Las Vegas Gleaner: Still waiting for Porter's reply

05/21/2008

Still waiting for Porter's reply

Your humble Gleaner is roaming the southwest on a mytho-tour, wherein one explores the culture surrounding popular area fantasies such as crashed alien spacecraft, John McCain's economic policy and the superiority of rural values. In a desperate attempt to make the website seem at least marginally less lame, passages from old posts will be featured and referred to as "Classic Gleaner" because that's seems like the sort of thing the grown-ups would do.

From A personal note to Jon Porter... Aug. 29, 2007:

Jon Porter ... a cad, a liar who would say or do anything to advance his political career, and a sleaze merchant who bargains away votes in Congress in exchange for campaign contributions, no matter what harm or trouble his actions bring on the people who live in his congressional district. He's a cynical opportunist who thinks his own constituents are morons who will believe anything as long as it's packaged properly, hence his well-earned reputation for running the sleaziest attack ads in Nevada politics. His venal behavior would perhaps be mitigated to some degree if he were an idiot. Alas, he isn't; he is just remarkably lazy, which is why, in those rare instances when he overcomes his cowardice and actually speaks with the press directly, he finds himself mindlessly mouthing talking points previously prepared by Washington professionals who, albeit for right-wing causes but in stark contrast to Porter, actually have to work for a living. Subsequently, he is routinely incapable of rendering an intelligent remark or observation about policy, because for him to do so would require taking the time to study issues and know something about them, and that in turn might interrupt band practice. Shiftless, morally vacant, profoundly insincere, demonstrably untrustworthy, hypocritical and apathetic about the well-being of the people he was elected to represent, Porter embodies all the most negative and pernicious qualities often intended — and in his case, deservedly so — by the pejorative phrase "career politician." Oh, and he's a scummy rent lord.

Now, why do we say all that? Because on blogs, authors can defame and lie with impunity because they can be anonymous and don't have to worry about the facts, as Porter reportedly told the Laughlin paper?

No. We say all that because after covering Porter's political career, on the Gleaner and in newspapers before that, over the last ten years, we are convinced that all of it is true. Also, Porter is not just a public figure, but one who presumes to represent the public (he's the Gleaner's congressman, in point of fact), and our being able to say that about him in no way depends on us being anonymous.

As Porter and his handlers know, the Gleaner is not anonymous. If Porter feels we've said something that rises to defamation, he knows where to reach us.

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