Hubris at the Observer
You really have to hand it to the Kennedy sisters, Skaskia and Sharon. They are on the verge of perfecting dumbass hypocrisy.
For weeks and weeks they ignored the obviously phony 4th District candidacy of Scott Markowitz and made every effort to dismiss it as a non-story. When Marko was scooped up by the District Attorney and charged with perjury all they did was repost the DAs press release. When Marko plea bargained they then began to delete comments that questioned their obvious dereliction and bias.
When they finally reported the story of Markowitz’s guilty pleas, it was in their print edition – where nobody could comment at all, and where they continued to pretend that the fake MAGA candidate, hand-held by Democrat operative Ajay Mohan, was a real candidate, now dropping out, instead of what everybody knew was true: Markowitz was a plant to take votes away from Linda Whitaker to the benefit of Observer favorite, Vivian Jaramillo. The unstated implication was clear: Marko acted alone and any other conclusion was a Bushala conspiracy theory.
What all of this really means is that the Observer Sisters, despite their self-righteous posturing as an “independent news” operation, is just the opposite. Recent FFFF readers started catching on watching their performance on the Trail to Nowhere and the moronic Wilt on Wilshire where the two studiously omitted passing on relevant facts, but actively engaged in drumming up support for their cherished boondoggles.
Longer term Observer observers, of course, long ago cottoned on to the preachy sanctimony and bias of the Observers, noting the disparagement, snide innuendo, and outright lies aimed at their supposed political enemies. It’s been going on for 45 years and was the stock-in-trade of the paterfamilias, Ralph Kennedy. Just a week or so ago, while they were deleting comments they permitted a salacious and defamatory comment about Councilman Fred Jung.
Of course nobody is forced to go to the Observer blog, and except for the unintended comedy, errors, misspellings and factual errors and omissions, there really is no reason. Ditto the print edition that is still killing trees for absolutely no reason. On the other hand there is no reason anybody has to treat the Observer even with the modicum of respect one might give a legitimate news outlet.
These two bird brains are really in a class by themselves. Throw in Diane Vena, Vince Bike, and some poor, misinformed kids and you have a regular soup of ineptness and blind ideology.
You mean Jack Hutt, I mean Vince Buck. The Non-observer has become nihilist, but it’s widely accepted by their liberal leadership because it fits their narrow world view. You can be nihilist from a progressive platform and they are…all things Jung, Dunlap and Whitaker are mas malo and all things Zahra are white as snow. The Non-observer wasn’t that always this way. The Observer wasn’t perfect, but it was palatable as late as 2020. Then there was a sudden shift in policy and politics. Editors and writers left and a Kennedy twin was left in charge. Even recently, they routed a new Editor and then she suddenly disappeared. Now it’s garbage. Maybe spend more time editing and less time making useless public comments at council meetings.
The sisters have no integrity and no objectivity. That’s a bad combination for people pretending to run a “newspaper.”
Back in 1994 Ralphy went over the top defending the three lame-o’s who were recalled. After that it was all pro City Hall propaganda.
The whole family has been like that. Mom was nuts and Dad limitlessly self-righteous. The sisters’ brother “Rusty” made a small fortune pimping hate crimeology for the County government and ended up being a police informant. That’s why the Observer left the cops alone – Rusty needed them at County budget time to give him support.
Why delete reader comments? What’s the point? It is the only outlet for readers to correct obvious errors or misinformation from the Fullerton Observer. It goes against the very thing journalism tries to protect. The 1st Amendment! What are they trying to hide? Who are they trying to protect? I can forgive the amateur writing because I assume the writers are not paid. The clear bias is inexcusable.
When criticized for factual errors, misspellings, getting names wrong, etc. The older sister always blamed volunteerism for the errors. But then she once had the balls to say the Observer was an “incubator” for journalism. I kid you not.
They have the right to publish or ban anything they want. It’s a free country. Still it’s a rotten look for people pretending to be objective.
Precious. Feigning anger that you’re upset that the Observer refuses to be your platform for political ops, and in this case, counter ops.
Your “commenters” didn’t complain with facts showing any kind of crime. When you convinced the DA to go on a fishing expedition and he found an incidental one (a completely unforced error on Markowitz’s part… anyone can get 20 legitimate signatures), they reported it.
Cry more. You have a platform, if you can’t break through to the general public, I suggest a proper, balanced, truthful form of reporting and analysis. But you won’t, because your opinionated, ideological, outrage junky, low fidelity approach is completely intentional.
Can “anyone” get 20 legitimate signatures?
https://www.fullertonsfuture.org/?s=Castaneda+signatures
Break through to the general public? What are you blabbing on about now John, you moron? This is a blog. That is supposed to be a community paper. Does it hit too close, your only place on the internet to feel relevant but the fringe porn sites you frequent? Your opinions are stupid and you like to feel like you’re clever, but all you are is a troll, but for your side.
Everything I wrote was perfectly intelligible. If you didn’t get it, read it again. It’s not a timed test.
Yes this is a blog, how does that let authors off the hook for ethics, morality, integrity? How low is the bar, exactly?
As to “fringe porn” I’m putting that down as reflecting, deflecting and projecting on your part, whoever you are.
As to being on my own side, I absolutely am.
I liked you better when you were off working your wood.
Whatever floats your boat
The downside of the internet being a place for unencumbered free speech, unless you’re the Fullerton Observer: this John character believing he is a somebody, when clearly he is a f-ing nobody in somebody clothing. Keep typing champ!
That’s hoogerhooter.
No, I’m what was promised. You are the fucking troll that we got instead.
Yes, it was nice and quiet for a while. No tortuous arguments and self back patting.
Unforced error, alright. But not by Markowitz, the unknown, who had no incentive to hire a Democrat poltical operative, create a campaign committee, a fake MAGA statement and a party re-registration. You and the Kennedy sisters can keep peddling the lone gunman theory, but no one will ever believe it. You don’t believe it yourself.
Speaking of low-fidelity and ideology, who collected the signatures and why were Democrats signing for a MAGA candidate.?
I don’t claim any “lone” theory. But the perjury thing regarding witnessing signatures required and comprised exactly one person’s action: Markowitz said he collected signatures that someone else collected.
As to why were Democrats signing for a guy making MAGA dog whistles in his candidate statement? Probably exactly what it looked like… unethical but (on their own) lawful shenanigans of running a dark horse candidate for the usual reason. The reason party operatives OF BOTH PARTIES do it all over America: seeking small tactical advantages
Glad you admitted the Dem signers knew what they were doing. They were therefore involved in the conspiracy, knowing full-well that the collector was not the guy whose name was at the bottom of the form.
And of course the circulator knew he was complicit too, handing over the signatures to the guy who didn’t collect them.
Sooner or later Diane Vena or one of the other crooks will spill the beans.
Conspiracy of who to do what?
I don’t know who what or why someone else collected the signatures. I am not a lawyer (neither are you), but the collecting of the signatures wasn’t a violation of law. Markowitz falsely claiming to have gathered them was a violation of election law, and perjury.
This whole thing of suborning purjury seems thin to me, but it’s for the lawyers to decide. To get there someone needs to have encouraged Markowitz to sign the form anyway, known it was illegal, and then you need to meet some evidentiary standards (two witness rule).
AFAIK. Whatever. I think it is over.
Starting to sound a little shaky, there. Why do you even care?
Shaky? Not sure how you mean.
Why do I care at all? Because this is 99% and but for the signature fail, would have been 100% within the range of political hardball. Bringing the heavy hand of the justice system into it is overkill and unfortunate.
I get your excitement and why YOU care, because you have an opportunity to leverage the power of the state to go after your political enemies and score some points. That blade cuts both ways though.
But for the unforced error, this would have been completely within the realm of politics to punish or reward the participants. Which is where it should be.
And since Markowitz plead guilty I think it should be and *probably* is over.
That’s the legal crux of the matter at the moment.
This is not just “shenanigans.” This was a conspiracy to commit a crime – perjury. Many people may have been in on it, others may have been just dupes. Whoever collected the signatures knows how many people were in on the fraud.
Well, mama got her wish. To be an uber hypocrite without recourse. Sure is quite over there without anyone for John to play with. Has to come here now to spew his BS.
That’s quiet.
I promise I know the difference.
What is elder sister going to do now with all her free time? Now that she doesn’t have to ward off all the daily embarrassment from commenters? Maybe she can go see what WOW is really like?
She and her sister can chat with each other. Of course they can also do that at home without bothering anybody.