Publisher’s Positions
Democrats Own The Government Shutdown
The Knoxville No-News Sentinel, like its sister Gannett papers in Tennessee, seems to ignore local news unless it can be spun into a tale of either race or social justice. Unfortunately, the No-News Sentinel, like the mainstream media outlets in this country, serves as merely an echo chamber for whatever liberal narrative that is being peddled. Opposition to President Trump, criticism of Republicans of any kind, and trying to pluck the heartstrings of whatever readers it has left to try and give the impression it gives a hoot about common people. In reading the No-News Sentinel, one could easily believe the Republicans in general and our congressman, Tim Burchett, in particular, are responsible for the shutdown of the government. That is a lie. There is not a single, solitary fact to support any such contention. The suffering inflicted upon people who depend on SNAP for food and essentials was the result of the longest government shutdown in American history. Congressman Tim Burchett voted more than a dozen times to keep the government open and approve a spending bill, as did 99.99% of the Republicans in both the House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate. Likewise, virtually every Democrat in Congress voted more than a dozen times to shut down the government over the bogus issue of ObamaCare. There were a very few exceptions, the most notable being Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania.
The entire issue of ObamaCare was founded on lies as well. Obama promised people could keep their doctor. A lie. That it would save an average of $2,500 for families. Another lie. You were promised, too, that if you liked your insurance plan, and most Americans did, that you could keep it. That too was a lie. Obama promised insurance premiums would go down $1,500. Yep, another whopper of a lie. Even the promises that the website would work and people’s information would be secure turned out to be untrue. Instead, insurance premiums skyrocketed and individual healthcare choices diminished or disappeared altogether. In case you’ve forgotten, PolitiFact named Obama’s “you can keep your doctor” as the “Lie of the Year” for 2013.
The Democrats in Congress voted to let the ObamaCare subsidies expire. Then turned around and demanded that Republicans bow down and extend them. While writing about the poor and the SNAP recipients, did the No-News Sentinel write about military families or the federal employees still going to work every day without getting a paycheck? I never saw it if they did. If the folks at the No-News Sentinel care about folks getting subsidies from the government, it is because they could be considered as the “oppressed.” As to working families, military families or the people who pay the bills, I don’t believe the Gannett newspaper chain gives a flying fig about those folks, who are the backbone of this country.
The No-News Sentinel seems to publish an article every day attempting to flog Burchett for rightly saying continuing fiscal resolutions kick the can down the road, which is financially all too true. Yet Congressman Burchett did the right thing by keeping the government open and working to keep things running. The truth is the No-News Sentinel is never going to approve of much of anything Tim Burchett does.
The mainstream media, like the Democrats in Congress, and the No-News Sentinel, told us the 20% inflation of the Biden administration was “transitory” and then finally told us it was a figment of our collective imaginations. Did they report on Hunter Biden’s laptop? Did they ever apologize for having been utterly and completely wrong about much of their coverage of COVID or the Russia hoax? The No-News Sentinel hasn’t reported on “news” in quite some time, and don’t expect them to start any time soon.
President Trump is trying to right the ship after four continuous years of ruinous spending, open borders, and enough fentanyl coming into our country to kill every person here ten times over. Gas prices, which soared under Biden, have begun coming down, as have other commodities. That has been accomplished in just nine months. And food prices will start coming down as well.
ALL of the pain inflicted on Americans during the government shutdown was accomplished by the Democrats in Congress, who achieved nothing except to make millions of Americans suffer for no reason. They had already voted for the budget that was approved. It is one of the stupidest things I’ve seen in observing national or local politics. Every bit of it done in the name of “fighting Trump.”
It was as ugly as it was foolish.
Juvenile Detention Facility Needs Experienced Administrator
The abrupt decision by Brian Bivens, interim head of the Knox County Juvenile Detention facility, to quit is a disappointment. Bivens resigned as the director of the Richard Bean Detention facility, citing the failure of the county to live up to its commitment. Addressing every problem and bringing the detention center into the modern age is going to take both time and resources. Governing by committee is generally neither effective nor efficient, and legislative bodies should provide oversight rather than try and micro-manage. What the Bean Detention Center needs is an effective administrator, rather than an ex-lawman at its helm.
The county would likely do well to utilize its Human Resource Department to put together the needed credentials and issue a call for a qualified applicant. Hiring a professional to resolve whatever problems exist at the detention center is the first step in fixing the problem.
