Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Leading Media Columnist Reports On The Mark Belling-Inspired "Jewish" Stir

Mark Belling's 1130 WISN-AM talk show assertion last week that powerful Jews were organizing behind-the-scenes to kill a Hilton hotel proposed for downtown Milwaukee is drawing wider media coverage.

Tim Cuprisin, the high-profile media critic at OnMilwaukee.com who held a similar position for years at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, reported Tuesday that Belling defended himself on his afternoon program, and said he had done nothing wrong.

Cuprisin's post traces the history of the uproar that began when Belling's remarks were picked up last Friday on this blog, then were expanded upon by Michael Horne on Monday with a significant news peg - -  a rebuke of Belling by Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett.

Belling's response this afternoon was made more likely because a posting by Tom Daykin on jsonline earlier Tuesday had quoted the Mayoral rebuke.

In other words, Belling had to explain himself once the big paper got involved, thus giving the story fresh legs.

My take (you can read it here) on Belling's explanation:

Leave out his defensiveness, some bravado - -  "I'm not going to back down here" - - and a giant helping of grandiosity (he lumped himself in with national conservative talkers he felt had been maligned) and there was little indication that Belling understands the issues and images he so needlessly and heedlessly chose to bring into a political discussion about whether downtown would get a new hotel.

A hotel. How on earth is that a basis for bringing in and focusing on religion - - especially, if as Belling said, he did so after choosing his words carefully?

While explaining himself, Belling again today used the word "cabal" - - an archaic and negative description of the way Jews were said to gather and scheme - - to describe the forces he said were opposing the hotel.

So I ask as I did from the very beginning: Why?

Where does this all come from?

Mark?

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I do not know anything about Mark Belling and have never heard of him. After seeing all of the posts concerning some Jewish remarks he made, I googled his name and found his website which, I think, has the text of what he actually said.

http://content.clearchannel.com/cc-common/mlib/3627/01/3627_1295388742.pdf

Although it seems like some people are attempting to brand him as racist, it looks to me as another example of something being blown completely out of proportion and may say more about his critics than Belling.

James Rowen said...

I would encourage you to listen to the full audio, which runs about 15 minutes for the full context.

James Rowen said...

You will media criticism on many blog sites, on many radio programs, in The Shepherd, at ThirdCoastDigest, Milwaukee Magazine, etc. Widen your horizons, friend.

Anonymous said...

So with the legion of media critics Milwaukee and Wisconsin is blessed with, will be interesting to see if any of them will have the integrity to report/comment on the sexual remarks progressive talk show host Sly on WTDY made about Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch.

My guess is that you Mr. Rowen will not even post this reference to it.

James Rowen said...

In deleting a comment earlier that contained false information, I inadvertently deleted a comment inquiring about how many media critics we had in town. I had left a response about which outlets carry media commentary. Sorry to that commenter, but I've recreated the gist of the question.