More on the Kanjo flap

I'm getting beat up by my local blog buddies for defending Congressman Paul Kanjorski's fumblemouth that the whole right wing blogosphere has jumped on. As The Mean Old Man would say " I Love it."

The Blogfather agrees with me .


"Non-issue, girls. It's simply a matter of the loose lips being faster than the aging brain. No biggie. "

Then he ripped me for being too partisan. This is from a guy who never has a good thing to say about the President and defends Bush's war's to this day. I hope he is eating well.

Look at my posts from the past 2 years and will you find that I have given more space to the Republican candidates in Luzerne County then the papers have. Such Bullspit.


Betty Rox (and she does) over at Pure Bunkum is worried about town meetings in addition to jumping on the bandwagon on this issue. I'm sure that Kanjo won't be doing any townhall type meetings after what happened last year and I can't blame him. They turned into ambushes by the Teabagger crowd.

Some right wing bloggers see it for what it is.


In Defense of….Democratic Rep. Paul Kanjorski?

From Right Wing News

Yes, Democrat Paul Kanjorski is irritating, liberal, and out of touch, but it seems like a huge stretch to interpret these remarks, as some conservatives have, as a slam at the poor,


He's not saying the poor are minorities or defective, he's saying that's what people INSINUATE the people having a hard time in this recession are like. The point he's trying to make is that these are just regular people who are having a hard time in a tough economy.

So honestly, I don't see anything wrong with his remarks at all.


The Hazleton Standard Speaker had one of those articles that the Yonk keeps talking about. I wish I wrote that.


Cut Kanjorski some slack


Last month, the Lou Barletta campaign attacked Rep. Paul Kanjorski for supporting student loan reform that led to layoffs for Sallie Mae, which has a customer service center in Hanover Township. When on the very same day the Barletta campaign implied that Kanjorski was "in bed with Wall Street bankers," it was clear the campaign was off to a mud-slinging start.

The mud got thicker this week. On Monday, the Barletta campaign accused Kanjorski of being a hypocrite for "refusing to meet with the public at traditional summer town hall meetings while agreeing to be the 'special guest' at an event held by his Wall Street buddies near Wilkes-Barre."

The news media largely ignored that salvo, which referred to the congressman's upcoming appearance at a meeting sponsored by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.

But Republicans at both the district and national levels hit paydirt Thursday. Barletta's campaign issued a statement calling for Kanjorski to "apologize for comments he made during a U.S. House of Representatives hearing Wednesday in which he called some people 'defective' and said minorities are not 'good people.'"

A review of the tape shows that Kanjorski said no such thing. Speaking ardently in favor of extending Pennsylvania's mortgage assistance program nationally, he was clearly mocking critics who might view the programs as a welfare giveaway. Here's the actual quote: "We're giving relief to people that I deal with in my office every day now unfortunately. But because of the longevity of this recession, these are people, and they're not minorities and they're not defective and they're not all the things that you'd like to insinuate that these programs are about."

Kanjorski didn't say he sees two classes of citizens. He said to his critics, "you'd like to insinuate that."

The sarcasm and passion that underscored that point seems obvious in the video, but it gets lost when you simply read the comments.

At least five minority lawmakers on the Wall Street Reform Conference Committee didn't hear anything offensive. They signed a letter defending Kanjorski. The congressman's constituents should cut him some slack on this one, too.

Kanjorski's get's some help from his friends that he works with everyday.

Chaka Fattah


Click here to view a letter from Congress members Maxine Waters, Luis Gutierrez, Mel Watt, Gregory Meeks, and Elijah Cumming.

This damage control shows how worried the Kanjo camp is about these remarks and they should be. At the same time Lou Barletta trying to capitalize on racially tinged remarks is dangerous territory for him.

McGruff passionately defends Lou Barletta after I tweaked him


Why don't the liberals acknowledge the hiring of minorities by the Bareltta family? Do they know how many children rode for free at Angela Park, owned by the Barletta family, because they didn't have the money? Do they know how much money or the provision of inkind contributions the Barletta family donated over the years to needy charities and families?

Why don't they acknowledge Lou's personal donation of property he owned to a local charity that services disadvantaged children including the colors of all skin to place a handicapped oriented playground?

Is it because the liberals have been getting away with their bs for too long? Sorry my friend on this we will agree to disagree.

Mitchell and Kanjorski have been getting their way too long in the media pressroom from this area.

I like Mayor Lou, we can spend hours talking baseball and have a few times. He is no more a racist than Congressman Kanjorski is. Which is to say they are not!

Even Barletta has realized that this has gotten to be stupid and want's to move on saying
“Dwelling on it will not help create jobs or fix our economy. The important thing now is to focus on the problems facing the people of Northeast Pennsylvania, which is what I have been doing and will continue do as the next congressman from the 11th district. We need to restore public trust and fiscal responsibility in our government and that starts with holding our elected officials accountable this November.”