Opinion
By Attorney J. Edward Pawlick
Was I Mean to Jennifer Peters at A.P.?
     Was I mean to Jennifer Peters at A.P. yesterday when I criticized her for her reporting on the election?
     If so, it was only because I held her to a higher standard. She has always appeared to be an intelligent person who makes an attempt to get the story in an objective manner.
     Since I first started MassNews and was immediately trashed by NPR’s WBUR, which taped an interview with me and then completely distorted everything I had said when they edited the tape, I have been totally distrustful of the media in this town. (I have had similar experiences with others, notably Metrowest Daily News and WGBH.)
     The one exception, believe it or not, was Bay Windows, when Jeff Epperly was the editor and Scott Giordano the reporter. Although we differed on most issues, they could be trusted to report my words with accuracy. And so I always returned Scott’s calls immediately, even when he move to a homosexual paper in Washington for a while.
     In her recent story, Jennifer totally missed the most important part of this year’s election story.
     Was it done on purpose or did she merely take the easy road? I would expect that the latter was true although I have no way of knowing.
     The big story about this election is that the citizens of Massachusetts are upset, with about two-thirds of them very angry about the SJC opinion on homosexual “marriage.” But they have had nowhere to turn with the owner of the Boston Globe, Pinch Sulzberger, being the chief “cheerleader” to such “marriage,” according to his own Ombudsman at the New York Times.
     The farce we saw this spring only increased their frustration.
     The big story in the 2002 election was never reported in this town --- about the star of the Democratic Party, Senate President Tom Birmingham, seeing his dream of being Governor go down the drain because of his illegal action against the Protection of Marriage Amendment. That is not hallucination on my part, but the words of Birmingham himself. As a result, we got a Republican governor, who believes it all happened because of his stardom and good looks.
     The big story in 2004 is the primary election which saw the militant homosexuals go down to ignominious defeat and Cheryl Jacques and others sending over $1 million in emergency money to the state.
     The big winners were Brian Camenker of Article 8 Alliance and Jim Lafferty of Traditional Values Coalition who helped fight off the militant money and saw every Democrat incumbent who supported traditional marriage win in the primary with the one exception of the candidate in Somerville who didn’t follow their advice. He tried to ignore the “marriage” ruling instead of confronting it as an important campaign issue.
     But even he lost only by a tiny number and is running a sticker campaign, hopefully with more gumption than in the primary.
     The big story was Emile Goguen (D-Fitchburg) who has courageously led the fight to remove the four judges who imposed homosexual “marriage.” He was targeted heavily and his son told us he was concerned for the first time about his father’s election. Rep. Goguen won against his opponent by 71%.
     What a story! Did you see that reported anywhere? Last summer, even the Washington Post sent a reporter and photographer all the way to Fitchburg to write about Emile. (They were sent by Sulzberger’s pals to do an attack story on Emile but the reporter couldn’t find anything to attack after traveling with Emile for a day, so he settled on laughing at the economic problems evident in Emile’s struggling city.)
     There are so many stories unreported out there that I wouldn’t know where to begin if I were at A.P. We all understand they will never be reported by the Globe because that paper is not an impartial source but the leader of the “gay marriage” movement across the entire nation.
     But somehow, I expected more from Jennifer Peters. I guess I am naive, but I live in hope.