’t yet heard.
What a great plan!
Every so often I see a ‘let’s cut off our noses to spite our faces’ plan, and it looks to me as though Jim Friedlich, the CEO and executive director of the Leftist Lenfest Institute for Journalism, the nonprofit organization that owns what I have frequently called The Philadelphia Enquirer,[1]RedState writer Mike Miller called it the Enquirer, probably by mistake, so I didn’t originate it, but, reminiscent of the National Enquirer as it is, I thought it very apt. has come up with one. Continue reading
References
| ↑1 | RedState writer Mike Miller called it the Enquirer, probably by mistake, so I didn’t originate it, but, reminiscent of the National Enquirer as it is, I thought it very apt. |
|---|
Former Penn women’s swim team members are finally speaking out Told to "STFU" when the Democrats held power, now they can shed anonymity to tell the truth!
This site has fairly thoroughly documented the case of Will Thomas, the former male swimmer for the University of Pennsylvania, who then decided that no, he wasn’t a man guy, but a woman. With the suspension of so much of life due to the COVID-19 panicdemic — not a typographical error, but spelled exactly the way it should be — Mr Thomas had a year off to ‘transition’ into a woman, through testosterone suppressants and female hormone supplements, though he hadn’t been castrated had any ‘gender reassignment surgery’ at the time.
Had the story ended there, Mr Thomas, now calling himself “Lia,” nobody other than his friends would have noticed or cared. But nope, the story didn’t end there: Mr Thomas decided that he wanted to compete on Penn’s women’s swim team, and the University, which does have biology courses, professors, and even its own medical school, allowed it. As we previously noted, some of the real women on the swim team were unhappy with this, but the team members had been ‘strongly advised’ to say nothing to the press, and only a couple of team members did speak to the media, under the condition of anonymity.
Why anonymity? The first swimmer to speak out said that she feared for her ability to find employment after being graduated from college for sharing her opinion about a transgender teammate, a fear the University pushed.
That was late 2021, and Joe Biden was just beginning his term in office. The Democrats controlled both Houses of Congress, and the silliness that girls could be boys and boys could be girls was politically ascendant, even if the fans in the stands didn’t see it that way.
It seems the American people didn’t see it that way, either. Donald Trump and Republican candidates raised the issue of fairness to women, and the American people responded by electing Mr Trump, and giving the Republicans an additional four seats, and the majority, in the Senate. British writer J K Rowling, herself very politically on just about every other issue, sent out the tweet shown above as President Trump was signing an Executive Order to try to keep males out of women’s sports.
Three of Lia Thomas’ swim teammates at Penn sue the school, saying inclusion of the trans athlete violated their rights